kartooner

See you next year then

by Andy Mac on November 17, 2004 at 10:43 am. Reply #

Andy, maybe he’s fin­ished a lot ear­lier. Rumors say that it’s been fin­ished in 11 hours already. But my, I’d love a review. I’ve seen some teasers before, and it looked too damn good to be true.

by Rob Mientjes on November 17, 2004 at 11:21 am. Reply #

I haven’t posted any­thing in the past few days. The delay was mostly due to the release of Half-Life 2 which I spent the greater part of last night playing.

The reviews I’ve read men­tion that Half-Life 2 can be com­pleted in 11–15 hours, but I’m tak­ing my time, absorb­ing the details and enjoy­ing the expe­ri­ence. From the out­set, it’s just a breath­tak­ing expe­ri­ence and many of the sequences in the game unfold around you (sim­il­iar to the first Half-Life) elim­i­nat­ing the need for cutscenes. At times I felt like I was tak­ing part in a movie or on a thrill ride at Dis­ney­land or Uni­ver­sal Studios.

For the most part it has exceeded my expec­ta­tions ten fold and then some. As I men­tioned when I fin­ish it, which I expect will be within a few days I’ll write a review. If for some rea­son I haven’t com­pleted it within the next week or so I’ll go ahead and write up my thoughts on the game. Regard­less you can expect a review sooner than later.

by kartooner on November 17, 2004 at 12:38 pm. Reply #

Simon: Quite hon­estly, as far as game­play is con­cerned it knocks the teeth out of Doom 3, which as it turns out had repet­i­tive game­play, at least to me any­ways. Half-Life 2 on the other hand offers twists and turns and white knuckle moments unlike those offered from Doom 3. It’s a mat­ter of opin­ion and pref­er­ence, but I will say this. I do plan on revis­it­ing the game even after I’ve com­pleted it, not one sin­gle game I’ve played (other than the orig­i­nal Half-Life) made me want to play it again.

It’s amaz­ing man.

by kartooner on November 17, 2004 at 1:39 pm. Reply #

It’s kick­ing my ass all kinds of ways too!

by Michael on November 17, 2004 at 3:02 pm. Reply #

Hmm.. See­ing as though I’m related to Erik, I feel the need to give you my input on Half Life 2. I myself, am very hard on review­ing games because Im very crit­i­cal. Any­ways, for a short review, Half Life 2 is like a movie that opens slowly and begins to pan out with ease.. From haunt­ing sounds of a evil tyrant warn­ing his slav­ings that a rebel is amoung a group.. Who the rebe­lious cause is, is also revealed.

Though, I’m not to far in to the game, but with most games I’ve played, if the game play doesnt pick up by the first hour then I’m totally going to ditch it and carry on with another game. (For exam­ple Doom 3, to me it seemed like all I was doing was walk­ing around shoot­ing stuff.. Open­ing doors, find­ing keys, run­ning for hell cause I’m out of ammo etc). In Half Life 2, your game­play varies between speed­ing away from can­nons being fired at you, rock­ets being launched from ves­sels fly­ing by or hid­ing from head crabs try­ing to devour your very head.

The Graph­ics are out­stand­ing, and every­thing is so full of color and depth. The humans speak with accu­racy when voice is trans­mit­ted through your speak­ers, and when things move, you lis­ten.

Regard­less of the prob­lems (Like AI being alit­tle dumbed down in the eas­ier dif­fi­cult set­tings), its a really really REALLY good game. Not only will you enjoy play­ing it, you’ll enjoy watch­ing how the story line pro­gresses.

Any­ways, SHORT REVIEW.. Expect Erik to have a waaay bet­ter one..hah..

by Matt (Brother) on November 17, 2004 at 5:30 pm. Reply #

Ian: Same here. I finally got to the part in the game where you drive the land buggy — which rocks by the way — and at one point I was just play­ing around with the Grav­ity gun, grab­bing wood planks, bar­rels, etc. and then jump­ing back on the buggy and cruis­ing the detailed land­scapes. I found out land buggy and deep ocean water do not mix.

Thanks for shar­ing your thoughts, I’ve been a fan of your CSS work for a while.

by kartooner on November 18, 2004 at 12:30 am. Reply #

Glad to hear it doesn’t have that flat feel­ing Doom3 had. Might have to scrounge up some old titles for a few trade-ins at the local EB to pick this up. I know the alpha was fun as hell just pick­ing up chairs with the grav gun and launch­ing them at npcs.

by Mark Michon on November 18, 2004 at 11:37 am. Reply #

kar­tooner: A land buggy! That sounds excit­ing; I’m not up to that stage yet.
I can’t get over how real­is­tic it all looks. I’ve thrown my mouse across the room sev­eral times due the fright I receive after a pesky head crab jumps out of no where.

Thanks for the kind com­ment on the CSS also.

by Ian on November 18, 2004 at 7:01 pm. Reply #

Haha, most the time in the SCARIEST scenes I was totally out of ammo on every gun and was only left with my grav­ity gun.. Need­less to say, I was fran­ti­caly try­ing to grab splin­ters of wood to launch at my foes but them just shrug­ging it off like it was noth­ing… I was run­ning through one part of the game the entire way, until I saw the light and got out.

I was more scared in one lit­tle town then I was pretty much in all of DOOM III. In Half Life 2, you don’t expect the scary like in D3, it just throws its evil lit­tle head at you.

by Matt (Brother) on November 19, 2004 at 11:06 am. Reply #

Bol­locks to this… I’m going to have to buy HL2 now.

I was wait­ing for my free copy after buy­ing an ATI card… but this is get­ting too much!

Thanks for mak­ing me part with more cash Erik! (

by Chris Owens on November 20, 2004 at 4:28 pm. Reply #

It’s just sim­ply the best game ever made, on any plat­form. Some peo­ple will point to Halo 2, but most PC gamers scoff and laugh at Halo 2, for good rea­son. Half-Life 2 is the game the reminds us jaded PC gamers what made us gamers in the first place.

I posted my impres­sions here:

http://3dgpu.com/archives/2004/11/16/half-life-2-unlocked/

I’ve also uploaded 40 screen­shots for those who don’t have the game, or don’t plan on get­ting it, so you can see the graph­i­cal good­ness. I’ve beat the game on Medium, but I was over­whelmed the first time around, so I plan on going through it again on Hard and take my time and rel­ish the pure bliss this game gives you. Even up to the end, the game holds the awe­some pace, and never lets you go.

by Matt Burris on November 21, 2004 at 8:50 am. Reply #

Don­nie: Half-Life 2 is pretty for­giv­ing, even on low end video cards. The Source engine is quite flex­i­ble, and gives a really solid per­for­mance, even on a GeForce4-level card. How­ever, if you really want to expe­ri­ence the game in full, and don’t want to spend a bun­dle, check into get­ting the new GeForce 6600GT com­ing out any­day now. I’m hop­ing to get one any­day now for review, and should have my expe­ri­ence up on 3dgpu.com — how­ever I’m hear­ing from oth­ers that got it early that is’a solid per­former for the money.

by Matt Burris on November 22, 2004 at 9:04 pm. Reply #

I must agree. As far as FPSs are con­cerned, I always liked Half Life the best. The sec­ond one exceeded all my expetations.

by Bald Eagle on May 25, 2005 at 1:16 am. Reply #