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And, again, from the 50-foot tall Strider trooping about to the fast-Zombies of Ravenholm, the game is certainly well done and breathtaking. But that’s not to say there are many changes in the game – notably the fact that the ‘Alien Slaves’ of the original are now your allies, but that doesn’t go without mentioning the greatness that is the Gravity Gun. I kid you not when I say physics-based gameplay is as fun as it looks in the trailers; forking over a table to have all kinds of objects slide off rather realistically, and to catch a grenade with the Gravity Gun or use tables as a weapon, as well as throwing fast-paced vehicles, such as the Buggy, into the entire affair is something that makes it an infinitely more enjoyable experience. This, of course, is where the A.I becomes the topic of discussion.
I won’t hestitate to emphasize the game’s flaws, however a slew of personal gripes they may seem; the A.I is one of the most disappointing aspects, in that even below the original game, the A.I doesn’t do much outside of charing you, occassionally reaching cover and strafing. Not to mention the game throws you outside of your objective with a sense of disconnection for no real reason outside of that, and the story feels less coherently presented than hoped. Not that the story is bad at all, just not as well presented (unless VALVe wanted to create such an aura of mystique that the game’s story feels almost intangible). There’s also a bit of a vexation with the low-resolution texture maps and normal maps in large, outdoor maps – it becomes a tad glaring. But the suspension of disbelief, interactivity, and gameplay to come along with it as well as the Source Engine makes up for it in one aspect too many. There are many physics puzzles, many familiar moments, even new rather cool surprises, very much so ‘YES!’ moments, and certain weapons and locales, and from the vistas of the end in the Citadel to the glistening of the normal maps and refraction of the fresnel, pixel shaded water and, again, familiar gameplay with remenants of Black Mesa everyplace; the game is, overall, superb.
And it’s about time I delve into the Source engine. To compare - while DOOM 3’s inferior in the sense that using projected, render-to-texture shadows and dynamic lightmaps and shadowmaps rather than real-time stencil shadows and per-pixel lightning, the usage of Pixel and Vertex shaders (up to revision 2.0) in both the 3D Skyboxes, deformable geometry and terrain, displacement mapping, dynamic props, volumetric fog, normal maps, fresnel water refractions, pixel shaded blood, protruding cobble stone (courtesy of Pixel Shader 2.0 based normal maps) and what not are all DOOM 3’s superior in that they create a cohesive expanse not really residing DOOM 3, though I should refrain from making comparison to begin with. Again; Havoc Ragdoll physics, occluding, high-quality 3D spatialization, and strongly supported 5.1 surround sound all help the game immensely. And the fact that VALVe have supported such a wide range hardware without a bad looking game isn’t going to be snuffed out, either; I literally was able to play without a hiccup of page-swapping and with relatively fast loading times (yet slow enough to ‘take you out of the immersion’, truth be told – a quality the original was much more brief in, even at the time), at 1024x768-1280x1024 and even beyond with 2x FSAA, X16 AF, and all programmable Shader Model 2.0 effects turned on (all of the aforesaid), I was able to play on a 2.66 GHz Pentium 4B, 1GB of DDR-SDRAM, and 128MB DDR ATI Radeon 9700 Pro at a completely playable frame-rate (30FPS-60FPS and above) with it looking just as good as it did in the trailers, if not better (since not even trailers do a game justice) – it looked indubeously stunning. And that’s on a system not very impressive anymore.
I would not, on the other hand, suggest running the game at it’s fullest, even at somewhat low resolutions and without AF or FSAA on a system with 512MB of RAM or less, and a 2GHz Pentium 4 or AMD Athlon XP or less, otherwise, you’re going to suffer very drawn-out loading phases and frequent hiccups of page swapping that make the game very unplayable, though with the graphics hardware needed the frame-rates will be surprisingly adequate, even on lower-end systems running the DirectX 7.0 path. I only wish 64-bit CPUs were supported completely, and that VALVe had implemented FP24 or even FP16/32 HDR for those with very high-end graphics hardware; it would have increased the enjoyment, visually, that much more. Nontheless, given the time they had and the material, the game is one of the best looking first-person-shooter’s around, if not one of the ideal looking games alone. Unless you want to belittle it with games not even out yet (like Oblivion and Unreal Engine 3 powered games)? But that’s a rather unfair comparison, by nature.
And speaking of ‘comparisons’, the game’s multiplayer component is rather abashing and trite, to me – Counter-Strike: Source feels like a separate game as a whole rather than an actual multiplayer component. Thankfully, VALVe Software quickly churned up a Deathmatch component actually employing the Half-Life 2 universe soon after (as this review has been updated) in December, which is surprisingly fun. Even more so fun than toiling with the physics in single-playermode, and that’s saying a lot considering it’s just multiplayer.
To tie this all up, though? Half-Life 2 is a great game. A superb one, even. Perhaps not quite as revolutionary as the original, but the Source Engine, gameplay, revealed story, and interaction of the game alone make it worth playing for even those not exactly ecstatic about the franchise as a whole. It’s basically met my expectations, and that’s all I clamored when all was said and done. It’s enough to get your headcrab-crowbarring spirit back up to snuff.
GRAPHICS: 9.0
VALUE:8.8
ENGINE: 9.5
OVERALL VERDICT: 9.1
The Meat: (Pros – Awesome visuals; awesome NPCs, awesome gameplay, and retains the astute formula of the original.)
(Cons – Disappointing multiplayer, somewhat incohesive story element, low-res texture and normal maps in large, outdoor areas, and a few other minor gripes that seem just that in comparison the Pros)
INTRODUCTION PAGE
DELVING DEEPER INTO CITY 17
THE CRUX
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