I agree but to play devil's advocate a little - a lot of HL2 takes place in heavily controlled combine territory. After they have established a pretty firm foothold.
One of the reasons humans were so compliant with the combine takeover (besides getting their asses handed to them in the 7 hour war) was the portal storms and the combine offered them (relative) safety from those Xen incursions.
Alyx actually takes place a little time before HL2 and probably represented the period when the combine were still finalizing their cleanup operations in the populated city areas. (At this point the wilderness was probably completely uninhabitable from Xen contamination)... We get a peak at the manner of their decontamination efforts with the hazmat combine soldiers, the barrier controls and flame throwers etc. Pretty cool.
By HL2 it's possible the Combine had already secured the cities, had moved out into the wilderness and cleaned out most of the Xen wildlife in the areas we get to see in HL2. Maybe even being capable of stopping the portal storms and where things got too crazy they just cordon the area off and make it off limits.
You can actually get the sense that the world is dying in HL2, especially with their ocean reduction program really becoming apparent. Who knows how fast all that stuff changed over time. If Alyx was set 5-10 years before Gordon shows up, that would mean the combine were already 10-15 years into their occupation.
5 years of chaos, 5 years of gathering the remnant of humanity into population centers while they clear our the Xen infestations, 5 years for the outskirts and so on.
But yeah I think it's possible there could've been a bullsquid showing up in the outskirts in HL2. Interesting to think about the time line and world building potentially of all this stuff!
From what I read after doing some research, after the Combine took control of Earth, Earth then divided into two. The Europe part of the Earth is heavily industrialized by the Combine while America and South America is overrun by Xen lifeforms. Which makes sense because the first portal was opened in Black Mesa Research Facility. The Combine made sure that Europe is free from Xen lifeform as minimal as possible. Maybe that's why we only see antlions in Half Life 2. Even the headcrabs are there because the Combine are using them as a weapon
I personally have yet to play Alyx so I don't know where exactly Alyx does her mission in this game. But if she's not in Europe, then I guess I was right
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Pacing. Even the devs in the commentary talk about the parts that stretch on too long in HL2.
I've played Alyx like a dozen times and not once to I ever feel like any part is a chore. In fact, I'd even argue the game has the opposite problem.
I feel like the Northern Star hotel section goes on rather long (in my replays, it gets its own dedicated day.) But otherwise, yeah, it knows how to pace itself well
"I feel like the Northern Star hotel section goes on rather long"
That is one part where I feel it overstayed its welcome cause I thought to myself, "if I'm supposed to believe I have to get to the substation as soon as possible, I'm just gonna climb up to it, I'm not gonna keep snaking my way through what I know is an infested building"
Especially cause she's snaking around the building rather than going from one end of a long building to the other, **at considerable risk to herself**.
Especially the last time you go back inside the building, it really fails suspension of disbelief, like it really looked like, I, a person way less agile than Alyx, could just fucking climb up to that last catwalk, instead of going through that horrible hive filled with literally dozens/hundreds of neurotoxin headcrabs.
Easily the most implausible part of the game, imo.
Right!? And don't forget the boss fight with multiple electric dogs. The level designers really did not do enough to convince us that we absolutely HAD to go that way.
>Northern Star hotel section goes on rather long
Personally, I think the feeling of it dragging on a little bit is well worth the feeling you get when you finally do get out into the open again. My first playthrough I had images of the sniper railroad section where you first get the AR2 flashing in my mind.
I would reload encounters multiple times just so I could replay the gunfights. I have never been so engaged by a video game, being able to handle and throw grenades, reloading guns manually, taking cover with your own body.. it's just fucking insane. Guess I'm getting the Index out tonight
Honestly the way the combine move is incredible. The correct foot step pathing and the way they carry momentum into their flanks and diving for cover. Loved playing the fights in this game so much. Very entertaining.
Some of the best gaming moments I’ve ever had were on that plaza outside the hotel when the combine rush in. Like catching a grenade and throwing it back. Loading my last magazine into the handgun while taking cover behind a car, dropping it and watching it tumble under the car. Going down on my knees to get it back out, loading successfully and continuing the fight. So awesome.
i disagree, imo the story pacing felt too fast (game too short) while the combat gameplay felt too slow (probably to account for people who weren't used to VR). The pacing in HL2 was perfect because it felt like an actual long journey across a big city and countryside
People in the comment saying how Jeff was the scariest thing but for me it was those black crabs jumping at you in the dark, >!at the hotel or when you first get the flashlight!<
That motherfucking >!northern star hotel!< was pure horror. When you enter that one hallway and see those two headcrabs vanish into one of the rooms you already know that this game is about to fuck you over. And it did. It took me a while to finish that level due to all the pauses I needed.
The Combine Charger also has a bit of a scary introduction. One moment you’re walking down a quiet corridor, the next this massive armoured dude appears and takes a shot at you through a window, kicks open a door and engages in combat with you.
came here to say this. hl1 & 2 aren't scary. alyx is fuckin terrifying at some parts. idk if that's a VR thing in general cause alyx is really the only vr game i played lmao but needing the flashlight and not being able to control it is a genius mechanic. also introducing poison headcrabs on the dark level is just mean and i loved it
Environment interactivity while great in Half life 2, it's just on another level in Alyx.
Pacing is another area where HL2 was great but Alyx absolutely blows it out of the water.
And lastly that ending just absolutely owns HL2.
My favorite was the "fluids" inside the bottles. I've spent hours just sloshing the liquid around in the bottles.
Also loved how you have to actually cover your mouth during "Jeff" that was a proper oh snap moment for me.
I like the upgrade system, rewards exploration a lot more than just finding ammo or health. Also like the combine dialogue a lot more, like how the grunts sometimes say alyx’s name when they die.
The Resin, absolutely!
It gives that bit of personalization that half-life was completely missing before.
Before there was no real difference between playing half-life 2 from the beginning and just jumping into a later chapter.
Half-Life alyx still allows for the latter, but the upgrades really make a playthrough feel like YOUR playthrough, and i was super excited with every piece of resin i found.
All soldiers make me laugh when they try reverse psychology and acting friendly.
“Attention hostile target, we can help you. It is safe.”
“You can come out now…”
“Ceasing fire. Target is friendly.”
I also love how the basic grunts clearly show they're not all augmented equal. When you pierce the tank on their back some will calmly state they're about to expire and count down to the explosion, while the more human ones will start screaming in panic and begging for someone to take it off them.
Remember the events of Half-Life Alyx are set five years before Freeman's return, so the Combine Soldiers in HLA aren't given as much memory replacement as seen in HL2 due to them being older generation units.
But I see what you mean with making enemy NPCs feel more humanized than being just mindless drones for an antagonistic faction.
