I presume that everybody who reads and visits this website has played (And finished?) Half-Life 2. If not, then you should, and I have some help for potential players early next year, but for now…
This week’s poll question is:
What is your favourite chapter from Half-Life 2?
I’m not going to list each chapter and write a brief description. If you need help then try HL Fallout’s excellent guide: Half-Life 2 Chapter Guide.
I haven’t played HL2 since I completed the game not long after it’s release in November 2004. I know other players regularly replay the game, amongst others, but I’ve never replayed ANY game.
I have some holiday and I think it’s time to replay the game. In fact I call upon other players, who like me have never replayed the game, to make some time within the next few weeks and replay it.
I may even write a review for it. I wonder how many games get reviewed nearly 3 years after release! If enough other readers replay it we could have an interesting discussion based on how we feel about it after we have played soooooo many mods.
So, who is with me? Half-Life 2, here I (we) come….
I’ll leave this poll open so you can vote after you have replayed the game.
my favourite chapter is….
Our Benefactors !!! it’s very madness fun!
…joke 😀
Wow… This was such a difficult choice! For a long time Highway 17 was my favourite because I love the melancholy atmosphere of the deserted coast (probably why I love Ico and Shadow of the Colossus so much).
However, recently I’ve also begun to love Nova Prospekt (for its creepy atmosphere, great human-Combine mix of architecture and clever level design reminiscent of the first Half-Life) and Anticitizen One (for its chaotic gunfights and awesome battlefield feeling).
Such a tough decision. I voted for Highway 17 because in the long run I had the most fun exploring all the hidden locations. The only downside is that there is very little interaction with other characters.
Highway 17 if only for the architecture on that viaduct, you simply don’t see that in many games….brilliant stuff.
If I may make a suggestion…While reading through a few forum threads, and older posts on the main site there was once an idea to have a section for models/skins, if Philip found the time (How on earth that might be possible I simply don’t know!…As that hasn’t happened as yet, why not re-play the vanilla HL2 with new combine-elite, a new buggy, new striders, and so on and so on. Why am I suggesting this? Because it is what I’m already doing!
Bright yellow hornet-skinned combines are simply brilliant!
Am I allowed to mention halflife2.filefront.com as a good place to start for the replacement models?
Seasons” greetings one & all!
The end of “Sandtraps” when you’re fighting your way into Nova Prospekt and have to fight the 2 gunships– when all 3 forces meet (freeman = rebellion, the wildlife = antlions, and the combine and its technology) all hell broke loose exponentially. That amazed me the most.
Nova Prospekt.
Yes, Jimbo, that battle was absolute carnage and I loved it! And the eerie silence when you actually break into Nova Prospekt afterwards is all the more chilling as a result.
well, Ravenholm but I’m a big Zombie Fan. Only replayed half life. The only game I replayed about 5 or 6 times was Quake 1.
I gotta vote for chap3 Route Kanal,and chap4 Water Hazard acct of the reminder of the airboat I had fun with in Florida! Also chap7 Hwy 17, acct of the custom dune buggy I used to own (VW powered, no machinegun)! All in all I’ve enjoyed the entire game and will still play it again!! 😉
Thats a hard question, they are all good.
For me its a toss up between, Hwy 17 & Nova Prospect.
Could’ve been Ravenholm, but after a while it is perceptible that it’s kind of short. I voted for Highway 17, thanks to all the driving moments.
Toss up between ravenholm and highway 17.Kinda liked the airbuggy ride too.Too tough a question.
Yes. This is a tough question.
To be honest, I’m going to pick ” Dark Energy.” Sure, not much in the way of gameplay, but NOTHING in the world of gaming (Well, MAYBE something in Deus Ex…) beats that first scene. The scripting, dialogue, voice acting, set pieces, lighting… All of it falls together to create something truly brilliant.
The climax of the game is still pretty sweet gameplay wise. Although it’s just chucking energy balls into a dark fusion reactor powering the Combine’s tunneling entanglement device (As well as the tried and true flipping soldiers around with Mr. Blue Gravity Gun) it still felt exciting and tense. (And even relatively fresh when I first played it)
Other than Dark Energy, I’d say the aforementioned Highway 17. The buggy/scout car is just fun to zip around the coastline with (However the car in HL2: Episode 2 is much better and way more fun. Despite the lack of a weapon, (Except Alyx) it feels so refined and tight and is awesome to race through in.) and there’s a sense of open-ended-ness.
