Is Half Life 2 overrated?

[GaiaHunter]

hl2, on the other hand was a revolution in physics. It was (i think) the 1st game that had that kind of physics. Puzzles, dragrolls, the gravity gun to pick up stuff to throw around, everything physics related.

When I played Half Life 2 I had already played Red Faction and Painkiller.
The HL2 physics were good but I had already seen other brilliant physics in play, so it had less impact.

 

[HardcoreRobot]

no, not even debatable. though YMMV as with all personal opinions

 

[EDUSAN]

Judging it as a game (rather than specifically FPS), and comparing it to say Tomb Raider 1 and 2 (both released before it), it falls up short on the plot front. TR1 and 2 are pretty light on plot as well, but at least the gameplay is broken up a bit with plot.

but you need to make a comparison in the same genre. Because if you compare tomb raider 1 and 2 plots with the plots a lucas art's graphic adventures from 1990 (to say an arbitrary year), they clearly fall short too.
As "a game", any graphic adventure has deeper plot, better characters and more funny, interesting and varied situations than any tomb raider and, probably, any other genre

 

[sandorski]

When the marines appeared in HL and moved as team, taking cover, tossing grenades, etc. it was another thing completely at that time.

Just the opening railcar ride was pretty impressive back then.

 

[CP5670]

I never understood why people like HL2 so much. It wasn't a bad game, just not particularly remarkable in any way, nothing like HL1 was for its time. It's been a long time since I played it, but I recall that most of the game was a very linear romp through an endless series of sewers and rubble, with few interactions with NPCs. By 2004, Deus Ex had a (far) better story and atmosphere, Far Cry and Painkiller had better gameplay and combat, and even the physics and interactivity were similar to Invisible War, which used the same physics engine.

 

[mikeymikec]

but you need to make a comparison in the same genre. Because if you compare tomb raider 1 and 2 plots with the plots a lucas art's graphic adventures from 1990 (to say an arbitrary year), they clearly fall short too.
As "a game", any graphic adventure has deeper plot, better characters and more funny, interesting and varied situations than any tomb raider and, probably, any other genre

Fair point, however, the extra depth of graphic adventure games usually comes with the cost of graphics quality, at least it is in my experience. The Tomb Raider games are basically first person shooters (except you're running behind the character you control) plus a bit more puzzle solving, which in my view makes them pretty comparable.

Pre HL2, FPS's didn't need to have any plot to be successful (e.g. Quake 1), it probably was considered almost completely unnecessary. Post HL2, FPS's don't necessarily need to have much plot, but as HL2 demonstrated to such an extent that it raised the bar for other FPS's to strive towards, plot is a good thing because it helps immerse the player with the atmosphere of the game.

Plot was considered to be so unnecessary at one point that, IIRC, the developers of an old platform game, Turrican 3 (a platform game, the genre which is probably a direct ancestor of the FPS), were asked what the plot was for their game. They said "the character wants to get his bicycle back". Of course there's nothing actually in the game to confirm this.

 

[DigDog]

Plot is by far not an essential component of FPS games exactly like cheerleaders aren't a major part of football.
I'm all for a nice story but when the gameplay suxx all the sudden i'm not impressed anymore by what is essentially a cosmetic improvement.

Now, i've played HL1 only - as said before - but all these great games which have come out after HL2 - i must have missed them all.

FEAR was the only game i liked in the FPS genere after the quake series.

Deus Ex was more of a first person adventure / rpg than a shooter, (although it does get to be quite shooty in some sections, yes) and it was great *because* it used FPS mechanics as a tool to let you play a fully immersive RPG.

Ofc i liked the way HL1 started. It sure was innovative, but in the end it was justa novelty that wore off pretty soon.
What i didnt like was the scripting mechaincs (mobs aren't there until a trigger spawns them, so if you nade a room with mobs, you dont hit shit - because they aren't there yet!), the 'orrible movement, crappy guns and linear maps.

Seriously, go back to Doom II's later levels and see how freakin awesome the morphing maps were; but all that had to go, because it didn't fit into the cinematic style that came afterwards.

(Red Faction 1 did destroyable environments like its nobody's business .. on the PS2!)

