Half-Life²: First Impressions

So, I just played through about an hour and a half of Half-Life², and I thought I'd give you guys (is anyone still reading this?) a bit of a mini-review of what I think of it so far.

First impression: OMFG

That's One Mighty Fun Game, for those of you paying attention.

The experience is absolutely phenomenal. It is absolutely unlike any game I've ever played before, and I mean that. This game places you right in the middle of the action by keeping the camera in first-person perspective through the entirety of your experience. No cutscenes, no pre-rendered videos; just you, the player, experiencing the events as if you were Gordon Freeman, the game's main character.

That isn't to say, however, that the game is light on cinematics and story. It's actually one of the more cinematic games I've played (if not the most cinematic). It simply accomplishes its story-telling in a different manner. One of the strongest story-telling mechanics in the game are the characters you'll meet throughout the game. The game combines revolutionary facial-movement technology, liquid-smooth character animations, and professional voice acting to make for jaw-droppingly life-like secondary characters.

You won't soon forget the first time you meet Alyx, one of the main secondary characters. Valve's developers modeled her to be not-too-hard on the eyes, but that's nothing new in the realm of video games. One need look no farther than Max Payne 2's Mona Sax, or Bloodrayne's main character for examples of "sexy" women in videogames. What those characters lack, however, is the humanity bestowed upon Alyx by the remarkably non-mechanical facial expressions and body language, the intelligent dialogue scripting and A-list voice-acting, and the sure-to-be-revolutionary lip-synching technology, which matches the movements of her mouth to every syllable and consonant she utters flawlessly.

And the gameplay surely isn't lagging behind, any. Once again, absolutely revolutionary. I'll be surprised if the architecture of the gameplay doesn't pioneer entirely new conventions and clichés for nearly every action game that follows it.

Many developers in recent years have used relatively new real-time physics technology to make their games look more realistic. The bodies of just-killed enemies become "rag dolls," left to the forces of gravity to determine how they fall to the ground, as opposed to the pre-scripted death animations which were used before this technology was widely available. Explosions send small "phys-objects" like bricks or pieces of wood flying through the air realistically. No other game to-date, however, of which I am aware, has taken the next step by employing this technology to aid the gameplay, making the experience feel and truly be realistic.

Half-Life² raises the bar, turning nearly everything in the game that's not bolted down (and some things that are) into physically manipulatable objects, and giving the player the ability to pick up these objects, carry them around, and drop or chuck them at will. Unlike in other games, however, this ability isn't just a gimmick. It's an infinitely valuable tool—just as, if not more valuable, than the bullets in your weapon. When you find yourself in a bind that you can't immediately see a way out of, rather than frantically inspecting the walls for any hidden doorways or passages you might have missed, you start looking for cardboard boxes you can stack up to climb over a wall, or flammable barrels you can move to a strategic location and then shoot to blow your way through a barricade. This, combined with incredibly life-like artificial intelligence on the part of your enemies, means that often, the difference between surviving a level and buying the proverbial farm can be more a matter of quick wit and thinking fast on your feet than having surgical precision with your mouse and keyboard—though raw skills like quick reactions and accuracy certainly still come in handy.

I haven't made it horribly deep into the action yet, so that's pretty much all I have to say as of now. I'll be sure to offer a more complete review after I finish the game.