If you’ve followed my other articles about the Half-life series up till now then my reaction to Half-life: Episode 2 might not be such a huge surprise. To quickly retrospect; Half-life is the aged original, primitive and wonky by today’s standards, but no less a cornerstone for the industry. The implicit storytelling, large, interconnected world and seamless narrative were revolutions in design at the time, establishing the franchise’s high pedigree, yet beneath all the narrative kicks, Half-life was a relatively vanilla first person shooter. Half-life 2 is the critically acclaimed band-aid solution; an amalgamation of the same uninteresting first person gameplay mixed with nifty, albeit inconsistent and tacky, distractions. These distractions segment the various chapters of the game (ie. gravity gun for this area, antlion bait for another) making the title feel like a circus of discrepant ideas glued together, still not enough overcome the lethargic gameplay, as made embarrassingly apparent by the early sections of the game. Episode One tore away from the Half-life 2‘s fragmented approach to gameplay, focusing on diversifying set pieces and minor confrontations. Partner Alyx played her part as an individual catalyst for rejigging the former framework. She worked (and still works) better as a narrative piece than an instrument for the gameplay. While breaking away from Half-life 2‘s cheap thrills, Episode One was an unrealized remix of Half-life 2, which is where Episode Two enters.

Episode Two is not a complete realization of Episode One‘s breakaway, it’s maybe 75% of the way towards thrilling but never quite hits the spot. Still, in comparison to Half-life 2, Episode Two represents a marked improvement, a highlight in the series. Think of it as Episode Two as a streamlined version of Half-life 2, set in a completely original environment.

The last point is something that will immediately standout to continuing players. Instead of trawling the European-esque cityscapes of City17, Gordon is now out in the wilderness. This new environment is lovingly crafted with a fine layer of grandiosity characterizing the environment in Valve’s signature style. The new visual aesthetic is teamed with some impressive improvements in graphical fidelity to the Source engine, making for another visually striking entry in the series. The new style is well suited to the episodic format as it’d likely lose flavour if it were drawn out any longer. It’s aided by locales that splinter away from the Alaskan-themed forestry. Gordon is rather preemptively thrown into a series of underground catacombs, shifting gears almost from the journey’s get-go. Once he is reacquainted with the over world, the rest of the game plays out above ground, save for the interior areas of White Forrest and a scattering of small towns, outposts and camps along the way. Each of these pit stops, these changes in location, have two functions. The first is to allow the game to visually chew its food and never become to entrenched in the one aesthetic or colour scheme. Gameplay-wise the environments stake off familiarity and grind, provide their own inherent challenges for play. The caves are claustrophobic playing areas, inhabited by menacing Ant Lion Guards yet balanced by the abundance of sticky glowworms which heal Gordon’s health and light up the glossy interiors. The wilderness areas are large and expansive, allowing for Hunters to give chase or offering enough room for Gordon to drive a car around. Set piece events, such as the final defense of the White Forrest station are suited and designed around their locales. As such the environments appropriate the confrontations, ie. the crux of the game. Already we can observe how the design has been re-centred on the environment and not whatever gimmick at hand.

You see, the gimmicks employed in Half-life 2 now conglomerate to form the start-game toolset for the episodes. Some of them are sacrificed (antlion bait), some reapplied (squad-based gameplay) and others made default (gravity gun) – Valve have streamlined the experience which inevitably forces them to redesign the crux of the the episode’s design; the moment-to-moment gameplay. Meaning that since they now have a decent base to work with and Valve can finally begin to design a decent first person shooter, which Episode Two is the first of.