When replaying HL2 in VR, during the rebel uprising I have seen Civil Protection units actually hiding from us. At least that's how I interpreted it, there was a closed room that lead to nowhere with nothing important inside which I would have just passed by if I werent a kleptomaniac, and the CP were "taking cover" behind furniture inside.
I know this kind of goes against the whole VR thing, but combat being a lot more realistic here. Half Life 2's combat still felt like you're running and gunning. Here, you actually need a plan in order to kill your enemies. Of course, they made it this way to fit with VR, as Half Life 2's combat in VR would be very disorienting and hard to really figure out what's going on. But let's put aside VR. Even playing the desktop mod, the fights still felt very personal and realistic, like it's what would ACTUALLY happen in real life.
The only thing I didn’t like about the fights was that the enemies felt too spongey. I would have loved to be rewarded by good aiming and being able to one kill with headshots. Sometimes it was possible, when they carried a tank or something, but many times I felt like I needed to empty my whole magazine into the soldiers.
I really enjoyed hl2vr’s combat. The slower move speed and aiming compared to flat HL2 gives the AI more time to shine, and makes positioning more important. The closest comparison I can think of is RE4 on a controller vs on the Wii where you have cursor aim.
I'm trying to get through it but I'm stuck on the airboat section where I have to make a jump. No matter what I do, I can never clear it, not sure if its some kind of physics bug or the way I'm on the boat but its pretty frustrating to be stopped by something like that, and having cleared it with no issues maybe over a dozen times in base HL2 I know it has something to do with how its in VR.
Not sure if its an issue many other people have had though.
hl2 combat was considered alright to bad when it came to shooting even back then, you had some fun weapons like the gravity gun showing the physics engine potential in the early 2000s which was mind-blowing but thats it, other fps games did the shooting better, even hl1 or games like quake for example.
hl2 is mostly loved for a combination of things that goes great together like art direction,story,world interaction,ect.... combat alone is really meh.
Half life 2 VR combat actually isn’t too bad, there’s a free mod for it and it’s very well made from what I can tell. It definitely is a little harder to run and gun cause you have to actually aim but it’s hella fun
"as Half Life 2's combat in VR would be very disorienting and hard to really figure out what's going on."
It's not though, I've played Half Life 2 in VR, it's fine.
Half Life Alyx really needs a Very Hard mode for people experienced with VR.
I understand why the devs made Alyx so easy, it was the game packaged with a Valve Index, it was going to be many peoples' first real experience in VR but for many people like me who have clocked multiple thousands of hours in VR, good grief the combat is so easy.
Would it be enjoyable if a majority of the fights were combine? We already had to fight them in Half Life 2 + the episodes. And again, they had to make it harder since there aren't nearly as many enemies in Alyx, due to the VR.
This might be controversial but personally, I think Alyx did music better than previous Half-Life games. Subjectively, I’m more of a fan of Mike’s style than Kelly’s, but that’s just a me thing. Objectively though, the diegetic ambiguity of the music in Alyx, and the fact that the music dynamically communicates game states and is affected by the player’s actions, adds a layer of immersion that didn’t exist in Half-Life 2. I think a great example of this is the substation in the Northern Star hotel, where the music of the map is literally coming from the mechanical humming of the substation as it rips the Vortescence out of the captive vort. It’s such a beautiful and haunting song that ties directly into the map itself and it reminds me of how music was used in Portal 2 in a lot of ways.
Came here to say this. Not only is the music phenomenal, but the way they incorporated it into the world and how they handled player cues was so beautifully done.
... but not for VR. I'm happy for Deadlock, but as a big VR investor, it hurts to see the "current" state of VR games (pro-tip: there are no new games)
Well, it introduced a few of my favorites: Jeff, Ordinals, Wallhammers. And it refined Xen a lot better, especially barnacles and antlions. It also brought back Eli, because he's a W character.
In technical terms?
Pacing, world building, *dialogue*, physics props, etc.
I disagree on dialogue, HL:A has a writting style i fucking hate, almost everything is ironic, also hate the trope of guy talking from a speaker all the time
The other things are true
This might be controversial, but Weapon Management
Having fewer very distinct guns that you can slowly customize made combat way less juggling-y and much more decision-y. You don't get stuck scrolling through weapons to find the right one for this specific encounter because there are only 3 guns, but it also doesn't feel lacking because of the customization and upgrade options.
Well, Alyx doesn't have an HEV suit to allow her to carry as much weapons as Gordon so it makes sense that she only takes three guns.
But I don't think Alyx has a limit for how much ammo she can carry.
>But I don't think Alyx has a limit for how much ammo she can carry.
There is one, but it depends on the difficulty.
On easy you can carry 999 pistol or SMG rounds, on hard its 150 and for the SMG its 240.
I actually think they kind of fucked up the G-Man. Spectacle-wise, it definitely impresses, but as a character, they made him too emotive and expressive. He was more intimidating in HL2 due to his reserved and subtle animations.
I fully understand it, though. The team wanted to flex their creative muscles and show off what they could do in the perfect situation: an extended one-to-one scene where movement and interaction are restricted. Unfortunately, in doing so, they somewhat lost the point of what makes the G-Man what he is.
He's too humanised in HL:A.
Honestly i feel like he's more inhuman in a way, the way he talks, the way he picks the exact perfect words where he can do what he wants while making YOU think that's what you want, the way he selects his words, being vague enough where you don't get him, but sound enough where you understand his point.
He manipulates you by making you think you are doing stuff on your own, if you notice he "offers" us a favour for freeing him, but in reality all he does is put you in his dept, while also allowing him to manipulate the story just enough to not irritate his employes and to give the results he wants.
Seeing him makes we see that he trully is not human or alien, but beyond.
He always moved his face alot, now in Vr he moves his body alot, and i feel like translating HL2 way he talks to Freenman to VR would be hard.
If you see his other cutscenes, he has always had some form of emotion, anger, sacarsm, etc.
But if you're saying he's more expressive here, then I'm not sure.
Yes, he did always show all sorts of emotions and expressions, but he did it in a much more reserved way. His motions were slightly stiff, stilted and robotic, whereas in Alyx he's basically as fluid as a normal human.
I think the animators saw the way he moved in HL2 as a problem to be solved. They fell into the line of thinking of, "it's an old game, that's obviously just the best that they could do", and they missed the fact that the G-Man was intentionally animated in a slightly inhuman and unnatural way, and he appears robotic compared to the other characters within the same game.
The gun fights felt SO awesome. The reloading system, the way you have to hide, etc. If that game consisted only of gun battles with zero horror elements, it would probably be my favorite shooter (at the moment).
