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Half Life 2: Community Update

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In an attempt to prove that Valve no longer works on its own games, they've released a community update with 11 years of bug fixes and commentary from Youtubers. Team Fortress 2 has had two community updates with lackluster results, so why not Half-Life 2?

With all of the talk of Brutal Doom, Half-Life 1 and Mario, Half-Life 2 really comes to life with better lighting and improved particle effects that I would have never noticed unless someone told me.

I would have much rather seen a Brutal Half-Life 2, but the game is already brutal and gruesome enough.

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How exactly is Half Life 2 gruesome when there's mostly just a simple blood decal after shooting bodies? Unless you count the story elements such as the stalkers being chopped up humans and those floating alien things in episode 2 cutting into the necks of people for a few examples.

The main reasons why Valve no longer works on their games is the success with Steam, it's making them more than enough money so they no longer need to rely on making games for income. I would guess the whole piracy issue they seemed to have with their games in the past fueled their creation of Steam to even happen.

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To be fair, I think it's really only a matter of time before we do see Brutal HL2, but obviously radically changing the gameplay wasn't the point of this mod, it was just to do some minor touch-ups to reflect the changes in computing power and the Source engine itself over the years.

I mean, LMAO, I still remember when my computer strained to run both HL2 and Doom 3 when they first came out (mostly because I had a really crappy video card at the time - it was the best I could afford on my budget). Then I got my computer more up to snuff, handled HL2 and Doom 3 no problem, but then TF2 was released, and all the updates made to the Source Engine once again took their toll and my computer chugged along at a snail's pace trying to run it on anything but the lowest settings. So I'll be honest, I'm actually a little excited to see the original Half-Life 2 get to take advantage of changes that have come along both to average computing power and to the Source Engine itself since its original release (er, that is to say while leaving the original game itself largely intact - while I want to see improvements, I don't want to see them to the ludicrous extremes of, say, the Cinematic Mod).

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Someone didn't like my Brutal Legend thread. Its now burning in post hell

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I'm going to get pretty brutal if episode 3 / HL3 never happens.

I feel like the G-Man has me stuck with dead Eli forever at the moment.

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pritch said:

I'm going to get pretty brutal if episode 3 / HL3 never happens.

I feel like the G-Man has me stuck with dead Eli forever at the moment.


I'm sure it'll come out before Half-Life 3. One has to lead to the other.

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Been playing it. The visual changes are very subtle, and whatever 'bugs' needed fixing are the kind of thing I didn't even notice the first time around. It's as good an excuse as any to replay a classic, though.

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They don't want you to remember anything about the incomplete Story of Half-Life 2 : Episode 2, in other word they don't want you to say any Shit like : "Hey ,if you're still working on Half-Life 2 did you start working on Half-Life 2 : Episode 3 .... " cause They're not even working on it
However,Flip Victor and his Team done it

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Can't work on something that's already done. Like TF2 there's probably 5 iterations by now.

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geo said:

Like TF2 there's probably 5 iterations by now.

Team Fortress Classic and Team Fortress 2,it's not that hard to count to 2 .
Hmm -_- What the ...

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Piper Maru said:

I like Half-Life 2, but I think I'm one of the few that actually prefers the first game.

How on Earth can you prefer the first game? I mean okay, there are things about the first game I prefer to the sequel, like the fact that the environment and enemies are much more varied. I miss Xen, I miss having to fight weird aliens I'd never seen before, in general I miss how much the game changed from beginning to end so that you never really knew what to expect and were always faced with new challenges. However, after playing Half-Life 2, I felt compelled to play the original game again, and when I did, its flaws became very apparent to me. Primarily, I couldn't stand the combat, which is something I put up with when I first played it because it was new and revolutionary at the time. I mean, the vortigaunts blasted you with lightning as soon as they saw you, but they telegraphed their attacks, so that wasn't such a problem, but the soldiers are virtually impossible unless you're expecting them (which means expect to die at least once every time you fight them). They immediately open fire as soon as they spot you, giving you virtually no time to react, so any section of the game involving soldiers requires you to basically use stealth and shoot them in the back. Realistic, maybe, but it totally changes the nature of combat and makes it less fun. Sure, you should be dead walking into a room and expecting to gun down half a dozen soldiers with their weapons all trained on you, but Half-Life was never a tactical shooter, and it didn't really do much to prepare you for that kind of combat. In fact, I found it amusing when the game actually became easier after you got past the soldiers and were once again dealing with primarily alien enemies. Sure, Half-Life 2 had its fair share of battles involving primarily human-ish soldiers with guns, but it was far more forgiving in that regard, allowing you to take on waves of enemies without having to go all Metal-Gear-Solid on them to stand a chance.