Additional Readings

Half-life Planet – GameSpy

Half-life 2: Episode One The Story so Far

Kirby’s Dream Land 2

There’s honestly very little to say about Kirby’s Dream Land 2. All you need to know is that it’s a black and white skinned Kirby title using the same template as Kirby’s Adventure. Because of this Kirby’s Dream Land 2 feels more like a sequel to the polished NES classic than the Game Boy original, and manages to individualize itself well by introducing three peripheral characters. Those characters – Rick the Hamster, Kine the Ocean Sunfish and Coo the Owl – cut in and out of the adventure and work as appropriate substitutes for a number of consumable abilities absent from Kirby’s Adventure. Since your animal friends layer on top of whatever ability Kirby has on hand they do add another tier of complexity to the title. Team this with a series of hidden rainbow pieces in each level (which open up an alternative ending) and despite it’s loftier hardware, Kirby’s Dream Land 2 is expanded enough to form a more than competent sequel to Kirby’s Adventure which, considering the polish of Kirby’s Adventure, says a lot. Other familiar tropes of the series are kept in tact such as the wonderfully characterized introductions preluding each world and mix of familiar characters.

The one thing that Dream Land 2 lacks (colour) can be compensated for on the Super Gameboy. Like Pokemon and Donkey Kong, whacking Kirby’s Dream Land 2 into your Super Game Boy will give the game a unique colour scheme different from the default swatches. Supposedly there’s some added spiff elsewhere too, not a bad deal if you prefer playing it on a TV. I played it on both.

Lastly, it’s nice to see Nintendo fix the disparity between the boxart graphic and in-game designs with this title. Kirby’s Dream Land 2 in this regard matches the game wonderfully, instead of appearing like an attempt at realistic abstract.

Half-Life 2: Episode One

If Half-life 2 were put to VHS, then Episode One would be the extended long-play. In a nutshell it’s more of the same gameplay from Half-life 2‘s later half, delivered in a remixed fashion with greater emphasis on set pieces and Alyx who now accompanies you throughout the 5-6 hour experience.

One might think that her part as a co-operative buddy might work in as another gimmick to colour the vanilla base of the series – in the same way that vehicles, ant lion bait and the gravity gun operated in Half-life 2 – unfortunately her presence surprisingly affects the core gameplay very little. You don’t need to babysit her much at all. She rarely dies, always follows you and can hold her own in a gun fight.

So what exactly is it that makes Episode One all that great? As discussed previously, the framework requires some sort of gimmick to make itself interesting, so what is it this time? Well…there isn’t really any prominent tricks, per see. What Valve deliver is a greater emphasis on improved moment-to-moment confrontations, teamed with a remix of some old mechanics from Half-life 2. Fundamentally the game offers very little new material, yet it’s approach to general gameplay is greatly overhauled. In Half-life 2, the game gave you an instrument (antlion bait, vehicle, gravity gun) and then pushes you out into a landscape largely composed of filler – it’s like you have to make your own fun. In Episode One, the wide lose-yourself-in-them landscapes are replaced with tighter quarters which is mostly dominated with more interesting segments of gameplay. Filler is now the glue between the action sequences rather than the other way around. Examples of these sequences may include a scenario where the lights go out while you need to survive an onslaught on zombies, where Alyx covers you as a sniper while you barge on ahead, where you see the gravity gun to grab falling debris there’s even a similar set piece to the cascade resonance from the original Half-life. Compare this to walking/driving around for extended periods of time to stumble upon an enemy camp, shoot a handful of Combines, zombies or Combine zombies and then continue walking around in the middle of nowhere. It’s easy to see in which game the fun lies?

This new found emphasis on moment-to-moment gameplay also serves to break down the chapterized feel of the game. In Half-life 2, each chapter sported a gimmick and stuck in the player’s mind as a series of compartments which the game organized as such. In Episode One, that structure shifts to a more scattered approach, relating to individual moments more so than instruments. This makes the title, although short, feel more endearing and continuous. Unlike Half-life 2 I have a difficult time ordering the events of the game. Valve have in this sense changed to way we consume the game.

Overall though, it can be seen that Episode One should be evaluated on the moment-to-moment action. While it does provide an assortment of interesting sequences which maintain a high enough pace, Episode One flounders in the end with a lame squad shifting exercise and a shortsighted boss battle. Furthermore there’s nothing much in Episode One that wasn’t in Half-life 2, which is disappointing. The best part is ultimately the re-evaluated approach, by spreading emphasis between gimmicks and confrontations, this gives Valve greater design leverage. Episode One does a good job at capitalizing on this, but not enough so to overcome what I believe to be Valve’s persistence to make these games realistic to the point of uninteresting. It’s a more accomplished and organised title, no doubt, but it’s a game in transition.