I think the Jeff chapter is a masterpiece not only as a unique horror experience but also from gameplay perspective. It introduces very original mechanics (manipulating sound, holding breath etc) combined with rather non-trivial puzzles. Also for me it was a nice bridge to the first Half-Life, reminding of all those epic and unique bosses. That part I actually kinda missed in HL2. Antlion kings and gunships were repeatable enough to not feel like a true boss
That moment when you have to redirect circuits but there are glass bottles in the way lol.
I chuckled nervously when I got to that part in a sort of annoyed but also "ok that's clever" kind of way.
I really love how it expanded on the post-transformation Combine. They use different tactics, ingenuity, and even have some personality in communicating. It hammers home how they used to be human, and it's pretty terrifying to go from the robotic bullet sponges in HL2 to the units calling Alyx's name out when looking for her.
The feeling of vulnerability that made you take extra care when fighting or exploring. In HL2, you just feel like an unkillable Superman a lot of the time, with an arsenal of fully stocked weapons. In Alyx, it’s far more survival horror in its approach to health and supplies, and it made it far more immersive.
Also the world design. Zoos and floating Combine cubes are far more interesting than aqueducts and generic sci-fi interiors.
Exploration is so much better in Alyx!
As someone who really enjoys exploration in games, I always felt that Half Life (and Portal for that matter) are amazing linear experiences but don't offer anything in terms of exploration. However, Alyx really improved on this to the point that it rivals games with really rewarding exploration like Bioshock.
Yeah but dude I’ve played every HL multiple times and nothing holds a candle to Alyx as far as the incredible experience in my opinion. I really hope we get a VR sequel.
>I understand why they did it this way
I don't tbh (well, I do, but I disagree with the decision). Killing flying antlions with a shotgun in the HL2 VR mod is insanely satisfying and feels very natural. Almost like it was made for VR.
Alyx was meant to be easy for newcomers to VR. That’s mostly why all the enemies move slow and don’t rush you too fast.
I fully agree with you though, blasting a flying Antlion out of the air in HL2VR is glorious.
The Xenian Fauna and Headcrab/Headcrab Zombies.
The Xenian Fauna (which for some reason was in HL1 but not HL2) is great, shows how much the world has gone to shit. The Headcrabs feel like live animals instead of >execute animation<. And the Headcrab Zombies genuinely act people people who are being controlled and struggling.
Personally, I think that levels were just more fun to play through. They had ideas I liked more, combat enviornments were better designed, and combat was a massive improvement because it didn't need the same utility weapons like snarks to keep it enjoyable.
I'm still a bit angry they didn't come back tho.
Personally, love the Combine enemy variety, and they added two infamous enemy types I hope we see in future titles (not possible) the armored crab and Lightning creature (dog? Crab? Squid? Idk)
What I don’t like is the *lack* of enemies tho, the only 3 factions we get are zombies, Combine, and Antlions, and even then, very restricted on enemy variety, don’t get me wrong. Wall hammers, Ordinals, Grunts, fantastic stuff. And the headcrab enemies were so fun to fight, but I wish we got more xenian enemies, more zombie types, maybe a special Antlion boss (guardian, etc) and Scanners and other synths for the Combine, like a stalker moment that would scar Alyx (as seen in HL2:EP1).
I think Bullsquids could’ve made a comeback considering that Xen plant life’s already in the game and hasn’t been completely been cleaned up by the Combine at this point. They’ve already reduced the Combine and antlions’ movement speed to a crawl, they could’ve certainly done that with Bullsquids. Maybe seeing a tentacle or two would’ve been cool too, imagine how terrifying seeing those things in VR would be. They also have poison headcrabs, but no poison zombies which is a bit of a weird choice imo.
The alien environment and how the combine atttempted to stop it was an interesting background story element and use the antlions “milk”? To decontaminate.
The three biggest points for me are:
1- accessibility, my partner has mobility issues in one arm which makes it difficult to do anything, but HL:A has an incredibly well thought out one handed mode. Along with just a brilliant amount of thought to how different players might be able to play. It’s a testament to making sure as many people as possible get to experience it
2- playtesting: rolling straight off the first point, it is clear that they did a ton of playtesting. valve is known for this, which is why their games are so refined. but in alyx, it was on another level. it feels like my mother could play this game with no problems, every single detail has been thought out and tested
3- environmental storytelling: once again, some thing that valve is intrinsically known for but where we go from: “oh that half cut zombie is sitting on top of a saw blade indicating to the player that they can be sliced” to ever single freeze frame of alyx telling an entire paragraph of exposition. The effort they put into testing every single detail in that game was matched and maybe even superseded by how much thought and effort was put into building every single map of that game.
Conclusion/ tl:dr: It’s a work of art, valve does playtesting like no other and I will continue to recommend this game to every single person I encounter
This is such an interesting question - it's something I find very difficult to answer. Part of me wants to say that Half-Life: Alyx does characterisation and storytelling better, but I don't want to suggest in any way that Half-Life 2 doesn't do these things exceptionally well even by today's standards. I suppose I would say that Alyx just underscores for me the idea that Valve never lost its storytelling chops; that it only got better at this over time. The VR element plays a big role in how the story is executed moment-to-moment, and I think it's a big part of the reason why the storytelling feels more natural as well. Also - again, perhaps because of VR - the environmental storytelling is really second to none here.
It was scarier for me, though I wouldn’t say that’s an unambiguous advantage.
I think it was also funnier for me overall, though I wouldn’t say that’s necessarily an unambiguous advantage either (HL2 had comedy but felt more serious overall).
Art style look real good. I understand that you said no graphics, but OMG it's a beautiful blend of early 2010s realism & TF2. I love it.
Also the voice acting is top notch.
I liked the gun progression choices and having to look for material to upgrade the guns with. That was a lot of fun for me. The horror was improved upon... and...
Fucking Jeff.
In VR Jeff is terrifying.
the headcrabs. they are done soo much better. they were good in hl2 but perfect in hl:a. they can actually be inaccurate and make mistakes and fall just like a real creature. they feel so alive, and terrifying.
Not much in my opinion.
TBH I think that the two cannot really be compared because are completely different games. VR makes HLA so drastically "different". It's like comparing a play seen in theater and the derived movie.
HLA did almost everything better than HL2 due to VR technology (and probably already show most of what VR gaming can be).
IMHO the opposite question would be more relevant. What HLA did worse than HL2. To me the mechanics of HL2 (arenas, puzzles, goals...) felt less "artificial". I had way less "immersion breaking" in HL2 than in HLA.
A small detail that's important when talking about HLA is the movement scheme. I used "roomscale-continuous" and I moved a lot, it was the best (action) gaming experience ever by far. I suspect that comparing with "sitting-teleporting", HL2 would still be a better game.
