It’s here. It’s finally here. After what seems to have been a lifetime since the original Half Life brought not only fresh ideas to what was becoming a stale genre, but it single handedly transformed PC gaming, and made it “cool” once more. So what on earth can a team so obviously talented as Valve do next? Why they can just take the genre by the gonads once more, and again turn the entire genre, and even PC gaming as a whole, to brand new un-thought of levels.
I’m going to make no apologies whatsoever for a gushing review, as this one is sure to become. Games that manage to develop feelings that Half Life 2 has managed to come only once in a blue moon. I mean, Valve could have oh so easily churned out a sequel to the first Half Life in 18 months, released it to critical acclaim, and by now we could be reviewing the forth outing of Gordon Freeman, as he battles the now half mechanical G-Man in order to free his imprisoned wife! But no, that’s not the Valve way is it.
As you watch the progress bar on your first intrepid steps onto the Steam network (which is as solid as we could have ever hoped for, despite eh vocal minority who have suffered problems), the build up to what your finally about to play hits you. This isn’t the usual feeling of joy as you place new game X into your console/PC. You know your about to make your first steps into a world that will take an obscene numbers of hours out of your life each and every day until completion.
In fact, Steam will be our first talking point in this review. Much has been made of the legal battle between Valve and VU, as the profit for all sales of Half Life 2 purely through the Steam network go straight into Valve’s no doubt bursting coffers. To combat piracy, you’re even required to be able to make good use of an internet connection, even to play the single player mode of Half Life 2. With the numbers of pirated copies Valve have stopped being played thanks to the Steam system, they will no doubt see it as a triumph for developers everywhere. For us gamers however, there is a hefty drawback. It’s not a show-stopping drawback by any means, in fact it’s probably more of an annoyance than anything. But even with my speedy internet connection, when you first attempt to load up Half Life 2, the speed at which the progress bar slowly snakes upwards is quite obscene. In fact, the total time between first ripping off the game package, and making my first intrepid steps into City 17 was hovering around the 90 minute mark. Luckily all future loadings are in a matter of seconds, as you already possess the files needed to play the game. You can even click on the “offline mode” and Steam won't need to connect to the Internet to get the game running.
But less of all that, what about the game itself. The G-Man begins the introduction of this sequel, giving you the first glimpse of the astonishingly high graphical level which is found throughout the game. After this opening sequence, we’re once again treated to a train ride (well, the first games transport of choice was a close cousin of a train!), but not on a simply journey to work. City 17 is your destination. Why your making the trip to this desolate place, you simply don’t know. Valve have made the decision to not utter a single word throughout the opening sequence as to what’s been happening in the years since the events at Black Mesa in the first game. You arrive at your destination, and the first thing you hear/see is the welcoming words/face emitting from a huge television screen, while in your head the year “1984” screams at an irritating level.
City 17 is a city under an oppressive police rule. Everywhere you move, you’re within a few metres of one of the “combine”, tooled up grunts clad in such a way that each looks identical to the next. Step out of line, and you’ll feel a swift kick the back of your legs. In fact, near the beginning one of these grunts laughs as he drops a piece of litter on the floor, and orders you to pick it up and place it in the nearest bin. The feeling of actually being in an overly oppressive atmosphere, where your every move, every thought, is being monitored is actually quite intense.
As you finally make your way through the checkpoints, and out of the train station you first arrived in, you’ll get your first glimpse of city 17. The first thing you’ll spot is the huge tower like building in the near distance, hogging the landscape like some C-list celebrity hogging the cover of whatever magazine is in fashion that week. The city itself is run down. Not in ruins by any stretch of the imagination, but somewhat reminiscent of the shots of Eastern European cities on the news, with the relevant architecture all in place.
The storyline that plays out in such an incredible way (the pacing in particular is quite phenomenal, and a perfect example of just how gripping a video game can be) that it would be extremely unfair for me to give away anymore than I have already. The game length is a talking point among some, taking no more than a weeks worth of gaming to complete even twice. But in this day and age where we’re looking less for quantity, and more for pure quality, Half Life 2 is perhaps the very best example of “bang for your buck” than there ever could be.
Much has been made of the in game physics, and the part they will play throughout the game. It’s worth it, that I’m quite sure of. The Half Life 2 world feels so much more alive than anything we’ve seen before. The way that each and every object throughout the game world reacts just as you’d expect it to if you happen to fire a shot in its direction is quite phenomenal. The gravity gun has been one of the main talking points ever since it was first witnessed in action. And it has to be said, it works surprisingly well. Though you don’t pick the weapon up until you’re a few hours into the game, it feels like you’ve been in possession of it all along. The sheer amount of items you can pick up, and the number of ways you can utilise each and every one of them to your advantage is quite incredible. Again, it’d be quite unfair of me to give away any details in a mere review, but it’s safe to say that that particular weapon itself is one of the games main sellable features.
So, it’s all been worth the wait? I’ve no qualms whatsoever to give a resounding yes to that little question. If anything, it’s entirely dazzling to merely place the first a second Half Life games side by side, just to see how far gaming has progressed in the past few years. In fact, you could even place Half Life 2 alongside Halo 2, and it’d take a fanboy of an extreme nature to proclaim Halo 2 as the better game. Valve have once again managed to transform a genre, and taken pure gaming pleasure to brand new, unthought of heights. The sheer number of moments you’ll be astounded by the graphical touches, by the storyline, by the sheer polished nature of the title, and even the incredible level design is quite astounding. I doubt a game has ever been more deserving of a full 10 score.
Chris Pickering
