http://www.planetphillip.com/posts/minerva-metastasis-parts-1-2-3-half-life-2/ 

I still don't have it :)

I only have to buy hl2 twice... and then presumably again when they release ep3 :( 

Having bought the orange box I have an extraneous copy of hl2:ep1. If somebody needs it to play this, or would just like to play the expansion itself, let me know.

/me downloads 

I guess I have that same thing. Someone told me I can give one of my HL2 "licenses" as a gift to another steam account but I don't know how to do it. Any clues? 

You can't give out the hl2 keys until the orange box is officially released next week. Probably for coding issues more than anything else, but it's not doable yet. 

http://support.steampowered.com/cgi-bin/steampowered.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=750&p_created=1189467405&p_sid=PrNrmhNi&p_lva=&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9zb3J0X2J5PSZwX2dyaWRzb3J0PSZwX3Jvd19jbnQ9MyZwX3Byb2RzPSZwX2NhdHM9JnBfcHY9JnBfY3Y9JnBfc2VhcmNoX3R5cGU9YW5zd2Vycy5zZWFyY2hfbmwmcF9wYWdlPTEmcF9zZWFyY2hfdGV4dD1naWZ0&p_li=&p_topview=1 

I get it now. thanks 

it really came together amazingly well. I'm talking inspiringly good.

Not having my old saves and thus wanting to start over from the beginning was definitely a good choice. The way the end wraps up the beginning is infinitely more effective if the last time you played the first map wasn't two years ago. 

I played through it completely (had already played the two first parts though).
The whole episode functions really well, definetely some great work here.
Atmosphere is cool, and the gameplay is pretty diverse considering how long this actually is. 

I hadn't played the first two parts before so did the whole thing at once.

Oh my fucking god.

It took me a few hours to play through because I took my time taking it all in, as well as spending a while stuck at a couple of the puzzles.

He needs a job at Valve, now. 

The releases just keep getting better and better, and Ep3 is just stunning. There were a few total jaw drop moments in this map (usually associated with the visuals) and as people mentioned already the game play is varied and fun throughout. 

Metastasis demonstrates what the Citadel part of HL2 should have been. 

Only nitpick: Some things you were supposed to do with grenades in order to progress were not really explained too good. Spent a good 15 minutes in that big core room thing before I figured it out. 

 

wasn't too hard for me. The SPOILER steam pipe breakout thing /SPOILER took me forever, which was made all the worse by the constant zombines coming up the stairs at me. 

I saw the big ratchetty things with the glowing balls. I shot them. I shot them again with smg grenades, irifle alt fire, then I saved and jumped into one. Nothing happened, so I figured they were just decoration.

Sigh. 

they were the same doohickies as the one you threw the crates and barrels and spanner into earlier while you were still disarmed. It's the classic Valve puzzle: the solution is just like the thing you just did only slightly different. 

grenades into those effin' things in every order I could think, as fast as I could, etc..

yeah there's some feedback missing from this puzzle, so i quit 

I figured it was pretty obvious to anybody with a ten minute memory. :P 

who did those citizen abel maps for q2? and that really cool Aliens type one for the original HL? 

http://zhaymusic.com/

His HL map was "Someplace Else" but I don't think he did anything for Quake2.

http://www.hylobatidae.org/minerva/parallax/someplace-else.html 

Yes, he has a map for Half-Life named Someplace Else. He was also developing Parallax, a longer adventure that was looking promising. However, I guess it is dumped by now. He also has one released for Quake, a base map in it's beta stages - Segmentation Fault: Core Dumped.

Citizen Abel series were by Brendon Chung, however. 

I didn't have a prob with any of the puzzles really, I did think you were supposed to throw grenades in a certain order into those hole things, that had me confused, but after messing around of a bit I realised that after a few grenades in one it died, so just filled them all up.

I really don't mind having to try some stuff to figure out puzzles, so many games just give you the solution right away, for instance I'm playing Zelda Phantom Hourglass these days, and the puzzles would be great if the stupid little bitch-fairy wasn't always giving you the solution 10 seconds after you into it. 

Was excellent. 

the way i figured it out was i threw a barrel into one, then jumped in while it was still flashing yellow.

i died, but i noticed the ball got released. :P