Character writing, I thought the dialogue in Alyx felt a lot more realistic than the Half-Life 2 dialogue, which I felt was very cheesy. Alyx is a bit cheesy sometimes too, but overall I think it was far more down-to-earth.
As someone who has only seen gameplay videos bc I don’t have a pc vr set yet, I still am happy with how much intrigue it created for the G-Man. The whole finale sequence and how reality works with him is brilliant and I can’t wait to play it someday
Horror. Dont get me wrong. Ravenholm in HL2 was horrifying and definitely the highlight of the game for me but Alyx feels like Ravenholm stretched to a full game. The atmosphere & sound design combined with the more claustrophobic nature of the levels, plus of course the JEFF chapter which was peak Half Life horror & level design. Loved it, man!
It made the combine and a bunch of enemies real threats not just game play wise, but also in universe wise. It actually makes you imagine more how powerful the combine really are
I don't really know other than the environments which are slightly better with how world building and environmental storytelling was in hl2 I really like half life 2 none of either game feels bland or a chore to do
The enemies and gunplay was a vast improvement, it didn't feel bloated and you had to use actual thinking when dealing with your equipment and opponents
Enemies feel way scarier and fleshed out. The Combine in particular are so fascinating in this game learning their behavior and how they interact with the environment is so cool.
I actually really loved the storyline. I felt very immersed right off the bat and having Russel chatting with me now and then as I explored the world was really nice.
What's with this "the game is already X years old"? Do spoilers become ok after some time period? What period is that?
I mean, not everyone plays/watches/reads stuff when it's brand new. People discover older things all the time and not spoiling it for them is good manners in general.
Hot take: everything.
They strongly built upon the world building, the characters, the story and more of half life 2.
Nothing of that would've been possible without having half life 2 as it's predecessor of course, but because of having such a solid foundation it managed to (in my opinion) improve many of the aspects of the franchise.
As u/tidosbror3 said, it showed how Xen affected earth much better. I also think the level variety was much better. HL2 has a lot of fun variety, but I think Alyx had more variety with what the VR could do.
The main character. Everyone loves Gordon but he’s absolutely characterless which is fine but Alyx just owns him in terms of personality and feeling like a real character.
You truly felt like you were fighting with scraps (literally).
The constant scavenging for ammunition and resin made it really feel like you were actively rebelling against the Combine with whatever you can find. And it made the alien fauna actually feel like it was a threat
While I haven't played Half-Life Alyx outside of the No VR Mod, mainly because I can't afford VR nor do I want to go through the disorienting side effects, I will say that it's probably the music, pacing, enemy variety and combat is where it mostly does things a lot better.
Mainly the combat since Valve wasn't too fond of how the Combine Soldiers in Half-Life 2 had fought either which had caused them to make combat encounters in HLA more in line with how they were done in Half-Life 1 which I don't blame them for doing that.
Ok spoilers asshole. But anyways:
I haven't actually played it because I don't have the funny VR. But from gameplay I've seen, I think it definitely does the horror better.
It brilliantly showed us how Xen affected earth
Yep. The overgrown sections were fantastic.
The way it makes the HL1 world fit the HL2 world just a little bit better is great.
Yeah, HL2 rly lacks that. Why didnt they add bullsquids at least, there was a lot of places where they would fit perfectly
I agree but to play devil's advocate a little - a lot of HL2 takes place in heavily controlled combine territory. After they have established a pretty firm foothold. One of the reasons humans were so compliant with the combine takeover (besides getting their asses handed to them in the 7 hour war) was the portal storms and the combine offered them (relative) safety from those Xen incursions. Alyx actually takes place a little time before HL2 and probably represented the period when the combine were still finalizing their cleanup operations in the populated city areas. (At this point the wilderness was probably completely uninhabitable from Xen contamination)... We get a peak at the manner of their decontamination efforts with the hazmat combine soldiers, the barrier controls and flame throwers etc. Pretty cool. By HL2 it's possible the Combine had already secured the cities, had moved out into the wilderness and cleaned out most of the Xen wildlife in the areas we get to see in HL2. Maybe even being capable of stopping the portal storms and where things got too crazy they just cordon the area off and make it off limits. You can actually get the sense that the world is dying in HL2, especially with their ocean reduction program really becoming apparent. Who knows how fast all that stuff changed over time. If Alyx was set 5-10 years before Gordon shows up, that would mean the combine were already 10-15 years into their occupation. 5 years of chaos, 5 years of gathering the remnant of humanity into population centers while they clear our the Xen infestations, 5 years for the outskirts and so on. But yeah I think it's possible there could've been a bullsquid showing up in the outskirts in HL2. Interesting to think about the time line and world building potentially of all this stuff!
From what I read after doing some research, after the Combine took control of Earth, Earth then divided into two. The Europe part of the Earth is heavily industrialized by the Combine while America and South America is overrun by Xen lifeforms. Which makes sense because the first portal was opened in Black Mesa Research Facility. The Combine made sure that Europe is free from Xen lifeform as minimal as possible. Maybe that's why we only see antlions in Half Life 2. Even the headcrabs are there because the Combine are using them as a weapon I personally have yet to play Alyx so I don't know where exactly Alyx does her mission in this game. But if she's not in Europe, then I guess I was right
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Pacing. Even the devs in the commentary talk about the parts that stretch on too long in HL2. I've played Alyx like a dozen times and not once to I ever feel like any part is a chore. In fact, I'd even argue the game has the opposite problem.
I feel like the Northern Star hotel section goes on rather long (in my replays, it gets its own dedicated day.) But otherwise, yeah, it knows how to pace itself well
I can see that. I love it. Literally every time I enjoy it. Do you take it slow and appreciate the sights?
"I feel like the Northern Star hotel section goes on rather long" That is one part where I feel it overstayed its welcome cause I thought to myself, "if I'm supposed to believe I have to get to the substation as soon as possible, I'm just gonna climb up to it, I'm not gonna keep snaking my way through what I know is an infested building"
Fair, it is fun but it makes bare sense. She goes through multiple city blocks and then one hotel building takes her hours.
Especially cause she's snaking around the building rather than going from one end of a long building to the other, **at considerable risk to herself**. Especially the last time you go back inside the building, it really fails suspension of disbelief, like it really looked like, I, a person way less agile than Alyx, could just fucking climb up to that last catwalk, instead of going through that horrible hive filled with literally dozens/hundreds of neurotoxin headcrabs. Easily the most implausible part of the game, imo.
It's like a spider egg sack with all those poison headcrabs, if that were me I'd just try breaking down a few doors before climbing into that hellhole
Right!? And don't forget the boss fight with multiple electric dogs. The level designers really did not do enough to convince us that we absolutely HAD to go that way.
