super gravity gun as the end to hl2: let down
super gravity gun as the into to ep1: surprisingly fun.

not sure if it's just because i already understood how it worked by that point in ep1, but it seemed more satisfying to progress from the super gravity gun to normal weapons than the other way around. 

Going from complex gameplay to simple felt wrong - from simple to complex much better.

Simple as in the range of options available. 

~~~ for megaman ~~~

I managed to get through the car sequence and to some buddies. Right there we got ambushed by dropships. Are those invincible? I shot 3 rockets in one and it did not crash. Then I got killed by some clipping bug on the lighthouse (where I had to rocket down a gunship for the 3rd(?) time in the last 30 game minutes.

Then came the part where I must not touch the sand because antlions will spawn (with screen shake and a grumbling sound!). I got through the first part alright but then felt down in that little area where the houses are. A fuckton of antlions spawned and hit me from everywhere while I was trying to cover my ass and run into a building. These things feel like slowdown-mechanisms more than anything (right now). I then hit the button and that stomping thing was enabled. Ok, that is kinda cool, earlier I thought those things were generators. I assumed the beach was safe now and was killed by antlions that spawned as soon as I stepped onto the sand.

That uber-antlion fight was stupid. I ran from it, got bumped into the back, then realised someone else was shooting at it. So I ran closer to the gunner and the thing followed me. Then it got stuck and did not attack me anymore, sheepishly loosing health and finally dying (its animations reminded me of the Droles in Quoth, no way to tell if it is dying right now or not).

Ok, so now I can attract and "command" antlions. Ooook, that's gonna show the enemy. I guess there will be some puzzle where I have to use them. Might be that I played too many "next gen" shooters in the meantime, but those enemies with their glowing headlights and no faces feel really stupid and clichee.

One thing I have to mention is that the cliffside and also that part on the bridge earlier really impressed my vertigo sense (?). That rarely happens in games but always feels kinda cool. Like "Oh my god, I'm gonna fall down!!" I am not sure how much of it is plain uneasyness and unfamiliarity with the controls/movement. Or even dreading loading times (which seems a good thing as it makes me dive into the game some more).

Now I am at that Nova Prospect beach where the enemy built silly short-range bunkers. I mean wtf, are they there as antlion shooting range or what. The guns are very uneffective (or the enemy guys have 5 layers of fat...) so what are they doing there. The antlions proved to be very useless and more of a distraction here. It felt like there were new ones randomly spawned for me. I approached the next loading trigger (I can smell those) and let it rest for now.



The crossbow is a lot less fun than the one in HL1. (The arrow looks like a lava stick?) The projectile is affected by gravity like a czg, you cannot even shoot straight for 100m and it flies very slow too.

Weapon changing takes ages. I should see if there is at least a cvar to make switching instant. Oh, kudos to Valve to keep the good id order of "mouse up -> previous and mouse down -> next". 

Today's session was much more fun. Feels like a FPS now. Open and a bit like Titan Quest though (tree, hill, grass, enemy horde, crates, goto 10). I hope there will be good old close combat, restricted indoors short-story driven gaming later. 

all of it. there wasn't a single part that didn't work for me. but then that probably had something to do with it being the only fps of last decade i actually played so i don't really have anything to compare it with :)

if i HAD to pick one criticism i'd share with you spirit it would be the sand generator type machines. they seemed to have no purpose; i too assumed they would activate some sort of electricity current that would stop any nearby antlions from rising; felt quite miffed when they didn't.

but i get the feeling the crashing/random death bugs you've experienced have dented your enjoyment of it to the point where every negative aspect seems worse than what it would have been :P 

Haha yes. I've been super negative about the game right from the damn speedboat sequence onwards.

Yesterday I went through Nova Prospect. Used godmode at the "defend 4 entrances with 3 turrets that get constantly knocked over" moment after dying 10 times.