There’s a saying that won’t quite come to mind, it goes along the lines of “life is about the journey, not the destination” The Half-life series epitomizes this mantra very well. The journey of Half-life can sometimes be as much of a detriment as it is a merit, whatever the case, that’s not the discussion point for this article. Instead I want to investigate how the series crafts a believable journey.

Much of this runs parallel to the stringent realism of the Half-life games. For one, both games run in a completely interconnected world where each time Gordon is given a simple task (reach this area). While he passes into obstacles along the way, his one goal remains the same, emphasizing the bond between one journey and one outcome, rather than a series of missions with a developing goal. The game centralizes this one goal with Gordon reaching civilian camps or Black Mesa foot soldiers to have them rephrase his objective, the means in which to achieve it and how he is closer to reaching that objective.

Half-life‘s world is so remarkable because of it’s coherence. Unlike some games which force a suspension of disbelief, everything that occurs in the Half-life games is logical and realistic of that world. If you infiltrate an abandoned enemy base, only a few lowly soldiers will be present. Those Combine soldiers will likely summon reinforcements (or the noise of gun fire will alert other groups), those reinforcements will take some time to arrive to the scene, will be organized into squads of controlled numbers and swarm the area in respects to other squads. In other games, enemy units just spawn and attack in a structure-less fashion and once they find you they don’t co-ordinate their attack patterns in realistic ways.

The whole game is told exclusively through a first person viewpoint and as mentioned previously relies on clues to prompt the player to investigate context. It’s a completely organic method of story telling. The player learns everything about his surroundings through his own observation and narrative is never made compulsory. By fixing the player into this perspective the game does nothing to detract from the experience and overarching journey.

Furthermore the games don’t distract the player with game-based norms which are outside of Gordon’s view. This is perhaps why there is so much quietness in Half-life, because the game mostly concentrates on what is within Gordon’s environmental sphere and not the players. Gordon can’t hear the ambiance crescendo as he walks into unsuspecting danger.

Ah, this is a rather lax analysis, but I’ll leave it there for now. I still have the two episodes to play so maybe my ideas will come to fruition in the meantime.

Additional Readings

Column: ‘The Interactive Palette’ – Grim Fandango and Diegesis

I honestly haven’t looked terribly hard, but I’m willing to hedge my bets that it’s rather difficult to find some rant-free criticism of the Half-life series. The truth is I didn’t like Half-life or it’s sequel as much as the universal acclaim would have you believe. At times I frankly wanted to punch a hole through the monitor in sheer frustration, but for the most part I was simply underwhelmed. I want to extensively examine my disliking towards the two games, since such writing is a distant departure from what most people have written on the series.

I’ve built up this angst towards PC games over the past decade. While I enjoyed classics like Jazz Jack Rabbit, Doom as well as a pile of Amiga 500 games as a kid, I can’t stand the uninviting PC games culture that has emerged and subsequently the games that appeal to that culture. I’m mainly talking most big-release PC games post-1996. My twin has taken a huge liking to these games in recent years and his contrast on me has brought my angst to the forefront, so I’ve gone on a crusade to try and break down my ignorant – ‘console boy’ – trepidation, to fall in love with the past decade of PC games.

Honest-to-God truth, I really tried this time. I want to like Half-life and Half-life 2, but I can’t as reasons below explain. On the flipside, I loved Quake when playing it for the first time late last year. So here’s my justification, don’t crucify me, please.

NB: I often use the word Half-life to signify both games, otherwise I will specify when required.

