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Geek Culture / Half Life 2

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Kentaree
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Posted: 13th May 2005 21:08
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*Takes out the fire hydrant*

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Megaton Cat
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Posted: 13th May 2005 23:28
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Quote: "Oh, and Russia is Asia."


A chunck of Russia including Moscow is considered Europe.

And yeah HL2 did have bits of Russian everywhere for some reason (like 'factory' and 'danger' ) As I said, City 17 is weird.

It's M-E-G-A-T-O-N. NOT MEGATRON.
DON'T MAKE ME GET THE RABBIT.
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Bio Fox
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Posted: 20th May 2005 11:33
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Yeah, City 17 reminded me of a lot of countries mentioned here. But it was wierd since everyone spoke english and "look" some what american, atleast I thought so. And, has anyone wondered how Dr. Cliner's lab was never found? I mean, the combine could just punch through the boarded up windows... maybe it was so obvious that a secret lab would be there that they didn't check... I dunno.

Rook Takes Pawn Productions... "Now if only we could get that accursed bishop!"
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UnderLord
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Posted: 20th May 2005 14:53
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Quote: "Why the heck does a priest have an endless supply of shotgun ammo in his pocket?!? "


You ask and you shall recieve right? i mean he was a "man of god" hehehe

Quote: "The physics were realistic, if you have any knowlage of balistincs at all you should know that when the bullet enters you it leaves way too fast to move you, in fact people who get shot dont even move an inch unless its under thier own power, usually they, well just collapse."


This is mostly true when i was in the army a M16A4 bullet (5.56) if shot at a moving person they would not feel nor sto prunning for atleast 100meters. Atleast thats the understand i had. Which i think is pretty not real. People would not collaps in real life they would not just fall down they'd most likly stand for a few moments before they hit the ground.

The fact is the physics where good. But in Counter-Strike source they could do with fixing it up a little there....

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Raven
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Posted: 20th May 2005 23:53
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Quote: "A chunck of Russia including Moscow is considered Europe. "


Hope you ment St. Petersburg.

Quote: "This is mostly true when i was in the army a M16A4 bullet (5.56) if shot at a moving person they would not feel nor sto prunning for atleast 100meters. Atleast thats the understand i had. Which i think is pretty not real. People would not collaps in real life they would not just fall down they'd most likly stand for a few moments before they hit the ground. "


The realism of the physics for me isn't the problem.
If the physics were realistic, then a) most people wouldn't believe them, and b) it would cost a lot more processing power.

What I find to be the problem is that everyone talks and claims Half-Life 2 has THE BEST and MOST REALISTIC physics. Almost as if, before Half-Life 2 no games used physics. Hell just go back to the first page and read up on how many people seems to completely forget how many other games have physics.

Physics is not new.
Object Manipulation (GravGun/PickUp) is not new.
Rag-doll is not new.
Level Object Interaction is not new.
Physics Bodies attached to large numbers of objects you might interact with is not new.

In-fact NOTHING about the Half-Life 2 physics is new. They have been done in a way that makes them fun. That's all.

It pisses me off to see people ignoring the real pioneers in to this technology, and making wild claims about what Half-Life 2 can do when there are games out there which do it better.

HL2 has neither the best physics, nor the most realistic physics. They've deliberatly toned down the level of the physics in order to allow you more objects to interact with.

Doom3 doesn't have that, because it uses the physics for calculating exact glass CSG, or where bullets hit the polygons with damage ratios as well as Skeletal Skin calculations to stop unwanted folding.

Yet no-one ever realises the Doom3 physics, because you couldn't grab objects.

Sorry but Half-Life 2 over uses the physics of the engine to take your attention away from the fact that it is in-reality a very very very short game. I know when it came out reviewers built it up to be 20hrs of gameplay.. but the reality was unless you tried to explore absolutely everywhere, you'd get 10 maybe 11hrs out of the game. It's not that the exploration areas were big, but often they'd have something to distract you. Like a coke can to throw at a Combine where he couldn't get you, or doing donuts in your buggy for 20minutes.

The sections that really padded out the game were the vehicle sections. That I dunno about everyone else, but began to bore the [censored] out of me.. they just seemed to drag on FOREVER.

