Half-Life 2

"A cookie cutter shooter that is neither memorale nor fun."

HALF LIFE 2

THE BITTER TRUTH
I'm sorry but in my opinion , what you just read is the truth. This game - half life 2 , is neither fun nor innovative. It does not have an atmosphere like doom 3 , a fun factor like halo , a mayhem factor like time splitters or an epic factor like the original half life. What it does have , is a fancy engine made to distract you from these faults.

WHAT INNOVATION'S?
First of all , 2 things I need to press on. The so called innovation's of having you never see Gordon Freeman [the games scientist hero not ready for combat who carries 10 weapons and kicks the butts of alien soldiers] and the games 'drop you right in and let you know nothing' story. You see in my opinion , this translates as 'wow you don't have cut scenes that's so amazing' [if you don't like cut scenes fair enough but why claim this game is great because they did not put them in?] and 'we are too lazy to tell the story'. What's so special about dropping you right in to this mysterious world [in the confined metropolis of city 17] and not explaining anything?

MEN WITH GAS MASKS
In this game , half life 2 , you play as Gordon now under the service of the g-man [an admittedly cool character]. You arrive at city 17 for no apparent reason to go to doctor Kleiners [a scientist from the original half life] lab for no reason and we learn that Gordon has become almost a messianic Neo-like figure among the downtrodden citizens of city 17 , who have been taken over by the combine , a fairly cool race of rather human people who are attracted to earth from the teleportation rift from half life one. Seemingly in charge of the whole earth all of a sudden for some reason in Dr. Wallace Breen , the administrator of black mesa from half life. The story miserably leads nowhere , as you enter a war against the combine , scale the citadels [a HUGE combine tower that suggests the combine are fast builders or half life 2 is YEARS after the original] and try to stop Breen , only to get an ending that is terrible , I mean its not even cool terrible.

WELL THE ENGINE IS NICE
The game seems to trudge along for longer than it should , with environments thrown at you. City 17 , the canals , an infested town called Raven Holm and some dilapidated highways. You pick up various weapons such as the crowbar and the plasma rifle , meet characters like Father Grigori and Alyx , and get to play with an awesome gravity gun which is the games main 'look at me and not at my faults'. The action , beyond the gravity gun , is simply everything we have seen before. The sound effects are nicely done , the voice acting is kind of poor with cheesy dialogue and the music is god awful. Some great graphics though. And a REMARKABLE job from valve getting the whole game on the Xbox. The graphics are no doom 3 but they convey the ambiance and mood of the levels nicely , with some amazing water effects.

PLAY ME AGAIN , NO , DON'T
There is no Xbox live , ok , don't ask anymore. Its not a fault. This is a single player game. Half life 2 death match would have been REALLY nice though but we always have counterstrike Xbox. And this game is so long and drawn out , I personally doubt you will play it again , never mind pass it pass raven Holm , level 6 - where the game already seems boring.

WHAT TO DO?
Rent it if your a serious shooter fan and enjoy the 2-3 hours of fun I think you will find in this game. Other than that , I'm sorry half life fans but in my opinion , this is a really , really horrible game.

5/10

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 07/31/06