It was fun exploring the houses, shacks, hamlets etc. that dotted the coast. The first time crossing under the bridge near the end of the chapter was amazing for me. The immersion was perfectly executed, the music fitting — And that effect of the train racing over the rails above was awesome.
And yes, Nova Prospekt was great, too. Excellent atmosphere, fun gameplay and a sweet setting.
I must also mention Ravenholm. I’ll be honest and say that I originally hated it — But as a played through it over and over again, it grew on me. Although it didn’t scare me (Fairly generic attempts at being scary) the atmosphere and mood was perfect. The gameplay is fun with myriad of physics objects and your trusty gravity gun. (Let’s not forget the traps!) Also, Father Grigori is one of the best characters ever. I mean, c’mon! An Eastern-European/Russian priest with a huge shotgun and Converse sneakers! What’s not to love?
Finally, there’s Follow Freeman. It combines the awesome street fighting of Anticitizen One with great NPC interaction (IE Barney and others) hectic strider battles, the fight through the museum/bank (AKA the Overwatch Nexus) and the climatic, epic strider and soldier battle just before you enter the Citadel. (Where everyone’s telling you to get to the horse statue) I LOVE music at that part! (HL2_song16.mp3)
Well, I like Point Insertion the best. Great atmosphere.I also like every other pre-disaster level there ever was.
I’m strange that way.
Point Insertion. It took me about an hour just to get through that part because I liked to keep throwing stuff at the metrocops to tick them off…
Plus, where else in that game can you get such rich NPC interaction as “Stop That!!” and “No More >:(“
I voted Waterhazard. The mix of action and beautiful scenery made it my favorite part.
I have always loved Sandtraps and the fight to get into Nova Prospekt. Controlled Chaos at its finest. Totally insane!!!
The combination of Antlions and rebels and the attacking(defending?)Combine, make for some crazy excitement. The mood shifts were game designing at its best. Going from frantic shooting and running for survivals sake and then moving into the quiet of Nova Prospekt with the anticipation of the next attack that could come from anywhere. Pure genius…I will have to go and play it all again. Thanks for the suggestion Phillip!
I find it hard to choose just one of them and will probably think a little longer on it. But I would like to lift my favorites out.
Point Insertion: A great introduction, the G-Man’s speech, the opressive atmosphere the citizen present you and when you step out of the station and into the plaza and you see the citadel looming over the city for the first time. It sets a great atmosphere.
Highway 17: The desolation of the place and being able to explore all those houses along the way, make it very fun with the bridge scene as on of the best moments.
Entangelment: The mixture of architecture, sometimes intense fighting and character interaction, makes this chapter very fun.
Follow Freeman: The destroyed city, fighting with rebels and having to fight striders, this chapter is an intense experience and one of my favorites.
Right now I’m undecided between Follow Freeman and Highway 17
I didn’t favor any area more than another. I kept waiting for the awesomeness to begin…
Highway 17 for its post-apoc atmosphere and sense of quasi freedom.
Well it has to be the whole segment from the moment of exiting Ravenholm mines till the beginning of Nova Prospekt with highlights being the sniper railtrack and wreckyard (intense Half-Lifeish atmosphere), the bridge (fascinating incorporation of architecture into gameplay and one of the best gunship battles) and the WWII like shoreline attack on Nova Prospekt culminating in the battle with two gunships (probably the most difficult battle in the game). Everything about design in this segment was work of art – from daylight process (morning till gloomy dusk) to level structures and sceneries..
I’m quite surprised at the number of people of voted for Highway 17 considering the sparsity of maps and mods based on this theme.
I would have thought it would have been a bit easier to make open spaces and allow the player to use the buggy to drive around killing things etc.
CtoA was one of the few that used the buggy alot.Probably why I enjoyed it so much.
The first and last chapters are my favorites of HL2. Point insertion set the mood of the game SO well. I was completely sucked into the experience. The final chapter with the super gravity gun were fun as heck too.