Half Life Storyline?

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SleeplessIncubus

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Hey...I know I am a little late on this one but I just finished HL2:E1 the other night and was just trying to get the story straight. I checked out wikipedia and read some stuff there however it really didnt go into too much detail.

I guess if you havent played any of the games I wouldn't read much further because this will contain spoilers.

Let me see if I got this straight......

In HL1 Gordon sets off a resonance cascade that opens a portal to Zen. All the aliens from Zen cross over and Gordon is left defending his life. At the end the G-man offers Gordon a job and he is put in stasis until he is needed further.

HL2 begins somewhere between 10-20 years after the events of HL1.Shortly after HL1 the armed force's of earth were involved in a war with the combine inwhich only lasts seven minutes. Dr. Breen negotiates the surrender of earth to the combine in exchange to spare the lives of the rest of mankind. Breen then becomes the ruler of earth but still has to answer to the combine. The G-man takes Gordon out of stasis at the beginning of HL2 in order to put an end to Breen. As Gordon progressed thru HL2 you learn of the events I just mentioned and ends with a confrontation between Gordon and Breen. Breen tries to escape via a Dark Energy Reactor atop the Citadel but Gordon destroys the reactor preventing Breen's escape and a massive explosion ensues. Before the explosion engulfs Gordon and Alyx the G-man appears and puts Gordon in stasis again where HL2:E1 begins.

Ep1 starts with the explosion inwhich the G-man appears but the Vortigaunts intervene save Alyx and put a barrier between the G-man and Gordon allowing him to escape. Gordon wakes up under some rubble and goes on a mission to restore the Citadel's reactor giving them more time to escape the impending meltdown. Alyx discovers that the Combine are trying to use the reaction, and therefore the destruction of the Citadel, to send a message to off-world Combine forces. A little later Dr. Kleiner appears on the large screen throughout the city telling the people of earth that the combine's supression field is down allowing them to reproduce. This supression field was setup by the combine so that humans wouldnt be able to procreate by doing so the human population would die off and they would have total control of earth. Ep1 ends with Gordon and Alyx riding a train out of the city with the explosion of the citidel in the background.

That is pretty much what I have read and understand....now somethings I dont understand. The Vortigaunts are from Zen, right? I am assuming they are "good" that you are not attacked by them in HL2. Were they the main residents of Zen before they were taken over by the combine?

A zombie is basically a person that has been attacked by a headcrab and then turned into a zombie, right? The headcrabs are they from Xen or are they part of the combine? Alyx mentiones "zombines" in Ep1 as a combine soldier that has been attacked by a headcrab so if the headcrab is a combine weapon why would it be attacking its own?

People of earth can work for the combine? I assume so because Barney is an officer in the Metro Police Civil Protection Unit.

I dont think this has been answered but exactly who does the G-man work for? Apparantly he unleashed Gordon to stop Breen and the combine but then again the Vortigaunts had to prevent the g-man from putting Gordon into stasis at the end of HL2/beginning of Ep1.

If I left anything out please feel free to add. I didnt go into details of the other mods like Blue Shift and Opposing force...just wanted to keep it straight forward.
 
For more information, this is a great site: http://members.shaw.ca/halflifestory/

As far as your questions, some of them are answered at the above link, but here goes:

1.) Yes, vortigaunts are from Xen which was conquered by the combine which is why they were fighting you in HL1 and allied with you in HL2.

2.) Headcrabs are a biological weapon on the combine. I'm not sure if they were developed by the combine or are natural residents of Xen though. And yes, a zombine is a combine/headcrab hybrid. The combine overwatch soldiers are basically modified humans and given that headcrabs still attack them, we can assume there is enough of the human bits left for the headcrabs to possess them.

3.) Yes, the civil protection unit is made up of both human and combine.

4.) We don't know who the g-man works for. It's basically the big running mystery throughout the games and it's assumed we'll find out at the end what the deal really is.
 
saan44 said:
For more information, this is a great site: http://members.shaw.ca/halflifestory/

As far as your questions, some of them are answered at the above link, but here goes:

1.) Yes, vortigaunts are from Xen which was conquered by the combine which is why they were fighting you in HL1 and allied with you in HL2.

2.) Headcrabs are a biological weapon on the combine. I'm not sure if they were developed by the combine or are natural residents of Xen though. And yes, a zombine is a combine/headcrab hybrid. The combine overwatch soldiers are basically modified humans and given that headcrabs still attack them, we can assume there is enough of the human bits left for the headcrabs to possess them.

