10 yrs since hl2......wow

Whach

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Dec 22, 2011
Messages
1,244
So, I was just browsing through my steam library etc....just realized that hl2 was released nearly 10 yrs ago, and I that had seen the demo at e3 the year before. Also remembered my ATi x800pro. (still have that somewhere in a box)

I feel old! I am also going to play through it once again =)..maybe the episodes too.
 
I remember the months before release when Doom 3 vs HL2 was shaping up to be an epic battle
 
I still remember thinking steam was a necessary evil when installing the game! Now, doom on steam = ]
 
I agree just played hl2 for the first time and honestly enjoyed far cry alot more..
 
Well, at least the Half Life 2 episodes wrapped everything up nicely.
It's not like Valve ended on a big emotional cliffhanger, or had dramatic endings to major characters in the Half Life universe, or left the player feeling helpless and unfulfilled at the close.

To do anything like that and wait a decade to provide and kind of resolution would just be stupid.
 
Well, at least the Half Life 2 episodes wrapped everything up nicely.
It's not like Valve ended on a big emotional cliffhanger, or had dramatic endings to major characters in the Half Life universe, or left the player feeling helpless and unfulfilled at the close.

To do anything like that and wait a decade to provide and kind of resolution would just be stupid.

i detect sarcasm? maybe? but i do agree, the waiting is getting silly in monumental proportions.
 
I agree just played hl2 for the first time and honestly enjoyed far cry alot more..

Wait, so you mean to tell me that you like a game that you feel nostalgic about that you played a decade ago more than a decade old game that you just played?
I just can't believe that. :p
 
I agree just played hl2 for the first time and honestly enjoyed far cry alot more..

why?


Wait, so you mean to tell me that you like a game that you feel nostalgic about that you played a decade ago more than a decade old game that you just played?
I just can't believe that. :p

I will say I played Far Cry many many years after it came out and it was still good. It had a weird ending though. In the span of 5 minutes you go from fighting mercenaries in the jungle to falling out of a helicopter into Doom 2, fight rocket monsters, climb into a volcano and kill some doctor...credits. I was like uum wtf.

90% of Far Cry was really good though.

Far Cry 2 was like living though Apocalypse Now. Not the game itself but the horror and surrealism of dragging yourself though it.
 
Don't forget about Painkiller coming out that year along with UT2K4. Man, 04 was an FPS orgy.
 
infln,,, pity it isnt still that way ... with great demos.. great game play.. instead of the same ole same ole were getting today.... oh yea.. and games didnt all look the same!
 
I found my original HL2 retail release day box. Yipeee. lost the t-shirt though =/
 
This was the first PC game I ever played. This game, Doom 3, and Far Cry were the games that made me buy my first PC. My Xbox committed suicide from loneliness not long after. Was not a pretty sight.
 
I feel weird remembering that I took pictures of the shipments when I worked at CompUSSR and made the HardOCP front page with one O_O. Ah to more simple times :)
 
Loved HL2, Doom 3, and Far Cry. Played the first 2 back when they came out and replayed them several times over the years. Actually, did not play Far Cry until the past year, it has held up really well.

Far Cry 2 was garbage though.
 
I've still never finished this game. Got to Ravenholm and just stopped caring. :/
 
It was a fun game, but nothing mindblowing. The gameplay really wasn't that exciting, although the physics was fun at times.
 
It was a fun game, but nothing mindblowing. The gameplay really wasn't that exciting, although the physics was fun at times.

Come on man, for the time it was awesome and this is coming from a COD lover (of course COD was pretty good back then too).

I pray Valve can fix gaming as every other game developer are catering to consoles. Let's hope HL3 will be a leap in graphics and physics over HL2 as HL2 was over HL1.
 
It was a fun game, but nothing mindblowing. The gameplay really wasn't that exciting, although the physics was fun at times.

I don't think it was the gameplay as much as it was the ambient feel of the story for me. However, for me, the gameplay, design and set pieces were really good and added to the whole experience. Much better than what else was out at the time. But then again, the original hl was my obsession, and I was giddy with excitement for more of the universe.
 
HL2, Doom 3, and Far Cry, I love all of them. Those were exciting times.

I wish there were more of such solid single player FPS today.
 
Those were good times - the build-up, delays and leaked code. Doom 3 was OK, but the monster closet approach killed it a bit. Along comes HL2 and it was awesome after all the build-up. Half-life has always been about the story-telling and atmosphere, which it had in spades.


And then Far Cry came along and stole the show. Prolly because no one expected a damn thing from it and it had eye candy to die for. Gave everyone justification for spending all their money on their hardware and still wanting more. Semi-shite story, but I actually remember the plot better than HL2 or D3, go figure. Far Cry 2 was great and crap, all at the same time. Having spent most of my life in Africa, I can say they got it right, but the inability to fast-travel was painful.

They got it right with Far Cry 3 - best game I've played in a long time, barring the faults.
 
I am playing through Half Life 2. Haven't touched it since it debuted...what 10 years ago you say? It has held up well. The game looks great, the AI is pretty smart, some of the puzzles are well thought out and fun to solve. Puzzle solving is one aspect of FPS gameplay that sort of fell by the wayside. Physics are excellent and integrated well into the general gameplay. The armed dune buggy was kind of fun to drive. I think I am about half done with it. Past Ravenholm and Alyx and I are shooting our way towards some destination or other, saving her dad.

Another old shooter that may be worth another play through is Return to Castle Wolfenstein. I liked it more than Far Cry. Haven't played Far Cry 3 yet. Never played Far Cry 2 either.
 