Don't get me wrong the game is fun; but everyone who played it claiming things about it and Valve themselves claiming things about the game... 90% of them were just untrue. That [censored] me off because I was expecting quite alot mroe.

I was expecting awesome realism.
Sorry but when you throw a can at someones head they shouldn't stand still, then turn to hut you.. I wanna see him move as if to say 'WTF was that?!' like you'd expect anyone too.
If you going to claim realism, I want people who've been shot to slide against a wall holding the wound.

Rather than making sure the mesh didn't unrealistically bend causing it to flatten (Mesh Fold), it would've been nice if they'd taken time away from making Alyx lip "I wuv you" in a kinda more realistic way and tried to keep the games realism flowing.

Half-Life 2 just didn't deliver what it promised, or what was expected of it.

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flibX0r
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Posted: 20th May 2005 23:56
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bitch bitch bitch

i quite liked it as a game. period. comma, period.



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Raven
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Posted: 21st May 2005 02:35
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Quote: "bitch bitch bitch

i quite liked it as a game. period. comma, period."


I liked the game too.
Doesn't mean my point isn't true.. sick and tired of the BS surrounding video games.

Why the hell can't we enjoy them for the experience rather than the hype that just isn't true. But then to listen to retards spout off about the hype that isn't true as if somehow because reviewers said something make it written in stone.

Just look at the list of commands and abilities that they have for DBP, while sure you can twist everything to fit what DBP is technically capable of... it doesn't mean it is true in the strictest sense.

People call it marketing, I call it false advertising. Doesn't mean the product is bad or unenjoyable as a result. But I don't see why people once they've actually played it can't accept that it was all just Marketing BS.

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flibX0r
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Posted: 21st May 2005 02:47
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yeah, you've got a point there



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Megaton Cat
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Posted: 21st May 2005 05:13 Edited at: 21st May 2005 06:14
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I found the same flaws with the game as Raven did. Esp the last bit

Quote: "Half-Life 2 just didn't deliver what it promised, or what was expected of it."


And it definatly did not earn the 98% in PC gamer. 98% means 2% away from a PERFECT game. And although HL2 was a fun joyride, it was far from perfect.

EDIT: to Raven
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow

It's M-E-G-A-T-O-N. NOT MEGATRON.
DON'T MAKE ME GET THE RABBIT.
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Megaton Cat
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Posted: 21st May 2005 10:56
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While we're on the topic...



It's M-E-G-A-T-O-N. NOT MEGATRON.
DON'T MAKE ME GET THE RABBIT.
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Raven
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Posted: 22nd May 2005 04:41
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heh

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OSX Using Happy Dude
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Posted: 22nd May 2005 05:59
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At the local PC World, they've still got stacks of HL-2 (and have for weeks now), all of which has been reduced to £19.99

So either its not selling well, or they over-estimated the number of copies they need around here.

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the_winch
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Posted: 22nd May 2005 06:30
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£20 is pretty normal for a pc game released nearly 6 months ago.
Lots of copies could just as easily mean it is selling well, why take up floor space for something which isn't making money?

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OSX Using Happy Dude
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Posted: 22nd May 2005 06:38 Edited at: 22nd May 2005 06:41
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Maybe, but there are two sides full of HL-2 games.
Most computer shops dont reduce software prices after six months - certainly not around here - Rise Of Nations is still full price for example, which makes me think some person ordered too many copies...

If the computer manufacturers really do want to increase the price of games, I do hope magazines improve their game reviews - most of the time they ignore any bugs, graphical problems, slow loading, crashes, not working on some systems etc etc.

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Raven
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Posted: 22nd May 2005 09:08
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Nick they sell it here for £40 still (well £39.99), there are only a few in ever.

There's one of the silver tin versions on the top shelf at GameStation.. been there for like ever. That said it does have a £65 price-tag. So can't say I'm exactly surprised.

The price rise I've seen recently are only with very selective games though. Most games seem to be £30 brand new, but then I buy everything through Game.. delivered to arrive the day it comes out and often get a good £10-15 off.

