Half-Life2: Episode Two

I agree with this, though. I doubt they'll want to release it later than a year and a half, but I agree there's far too much story to finish "well" in just another 5 hours of game.

My guess is that it might be just closure for this group of characters and the task at hand, but that it'll have a "we've saved our immidiate friend's lives but lets leave the rest of the world for another day" sort of feeling.

I really like the universe. I mean really love the HL universe, so I'd hate to see it completelly end. They really do need to wrap up this story arc though.

 

Yes.

Spoiler

Basically you just go out of town to get to the rocket base and close the super-portal opened by your destruction of the Combine tower in Ep 1. There's an overly long diversion which is a dungeon crawl to save the mortally wounded Alyx, but that's about it. You don't even get the rocket launcher until almost the end of the game.

There's a few teasers for the future story that just come out of left field, a couple of set piece battles, and a few plot twists, but nothing that makes you feel you've progressed the storyline significantly.

I certainly hope Valve can sort out their execution, because I don't believe you can call a third of a game every 18 months on an existing engine and existing art assets as "episodic". Without Portal and TF2 to pad it out I can't see that Ep2 would be so impressive after such a long wait for a short continuation.

 

Of course episodic contect is a failure for Valve, they've already said that themselves I believe. They simply are going to keep naming them episodes because its well known now. Oh well, I don't really care. Episodic content, in theory, is still tremendous. The Sam & Max games for instance show greatness and potential for a series to be done entirely this way. It's just not right for some developers and game types. In a recent Games for Windows this was discussed in a interview with Dave Grossman who is the lead designer for Sam & Max.

I also the mass amounts of "this is not a full" game people to bring a real definition to "full game." You can't call so many games "full games" if length is even part of the equation. Bioshock for instance is amazingly short, (yet a brilliant game) cost $50, and that is a full game. So why can't Ep2 which is not that much shorter than Bioshock and at $30 not be a full game, or even near one? Length = full game is bullshit.

I still strongly believe Ep2 did a ton to advance the Half-Life story. The fact that i opened so many plot twists relative to past games was plenty for me to love that aspect. I love the story telling of the Half-Life series however, especially since HL2. It makes you work a bit instead of going "this and this and this happened" like so many other games. It is the middle game, this is what its suppose to do. Just like the middle book in a series.

 

Spoiler

That's wrong. You opened up that portal in Half-Life 1. The significance of EP2 was that you closed the only portal that the Combine could use to get to earth (the portal was from xen to earth). Now the Combine have no way of sending troops/aid to reinforce the dwindling Combine forces already on earth. In EP3 you head to the Borealis to destroy it because that probably has some form of portal technology that the Combine could use to open another Portal Storm to earth. It is imperative as Eli and G-Man said for Gordon to destroy the Borealis. That is where we are in the Half-Life story.

 

That's why I said:

Spoiler

That's the whole reason for launching the rocket that is the main aim of the game and the climax of Ep2.

 

Spoiler

No that's still incorrect, the portals were not caused by the destruction of the Combine tower in Ep1, see my previous post

 

Playing the new Metastasis maps, the graphics and sound are just awesome!!! Very immersing.

 

Metastasis?

 

Google?

 

Hm, I'll check it out..

 

I finished off Episode 1 and am just starting Episode 2.

Is it me or is it just one long interactive cut scene? A bit harsh maybe but I feel like I am a bit player in a film. It's very linear and seems to be full of those lever pull button push scenarios placed at very uniform places. This is a far cry from, er, Far Cry type game play. This film type game play with limited scope seemed to start with Star Trek Voyager a few years ago, with that I was always having to go somewhere to do something while the game plodded on.

I'm not even doing that much shooting either.

It was nice to get out in the fesh air and not the murky pits of the city but now I am apparently going down a dark mine.

Maybe I am just a miserable old git nowadays.

 

Nah, the first half of Episode 2 pretty well sucks, and you have hardly seen the worst of it yet. The second half rocks though, so keep playing.

 

i thought EP2 was fine. The whole thing.

Spoiler

The cave crawl didnt really bother me at all. Especially enjoyed defending the elevator with the 2 sentries and mines from the swarms of ant lions.

If they'd release the damn things faster then they have been they'd be great.

 

what happened to the forums? i've been getting a "problems...fixing" message for about a week (including today)? yet it seems others have been posting during that time period.

anyway EP2 was a time/value disappointment for me, i'll probably wait a long while or not purchase the next installment. $30 is too much from 9 hours (2 year? wait) compared to the 100's of hours i get from Gothics, Oblivion, GTA's, Two Worlds, Fable, even HL1 and 2.

 

DNS wackiness. don't know what to tell you except that your DNS should fix yourself (DNS is stupid, argh).

 

Thanks for mentioning this folks. It's really, really good. At least as good, as Ep1/Ep2

 

I like the narration--I don't like the fact that you can't double-check what it says or that it's completely non-obvious what to do sometimes.

 

if it works at home but not at work, i guess that means im in 2 zones? or just 2 ISPs?

 

Anyone done the Gnome challenge yet?

http://www.kfj.f2s.com/index.php/2007-10-15-gnome-quest (Warning: contains spoilers to Ep2).

 

I am about halfway through the chopper run with the little frakker. If Valve had had the sense to provide somewhere in the car where the little bleep would sit easily without falling out all the time then this would be less of a chore than it is.