Wow, I still very clearly remember my first trip through Ravenholm. That was fun. Gravity gun and saw blades. The crazy guy on the roof-tops. That section just dripped atmosphere right out of the screen and all over my desk. :D These days, I find that I go back and play Doom 3 every so often, (I'm a bit of an id fan) HL2 less so, but I've played it through again once in the last 4-5 years. I haven't played Far Cry since the first time I beat it, but I remember having a lot of fun with it. Never played the next two. Wow... 10 years...
 
HL2 was awesome. HL3, when released, will never live up to the buildup and hype machine. It's gotten pretty bad to where people will want absolute perfection. Coming from Valve, it's definitely possible, but they're going to need an 10/10 game, not a 9.5/10...

Far Cry. Still one of my all time favorites. After seeing the Crytek demo with the dinosaurs, I was in love with that engine. Seeing Far Cry the first time, I was speechless. It was amazing. Still looks good for an old game (as does HL2).

Doom 3. Never liked it. Didn't feel like Doom at all, and the graphics were a real disappointment to me.

What I think is cool is that those games can be played on a laptop with onboard Intel HD graphics with an acceptable framerate. :)
 
I've come to the determination that the more modern id games aren't for a lot of people. The people that like them really like them, and then there are the others that just plain don't like them. There isn't much of a middle ground with them. I just find that the overall id aesthetic pulls me in a bit more than a lot of other games. It's not necessarily down to just this or that graphical feature, (though they do play a part,) or how many polygons they used to drawn an imp, etc. It's some collection of their art style, the things they DO choose to focus their engines on, etc. I also like their simplistic play style.

The newer games are not like the original Doom/Doom2. For me, as much as I (still) like the old ones, and spinoffs like Hexen/Heretic/etc. I think it's a good thing. The shooting aspect, which is why I think one would play an id game, is pretty much spot on for what it's trying to be. Pure action. Not overly tactical (though the AI in something like RAGE is pretty damned good.) It's kind of a visceral arcade style experience. People praised Serious Sam for going back to the hordes of enemies like Doom approach, and to me, it just gets tiresome after a while. I'm probably in the minority there, but running backwards in a circles until every last enemy is gunned down is what got tedious.

Another criticism I've seen is the monster closet. I'll actually agree on that one for Doom 3. It could have been handled a little better in some cases, but really, the whole game wasn't like that. Monsters do end up coming from all over the place. Wiring channels, pipes, the spider-things in the ventilation system, etc. etc. To be fair, there were also monster closets in the original Doom games. :D

Anyway, that's my rationale. I'm not even saying id games are better than Valve, Epic, Crytek, etc. They just speak louder to me. I enjoy them a bit more, even though I like any game that's good for what it does more or less. I find them more memorable generally speaking.

On the other hand though, System Shock 1 and 2 blow away any other shooters that I can think of period, so...
 
I remember it taking about a full week for me to install and finally being able to play HL2. I didn't have a big problem with Steam, as I had created an account long before then to play CS 1.6. But they were absolutely not ready for the server demand when HL2 was released. It was made even more painful by the fact that I was still on 56 kbps at that point. I bought it along with Metroid Prime 2 for my birthday, so at least Metroid kept me amused during the wait.

Boy did the Source engine run like crap on the GeForce FX series ;).
 
I remember buying an X800, installing an Arctic cooler on it in preparation for both D3 and HL2. However, shortly before picking up either game I decided to go with 2 6800 GTs in SLI. :D I wanted to have the perfect setup for these releases. I don't think I've upgraded specifically in anticipation of a game release since. Though I have upgraded a few times when I've determined my setup isn't good enough for whatever I'm playing at the time since then.
 
I remember buying an X800, installing an Arctic cooler on it in preparation for both D3 and HL2. However, shortly before picking up either game I decided to go with 2 6800 GTs in SLI. :D I wanted to have the perfect setup for these releases. I don't think I've upgraded specifically in anticipation of a game release since. Though I have upgraded a few times when I've determined my setup isn't good enough for whatever I'm playing at the time since then.
I did the same by buying two 8800 GTX for SLI in anticipation for Crysis ;). Beyond that I've really only ever upgraded out of necessity.
 
HL2 was awesome. HL3, when released, will never live up to the buildup and hype machine.

What hype machine? There are no commercials, no viral games, no leaked news, no announcements, no trailers, nothing. Just people who are turning HL3 into a meme for their own amusement.
 
I agree just played hl2 for the first time and honestly enjoyed far cry alot more..

agreed,

HL2 was a complete let down for me. It was a boring mess of a game. to this day, I can't replay through the whole thing, it just bogs down with how mediocre it is and gets boring.

I pre-ordered the game, was so super excited when it finally in my hands and I could play it, and then was just completely let down.
 
I replay HL2 every few years and it still looks pretty cool even by modern standards. While it's missing details, the artists did a phenomenal job of making the world look real. I don't think any other devs put the TLC into their game that Valve did. At this point, I think HL3 is destined to be their "Chinese Democracy." I'm sure it'll come out someday, but I bet it's a massive letdown.
 
Hl2 lived up to the hype for me. Far cry didn't take anything away from hl2 imo. It did shit all over doom 3 however which was hyped to be a technical marvel.
 
What hype machine? There are no commercials, no viral games, no leaked news, no announcements, no trailers, nothing. Just people who are turning HL3 into a meme for their own amusement.

No official news at all. But, the gamers have created an artificial hype that the game probably won't live up to. HL & HL2 are some amazing games. People are looking forward to a new Half Life game, and more and more people are jumping in on the "Is it coming?" "HL3 confirmed" and things like that. When it's officially announced, people are going to expect perfection.

The hype isn't being generated by Valve, but the gamers wanting and expecting HL3.
 
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