Hey it appears the zombies speak backwards

http://www.hlfallout.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=22357

I thought there was something deeply unsettling about the way the zombies scream.

Personally, I don't like the "G-Man and Gordon are one and the same" theory. Probably just because the G-Man actually speaks. I like the idea of Gordon remaining a mute, I don't want to ever hear what he sounds like.

Couple of things I missed in HL2;

The "stalkers", the fully equipped versions of those freaky things in the citadel with no arms, legs or faces. The fully equipped versions sported a nasty laser beam and a sprint that put the Hazard suits sprint to shame.

The artillery combine - theyre shown as well on the "production line" before you get to breen, theyre the small crescent shaped fellas. Fire mean shots over quite a distance.

The ending was a big let down, but still a great game nonetheless. I feel they could have given us a bit more information about the Combine, and maybe some more information about what exactly was going on inside the citadel, but I guess that can wait 'til HL3.


Oh, and what secret ending?

Read his sig... he's a compulsive lyer.

OK, just finished HL2, great, great, great game.
The storyline was way too vague imo, and gave you just enough detail to confuse you and nothing more unless your really willing to dig, which to me is a pain. The ending was definitely a let-down.

I don't get why people are so into the 'who is barney' deal.
Honestly, how many times did you hear "Catch' me later, I'll buy you a beer?", so one of those survived, ok, so what? Get over it.
And I really, really hope Gman isn't Gordon Freeman, that'd be too damn corny.

The backwards zombie scream is awesome, now that's gonna send a chill down my spine every time I hear one.

I kinda already noticed the "God help me" when playing the game. Like I knew it was something along those lines but not exactly.

http://www.angelfire.com/oz/gman/

Ok this has some nice audio files ripped from HL1. Now whats interesting is the stuff the boss says. These are kindy sketchy cause they have been looped.

Not you Alone
You will decieve (might be the other way around because of the loop)
You are the Last
You are man, he's not man, for you he waits, for you
We are their Slaves
I am the last
The Truth you can never know
You all are thieves (again could be reversed due to loop).


Well thats confusing however it does point out that Xen was indeed enslaved and odds are it was the combine who did it. Also Nihilinth has a metal base he floats on and surgey scars on him. The Combine seem to love cybenetics.

After FINALLY finishing the game, here's my take:

Everything is simple, and there is very little need to analyzation. In HL1, you were being tested by G-Man to see if you were fit to work for him. In HL2, you worked for him, the instrument some unknown side of the conflict.

Breen was right. You were not working to save humanity, you were working against it. My guess is that in HL3 you will see an even darker world full of even more insane dimensional rifts. Also, I think that in HL3 you ultimately challenge G-Man.

The story is purposefully vague because it doesn't matter. Gorden isn't supposed to have any idea of whats going on; G-Man has the ability to put him anywhere at anytime, and G-Man will only tell him what he needs to know.

HL3, much like HL2, will have nothing to do with its prequel. I can't imagine anyone saying that there is even the slightest possibility that any character from HL2 is alive, with the exception of maybe Kliner, Barney and Dog, and even then, in the next game they will be much older.

Sorry that I seem so sure of myself, but I didn't want to write "I think" infront of every sentence.

Just remember HL1 and HL2 story line is done by a published aurthor and we have seen evidence of scenes cut from the game (mainly the E3 stuff and some of the Bink Vidoes) cause they didn't make sense story wise. So it is possible that clues and other things are left in the game (the concept artist and writer worked very hard to put in little details in these games). We know that Valve started work on HL2 almost immediatly after HL1 (design phase) so there was already plans laid down that HL1 would set up story elements touched up on in HL2. Then also why would Valve bother with all these little details story wise?

People are still at odds as to whether Gorden came out of the Black Mesa incident as an accident or a the G-man was watching him.... but then why Gorden? and Why Adrian Shepard?

We see in the training missions for OPFOR that the G-man is in the Marine barracks in a special forces room and that Adrian Sheppard has somehow been assigned to a special combat squad.

Gorden was sponsered by Dr. Kliener and was to be the one that would take the speciment into the mass spectrometer. The scientist didn't agree to this yet we see the G-man telling (ordering) the scientist to go ahead with the experiment (muffled voices in a room).

Theres also clues to the ending of HL1 where while the G-man is talking in Xen you can notice strange runes on arcs. Now that big slug thing you see in HL2 also has these runes around its neck on a collar. There is a definite connection to both the HLs but, it has alot to do with the teleporting tech.

Update: Ive also found out that those strange creatures (the humans without arms and legs) are called Stalkers and that in the Leaked version of source, there was a completed version of the stalker (that cyclops thing i mentioned earlier).

The upgraded gravity gun is the most awesome gun in the game. kudos to vavle and their creativity

I'm not sure if the story was pre-determined. I don't expect you'd find clues to the story by looking at the first game. Maybe they made things fit with the first one explicitly, but that's it.

I'm wondering if they release a demo like Half-Life Uplink (i.e. a demo with a completely new level). If so, I hope its Trap Town, that was my favourite out of the videos released, and it's an awful shame that the level wasn't in the finished game. To keep this on topic, the new level may add more clues to the mix.

[edit: Speaking of Half-Life Uplink, I always disregarded it story-wise, because it didn't fit at all with the story of the original game. However, due to story developments in Half-Life 2 and the G-Man's obvious power over time, perhaps that is no longer the case. Perhaps even, Uplink was set after (according to Gordon's own chronology) Half-Life 2.]

Actually there's a very good place for it to have been placed, and may well have been... in HL1, in the beginning of the "Forget about Freeman" chapter before you reach the Lambda Complex, there's an elevator to your left that you don't have access to. If you use noclip to get inside and try to press a button, it tries to load something but fails. The story behind Uplink works pretty well around that part. It's just the "end" of Uplink that needs to tie in somewhere.