3.) Yes, the civil protection unit is made up of both human and combine.

4.) We don't know who the g-man works for. It's basically the big running mystery throughout the games and it's assumed we'll find out at the end what the deal really is.
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hey thanks for the link and the answers.....another question

so are the combine overwatch soldiers humans that have been brainwashed or something or are they grown by the combine. as in they are human in form but not really humans?

and so your saying that the humans and Vortigaunts were enemies at first but now are on the same team fighting against the combine....why the change of heart?
 
SleeplessIncubus said:
hey thanks for the link and the answers.....another question

so are the combine overwatch soldiers humans that have been brainwashed or something or are they grown by the combine. as in they are human in form but not really humans?

and so your saying that the humans and Vortigaunts were enemies at first but now are on the same team fighting against the combine....why the change of heart?
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The overwatch are humans that have had been implanted with combine technology and are brainwashed/mind controlled. The Vorts are friendly because you freed them by killing the nilihanth(sp) in HL1.
 
WarriorX said:
The overwatch are humans that have had been implanted with combine technology and are brainwashed/mind controlled. The Vorts are friendly because you freed them by killing the nilihanth(sp) in HL1.
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thats what i thought....just read the timeline from the link that was posted here and got it all straight.

basically if the Vorts and humans wipe out the combine then the vorts can go back to xen and the humans can have earth back. also just watched the trailer for ep2 on youtube and it looks pretty good. looks like lots of open field combat.
 
:D Damit you guys... now I have to play through HL1, HL2 and Episode 1 again because of this thread... damnit.

I love this game so much... why can't every game have as much thought and story behind it.

Reaaaally looking forward to EPS2 :D :D :D
 
SleeplessIncubus said:
The Vortigaunts are from Zen, right? I am assuming they are "good" that you are not attacked by them in HL2. Were they the main residents of Zen before they were taken over by the combine?
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The Vortigaunts are native to Zen, which was the planet previously invaded by the combine. The combine are kinda like the Borg from star trek and enslave the races they defeat and add their traits to their ever growing race of different species

The Vortigaunts that attacked you in HL1 either did so through force or through simply giving in to the combine.

A zombie is basically a person that has been attacked by a headcrab and then turned into a zombie, right? The headcrabs are they from Xen or are they part of the combine?
Click to expand...

They're a weapon of the combine, quite wether they were originally native to Zen or wether Zen itself was attacked by the headcrabs no one is really sure of.

Alyx mentiones "zombines" in Ep1 as a combine soldier that has been attacked by a headcrab so if the headcrab is a combine weapon why would it be attacking its own?
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I dont think the headcrabs posses inteligence, they're just a parasite that attacks anyting any anyone.

People of earth can work for the combine? I assume so because Barney is an officer in the Metro Police Civil Protection Unit.
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Seems so, certain members of earth will no doubt be assigned roles to aid the structuring of the survivours, that includes some form of policing the system, it wouldn't supprise me in fact if a lot of the combine soldiers you fight are either brainwashed humans or mutated/genetically enhanced humans.

I dont think this has been answered but exactly who does the G-man work for? Apparantly he unleashed Gordon to stop Breen and the combine but then again the Vortigaunts had to prevent the g-man from putting Gordon into stasis at the end of HL2/beginning of Ep1.
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No one knows for sure, a lot of people seem to think he's there to put a stop to the Combine from taking over the whole universe, his actions towards the combine are malicious. However he's uneasy in human form, you can tell from his manerisms and his voice, so it's obvious that he is also not human. I think one of the more popular ideas is that he's some kind of representative from another race who knows of the combine but has manage to survive/avoid them, possibly some intergallactic alliance of many races who have elected to stop the combine this way. It's really only guessing though.

My personal theory is that we wont find out, not even at the end of episode 3, they will want to leave the story open to carry on the franchise which means there's going to be some seriously big unanswered questions at the end of episode 3. We may never find out who the G-Man is, it may just be left a mystery - as is often the case with these sorts of things.