I agree though, I am getting tired of finding out that a game provides joypad support but ONLY for Logitech or something equally as annoying. I mean I wanted to play Half-Life 2 with my controller, but you can only set source to have joystick look OR move, you can't have both. Can't even set any of the buttons up for firing or anything.. I mean what a [censored] waste of time. Why even bother adding joystick support at all?!

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Jeku
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Posted: 22nd May 2005 17:24
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Quote: "If the computer manufacturers really do want to increase the price of games, I do hope magazines improve their game reviews - most of the time they ignore any bugs, graphical problems, slow loading, crashes, not working on some systems etc etc."


That's because most, if not all, of the magazine reviews you read are from beta copies of the game before the release is finished (so the review is released around the time of the game release). Most likely when the journalist encounters a bug, the developer will swear up and down that said bug was already fixed and won't be in the release version. This of course does not always ring true


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OSX Using Happy Dude
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Posted: 22nd May 2005 17:37
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Quote: "This of course does not always ring true"

I know...

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Mentor
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Posted: 22nd May 2005 19:20 Edited at: 22nd May 2005 23:19
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to the chorus of "good move valve" <sarcasm>

Steam killed Halflife, I was complaining about Steam from the first time I tried (note the tried) to play HL2, it made life seriously BAD on 56k, what a messed up "protection" system, on the Steam forums it was more like open war, lotsa people got severly annoyed over the Steam debacle, I now know (in the real world...not counting online) of four people who are not going to buy the sequel until it`s on budget or they borrow it and use a Steam crack, and six who are not going to buy HL2 or 3 or THEY borrow it and use a steam crack (this is out of 20 gamers I know...hey over 50% of the user base wiped out).

good move Valve, you actualy got people to hate a good game so much that some won`t buy it, most of those that did aren`t buying the sequel, and a whole host of people are planning on waiting for the cracked version so that they don`t have to endure Steam, you actualy got a lot of people who normaly buy all their games to stop paying for them and wait for cracks and sneakernet (DUH!), around here they have mounds of the game left at £19.99 and some of the software shops had "we will not accept HalfLife returns" posters in the windows, (although I think they are breaking the sale of goods act doing that).

as a retailer you have got to have problems with customers when you feel you have resort to dissing a title you want to sell to people before they get in the store , good move Valve, looks like your sales of HalfLife2 are below projections to me, just wait until you try to sell HL3, imo it`s going to bomb bigtime, hope you haven`t spent too much money developing it (nah! course you haven`t, it`s only for getting money out of those scummy customers, you just want the cash, sod the people who pay your wages)...good move Valve

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Megaton Cat
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Posted: 22nd May 2005 22:51 Edited at: 22nd May 2005 22:56
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Quote: "Steam killed Halflife"


Oh hell yeah. Not only does Steam eat up huge memory usage while it runs in the background with HL2 but it makes the lives us people with slow connections a nightmare. I once came home on lunch break with the hopes of spending the next 40min playing my new HL2 but only spent the entire lunch updating steam and/or trying to launch it.

And the nail in the coffin is that because of the Steam on-line registration thing and the email registration, it makes it impossible to trade in at a store.

Thank you Valve for taking my $75 and forcing me to live with a dud.

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Raven
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Posted: 23rd May 2005 02:36
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what's wrong with Steam?
it might be the fact that I'm not on a narrowband connection anymore, but I don't remember having problems before.

you have to update games to play them online, that's just a fact of life. I don't know any game where you can use a different client to the server your trying to connect to.

I have Half-Life 2 (and Half-Life after adding my serial to the database) as Digital Subscriber Editions. No physical case.
Don't have an urge to take it back to the store simply because I completed it, but if I did there is the customer service button to have them wipe it from the database and refund you money (within 13days of purchase).

Personally I think too many people just bitch about Steam because 90% of the rest of the people do.