A lot of the gameplay was waiting for a shitload of antlions to run and die. I took a turret with me as long as I could, that was kinda nice.

Could someone fill me in on the story. Why was the black guy in that combine thing?

That "plot twist" with the woman in white was totally unpredictable... I expected her to betray "us" right after her first sentences in the game. Bah, silly clichee.

Got crushed by the moving castle... err citadel because I got stuck in debris. And then I spent a long time to stack crates in the high elevator shaft (where dog falls down later) just to fall into the loading screen and not damaging me at all.
Puzzles feel awfully gimmicky, just out of place in a world that tries to hard to seem realistic.

Also the "that old puzzle but this time with this marginal difference" parts (disabling the force fields by taking out the plug, shooting the plug, throwing a grenade around (fucking stupid physics btw)) are bleh.


It crashed again (corrupting the savegame) so I need to build up some motivation. How much of the game is left, I just got the squad?

PS: The one death I described earlie (being levitated and crushed) actually was one of those things that hang on ceilings. There is no visual hint that it grabbed you nor a sound, pfff. 

"Could someone fill me in on the story. Why was the black guy in that combine thing? "

I ... don't want to be insulting here but you've asked several highly obvious questions about the story so far in this thread. Are you watching the cut scenes and listening to what people say? I get the impression that while they're talking, you're over in the corner jumping around or something. 

C'mon it's a great song, can't blame anyone. 

spirit, you seem to be experiencing an inordinate amount of bugs and crashes... my first play through, i think the game crashed once after a particularly long play session (probably due to memory fragmentation, i didn't have much ram in those days) and maybe got stuck once or twice (and then i just noclipped quickly to get unstuck).
it's hard for me to take your posts seriously because it seems like you're just making shit up. :P 

I am using Wine (Windows "emulation" on Linux). So it's not Valve's fault I guess. 

Spirit. You got pwnd by a barnacle. You really suck. 

lol 

The barnacle has a clearly visible tentacle and it does sucking sounds when it grabs you. If you didn't see/hear them, you probably might want to consider not playing HL2 through Wine. 

Stop wining ;) 

i played it on windows and agree with a lot of spirit's comments. 

After C&C 1 and 2, EA has now released Tiberian Sun as freeware. Nice move.

http://www.commandandconquer.com/classic 

No StarCraft 2 Beta for me -.- 

nostalgia.
thanks negke 

recent thread from Gentoo forums:

So it's been a couple of years after Epic promised a Linux port. They still maintain one is coming.

My question is, why TF are they lying? It's not coming and hasn't been coming.

http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-815875.html

The natives are getting restless. 

All 12 of them? :) 

Yeah, the others are busy playing ETQW.

I think the moaning is because it's seen as vapourware. When id says there will be a Linux port, there usually is one, otherwise they don't say so. 

Avp3 SP - how is it? Worth the 27 bucks or wait a few months? 

GG Ubisoft for heralding a new era of fucking with regular customers for zero gain. Ass ass in screed indeed. What's next? requiring people who bought the game to go to the nearest game store to be able to play it there...? 

Finished HL2 the other day. Can't be arsed to write much more. The NPCs were stupid and annoying, saying "sorry" and blocking you all the time. The zickzacking part before that fancy house with the generators felt oh so artificial. Striders seemed only to go down if I shot them, not the NPCs. Elevator up the citadel was kinda cool. Long train ride inside not. Nor the "wait for the elevator and defend that place" sequence. Beardy guy's omnipresence such a silly 1984/THX1138/etc clichee.

Ending is a kick in the balls.

The best moment was when Judith and Eli sat there (after the Doctor escaped, again, what a fucking bad clichee scene...) giving each other bedroom eyes until Eli looked at me with an apologethic "fuck off, i know she is desperate but i am too" face.

Anyways, thanks to Friction for gifting me the game. If anyone wants the Steam account just raise your hand.

The episodes are just more of the like, is that correct? 

You ain't missing anything if you never played HL2. Unless you like b-stories, 5 enemy types, lots of ingame "cutscenes", boats, cars, boats, scripted sequences and an anti-climax ending.