If I left anything out please feel free to add. I didnt go into details of the other mods like Blue Shift and Opposing force...just wanted to keep it straight forward.
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theres laods of extra details but the story is largely assumed and not actually told in any definitive way, which is actually rather frustrating, at least in HL1 you had a rough Idea of what the hell was going on. blue shift and Opposing forces really just play through the black mesa incident from 2 other different viewpoints, i dont think they reveal anything new to us than what HL1 told us.
 
re headcrabs, isnt there some less evolved headgrabs on zen? i thought they were native to zen, but less agressive there. i certainly never saw any vort-headcrab zombies so i dont think they get attacked.
 
Martyr said:
re headcrabs, isnt there some less evolved headgrabs on zen? i thought they were native to zen, but less agressive there. i certainly never saw any vort-headcrab zombies so i dont think they get attacked.
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Perhaps the Vortigaunts' highly electrified nature discourages the headcrap from attempting to "couple" with them.
 
Sort of on the same track....

Do you guys think that the guys at Valve already have the whole story thought out? Or do you think they're making it up as they go?
 
l3ender said:
Sort of on the same track....

Do you guys think that the guys at Valve already have the whole story thought out? Or do you think they're making it up as they go?
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I'm pretty sure they adapt the story as they go. They made mentions to that in the developer's commentary in Episode 1. Gabe Newell talked about consulting the writer about modifying the story due to changes in technology.

I'm sure the writer has an idea of the general direction it will go, but I think the details are pretty much up in the air.
 
Mark_Warner said:
Perhaps the Vortigaunts' highly electrified nature discourages the headcrap from attempting to "couple" with them.
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haha headcrap. it could be a possibility. imagine what that would look like....a vort-zombie!

I have to agree with you Frosteh about the g-man (after reading the link from the 2nd post). however i dont see why revealing what the g-man is or who he works for would close the series. Valve has said that the 3rd ep would be the last but they could always do some type of spin off or even rescue the franchise in the future.

the hl series is way too profitable for valve to just shut the door. im sure they got something up their sleeve - they always do. :D
 
SleeplessIncubus said:
the hl series is way too profitable for valve to just shut the door. im sure they got something up their sleeve - they always do. :D
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Well they've left the story wide open for parallel stories. The open rebellion that humanity is in would could provide a lot of characters that they could build a new series of games on.

I'd kindof like to see what else Valve can do, other than Half-Life. And I'm very curious to see how they intergrate the Portal stuff into the Half-Life story.
 
Mark_Warner said:
Well they've left the story wide open for parallel stories. The open rebellion that humanity is in would could provide a lot of characters that they could build a new series of games on.

I'd kindof like to see what else Valve can do, other than Half-Life. And I'm very curious to see how they intergrate the Portal stuff into the Half-Life story.
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I agree with you....was just asking why revealing the gman would close the story. i would love to play in the 7 minute war....or atleast the events leading up to it because well, the war is only 7 mins and that wouldnt be very time consuming.

kinda off topic but what is portal. i seen the ads in steam but havent had a chance to look it up.
 
Portal is a game where you play a participant in a program that is testing portal technology. "They" have developed a gun that can shoot portals onto surfaces. You basically set two endpoints, and you (or other objects) can travel freely between them. You can also see the destination area through the portal, and any objects therein. That makes it possible for you to chase yourself around a corner. Newell has stated that the Portal program (and presumably the company that is running it) will make its way into the Half-Life story. (Link to video)

It is due to be bundled (with TF2) into the Episode 2 package.
 
Mark_Warner said:
Portal is a game where you play a participant in a program that is testing portal technology. "They" have developed a gun that can shoot portals onto surfaces. You basically set two endpoints, and you (or other objects) can travel freely between them. You can also see the destination area through the portal, and any objects therein. That makes it possible for you to chase yourself around a corner. Newell has stated that the Portal program (and presumably the company that is running it) will make its way into the Half-Life story. (Link to video)

It is due to be bundled (with TF2) into the Episode 2 package.
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found it on youtube as well....looks interesting

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeUjVkJ7seY
 
Martyr said:
re headcrabs, isnt there some less evolved headgrabs on zen? i thought they were native to zen, but less agressive there. i certainly never saw any vort-headcrab zombies so i dont think they get attacked.
Click to expand...

The "less evolved" headcrabs were the baby headcrabs on the level you fought the Gonarch (essentially a/the mother headcrab). The headcrabs, as far as I know, anyway, are native to Xen, but were no less aggressive while one was there than they were on Earth. As for vortigaunt-headcrab zombies, I'm tempted to say that complete control over Xen creatures by the Nihilanth probably prevented that sort of thing from happening.
 
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