The other place I could see it being is when you send the sataillite in space right before the "Apprehension" chapter (when you face those fish monsters). I say that mostly because Uplink "feels" like it fits there with the sattalite stuff, it being nighttime, and the general environment. HL1, however, is pretty flexible in that regard, seeing how I already know that Black Mesa overlaps its own space just from the train ride (yes, I'm a geek -- I actually mapped that part out on paper).

Whatever the case, I would have liked to know what Valve officially had planned for that elevator.

You're probably right Geb. Uplink probably fit there initially, but got cut for the same reasons that so much stuff got cut out of Half-Life 2.

Which reminds me. I remember looking back through a magazine (after the first game came out) that had a preview of Half-Life 1. There was a screenshot of a scientist who had heavily bulked up and his clothes had ripped (Incredible Hulk style), and there was some really odd alien behind him that wasn't in the final game. Whatever that sequence was, I'm glad it was cut, it didn't look like it fit.

Does anyone know what I'm talking about?

Yes Ant. There's actually a place over at Planet Half Life that shows all that stuff:

http://www.planethalflife.com/nostalgia/

Unfortunately the videos don't seem to work anymore

Supposedly if you open up the files in Half Life (and HL:Source) you can find models or monsters and objects not used in the game. One of the models is the original Gorden Model thats really bulky. The only reason for this was it was probably before they tweaked the Q1 engine more (since its clearly a quake1 model).

Is that the one where he looks like a dwarf?

Cool link Geb.

I think I saw the pic on there I was talking about, but it didn't look how I remembered it. The scientist wasn't all muscular (Gawd knows where I got that from), but he looked downright evil. The alien was one of the aliens that made it into the final game, but the texturing was completely different.

The Gimli Freeman (who Eversor is probably refering to) was hilarious.

"Nobody tosses a dwarf!!"



During my brief editing affair with the first Half-Life, I came across a yellow maintenance guy that you could place in your level. There's a screenshot of him on the link that Geb posted.

I believe you can see those blokes relatively early on in the tram level.

Heres a discussion with the leaked script (from either the alpha[anon] or the one from CS:source)

http://www.halflife2.net/forums/showthread.php?t=55932

Ok find the website that contained an awful lot of information of the first game (including the expansions and the PS2:HL decay)


http://website.lineone.net/~wingerden/

That looks good... but I wonder, how much of that is fact(don't be technical about it, you know what I mean) and what is fan fiction?

For example, it mentions something about majestic-12, and the G-Man is referred to as the administrator. I can't remember reading anything about the former, and we know that Dr. Breen is the actual administrator. (took me awhile to figure that out tho'... early on in HL2, I also thought that Breen was the G-Man, but later on realised what had been going on)

Its not completely accurate but it does help tie in all the Half Life games up till HL2 (such as alot of that is from the PS2 half life).

Ya know, something just hit me. Is it possible that Valve is already working on/done with HL3, and that they are simply waiting for the hype from HL2 to die down to start leaking stuff? Sorta pull a Matrix, where they made the last two at once.

...or a LOTR where they filmed all 3?
I wouldn't say that valve is above this...but who knows. Maybe that was the reason for the alleged source leak and all the delays...CONSPIRACY!

.

On a side note, has anyone spoken to a Vortigaunt (sp?) that attatches the gun to your air boat? He's got a lot to say, I don't know if all the Vortigaunts talk this much.

Vortigaunt: You must throw the pheremone grenade thingy into the pit.

Gordon splashes paint all over Vortigaunt's face.

Vortigaunt: ...

Gordon throws grenade thingy.

Vortigaunt: Once again, the Free Man excels at all tasks.

Firestorm, somewhere on the first page you said that you think zombies are natural residents of Xen. I disagree. Haven't you ever shot the headcrab part off a zombie to reveal a human face? The zombies are humans that got their heads sucked on a little too long by a headcrab.



There is no reason you ever have to walk on the beach., gravity gun or not. Scattered around are some 30-foot long planks of wood you can use to build a trail across the sand.

But, really nice read Firestorm. Lots of info you have dredged up. I didn't even notice the slug thing Breen was talking to at the end.. I also thought it was interesting near the end when Breen shows up on a TV thingie and says something like, "Freeman, you sure are good at tearing down and destroying, but can you name even one thing you have created? I thought not."

You see early in Hl1 a human turning into a zombie from one of those headcrabs, zombies definitely aren't from Xen.

http://members.shaw.ca/storage_4/hl2story/

Thats an interesting timeline. Doesnt really prove anything and its all opinions, but its fun to look at.
I dont agree with everything he says, but it does make it easier to look at these games.

Finally, the Combine makes more sense...

Another thing the G-Man mentions at the very end that no one has noticed yet:

"And so as not to give the illusion of free will, I have chosen for you." (Not an exact quote, but damn close)

Does this imply that the G-Man controls everything Gordon (or even everyone) does?

Oh, and Firestorm, for God's sake, Gordon is spelt with an O!!! Not an E!!!! GORDON, NOT GORDEN.

And for the rest of ya, its Nova ProspeKt not ProspeCt. :p

No, it just means he has control of Gordon.

Last time the choice was Work for him, or die.

So, rather then give him the illusion of free choice (example above) hes just going to choose for him.

Ahahaaha...funniest thing I've read in a while.

I just finished. I think the freakiest thing, is that it seemed like all the metal walls and combine structures themselves were- alive, or growing some how. It freaked me out every time I saw them. They just seemed to grow up through houses and things.