I've heard people complain about
- Time to activate a product / What takes the time to activate is it downloads the missing sections of the archieves. The bigger the archive (HL2 ~3GB total) then obviously the longer it'll take. Only took a matter of 20-30sec on this machine, hardly something to cry about.
- Memory useage / It uses 12MB, given most Bit Torrent and Messengers take >10MB on thier own.. together that seems relatively memory conservative to me, and anyone who has the ram to run the games really should have enough not to be worries. It only uses .1% processor time, and that's WITH it being active.
- Time to download updates / Apart from the fact you can turn the Auto-Update off so you don't need to for offline play, you would have to spend longer waiting in a line on Fileplanet or 3D Gamer Hell particularly for popular games like Counter-Strike for the patch, and the download would be bigger as it doesn't just replace the files, but also has the installer.
- Having to be online to use Steam / You can set it to off-line mode and only log online when you want to play online.
- Crashes / Never had one, even on my system where the CPU and RAM were corrupting more and more each day.

Most of the whinges that people have about steam is the same of tripe you hear when it first came out. It's 3years old now, and Valve have actually got it working pretty well now.

All of the original complaints were always exaggerated, but what pisses me off the most is that quite typically people cling on to the old BS about a product.

Steam, Windows, AOL, etc... every keeps treating the products and compaies based on the experiences or more often, the stories they've heard about the product.

What so your annoyed you can't take a game back and ripp off the developer because your bored of it now? You can have your complete Valve game library on any computer you log-on to steam with.

Most on a 512k connection will download ready to play in 10minutes, and when your playing the loading time generally only extends from 5min to 15min between areas. Due to the connection speed.
You can always back-up your game Cache for each game, and just take it round a mates on CD/DVD though.

Seriously I've never met such a bunch of whiners since steam came along.

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Ian T
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Posted: 23rd May 2005 03:30
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Quit the personal attacks, you're dragging the thread down

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Megaton Cat
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Posted: 23rd May 2005 03:53 Edited at: 23rd May 2005 03:57
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Quote: "you have to update games to play them online"


That's the thing. I *didn't* want to play online. I wanted to play the single player...

EDIT:

You know Mouse, this thread isn't just to *praise* HL2, it's also for discussing some of it's negative aspects.

It's M-E-G-A-T-O-N. NOT MEGATRON.
DON'T MAKE ME GET THE RABBIT.
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Raven
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Posted: 23rd May 2005 05:32
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Megaton, as I mentioned above. You can set Steam to Off-Line Mode as well as setting programs to only update when you manually start it rather than the default automatic when a new update is ready.

You have a choice. The whole program is defaults mainly because over 500,000 players daily are playing Counter-Strike and Half-Life 2 Deathmatch.. which while the number of HL2 SP players was no doubt more on release, that is a very small peak.

It's just defaulted for the masses. You'd be hard pushed to find a game or peice of software that isn't.

For example Windows Professional comes with the ability to become a network server out-of-the-box. Though as most people will be using it as a client machine, it's obviously disabled as part of the default set-up.

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Megaton Cat
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Posted: 23rd May 2005 07:35
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Sry couldn't resist



It's M-E-G-A-T-O-N. NOT MEGATRON.
DON'T MAKE ME GET THE RABBIT.
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Megaton Cat
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Posted: 23rd May 2005 11:02 Edited at: 23rd May 2005 11:05
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Here's a new one I made.
Who doesn't love Half-life kung-fu???
(note the beaten up Alyx)



It's M-E-G-A-T-O-N. NOT MEGATRON.
DON'T MAKE ME GET THE RABBIT.

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Raven
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Posted: 23rd May 2005 12:24
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heh Gary's mod is pretty awesome.
you know version 8 you can have Bloom and Depth of Field, add some realism to the screenshots.

Someone did some high-poly HDRi of Dog and the Combine soliders for his forums.. they look truely awesome, but while they look real at some points, others you can see it's just a sub-div.

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Ian T
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Posted: 23rd May 2005 13:32
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Quote: "You know Mouse, this thread isn't just to *praise* HL2, it's also for discussing some of it's negative aspects."


Talking about HL2 has nothing to do with personal attacks. Read my post again

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JoshK
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Posted: 23rd May 2005 14:28 Edited at: 23rd May 2005 14:33
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I thought that the game maps were extremely linear. I was expecting a full city to explore, but found that City 17 was reduced to a few blocks and a lot of tunnels.

I also felt mislead with the preview movies, which showed a MUCH more interactive world than the game actually delivered.

