Half-Life 2 - official (9/14 Black Mesa Source?!)

Yeah, but the first Half-Life ended by explaining the purpose of the guy you'd seen following you throughout the entire game, or at least finally letting him talk. It also answered a bit of what had been going on. Ending Half-Life 2 with the G-Man Ex Machina didn't work nearly as well, because we already know who he is in a basic sense, and he didn't tell us anything new, explain the purpose behind everything that had just happened, or really say anything of worth. He just stepped in at the climactic moment and stopped the game.

i hold that the g-man didn't say much of worth at the end of hl1, but it was definitely more substantial than hl2. it's just that the citadel sequence makes up for it. it's so much better than hl1's last few levels, i can forgive the abrupt end.

Played for awhile today, taking my time enjoying the game as I havent enjoyed one like this in ages.

Made it to the part where the old guy in Raven"whatitsplace" helps you out of town.. you cut through the grave yard and go into a room with a big well where ill assume you must make your way down, anyway.. I saved here..

This game is just lovely and stuff, I prefer the alien soldier fighting too the scary darkness of Raventown or whatever its called so hopefully it gets back out into the day time city fighting like the beginning of the game.

I agree that the final levels were amazing, but the entire story felt a bit like fan fiction to me... a bunch of popular characters put in vastly different circumstances under a general concept (1984 style dystopia), with no real explanation of how they got there and no real ending. It felt like a "what if" story rather than a real sequel to me, and the ending screamed to me that Valve had no idea how to wrap things up.

Maybe they don't want to wrap things up until they're done. I wonder how many Halflife's we're going to get out of this series? I'm guessing about 5? I'm also assuming that we're going to do the next game completely before the City 17 incident. Meaning that Freeman travels through time to accomplish goals as the G-Man needs them fulfilled rather than chronologically ordered objectives.

I like this game, but I hope we don't have to wait 6 years for another game to come along and lift some question marks off.

I don't expect them to wrap up everything, but after six years I don't think it's unreasonable to expect them to wrap up something.

My understanding of this series, the G-Man, and how it all ties to Gordon is exactly the same after finishing the game as it was before I started.

They determine the path of the story. You haven't finished the book yet, so be patient.

Where were all the people saying this about Halo 2's ending? ;)

as i mentioned previously, valve was originally going to be more explicit in half-life 2's introduction, but changed their mind and decided to let the game speak for itself. there are many clues throughout the game that explain what happened after half-life 1 ended. most notably the bulletin board in eli's lab. also, that vortigaunt when it fixes up your hoverboat explains more if you talk to it. more information can be inferred from the levels themselves.

my guess is that the xen aliens were already a combine-enslaved race. that you conquered xen doesn't mean much, as the g-man himself refers to it as a "border world" in half-life 1. this is made even more clear when you note the headcrab-filled drop-ships. the combine have a habit of co-opting the worst aspects of a conquered race for their own war machine.

anyway, after xen was taken over, the combine invaded the home of their newly discovered enemies. the war is over in 7 hours, the peace negotiated by the administrator of black mesa, in a massive power grab. 10 to 15 years later, hl2 starts.

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the entire story felt a bit like fan fiction to me... a bunch of popular characters put in vastly different circumstances under a general concept (1984 style dystopia), with no real explanation of how they got there

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i don't understand why you find it odd that the popular characters from hl1 would all make it into hl2. seems like a strange complaint when you take into account the fact that very few, if any of the black mesa characters in half-life 1 had a distinct personality. i mean, there are dozens of interchangable barneys, elis and klieners. it's perfectly natural that valve would choose to create a major hl2 character from each of these overused models as a nod to the first game. that's not fan fiction, it's adding depth to underused characters. very common in sequels.

Halo 2's story didn't even remotely finish. Atleast here the G-Man pulled you out, and ended your City 17 visit. He seems to want you to destroy stuff, and that's it. Also, Halo 2's single player campaign was shit, story aside. The game wasn't that fun to play, which is why everyone was on multiplayer the night it came out.

Halflife 2's single player campaign is the single greatest in the history of gaming, so people can overlook the unanswered questions because of that.