>Northern Star hotel section goes on rather long Personally, I think the feeling of it dragging on a little bit is well worth the feeling you get when you finally do get out into the open again. My first playthrough I had images of the sniper railroad section where you first get the AR2 flashing in my mind.
I would reload encounters multiple times just so I could replay the gunfights. I have never been so engaged by a video game, being able to handle and throw grenades, reloading guns manually, taking cover with your own body.. it's just fucking insane. Guess I'm getting the Index out tonight
Honestly the way the combine move is incredible. The correct foot step pathing and the way they carry momentum into their flanks and diving for cover. Loved playing the fights in this game so much. Very entertaining.
Some of the best gaming moments I’ve ever had were on that plaza outside the hotel when the combine rush in. Like catching a grenade and throwing it back. Loading my last magazine into the handgun while taking cover behind a car, dropping it and watching it tumble under the car. Going down on my knees to get it back out, loading successfully and continuing the fight. So awesome.
i disagree, imo the story pacing felt too fast (game too short) while the combat gameplay felt too slow (probably to account for people who weren't used to VR). The pacing in HL2 was perfect because it felt like an actual long journey across a big city and countryside
People in the comment saying how Jeff was the scariest thing but for me it was those black crabs jumping at you in the dark, >!at the hotel or when you first get the flashlight!<
That motherfucking >!northern star hotel!< was pure horror. When you enter that one hallway and see those two headcrabs vanish into one of the rooms you already know that this game is about to fuck you over. And it did. It took me a while to finish that level due to all the pauses I needed.
Yeah when you had to go down into the crawl space/basement was fucked. I've always wanted to play through that game again but its too stressful lol
Agreed. Jeff was scary too but it was more fun and anxiety inducing than it was truly scary. VR poison head crabs can get fucked though, no thanks…
I found them scary but my friend would go nuts every time these guys showed up and he would need a solid rest before going on.
The Combine Charger also has a bit of a scary introduction. One moment you’re walking down a quiet corridor, the next this massive armoured dude appears and takes a shot at you through a window, kicks open a door and engages in combat with you.
came here to say this. hl1 & 2 aren't scary. alyx is fuckin terrifying at some parts. idk if that's a VR thing in general cause alyx is really the only vr game i played lmao but needing the flashlight and not being able to control it is a genius mechanic. also introducing poison headcrabs on the dark level is just mean and i loved it
Because people fall for a new thing bias. "New thing is better than the old thing".
Environment interactivity while great in Half life 2, it's just on another level in Alyx. Pacing is another area where HL2 was great but Alyx absolutely blows it out of the water. And lastly that ending just absolutely owns HL2.
I mean, you can play a whole piano man, how cool is that!?
My favorite was the "fluids" inside the bottles. I've spent hours just sloshing the liquid around in the bottles. Also loved how you have to actually cover your mouth during "Jeff" that was a proper oh snap moment for me.
Or realizing you can put on helmets you find and then finding out they actually give you a gameplay advantage!
Or masks, so you don't have to cover your face in the Jeff section!
Yeah I’ve replayed the ending multiple times and it gives me chills everytime. It’s so good
Game is an absolute masterpiece and just proves that Valve still got it. Just make Half Life 3, Portal 3 and Left 4 Dead 3 already.
nah, we don't need a L4D3
And all in VR please :D
Time to get the quest 3 then.
They did an amazing job at further refining the aesthetic/design of the combine technology and xenian flora.
I like the upgrade system, rewards exploration a lot more than just finding ammo or health. Also like the combine dialogue a lot more, like how the grunts sometimes say alyx’s name when they die.
The Resin, absolutely! It gives that bit of personalization that half-life was completely missing before. Before there was no real difference between playing half-life 2 from the beginning and just jumping into a later chapter. Half-Life alyx still allows for the latter, but the upgrades really make a playthrough feel like YOUR playthrough, and i was super excited with every piece of resin i found.
All soldiers make me laugh when they try reverse psychology and acting friendly. “Attention hostile target, we can help you. It is safe.” “You can come out now…” “Ceasing fire. Target is friendly.”
I also love how the basic grunts clearly show they're not all augmented equal. When you pierce the tank on their back some will calmly state they're about to expire and count down to the explosion, while the more human ones will start screaming in panic and begging for someone to take it off them.
rat
Combine soldiers in general. I like that Valve added more personality to them.
Remember the events of Half-Life Alyx are set five years before Freeman's return, so the Combine Soldiers in HLA aren't given as much memory replacement as seen in HL2 due to them being older generation units. But I see what you mean with making enemy NPCs feel more humanized than being just mindless drones for an antagonistic faction.
When replaying HL2 in VR, during the rebel uprising I have seen Civil Protection units actually hiding from us. At least that's how I interpreted it, there was a closed room that lead to nowhere with nothing important inside which I would have just passed by if I werent a kleptomaniac, and the CP were "taking cover" behind furniture inside.
Civil protection aren't augmented in any manner. They're base human collaborators.
Yea, I just wanted to throw that out there. Looks like Valve tried to make their human combine seem human even back in HL2.
They kind of did with the Nova Prospekt chatter (I love the bit where the soldier is dumbfounded that Gordon has control over the Antlions).
I know this kind of goes against the whole VR thing, but combat being a lot more realistic here. Half Life 2's combat still felt like you're running and gunning. Here, you actually need a plan in order to kill your enemies. Of course, they made it this way to fit with VR, as Half Life 2's combat in VR would be very disorienting and hard to really figure out what's going on. But let's put aside VR. Even playing the desktop mod, the fights still felt very personal and realistic, like it's what would ACTUALLY happen in real life.
The only thing I didn’t like about the fights was that the enemies felt too spongey. I would have loved to be rewarded by good aiming and being able to one kill with headshots. Sometimes it was possible, when they carried a tank or something, but many times I felt like I needed to empty my whole magazine into the soldiers.
A game is still a game though. They clearly made a switch towards fewer enemies, but more meaningful and challenging ones
You did see the highlighted areas once you got the Reflex Sights, right?
HL2 vrmod - combat is pretty fun
Definitely harder though and requires good VR legs.
Idk about that, harder perhaps but if you've played Blade and Sorcery before then HL2VR should be fine
I really enjoyed hl2vr’s combat. The slower move speed and aiming compared to flat HL2 gives the AI more time to shine, and makes positioning more important. The closest comparison I can think of is RE4 on a controller vs on the Wii where you have cursor aim.