As for the story, I prefer games with a minimal story. All you need is a setup so you have an idea of where you are. It's better to leave the details to the player's imagination. For this reason, I thought Doom 3 delivered a much better experience...they just left you alone and let you play. Unreal 2 probably is the worst example of an annoying storyline you have to interact with. I don't want to listen to some character whine about his alcoholism, I just want to freakin' play the game!

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Megaton Cat
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Posted: 23rd May 2005 22:50
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That is what I have been saying since the start if the thread too...

It's M-E-G-A-T-O-N. NOT MEGATRON.
DON'T MAKE ME GET THE RABBIT.
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Ian T
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Posted: 24th May 2005 00:28
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IMHO:

The story was fantastic and I appreciated it, as it helped propel the action. If I was ever getting a bit bored with the action, well, I knew there'd be more of the story at the next stop, and that helped the game feel more solid.

The levels were frustratingly linear. Half-Life 2 is one of the first of the new generation of FPSs, and I imagine it'll be a generation that drops the textured door vs object door method of drawing the player along a linear path, with no excuses or reasons for why he can only go in one direction at any given time. It's a shame HL2 itself did not.

At the end of the day, slicing zombies up in Ravenholm with razor blades remains the most fun thing I've ever done in a shooter game, possibly any game. And I had more 'wow' moments in HL2 than any other game I've played. So I feel the linearity is redeemed

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JoshK
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Posted: 24th May 2005 01:53 Edited at: 24th May 2005 01:57
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What exactly was the plot? A bunch of Orwellian references and a pet headcrab? And then in the end "it was all a dream"? The story feels like it was written by a 7th grader who just read "1984" for school.

Oh god, and then there was "Dog". I hope Valve goes out of business for that.

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Megaton Cat
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Posted: 24th May 2005 01:55
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Just to lighten up the mood:

It's M-E-G-A-T-O-N. NOT MEGATRON.
DON'T MAKE ME GET THE RABBIT.

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David R
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Posted: 24th May 2005 02:27 Edited at: 24th May 2005 02:28
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That's the greatest screen of HL2 I've ever seen. They should use it on the box (of HL2)! That looks like one weird mod by the way.

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Jeku
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Posted: 24th May 2005 04:15
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Am I the only one who *prefers* linear games? I loathe when I come to a fork in a game where I have to make a decision to enter path X or Y, because I know when I finish the game, I'll have missed something, and it will bug me. Better hope I saved my game at the fork, too, because there's no way in hell I'm replaying the entire game when I have 50 other games waiting to be played, just so I can see what happens when I walk down path Y. Argh!

Thing is, when I finish a game, I don't want to touch it ever again! Some games are exceptions, but not most.


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Raven
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Posted: 24th May 2005 04:32
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maybe Jeku. it's not the linear gameplay i object to in Half-Life 2, but the fact that area's themselves are linear.

Something I like is when you have 2-3 options, like in Metal Gear Solid.

You can go way A, B or C.. but they all lead to Point D.
The main difference between each of them is they'll un-cover something else that won't affect the main story, but is a nice little nugget.

Often I will go back and replay most of my games I've played before, rather than starting a new game. I enjoy playing through a game to see new things.. the first time I play it is to simply complete it. Everytime after that I play them to have fun.

I like Beyond Good and Evil alot for this reason. Because the world itself is open with so much to do that isn't related to the main story. Most of it is just a distraction.. but that's what make it fun, because while the main game is only a matter of 6-7hrs long (once you've completed it once), doing all of the sub-quests, finding lock combinations, photoing the animals, getting 1st and Records in the races, etc.. it all extends the gameplay to the same length as when you first played it.

I think I just like being able to make my own mind up on where to go next rather than having to do what the level developer created for me.

See I wanted to change this in the first few games I ever worked on.. my input and design helped to create more dynamic environments.

TR4 for example, just adds a more dynamic are that you move between. Wasn't a very good implimentation tbh, because you were often left clueless where to go next. Ya have to start somewhere though right? heh

TR6 the designed leaped forward. The first few levels (parts I actually worked on) give you several options to achieve the same goal. You could go through the whole game and not even notice these additional routes or special areas. So someone like you Jeku, would feel "ahh a job well done", but for those who explored around and looked at thier options, would've seen several possible solutions to a given problem.