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geekmarine said:

Stuff & Things


How on earth can I prefer the first game? I just do. Some people prefer apples over oranges and vice versa, some people prefer collecting salt & pepper shakers over stamps.

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I never understoond why HL2 got such a high rating and amount of praise, when I played it I found the story interesting enough to playthrough it fully once but I found the gameplay quite dull and linear and the shooting side very weak.

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I find HL2's gunplay much weaker than HL1's. I don't like the atmosphere+story as much as the original's either.

Oh and there's better infighting and optional NPC killing in the original, less handholding, too (after the start)

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Magnum is more powerful then the one in Half-Life "1",i always use it as my Main Weapon for close combat :3

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Even though it's supposed to be a .357 caliber it seems just as powerful as a .44 caliber.

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VGA said:

I find HL2's gunplay much weaker than HL1's. I don't like the atmosphere+story as much as the original's either.

Oh and there's better infighting and optional NPC killing in the original, less handholding, too (after the start)

This.
I've noticed that the gunplay in HL2 seems too weak in comparision to HL1 which had better gunplay and constant combat happening.

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geekmarine said:

...but the soldiers are virtually impossible unless you're expecting them (which means expect to die at least once every time you fight them). They immediately open fire as soon as they spot you, giving you virtually no time to react, so any section of the game involving soldiers requires you to basically use stealth and shoot them in the back. Realistic, maybe, but it totally changes the nature of combat and makes it less fun.


What you wrote reminded me of the common complaint of DooM's "hitscan" enemies, and I don't get any of those. Yes, they present a different challenge than the projectile-tossing enemies, but they are definitely not "virtually impossible". If you can't beat a problem, you alter your tactics to fit the situation, yes?

Avoozl said:

I never understoond why HL2 got such a high rating and amount of praise, when I played it I found the story interesting enough to playthrough it fully once but I found the gameplay quite dull and linear and the shooting side very weak.


I couldn't agree more. Half-Life beats its sequel black and blue in my book. Sure, I'd still count it as a (fairly) good game, but it's nowhere near the original. The two latter episodes are much better, but I'd say that HL1 still tops them. I'm thinking of both atmosphere and gameplay here.

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Avoozl said:

I never understoond why HL2 got such a high rating and amount of praise, when I played it I found the story interesting enough to playthrough it fully once but I found the gameplay quite dull and linear and the shooting side very weak.


HL2's combat is pretty dull, and the guns aren't all that fun to use, indeed. If anything, I'd say the sound effects are partly the reason, as the pistol for one sounds like someone spitting. Match that with it's meh accuracy, high rate of fire yet low damage, and you have a spit gun.

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There's a difference, though, between Doom's hitscan enemies and the soldiers from Half-Life. The soldiers from Half-Life are much quicker than Doom's hitscan enemies, and they're bullet sponges, so it takes a lot to drop 'em. With Doom, as long as you still have a pulse, you should be able to fire off a shot and drop any hitscan enemies you may come across. With Half-Life, it takes a lot more planning to ensure that you get in enough hits to kill them and still have enough time to run for cover before dealing with the next one.

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Avoozl said:

How exactly is Half Life 2 gruesome when there's mostly just a simple blood decal after shooting bodies? Unless you count the story elements such as the stalkers being chopped up humans and those floating alien things in episode 2 cutting into the necks of people for a few examples.

The main reasons why Valve no longer works on their games is the success with Steam, it's making them more than enough money so they no longer need to rely on making games for income. I would guess the whole piracy issue they seemed to have with their games in the past fueled their creation of Steam to even happen.


Not necessarily. Half Life 3 could break the image of their company. If people start hating Valve they will start hating Steam too and that would be catastrophic.

If they were smart they would announce that they cancelled Half Life 3 but that the fans are free to create their own sequel. Once a promising fan sequel arises Valve hires the guys and makes it an official product. The success and quality of Black Mesa and the immense demand for Half Life 3 could fuel this. Even if it fails it won't be Valve's fault.

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Holy crap, that actually gets me to wondering - what if the Black Mesa team had devoted their time and resources to creating an unofficial sequel to Half-Life 2 instead of remaking the original? I mean, don't get me wrong, I friggin' love what they've done, it'd just be interesting to see them work on something new.

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I think the Black Mesa remake is pretty dull honestly. Yes it's very technically impressive they were able to make it and all, but honestly I just find it less fun than the original. I would rather just play the original with mods than black mesa.

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hardcore_gamer said:

I think the Black Mesa remake is pretty dull honestly. Yes it's very technically impressive they were able to make it and all, but honestly I just find it less fun than the original. I would rather just play the original with mods than black mesa.

It's nice to see the screen bobbing again in this mod :P

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