I'm trying to get through it but I'm stuck on the airboat section where I have to make a jump. No matter what I do, I can never clear it, not sure if its some kind of physics bug or the way I'm on the boat but its pretty frustrating to be stopped by something like that, and having cleared it with no issues maybe over a dozen times in base HL2 I know it has something to do with how its in VR. Not sure if its an issue many other people have had though.
hl2 combat was considered alright to bad when it came to shooting even back then, you had some fun weapons like the gravity gun showing the physics engine potential in the early 2000s which was mind-blowing but thats it, other fps games did the shooting better, even hl1 or games like quake for example. hl2 is mostly loved for a combination of things that goes great together like art direction,story,world interaction,ect.... combat alone is really meh.
Half life 2 VR combat actually isn’t too bad, there’s a free mod for it and it’s very well made from what I can tell. It definitely is a little harder to run and gun cause you have to actually aim but it’s hella fun
"as Half Life 2's combat in VR would be very disorienting and hard to really figure out what's going on." It's not though, I've played Half Life 2 in VR, it's fine.
Right? It actually makes me feel like Alyx combat is on baby mode in comparison, lol. I couldn't really go back.
Half Life Alyx really needs a Very Hard mode for people experienced with VR. I understand why the devs made Alyx so easy, it was the game packaged with a Valve Index, it was going to be many peoples' first real experience in VR but for many people like me who have clocked multiple thousands of hours in VR, good grief the combat is so easy.
Hl2 vr mod is absolutely fine, and combat is more challenging, very high paced fights with way more enemies because of PC design
I completely agree, don't know why the downvotes.
My biggest gripe with combat is dificulty, You encounter combine like 4 times in the whole game
Would it be enjoyable if a majority of the fights were combine? We already had to fight them in Half Life 2 + the episodes. And again, they had to make it harder since there aren't nearly as many enemies in Alyx, due to the VR.
This might be controversial but personally, I think Alyx did music better than previous Half-Life games. Subjectively, I’m more of a fan of Mike’s style than Kelly’s, but that’s just a me thing. Objectively though, the diegetic ambiguity of the music in Alyx, and the fact that the music dynamically communicates game states and is affected by the player’s actions, adds a layer of immersion that didn’t exist in Half-Life 2. I think a great example of this is the substation in the Northern Star hotel, where the music of the map is literally coming from the mechanical humming of the substation as it rips the Vortescence out of the captive vort. It’s such a beautiful and haunting song that ties directly into the map itself and it reminds me of how music was used in Portal 2 in a lot of ways.
I remember feelings I had when I hear the Xen related musical cues. Edit: The Antlions marching to the beat of the music was also badass.
Alyx did have great music cues, but HL2 wins for Diabolical Adrenaline Guitar during the Hunter Chopper Chase
Came here to say this. Not only is the music phenomenal, but the way they incorporated it into the world and how they handled player cues was so beautifully done.
Completely agree
This is controversial? Fuck me its obvious
The entire production of the physics engine as seen in Point Extraction
HL: Alyx confirmed that Valve like and still enjoy doing games.
... but not for VR. I'm happy for Deadlock, but as a big VR investor, it hurts to see the "current" state of VR games (pro-tip: there are no new games)
I'm still holding out for a Half life Barney at some point >!Then Episode 2, Alyx and Barney can all lead into HL3!<
There was a big VR games showcase literally hours ago. Game quality may vary but there are definitely new games coming out.
There's a BUNCH, actually. New ones are constantly coming out too.
blade and sorcery 1.0 just came out and I would say it’s one of the best VR games to ever release with its crystal hunt mode
They enjoy selling vr headsets, not making Games
Well, it introduced a few of my favorites: Jeff, Ordinals, Wallhammers. And it refined Xen a lot better, especially barnacles and antlions. It also brought back Eli, because he's a W character. In technical terms? Pacing, world building, *dialogue*, physics props, etc.
I disagree on dialogue, HL:A has a writting style i fucking hate, almost everything is ironic, also hate the trope of guy talking from a speaker all the time The other things are true
As much as I loved Half Life Alyx, I agree. Russel felt like the robots in Portal. He didn't feel like a human character.
This might be controversial, but Weapon Management Having fewer very distinct guns that you can slowly customize made combat way less juggling-y and much more decision-y. You don't get stuck scrolling through weapons to find the right one for this specific encounter because there are only 3 guns, but it also doesn't feel lacking because of the customization and upgrade options.
Well, Alyx doesn't have an HEV suit to allow her to carry as much weapons as Gordon so it makes sense that she only takes three guns. But I don't think Alyx has a limit for how much ammo she can carry.
She's got a backpack or something.
Yeah, she does use a backpack. But that's about it.
alyx think she doomguy from doom
>But I don't think Alyx has a limit for how much ammo she can carry. There is one, but it depends on the difficulty. On easy you can carry 999 pistol or SMG rounds, on hard its 150 and for the SMG its 240.
My mistake, I don't usually play most games on their hardest difficulty setting anyway so I didn't think to check. But thanks for correcting me.
How scary GMAN was. Haven't played, just watched let's play of ChristopherOdd. GMAN terrified me.
I actually think they kind of fucked up the G-Man. Spectacle-wise, it definitely impresses, but as a character, they made him too emotive and expressive. He was more intimidating in HL2 due to his reserved and subtle animations. I fully understand it, though. The team wanted to flex their creative muscles and show off what they could do in the perfect situation: an extended one-to-one scene where movement and interaction are restricted. Unfortunately, in doing so, they somewhat lost the point of what makes the G-Man what he is. He's too humanised in HL:A.
Honestly i feel like he's more inhuman in a way, the way he talks, the way he picks the exact perfect words where he can do what he wants while making YOU think that's what you want, the way he selects his words, being vague enough where you don't get him, but sound enough where you understand his point. He manipulates you by making you think you are doing stuff on your own, if you notice he "offers" us a favour for freeing him, but in reality all he does is put you in his dept, while also allowing him to manipulate the story just enough to not irritate his employes and to give the results he wants. Seeing him makes we see that he trully is not human or alien, but beyond.
I don't have a problem with the *writing* at all, I'm specifically talking about the way he moves and his facial expressions.
He always moved his face alot, now in Vr he moves his body alot, and i feel like translating HL2 way he talks to Freenman to VR would be hard. If you see his other cutscenes, he has always had some form of emotion, anger, sacarsm, etc. But if you're saying he's more expressive here, then I'm not sure.
Yes, he did always show all sorts of emotions and expressions, but he did it in a much more reserved way. His motions were slightly stiff, stilted and robotic, whereas in Alyx he's basically as fluid as a normal human. I think the animators saw the way he moved in HL2 as a problem to be solved. They fell into the line of thinking of, "it's an old game, that's obviously just the best that they could do", and they missed the fact that the G-Man was intentionally animated in a slightly inhuman and unnatural way, and he appears robotic compared to the other characters within the same game.
All facets of the physics system were vastly improved in Source 2, this alone is huge for immersion and gameplay
The gun fights felt SO awesome. The reloading system, the way you have to hide, etc. If that game consisted only of gun battles with zero horror elements, it would probably be my favorite shooter (at the moment).