Beyond the Aftermath

The one immediate impression I reached on the Half-life series was it’s similarity with Metroid, particularly so with Half-life 2. The Metroid games are brilliant at portraying a sense of desolation and atmosphere. Both Half-life and Metroid achieve this in the same way; they make the player walk into the aftermath of some devastation or some expansive area of recent abandonment. In Half-life the latter comes out through the Black Mesa facility and it’s soulless interiors and hard surfaces, in Half-life 2 the former comes out through the dried out river area which has seen shocking environmental impact. These landscapes are rich in markers that signify emotional impact and allow the player to absorb the full impact of the environment by elongating the moments of low player participation. Half-life 2 in particular achieves this with it’s drawn out environments (again, the dried out water ways of ‘Route Kanal’) which only demand that the player continually drive forward – no Combine soldiers, no antlions – just long stretches of minimalist environment. Both the Metroid and Half-life series excel at these foreplay-esque gameplay sequences which work to intensify the moments when you make first contact with threats.

I personally prefer the way the Metroid games manipulate the player’s emotional state through atmosphere. Of course, each game does this differently.

For instance, Metroid II is a very mute game throughout, each of the confrontations with the 39 Metroids are peaks in excitement, exacerbated by the long stretches of loneliness. Metroid Prime 2 symphonically and in measured frequency of native fauna, controls the game’s atmospheric peaks and dips. The game begin low, peaks, normalizes and then stays constant, occasionally interrupted by confrontations with Space Pirates – rinse and repeat. Overall that constant is much higher, but the peaks are much lower too. Generally speaking, the hills balance out the valleys in either case.

Half-life (both games) on the otherhand never become exciting. The interludes of excitement (usually confrontations with Combine soldiers) rarely feel threatening. There are two reasons for this: the atmosphere and the threat. We can discover how Half-life fails (or is less successful) in this regard by contrasting it with how Metroid succeeds. The Half-life games are (for the most part) void of one critical element that allows the Metroid games to so vividly manipulate atmosphere: sound. The Metroid games use sound – even muteness (which is over exhausted in Half-life) – very effectively. The Half-life games rarely have any background music to set the mood. Occasionally, the music introduces the in-game drama with a crescendo, but not often enough to be considered consistent. The confrontations themselves are (again) mostly unexciting, the dominant selection of enemies are weak fodder, only the Combine foot-soldiers and those evil chimera/licker monsters are exceptions. Even the Combine soldiers are dispersed in limited numbers. This all makes for mostly uneventful gameplay, with no atmospheric crutch.

There are two examples of where the games felt particularly exciting, both which deviate from the aforementioned norms of the main game, concentrating on the aural atmosphere and conflict. The first was in one of the abandoned docks (Half-life 2). Once you make land, a helicopter roars out, the music breaks to one of the game’s few but excellent exhilaration tracks and you’ve got to run-and-gun through a series of freight containers while being attacked from air and land. You then make your way into the compound, clear the area and open the water gates only to be confronted by more guards. The whole sequence plays on the shifting atmosphere, which changes on arrival, switches back once clearing out the guards and changes again once they send reinforcements. It switches between quiet calm and exalted panic wonderfully. In this instance the music and conflict are used collaboratively to shape an enthralling experience.

The second example is Nova Prospekt which I consider the most immerse part of the game. The music is used well throughout, consistently creating an air of atmosphere that accompanies the visual design and layout of the place. The Combine soldiers are a mean threat and the use of antlion baiting and turrets diversify the approaches to conflict. It feels cohesive and is genuinely convincing compared to the relatively tame Ravenholm. Note though, that these two examples are divergences from the bulk of the game.

There are set piece battles and events which bump the excitement up a little, but they’re mostly non-affairs which are over rather quickly (ie. shooting a gunship down with a couple of well placed shots). The two games are like this from start to finish, it’s all foreplay and nothing else. Talk about leaving you hanging.

I’m sure that people would say that this is part of Half-life‘s style, it’s meant to be like that, it contributes to the game’s determinedly realistic approach, but again, it didn’t make for a particularly compelling game. It’s dull, almost nauseatingly vanilla at times.