The game often was unaware of the other options, and it relied on thier own actions and personality to a degree to what they did to get in to St. Aicards, or how they'd get in-to the Louvre.

In this sense it fit so many more gamers in the design aspect.
Just a pitty the release engine sucked..

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JoshK
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Posted: 24th May 2005 04:43 Edited at: 24th May 2005 04:43
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It's just that Valve promised a whole city to explore, but gave us maps that are of an extremely confined style. A long narrow hallway with buildings peeking out behind fences does not make a city.

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Raven
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Posted: 24th May 2005 04:46
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you know it differed from the alpha design of the game.
where City 17 was the hub of the game.. each section of the game was chapter and you'd go back to C17 to the resistance HQ, get a mission then back out.

you could choose the order you played the game, so rather than one big story.. lots of little one. wonder why they changed it.

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Megaton Cat
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Posted: 24th May 2005 05:03
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Because that idea appealed to alot of people and Valve changed it out of fear of actually making a good game.

It's M-E-G-A-T-O-N. NOT MEGATRON.
DON'T MAKE ME GET THE RABBIT.
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OSX Using Happy Dude
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Posted: 24th May 2005 05:47
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Meow...

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Raven
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Posted: 24th May 2005 07:16
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hehe
Anyone else kinda wish they hadn't shown like the entire game in huge videos?

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Osiris
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Posted: 24th May 2005 13:25 Edited at: 24th May 2005 13:26
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@JoshK
Quote: "What exactly was the plot? A bunch of Orwellian references and a pet headcrab? And then in the end "it was all a dream"? The story feels like it was written by a 7th grader who just read "1984" for school."


Ok jerk K, the plot was this, you were dropped off in a world infested with baddies and you need to get rid of them, you were brought there by the Gman, are you following so far or do I need to go a little slower?, anywho the baddies are the combine wierd aliens with advanced tech, they basicly destroyed the human race, turning most if not all of the remaining ones into rebels, now if that wasnt bad enough you have head crabs and zombie things to worry about as well, that big citidel is eating away at the city and there are tons more of them all around eating away at the planet, at the end, you stop the head baddie and save the day, oh and there was only about five minutes of audio on that pet headcrab so lay off, it was a great game, the story line gave the game more life than it would without it and how in the hell did you get, that crap you said about it was all a dream, you must of been smoking or very stupid to think that, the end is that the Gman brought you there and now hes putting you back so you can come back later in time.

So next time you want to say bad things about a game dont smoke while you are playing it, if you did play it that is.

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Eric T
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Posted: 24th May 2005 13:45
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My opinion (not that it matters):

Half-life 2 was a great single player game. I loved every aspect of it, and in the end, I felt more fullfilled with it then I did with Doom 3. I also don't have a problem at all with steam, I had bought my online copy 2 weeks prior to the release, and at 1:01am my time, I was already downloading the last files, and IIRC (I was a bit tipsy, and I had to leave early in the morning, so my memory is not serving me well), by 1:16am I was playing. The only problem I had that night was on MY end, my wireless connection (which has always been sh*t).

Now, I played through HL2 in about 2 days or so. I was totally engrossed in its world, and its atmosphere. I loved the game so.

I don't have the game installed anymore none the less. I have CS: Source still though. I play CS: Source almost everyday. CS: S alone was worth the purchase of HL2 (I got the silver pack online). I also play through HL1: Source. It is quite enjoyable, as it blends the best of HL1 with some good of the new.

I also got the whole back catalog of Steam games. And, when it comes out, Day of Defeat: Source.

So was I pleased with the $59.99 I spent? Your damn right I was. It's the best $60 I've spent in a long time. I'm getting more than my moneys worth of gameplay from it. I especially felt I got alot when, after they insisted they weren't going to do DM, HL2DM was released.

I say, If not only for HL2, what about all the damned extras it came with? Surely they are worth the money (CS: Source the most to me...).

Eric

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Posted: 24th May 2005 17:05
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Osiris - Do make an attempted at being polite.

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Megaton Cat
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Posted: 25th May 2005 01:24
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CS: Source is simply the old Counter-Strike with pretty water effects and physics. I hardly see how it's "worth alone the the purchase of HL2".