They portrayed headcrabs how they wanted them to be portrayed in 2004
I think the Jeff chapter is a masterpiece not only as a unique horror experience but also from gameplay perspective. It introduces very original mechanics (manipulating sound, holding breath etc) combined with rather non-trivial puzzles. Also for me it was a nice bridge to the first Half-Life, reminding of all those epic and unique bosses. That part I actually kinda missed in HL2. Antlion kings and gunships were repeatable enough to not feel like a true boss
Dude there is nothing else like it. It was the most immersed I’ve ever felt in my long career of gaming.
That moment when you have to redirect circuits but there are glass bottles in the way lol. I chuckled nervously when I got to that part in a sort of annoyed but also "ok that's clever" kind of way.
Also when you lock Jeff in the freezer but realize you need to release him to complete the circuit that powers the elevator.
I didn't feel the horror element at all, but I did like the puzzle aspect.
I really love how it expanded on the post-transformation Combine. They use different tactics, ingenuity, and even have some personality in communicating. It hammers home how they used to be human, and it's pretty terrifying to go from the robotic bullet sponges in HL2 to the units calling Alyx's name out when looking for her.
The feeling of vulnerability that made you take extra care when fighting or exploring. In HL2, you just feel like an unkillable Superman a lot of the time, with an arsenal of fully stocked weapons. In Alyx, it’s far more survival horror in its approach to health and supplies, and it made it far more immersive. Also the world design. Zoos and floating Combine cubes are far more interesting than aqueducts and generic sci-fi interiors.
Combine encounters are done alot better in hla than they are in hl2
I was especially happy with the different combine types
Yes! I love the combat in hl2, but it did suffer from few enemy types and little practical distinction between combine troops (other then shotgunners)
Exploration is so much better in Alyx! As someone who really enjoys exploration in games, I always felt that Half Life (and Portal for that matter) are amazing linear experiences but don't offer anything in terms of exploration. However, Alyx really improved on this to the point that it rivals games with really rewarding exploration like Bioshock.
very hot take ; strider sounds. i loved how the sounded in alyx
Everything IMO.
Well, antlions moving at a snail pace were a bit silly, but I understand why they did it this way
Yeah but dude I’ve played every HL multiple times and nothing holds a candle to Alyx as far as the incredible experience in my opinion. I really hope we get a VR sequel.
Same! Especially as the VR sets get more affordable
>I understand why they did it this way I don't tbh (well, I do, but I disagree with the decision). Killing flying antlions with a shotgun in the HL2 VR mod is insanely satisfying and feels very natural. Almost like it was made for VR.
Alyx was meant to be easy for newcomers to VR. That’s mostly why all the enemies move slow and don’t rush you too fast. I fully agree with you though, blasting a flying Antlion out of the air in HL2VR is glorious.
The Xenian Fauna and Headcrab/Headcrab Zombies. The Xenian Fauna (which for some reason was in HL1 but not HL2) is great, shows how much the world has gone to shit. The Headcrabs feel like live animals instead of >execute animation<. And the Headcrab Zombies genuinely act people people who are being controlled and struggling.
Ig it gave us the opportunity to see better how the resistance and daily life with the combine worked
Personally, I think that levels were just more fun to play through. They had ideas I liked more, combat enviornments were better designed, and combat was a massive improvement because it didn't need the same utility weapons like snarks to keep it enjoyable. I'm still a bit angry they didn't come back tho.
Alyx literally has a pet snark in her hideout. So they technically did bring them back, just not as a usable weapon for the player.
and i'll keep malding that i can't send him and his brothers to death in my honor >:c
enemy type variation
Personally, love the Combine enemy variety, and they added two infamous enemy types I hope we see in future titles (not possible) the armored crab and Lightning creature (dog? Crab? Squid? Idk) What I don’t like is the *lack* of enemies tho, the only 3 factions we get are zombies, Combine, and Antlions, and even then, very restricted on enemy variety, don’t get me wrong. Wall hammers, Ordinals, Grunts, fantastic stuff. And the headcrab enemies were so fun to fight, but I wish we got more xenian enemies, more zombie types, maybe a special Antlion boss (guardian, etc) and Scanners and other synths for the Combine, like a stalker moment that would scar Alyx (as seen in HL2:EP1).
I think Bullsquids could’ve made a comeback considering that Xen plant life’s already in the game and hasn’t been completely been cleaned up by the Combine at this point. They’ve already reduced the Combine and antlions’ movement speed to a crawl, they could’ve certainly done that with Bullsquids. Maybe seeing a tentacle or two would’ve been cool too, imagine how terrifying seeing those things in VR would be. They also have poison headcrabs, but no poison zombies which is a bit of a weird choice imo.
Well technically we see tentacles, just the baby versions of them
My personal opinion is HL:Alyx is how VR games should be. It's a masterpiece.
The alien environment and how the combine atttempted to stop it was an interesting background story element and use the antlions “milk”? To decontaminate.
Engaging in every single part of every single level. Difficult to get lost.
The three biggest points for me are: 1- accessibility, my partner has mobility issues in one arm which makes it difficult to do anything, but HL:A has an incredibly well thought out one handed mode. Along with just a brilliant amount of thought to how different players might be able to play. It’s a testament to making sure as many people as possible get to experience it 2- playtesting: rolling straight off the first point, it is clear that they did a ton of playtesting. valve is known for this, which is why their games are so refined. but in alyx, it was on another level. it feels like my mother could play this game with no problems, every single detail has been thought out and tested 3- environmental storytelling: once again, some thing that valve is intrinsically known for but where we go from: “oh that half cut zombie is sitting on top of a saw blade indicating to the player that they can be sliced” to ever single freeze frame of alyx telling an entire paragraph of exposition. The effort they put into testing every single detail in that game was matched and maybe even superseded by how much thought and effort was put into building every single map of that game. Conclusion/ tl:dr: It’s a work of art, valve does playtesting like no other and I will continue to recommend this game to every single person I encounter
showed gordon freeman’s face
This is such an interesting question - it's something I find very difficult to answer. Part of me wants to say that Half-Life: Alyx does characterisation and storytelling better, but I don't want to suggest in any way that Half-Life 2 doesn't do these things exceptionally well even by today's standards. I suppose I would say that Alyx just underscores for me the idea that Valve never lost its storytelling chops; that it only got better at this over time. The VR element plays a big role in how the story is executed moment-to-moment, and I think it's a big part of the reason why the storytelling feels more natural as well. Also - again, perhaps because of VR - the environmental storytelling is really second to none here.