There are many constituents that form together to make the Half-life series particularly realistic, I enjoy all of these besides the things that contribute to the boredom. I liked the empty environment, the way everything is told in first person, the fact that the game refuses to answer all questions – these are all positive assets. On the other hand I dislike the meager enemy set, lack of rewards for exploration and uneventful gameplay are features that push realism to the point of uninteresting.

First Person Platforming

Most, it not all of the following criticism is leveled exclusively at the original Half-life, the sequel is not immune though.

Considering that all first person shooters since the original Half-life have basically flogged everything that made the original so redefining, I can understand how playing both of these games in a modern context (where Half-life‘s qualities are the norm) probably destroys my appreciation of the games. I suspect that this has also played a large influence over my immersion into the games too, since I’m better acquainted as a player with the techniques Valve would likely pull on me. That is, my awareness of what I’m playing supercedes the desired effects that the developers are trying to have on me through the use of fixed set pieces for narrative – ie. head crab in a vent. The following though can not and will not ever been forgiven.

The platforming is god awful. First person platforming is very difficult to design for and it’s clear that Valve made a huge mess of this, so much so that platforming was barely present in the sequel. The key problem is that the environmental layout wasn’t designed very well to accommodate jumping and tight maneuvers, yet the game constantly demands too much of you and at such a high frequency.

Allow me to garnish with some examples – I need to vent. Two instances come to mind, very vivid. The first is from Half-life, nearing the middle of the game you find a set of stairs leading to a control panel. Two blue trip-wire lasers set to explosives cover the stairs. The first can be easily avoided by crouch walking underneath it, the second one is at step level and must be jumped over. The problem is the slant of the stairs makes it impossible to jump over, Gordon can only hop maybe 20cm, landing on the trip wire. It is possible to make a running jump and successfully bypass the laser, this is very difficult to do since the leeway is incredibly narrow but it’s possible. I achieved this once but unfortunately the game nudge me backwards right into the beam once I landed. P=MV I guess. Eventually I decided that I could reach the top by rubbing up to some boxes to shift them around the room to eventually construct my own makeshift sets of stairs, terribly awkward though.

The second instance, the original Half-life again, occurred when Gordon was on the outside and a tank rolls up, later you make your way into a building, scale the ledge and leap to reach a ladder. The problem is the gap between the ladder and platform is so distant that you’re more than likely to discard the route and head off wandering aimlessly elsewhere. The clipping and detection is awful, finicky at best.

(I really need videos to prove my point)

Progression Clues

One thing you begin to notice while playing Half-life and Half-life 2 is the way the games drops clues to guide you along your way as well as to foster investigation, that is to create player narrative. The environmental layout, use of aesthetics and sound, scripted scenarios are examples of the way Half-life guides the narrative experience of the game. It’s truly a game that marries story and gameplay well.

Driving along on your hovercraft you’ll spot an abandoned house at the corner of your eye, there may be some sort of distinct marking or attribute about the building which will lure you over to discover the aftermath of some event – usually murdered citizens. These areas almost never have any use besides some wayward ammo and health dumps, instead they are designed to create context and they achieve this well.

These devices are all heavily constructed – you were meant to look in that house. The game dictates that as you make your way around the bend, that abandoned house will be right in the corner of the player’s visual frame, and whatever peculiar marking the location has, it’s bound to arise the player’s suspicion. Hence the player will unwilling fall into the designers trap and investigate. It’s genius really.

Two of my recent columns on GameSetWatch have discussed performance management through language, in this case we can see constructed performance through design.

Being a rather dated game, it’s easier to see the strings pulling the player along in the original game. Sometimes they were blindly obvious to the player and prove that the title doesn’t really stand the test of time (more on that later). Half-Life 2 does a much better job at concealing it’s strings, and comes off more convincing.