I do not know anyone who'd pay $65 for a 6 year old game.

It's M-E-G-A-T-O-N. NOT MEGATRON.
DON'T MAKE ME GET THE RABBIT.
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Eric T
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Posted: 25th May 2005 01:56 Edited at: 25th May 2005 01:57
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Quote: " CS: Source is simply the old Counter-Strike with pretty water effects and physics. I hardly see how it's "worth alone the the purchase of HL2".
"


To each his own. What I see though is new physics, much better built maps (anyone played the new de_Inferno that was released the other day, this map is freaking beautiful), less 1337haxx0rs (especially with the latest VAC update, makes things great), did I mention the gun physics are improved greatly? I did, well, I want to emphasise that point. It also runs a hell of a lot better on Net wise then CS original ever did.

Besides, lets not forget the amount of HL2 mods too come that will be worth playing...

Edit: BTW, I wouldn't pay 65$ for CS: Source, I'd pay 50$. for the amount of time that I play the game, thats more than worth it.

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Raven
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Posted: 25th May 2005 11:24
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I'd strongly disagree.. Counter-Strike : Source doesn't make it worth the cost.

Sorry but, while there might be a huge selection of maps for Counter-Strike; I can asy that personally I only ever see people playing dust, italy and office;

Aztec, Compound and Port are played too.. but it's very hard to find many servers with them. What annoys me more is you see like 20 different maps in constant circulation but they're just version with minor differences of the main 3 being played.

Another thing that truely pisses me off about it, is 90% of all servers online are full of bots. These are the only servers I find playable, given the rest have like 20-50 players which seem to be where everyone gathers around.. in order to even run those levels at a reasonable rate you have to have a sodding top-notch system.

Even my AMD64 3200+ w/Geforce 6600GT show considerable lag in these maps, not to mention they ping at ridiculous rates.. something close to 130-240, given most maps with 8-16 players will generall ping at 8-30 it's just ridiculous.

Sorry but despite the physics and shaders, there is NOTHING different about the game what-so-ever. Oh wow so you can shoot down some terrain things like cabinates or barrels to kill an opponent.

Whoop-de-freaking-do. You can't pick up anything and build defensive bunkers, there's no new mods of gameplay.. hell all there is right now is Bomb and Hostage maps.

Sorry but given this mod is no different gameplay wise than the free original, which I was never particularly impressed with I don't understand how anyone in thier right mind can say that CS:S is worth buying HL2. In my opinion it should've been free too, but it's just another way of forcing players to buy the more expensive HL2 packages.

HL:S is interesting, but seriously.. they didn't even replace any models or textures. Some shadows, enhanced glow on the lighting, and the water is a shader now. Aside from that the game is just the original recompiled, and is really isn't that much different from when they changed from Won to Steam.

About the only part of the HL2 package that I've enjoyed so-far getting it as a 'bonus' has been Counter Strike Condition Zero Deleted Scenes. CSCZ sucked, it was just god aweful... Bot CS, in a Quake 3 fashion; how the hell was THAT the awesome all-new SP experience that Valve was claiming?

Really the whole gameplay of the entire Valve range is getting stale and boring. Half-Life 2 was good, for a while.. but once it was over it didn't really make me want to play it again. I didn't feel I missed anything, I didn't feel that somehow the experience would be different replaying it. It was just so linear and constricting which wasn't what Valve promised or was leading anyone to believe.

Honestly, I think that while it does feel like good value. I still don't understand what the facination is that keeps people playing the same god damn maps for the past 6years in Counter-Strike.

On the whole, I just expected more from the whole 'source' update.
No doubt they'll still omit vehicles from Day of Defeat, making it some weak-ass clone.

I'd love to know why people keep playing Counter-Strike, Unreal Tournament 2004, and other games.. with just the same old maps.
Surely it gets as boring to everyone else as it does for me?

I mean I play CS for a few days every month, and that's more than enough.. after that I'm bored of how people play, and the sheer repetitive nature of the game.

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Osiris
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Posted: 25th May 2005 11:31 Edited at: 25th May 2005 11:32
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Hmmm, why dont you shut he hell up! No one wants your poeish oppinion.

