Half-Life 2

After being completely hooked on this game to the point where I’m actually ignoring certain aspects of life just to have time to play, I thought I would jot down a quick review here at work to help pass the time. After about a week of playing a couple hours daily after getting home and about 18 hours this past weekend I did manage to beat in my opinion the best FPS game I’ve ever had to endure.

This is saying a lot coming from a big fan of series like Halo and such but the game really was amazing. I think what really blew me away was the attention to detail that was done. Details can really add a whole new dimension of realism to the game play and in Half-Life 2 (HL2) there’s so much going on that isn’t centered around the main character.. It just makes you feel like your actually there.

I had the chance to play both the Xbox and PC versions of HL2 and it was interesting to compare the two. They definitely skimped on some of the detail with the Xbox version and overall it just feels dryer then when playing on the PC. If you have a computer that will run the game I would suggest looking into the PC version. Personally, I ran the game on my P4 3.2 GHz / 1GB DDR2 / Geforce 6800 with the graphics settings cranked up at 1280×1024 and it runs without a hitch.

The story in HL2 was solid and very well done. I’m a huge fan of urban combat myself so blowing away nazi Combine soldiers in the streets of a metropolis was wicked fun, but it seems the game offers an amazing story-backed experience for everyone.
There’s lots of action, puzzle solving, and graphic horror scenes involved in HL2 and it all ties very well into the story. However it’s definitely not a game for the younger ones.

Although the game has plenty of content it seemed to end fairly abruptly. There was a lot left unexplained, this may have been done on purpose however it really caused the ending to be too predictable. This happened in the first Half-Life too.. It’s like the extreme realism suddenly drops off in favor of some kind of fantasy ending to the story. The problem is that the transition doesn’t blend real well due to the lack of information about what’s really going on. Don’t get me wrong, the ending was good it was just sub-par compared to what else I’ve seen in the game.

If you plan to get HL2 definitely look into the first Half-Life. HL2 picks up right where the first left off and to get the full jest of what’s going on you almost need to be familiar with the story. I picked up Half-Life 2: Game of the year edition which includes a re-mastered copy of the original Half-Life along with Counter-Strike: Source for around $40.00 USD…