 

[GaiaHunter]

(Red Faction 1 did destroyable environments like its nobody's business .. on the PS2!)

I'm not sure what you mean by that, but Red faction did it on PC as well.

There is a good bunch of shooters, with good story in between Half Life and Half Life 2.

No one Lives forever.
No one Lives forever 2.
Clives Barker's Undying.

All of the above are still playable these days. I would recommend playing them.

You also had Deus EX, Halo, Red Faction, Call of Duty.

Painkiller had almost no story, but the sheer fun of nailing enemies to the wall with a massive stake gun was crazy. Also recommended.

2000-2004 were really good years for gaming.

FEAR was after HL2.

 

[-slash-]

HL1 was one of the first PC FPS games I played. Mechwarrior 2 was the first. HL1 is awesome. I;ve gone back and played it many times. Once you hit Zen I lose interest, but the escape from the facility and events leading up to it were awesome. The Black Mesa project really hit it out of the park with their remake on the source engine.

HL2 was a game I didnt play till 2009 or so. I always had it, I just played CS:S instead. It kept me busy for awhile. Very fun game. Slow at times, but it eventually progressed and had a decent plot. Graphics are not insane, but it is an OLD game.

The mods available for HL2 are also awesome. I spent a lot of time playing mods.

Overrated, no, not by a long shot.

 

[S3trio64v2]

HL1 wasn't overrated but HL2 was. HL2 was good but nothing really special.

 

[werepossum]

I just went back and finished Halflife 2 a few months ago - I had never made it through that level where you infiltrate the building protected by the unbreachable force field. Generally I felt it was much too linear, less of a game than a fun basic physics test. But for a decade ago, it was fairly impressive.

 

[nemesismk2]

I upgraded my computer just to get better performance with half life 2. i upgraded from AMD Athlon XP 2500 to AMD Athlon XP 3200 and bought a ATI Radeon 9700 Pro which gave me great performance with Half Life 2.

 

[Stringjam]

"FPS" is a camera mechanic, not an entire definition of how a game is supposed to be designed.

I like to read. I like well-written stories with interesting characters, dialog, and interaction. I like games that strive for the same.

It annoys me to no end when I hear people say "plot is not important to FPS." So....when your view is through the player's eyes - arguably the most immersive position you could place yourself in a virtual environment - the plot is no longer important?

I thought PC gamers were more intelligent / open-minded than that.


I will agree that not every game should take a story-driven approach. These are still games, and lots of them are fun just based on their mechanics alone. When it comes to what I prefer to spend my money on, however, I'll take Metro over DOOM any day.

 

[Sho'Nuff]

Half-Life 1 was revolutionary. So was Half-Life 2. But HL2 was a bit less revolutionary than the first, and it happened to get released several months after Far Cry, which was really raising the bar for what FPSes could be. I wouldn't say that HL2 is overrated, as it's still a sensational game in the context of its time, but it certainly didn't revolutionize the genre in the same way the first did.

I don't know. HL2 ushered in the era of physics based gameplay, which was huge and is used in almost every major title now. Whether as a major part of the game or to enhance the sense of reality. HL1 did something different, in that it introduced cinematic telling of an in depth story in an FPS. Both were advanced graphics wise for their time, but IMO their lasting impact is more about gameplay and immersion than it is about graphics.

 

[Topweasel]

Their is also side things like useful side kicks with their own personality. Without Alyx we don't get Ellie in TLoU.

 

[BudAshes]

They say there are no stupid questions, only stupid answers. They were wrong.

 

[AstroManLuca]

The question was "is it overrated?", not "is it good?"

Is it a good game? Yes.

Has it aged perfectly well? YMMV. I personally find it linear and overly long, a pretty common complaint. But it was at least good for its time, and it did some interesting stuff.

Is it overrated? That depends on how well it's rated right now and it's pretty tough to answer.

Basically, people who say "best game ever 10/10" are overrating it, and those who say "linear boring shit with bad graphics 1/10 nostalgia losers" are underrating it. But the same can be said for anything.

 

[IGemini]

^^^Pretty much how I see it.

Pretty much the lock step type answers I expected. I beat the game back in '04, can't help but feel all the clamor for a part 3 is a bit overhyped.