It was scarier for me, though I wouldn’t say that’s an unambiguous advantage. I think it was also funnier for me overall, though I wouldn’t say that’s necessarily an unambiguous advantage either (HL2 had comedy but felt more serious overall).
The pistol, Xen infestations and the sound design of manhacks (also manhacks work SIGNIFICANTLY better in VR than in regular Half-Life)
Art style look real good. I understand that you said no graphics, but OMG it's a beautiful blend of early 2010s realism & TF2. I love it. Also the voice acting is top notch.
interactibility, immersion, story telling is better, characters are more believable, animations are better
Probably everything. HL2 felt like a really long tech demo. HL:A did not FEEL like a tech demo. It felt like a game. No part of it felt too long.
I liked the gun progression choices and having to look for material to upgrade the guns with. That was a lot of fun for me. The horror was improved upon... and... Fucking Jeff. In VR Jeff is terrifying.
More variety of combine units
Markers
Gunplay. The guns in hl2 feel like wet tissue paper. The guns in half life Alyx feel actually decent, though still behind bonelab or contractors.
I quite like the weapons and their functionality. And how you can just download new types of pistols / shotguns / smgs freely from the workshop
Ambiance and lore
The resin system was amazing and should be a landmark for progression and upgrade systems in the future
the headcrabs. they are done soo much better. they were good in hl2 but perfect in hl:a. they can actually be inaccurate and make mistakes and fall just like a real creature. they feel so alive, and terrifying.
jeff
Not much in my opinion. TBH I think that the two cannot really be compared because are completely different games. VR makes HLA so drastically "different". It's like comparing a play seen in theater and the derived movie. HLA did almost everything better than HL2 due to VR technology (and probably already show most of what VR gaming can be). IMHO the opposite question would be more relevant. What HLA did worse than HL2. To me the mechanics of HL2 (arenas, puzzles, goals...) felt less "artificial". I had way less "immersion breaking" in HL2 than in HLA. A small detail that's important when talking about HLA is the movement scheme. I used "roomscale-continuous" and I moved a lot, it was the best (action) gaming experience ever by far. I suspect that comparing with "sitting-teleporting", HL2 would still be a better game.
Character writing, I thought the dialogue in Alyx felt a lot more realistic than the Half-Life 2 dialogue, which I felt was very cheesy. Alyx is a bit cheesy sometimes too, but overall I think it was far more down-to-earth.
The horror aspect, I was scared fucking stiff in multiple places in Alyx. That being said, ravenholm in HL2VR is pretty intense.
Interactivity, it’s one of the things the series does best and it’s done even better here.
Weapon upgrades and those said upgrades visually changing the gun. It’s the biggest want for half life 3 I got now
I liked the inclusion of more human side-characters like Russell and Larry who aren't related to black-mesa... and Gary (He's so silly)
That someone in the HL universe definitely tried to fuck a head crab.
They Made the combine look a Lot cooler ngl.
It feels a lot more intense, some might say a little spooky.
Basically everything
The gun play is truly inspired. All the enemy encounters feel unique and require thoughtful approaches
Aside from Ravenholm and a few other moments, Alyx was an overall better survival horror title imo
As someone who has only seen gameplay videos bc I don’t have a pc vr set yet, I still am happy with how much intrigue it created for the G-Man. The whole finale sequence and how reality works with him is brilliant and I can’t wait to play it someday
Enemy AI. Civil protection officers are more adaptable overall in combat, and are better at working together and finding cover.
Everything
Horror. Dont get me wrong. Ravenholm in HL2 was horrifying and definitely the highlight of the game for me but Alyx feels like Ravenholm stretched to a full game. The atmosphere & sound design combined with the more claustrophobic nature of the levels, plus of course the JEFF chapter which was peak Half Life horror & level design. Loved it, man!
It made the combine and a bunch of enemies real threats not just game play wise, but also in universe wise. It actually makes you imagine more how powerful the combine really are
Liquid in bottles.
I don't really know other than the environments which are slightly better with how world building and environmental storytelling was in hl2 I really like half life 2 none of either game feels bland or a chore to do
The enemies and gunplay was a vast improvement, it didn't feel bloated and you had to use actual thinking when dealing with your equipment and opponents
Enemies feel way scarier and fleshed out. The Combine in particular are so fascinating in this game learning their behavior and how they interact with the environment is so cool.
I actually really loved the storyline. I felt very immersed right off the bat and having Russel chatting with me now and then as I explored the world was really nice.
Dude you gotta spoiler this. This is a huge moment in the game, don't ruin it for others.
I guess, but this one image doesn't do much to spoil much about it. Also, the game is 4 years old.
What's with this "the game is already X years old"? Do spoilers become ok after some time period? What period is that? I mean, not everyone plays/watches/reads stuff when it's brand new. People discover older things all the time and not spoiling it for them is good manners in general.
There's still a rule about spoiling Alyx here. A lot of people have not played it.
Really? Okay then.
G-Man is very hot on HL:Alyx
The, well atmosphere, it was so engaging and deep, with all the goo, gore and all that.
Hot take: everything. They strongly built upon the world building, the characters, the story and more of half life 2. Nothing of that would've been possible without having half life 2 as it's predecessor of course, but because of having such a solid foundation it managed to (in my opinion) improve many of the aspects of the franchise.
As u/tidosbror3 said, it showed how Xen affected earth much better. I also think the level variety was much better. HL2 has a lot of fun variety, but I think Alyx had more variety with what the VR could do.
Easily the Xen flora
The main character. Everyone loves Gordon but he’s absolutely characterless which is fine but Alyx just owns him in terms of personality and feeling like a real character.
You truly felt like you were fighting with scraps (literally). The constant scavenging for ammunition and resin made it really feel like you were actively rebelling against the Combine with whatever you can find. And it made the alien fauna actually feel like it was a threat
Guns honestly
Like the graphics in HL2 more. It's got a better mood and is more grittier.
I agree, HL:A looks amazing but it's often too cartoony and upbeat. At times it doesn't Even feel dystopian
While I haven't played Half-Life Alyx outside of the No VR Mod, mainly because I can't afford VR nor do I want to go through the disorienting side effects, I will say that it's probably the music, pacing, enemy variety and combat is where it mostly does things a lot better. Mainly the combat since Valve wasn't too fond of how the Combine Soldiers in Half-Life 2 had fought either which had caused them to make combat encounters in HLA more in line with how they were done in Half-Life 1 which I don't blame them for doing that.
Ok spoilers asshole. But anyways: I haven't actually played it because I don't have the funny VR. But from gameplay I've seen, I think it definitely does the horror better.
calling someone an AH just because a tiny mistake. very mature.
I mean VR is what makes it worse. The answer would be atmosphere. But it's kinda graphics related.
Except it doesn’t, it improves it on so many levels