time, dr. freeman?

wow. today i wrapped one of the finest gaming experiences i have ever had.

having completed half-life 2, i can say that it more than lives up to the hype. in fact, it surpasses the original in nearly every way. if i had to come up with a complaint, it would have to be that the ending it a little too open ended for my taste. your team ai could be a little better as well, but i didn't seem to be bothered with that as much as some reviewers.

the story is one of the best in any game i've played. i couldn't wait to get to the end, and now that i'm there i'm both sad that it's over, and eagerly anticipating the third installment. there are few games where i've ever cared about the characters as much as i have in this game. one of the biggest achievement with valve's realistic facial expressions and voice-acting is that the people really come alive. you can see the emotion in their faces and hear it in their voices. part of the reason i can't wait till HL3 is that i'm already dying to know what happened to my companions. it's possibly the most cinematic game experience i've seen. this is the new benchmark by which all other action games will be judged.

obviously, half-life 2 and halo 2 will be compared a lot, due to both their glowing reviews and huge fan bases. in my mind, it's not even a competition.

halo 2 was definately a let-down in single player. halo 2's gameplay stuck to the same basic formula throughout. you move from room to room, killing everything. sure, you play half the game as an elite, but that change is mainly cosmetic. the actual gameplay itself is the same. the story is more detailed than the original, but i thought some parts were absurd, and others failed to be given adequate explanation. on the other hand, half-life 2 is probably the best single player game ever made. it may be a first-person shoot,er but it transcends every genre in that catergory. it's an action game, obviously. other parts, such as the urban uprising against the combine, have such a wargame feel to theme to them that i kept thinking back to games such as call of duty. the ravenholm level is a downright white-knuckled horror scenario. the two driving levels are packed full of adrenaline, and some of the most fun i've ever had using vehicles in a game. as i said before, the story itself is extremely engrossing, to the point that you want to find out about every little etail and speck of possible background information.

*warning: this may have some spoilers*
as far as endings go, both games decided to go with cliffhangers to leave their fans salivating for the third installment. however, in my mind one was done correctly, and the other was poorly. as the player reaches the end of halo 2, he has no idea he's at the end. as master chief approached earth, i was preparing myself for the big showdown with the covenant. this was going to be the big climax. then BAM, bungie pulls the plug. there was no big showdown. no final battle for victory. bungie didn't put an ending on the game, they just chopped it in half and stuck a "to be continued" on the end. i felt like i'd been robbed.

half-life 2's ending didn't make me feel as if i'd just wasted my time. keep in mind, the ending is still very open ended. in fact, it is a little disappointing that more isn't immediately resolved or explained. however, hl2 had a climax. like, halo 2, near the end i was feeling pumped at the impending showdown with dr. breen. even though the ending may actually open up more questions than it answers, it still left me with a very real sense of accomplishment. there is also a lot of intrigue and theories to speculate on, which keeps the game fresh. i loaded my last save to watch the ending again, and then went back and played through the whole last level to see if i could gain any more insight on what had happened. i already want to go back and play through the whole game again to see if i can catch and clues or details that i missed the first time. but that's all i want to say about the ending without anyone having played it.

it seems valve can do no wrong. let's just pray we don't have to wait another six years.