Halflife 2: First Impressions

[TRow]

So what do you guys think?

Is it better than FarCry, and Doom3?

Was it worth the wait?

Anyone beat the game and see the ending?

T.RoW

[devnull]

Personally, I think it was worth the wait. But its only AFTER the wait that I say that. Really, though, it is a solid game. A lot of people are bashing it for creating more questions than answering questions from the first game, but it seems like Valve has the story down and can make HL3 as great as its predicessors.

[hills420]

I have enjoyed playing it. I do think it is a lot better than Dooms 3 (I haven't played Far Cry much).

Lets just say I haven't played halo2 since HL2 came out

[devnull]

I played D3, Farcry and beat HL2 about 4 days after I got it. Wow, I have to say that HL2 was much better than the other two by a lot. When you look at doom3, it ends up just being a fantastic looking game, but makes you get keycard after keycard. I cant tell you how frustrating it was playing that game for some 26 hours and having the same mission over and over and over ('you must get so and so's PDA to open this door that you will eventually need another key for! *zombie jumps out x 1000*'). Farcry was also a great looking game but they made it just too damn long. It never seemed to end and, because of its very straightforward gameplay, it lost its interest at around 15 hours. I ended up finally beating both games on normal mode but cripes, it was frustrating and left quite an unpleasant taste in my mouth.

However, HL2 has been a great experience, allowing me to get into awesome firefights (with great music, by the way) and then slow things down and let my brain do a little of the work with the puzzles. I cant wait for HL3, I wish 2020 would get here a little sooner ..... </end joke at Valve's inability to produce a game quickly>

[davethebrave]

devnull said:

I played D3, Farcry and beat HL2 about 4 days after I got it. Wow, I have to say that HL2 was much better than the other two by a lot. When you look at doom3, it ends up just being a fantastic looking game, but makes you get keycard after keycard. I cant tell you how frustrating it was playing that game for some 26 hours and having the same mission over and over and over ('you must get so and so's PDA to open this door that you will eventually need another key for! *zombie jumps out x 1000*'). Farcry was also a great looking game but they made it just too damn long. It never seemed to end and, because of its very straightforward gameplay, it lost its interest at around 15 hours. I ended up finally beating both games on normal mode but cripes, it was frustrating and left quite an unpleasant taste in my mouth.

That was pretty much my assessment of those games as well.

Just when you thought you were at the end of Far Cry, it kept going...like those movies that trick you into thinking its over but then the alien monster rises from the dead to attack again. Entertaining game and very pretty. One of those games that you just take a moment to stop and admire the scenery like that moment you step out in the open in Unreal and saw the waterfall for the first time...

Doom 3 I found to be very boring after going through 4 sublevels of open door, kill zombies, find ammo, open door...and the swapping of the flashlight and the weapon was particularly annoying (this was before the flashlight mod). Its a very graphically pleasing game, but its too much been there done that in game design.

Half Life 2 is definitely cool. Has some variety in gameplay and tactics. Visually appealing, good use of music and ambient sounds to set the mood. I'm still working my way through that one. I just love tossing a grenade through a window or door that they're hiding in and listen to their radio chatter. "krrrt...Grenade!...krrrt" lol. Now if they would just de-couple it from Steam for single player or ditch the cd check...but I think that topic has been beaten to death.

[crusier]

XPS Gen 5 reviewed at PC Magazine if anybody is interested.