The con doesn’t always work as effectively as it should and there’s rarely little contingency plan in case it doesn’t. Take for example a sequence nearing the end of Half-life 2. Gordon Freeman and his team of infinitely-spawning civilian friends manage to take down two of the long legged drones with mounted sentries. Once the battle is won it isn’t explicitly clear where to go next as the battle took place on the roof of a building. I spotted one of the civilians firing gunshots into the distance and followed the dead end trail, suspecting that it might steer me in the right direction. After 30 minutes of fluffing about I realized that I had to cross a thin timber framework adjacent to the building where the battle ragged. I would have never suspected that the thin tight walk was actually walkable terrain, moreover it was intended that I would cross it. I fell into these road blocks on frequent occasions for both games – massive headaches ensued.

Vanilla Template + Gimmicks = Success

I’ve developed this fascination with the way games with vanilla templates become interesting through the use functions other than the new abilities gained by the protagonist. Super Mario Bros. 3 or Prince of Persia: Sands of Time are two good examples of games where the protagonist has a fixed, initial skill set and the game world itself is ultimately the catalyst for fun. If either of these games had sucky level design, the games would not be very good – the level design is directly proportional to fun.

Half-life 2 has a vanilla template but instead of using level design to create fun, in employs a consistent use of gimmicks. This includes the two vehicles (the car and hovercraft), the gravity gun (in particular the saw blades in Ravenholm once you acquire the gun), the antlion posse, the citizens who form a squad and lastly the re-engineered gravity gun. Without these tricks, Half-life 2 would be a rather generic shooter.

Design and Emulation Issues

Major criticisms aside, both Half-life games contain a number of small design issues that I quickly want to run through. The first of which might be related to the Steam emulation of the original game, I’m not sure. The original Half-life feels rather finicky and quirky at times – particularly with player movement, clipping and enemy reactions. The worst offender would have to be a glitch I encountered on Xen. I couldn’t defeat the spider boss as it refused to jump down onto the webbed platform allowing me to deliver the coup de grâce, giving entrance to the floor below. After reading about this glitch on GameFAQs and then attempting to jimmy my way around it, I realized that I couldn’t. So I actually couldn’t continue my game – that’s right, I haven’t even finished Half-life. >_<

The second minor quibble relates to ammo and health placements. The combat in Half-life and Half-life 2 is moderate for the most part yet the game can sometimes drown you with supplies before leaving you standard when you most need it. Also the game doesn’t reward exploration besides additional ammo and health packages which often aren’t needed. There’s rarely any benefit in walking off the beaten track besides having to head back on course.

Levels of Appreciation

Lowered the pitchforks and sticks? Oh good. One thing I tried to take into account while playing both these games is that they were very influential for their day, so much so that what they introduced is now standard fair and it’s likely that I would take this for granted in my play throughs. I can’t help that. I’m sure if a gamer of this era went back to play Goldeneye (or any other game for that matter) for the first time then they’d likely be writing the same catalogue of complaints. Still, the merit in sharing this evaluation is worthwhile in assessing the way these games hold up and if they’re worth playing today.

I will be concluding my thoughts on these two games in my next article where I dissect what I perceive to be the series’ most endearing quality; the journey. So stick around till next time, won’t you?

Additional Readings

Eurogamer Xbox Review (good hindsight here)

Retronauts Half-life Podcast (scroll some to find)

Half-Life 2 Intro

“Half-Life 2 was merely a rumor until a strong impression at E3 in May 2003 launched it into high levels of hype, where it won several awards for best in show. It had a release date of September 2003, but was delayed. This pushing back of HL2’s release date came in the wake of the cracking of Valve’s internal network,[51] through a null session connection to Tangis which was hosted in Valve’s network and a subsequent upload of an ASP shell, resulting in the leak of the game’s source code and many other files including maps, models and a playable early version of Half-Life Source and Counter-Strike Source in early September 2003.[52] On October 2, 2003, Valve CEO Gabe Newell publicly explained in the HalfLife2.net forums the events that Valve experienced around the time of the leak, and requested users to track down the perpetrators if possible.

At the trial in November 2006 in Germany, Gembe was sentenced to two years’ probation. In imposing the sentence, the judge took into account such factors as Gembe’s difficult childhood and the fact that he was taking steps to improve his situation.[57]”