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Eric T
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Posted: 25th May 2005 12:52
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@Osiris: Shut up you retard. We can't even have a logical discussion when we have idiots like you around...

@Raven: CS: S comes with every HL2 package (even the cheapest one, yes). Though I'm going to have the pull the "I'm a CS: Source fanboy" card on this round. I do play it alot, thus my opinion always tends to lead too it. I know 2 people who bought HL2 only for CS, and have not even played HL2 (One of my best friends and my brother).

There are a few people fanboyish as me

I normally don't play the normal maps unless its a slow day, I usually play the mod maps. There is one server I found (69.61.67.170:27015) that plays all Glass maps. Those are the ones based on glass floors or something and the goal is to make the other players kill themselves by breaking the glass. The server I normally play on (70.84.183.11:27015) does the full CAL rotation. It does 30 - 45 minutes on each map. There are some half decent players on there (I go by Eric T on it). That server is usually full though (and it does have a swear filter, the only reason I don't bitch about it is because it keeps the n00bs who go "You F****** l000zer n0000b" out. Makes the playing experience much more enjoyable.

Eric

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Jeku
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Posted: 25th May 2005 14:04
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Quote: "Osiris - Do make an attempted at being polite."


Don't say you weren't warned.

Back on topic:

Valve never claimed that they were completely redoing HL for HL:S. Plus Raven, didn't you say you bought two copies of HL2? Can't be that bad


--[R.O.B.O.I. and FireTris Coming Soon]--
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Raven
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Posted: 25th May 2005 14:57
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Yeah, I can understand why there are fans of CS. Something I am confused to is... why?

It would be good to know given we have something similar to Counter-Strike in the pipeline, so knowing what ppl love about the game will help me and the guys to understand how we can cash in on it.
Given what I like, what my brother likes, and what Andy likes are all the same thing but very different to what people who play CS like. heh

we all prefer Perfect Dark / Goldeneye's multiplayer madness.

Quote: "Valve never claimed that they were completely redoing HL for HL:S."


Valve never said anything past, they were making Half-Life : Source. It might've been arrogant to assume this ment they were remaking it from the ground up for the Source Engine than just recompiling it, I still think they should've put more effort in.

If only to replace the weapons, and models. I dunno, I just expected more.

Like with Half-Life 2 itself. From what they said about it.. I expected more. This wasn't to say it was a fun and awesome game, just that it wasn't what I expected; and it's fair to say that I'm not alone in feeling like they didn't deliver what they promised, just what they thought they could get away with.

After all they spent an entire extra year on the game. Given almost everything was shown off the previous year at E3 in those mammoth videos they showed.. I mean that was another thing that annoyed me, they spoilt almost the entire game.

No news for 5years then BAM! let's show off the game to everyone completely long before they buy it.

It's not Half-Life 2 that annoys me, but Valve and the fanboys.
That's what really piss me off and make me want to scream at them about how it isn't the best game and it isn't the best engine.

Yes it was fun, and an awesome sequel which didn't over-shadowed the original, but more added to it's context. So I loved it, but when I hear 'Oh HL2 is da m0st aw3som3st gam3 3v0r caus3 lik3 it has physics!'.. i just want to grab a baseball bat and not stop hitting them until they're a little pastey goo you see the headcrabs eating.

Half-Life 2 wasn't innovative, the first game to do ANYTHING it did, the most engrossing game ever, the most story-drive game ever, the most freeform game ever, the best game ever, what was promised, or any of the other fanboy BS.

It was fun. As was Doom 3, as was Unreal 2, as was many other games. They're very good sequels to the previous games, creating some good atmosphere's and stories through different graphics methods and styles. None of them are better are being Modded than the other.. None can claim to be the most technically advanced or more beautiful engines over the others.

As while we see one side of the engine with the release developer games, we see a completely different side when Mod developers get thier hands on them.

I mean sorry but.. Doom 3 and ET:QW just couldn't look more different if they tried. They both look incredible in thier own respects.

No doubt I can see HL2 becomming the fan mod's favourite just as HL was, but when you think about it.. Doom3 and Unreal2 have become what thier predecessors were, what the professional modders use.

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