If hype over an unreleased game is affecting your opinion on one that's nearly a decade old, that's your issue.

 

[-slash-]

"FPS" is a camera mechanic, not an entire definition of how a game is supposed to be designed.

I like to read. I like well-written stories with interesting characters, dialog, and interaction. I like games that strive for the same.

It annoys me to no end when I hear people say "plot is not important to FPS." So....when your view is through the player's eyes - arguably the most immersive position you could place yourself in a virtual environment - the plot is no longer important?

I thought PC gamers were more intelligent / open-minded than that.


I will agree that not every game should take a story-driven approach. These are still games, and lots of them are fun just based on their mechanics alone. When it comes to what I prefer to spend my money on, however, I'll take Metro over DOOM any day.

Exactly. HL1 and HL2 are FPS games, and very good ones at that when it comes to story line. CS is another great FPS, but a very different style.

 

[pontifex]

yes, but then i played it years after release. there was nothing special about it.

 

[Topweasel]

yes, but then i played it years after release. there was nothing special about it.

That is a really important part. Games especially from 2000-2009, were a constantly evolving beast. Games from all developers were making strides by using idea and tactics taken by other games. Some would call it a golden age of PC gaming. When HL2 hit it was huge, a fantastic and almost revolutionary approach to storytelling in an FPS, real fleshed out characters (including one that was just a random in HL1), a seamless blend of action and cinematic (another great component of HL2 that games live by today, scripted events).

At the time no one had as useful a sidekick system. Nobody used scripted events as well as them, I mean Id was still using them to make monsters pop up behind you. Nobody had as well established a plot (within the game) as them. It also was really well put together with one of the more powerful and realistic engines of the time. Probably the best looking (Doom3 had better skeleton system but everything always looked off with it) till FarCry.

But like all good games its strengths were picked apart. Games like TLoU, Bioshock Infinite, even TR are better games and include a lot of things learned from HL2. But if you play any of these and other games that worked on and in some cases perfected the different components of HL2 first before playing HL2. Then it's really easy to miss what a lot of people experienced when, after they had been playing 3d FPS's from the mid 90's, they got to play HL2.

 

[WaitingForNehalem]

nope

 

[Moe Zart]

I agree.
It's a cookie-cutter first person shooter, repetitive as hell. It's basically a tunnel shooter where the tunnels are presented as wide open ranges as an illusion, but are essentially still linear tunnels. Run forward and shoot stuff, again and again, perfect for the unsophisticated gaming crowd that doesn't ask for more.

But what irritated me the most were the childish characters and narrative. Half Life 1 had you with adult themed and often cynical scientific colleagues, but Half Life 2 was like "Follow freeman everyone!" "Everyone loves freeman, he's so cool and popular!", and the most cringe-worthy, Alyx "Be careful Gordon...*hand gesture*".

It did have good physics though, and that's what the whole game was, with its mundane puzzles, it was a showcase for the new Physics engine they made.

 

[DigDog]

Exactly. HL1 and HL2 are FPS games, and very good ones at that when it comes to story line. CS is another great FPS, but a very different style.

you know the S in FPS stands for SHOOTER, right? its a shooter game if you win by shooting. you could shoot in flashback but you win by jumping on platforms and thats why that was a platformer. you get to pick your parts in gran turismo but that doesnt make it a managerial game or an rpg - its a racing game. same as wipeout, you can shoot, but you win by the core mechanic of goin'reel'fast.

 

[CP5670]

HL2's story was pretty thin for its time. Most FPSs before HL1 had basically no plot, but games had evolved a lot by 2004. I think even some earlier games that were not praised much for their story, like Invisible War or Unreal 2, still had better stories than HL2. The physics was not new and used the same Havok engine as IW (and had the same kinds of glitches). HL2 did use it well for scripted physics-based puzzles, but IW used it better for emergent gameplay.

My favorite aspect of HL2 was actually the Quake-style bunny hopping, where you build up speed as you hop. It was totally unrealistic but lots of fun, and had become rare in games by 2004. I think Painkiller was the only other game at the time with this. It made the otherwise tedious levels in HL2 a lot more fun.