The channel wakes up and smells the ashes thanks to the Patrons! - https://patreon.com/IFinishedAVideoGame Use code CROWBAR for 50% off your first month! TWITCH - https://www.twitch.tv/ifinishedavideogame DISCORD - https://discord.gg/EvApzbyBsT ===== There are few games that loom as large as Valve's Half Life 2 - a revolutionary first person shooter that rebooted it's genre and laid the groundwork for Steam to take over the world. It's a tale that has been told countless times already - but do we really know the full story? Today we're going to try answer a simple question - Is Half Life 2 the masterpiece it is constantly described as or was it a piece of video game madness? It's a journey that is going to take us through it's absurd development, require us to reassess it's strengths and weaknesses, honestly investigate it's launch and sales numbers - before we unpick it's strange episodic ending and work out why it went away forever... It's part critique, part retrospective, part review and part history lesson - obviously full of spoilers and obviously full of my opinions ===== Credit for the fantastic thumbnail goes to the visionary - https://x.com/HotCyder Additional editing in chapters 1 2 3 9 and 11 came courtesy of Liam! All media in this video is used for the purpose of review, commentary or criticism and is defined as fair use under US Copyright law. Source and Bibliography will be added shortly === Chapters === 00:00:00 – Wake Up and Smell the Ashes 00:04:07 – Everything Possible Goes Wrong 00:18:16 – Somehow Everything Got Even Worse 00:30:23 – Welcome to City 17 00:44:51 – Is This Even A Sequel? 01:01:16 – Beautiful Structural Incoherence 01:17:11 – Where Gordon Goes Wrong 01:27:10 – An Ending That Doesn't End 01:37:01 – The Forgotten Middle Years 01:50:53 – Return to Castle Combine 02:03:20 – Agent Orange Box 02:12:29 – A Portal Storm in a Teacup 02:28:51 – More Than Just A Cliff-hanger 02:42:09 – The Truth About Half Life 2 === #halflife2 #valve #Retrospective
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Very grateful for your final segment discussing how Valve's priorities have changed so drastically to focus on multi player and loot boxes. I think a lot about how Valve has made a lot of effort to scout incredibly talented devs and they end up noodling around on prototypes that go no where and responding to customer support tickets. Imagine you're a crazy talented dev and you get scouted by your dream studio just to find out you're assigned to squashing UI bugs.
Thank you for yet another great video.
Just watched both HL videos, great content!
The idea at 1:19:00 that we, the Player - through Gordon Freeman - are just a small part of a bigger event, is a really interesting point that I hadn't considered before. Playing Half Life 1, I LOVE the feeling that I'm learning by observing, and just doing my own thing trying to survive. Half-Life 2 certainly positions you as the superhero main event, rather than being a small part of something much larger. The more I think about it, the more I prefer the HL1 approach.
As always a wonderful work, you can be proud my friend
great work, Liam! really cool editing
even though i knew most of the info about development from hl2 25th anniversary documentary, it was still very interesting to listen to. thank you for quality content
lol as someone who lives in Bellevue, it’s always so fun seeing these pictures and seeing the background and knowing exactly where that is.
I thought to myself multiple times throught the video that the editing was a step up, props to Liam for elevating an already top-tier channel! Matt, I know you usually avoid too much editorialising in your docs, but I'm curious how you feel about Valve as a company after digging in to the history? In past videos you haven't been afraid to call out poor behaviour like mad crunch, broken launches, dodgy legal deals and unrelenting profit chasing from companies and publishers like Activision and EA, but to me it seems you've slightly brushed past those exact behaviours from Valve in this video. Am I overthinking this or have the Steam Sale and "Gaben" memes whitewashed Valve from public accountability for their poor conduct? Huge fan of the channel and a longtime Patron.
Your vids totally have the same vibe as curling up with a good book, always such a treat. Thanks!
holy 3 hours worth it
Bro .. this is Golden content! ❤️🔥
You know, maybe you are our most powerful weapon in bringing back dead series. Since developers seem particularly devoted to rendering your videos incomplete lol. Prince of Persia had two games, lotr had like three new games, new indiana jones and metroid prime 4 finally came out from development hell, there is the new wolverine and castlevania coming out. This might be our best chance yet to get Half Life 3. Those pesky developers simply cannot stand your videos being complete retrospectives for long.
Here's a little more history that's often overlooked in these documentaries.. I didn't buy Half Life 2 when it was released. I got it as a steam code a year before the actual release. It was included in the purchase of the ATI 9800/9600 XT video card at the time. I bought the 9800 XT. Waiting a year or so for it to finally release. Patiently waiting for the day. Never thought I'd be waiting even longer for Half Like 3. I still have that Half Like 2 steam code card.
WELCOME LIAM, GOOD TO HAVE YOU HERE!
I agree with your initial assessment that episode 3 was canceled because Gabe wanted to focus on the real cash cows, but I think things changed with Alyx. They actively set up the larger narrative to go somewhere, there’s been demonstrable proof of development on a flat screen Half-Life project leaking out over the last couple of years now. I was a total doomer on the series for at least a decade, but the past couple of years have given me hope that *something* is coming in the next year or two
I'm always so happy to see you post a new video.
My life has been a depressing dumpster fire this year, I'm glad we have channels such as yours to cheer me up <3
What a brilliant and in-depth gamereview, keep going Sir. 🎉
1:52:00 Well, you see. These Vortigants are purple. They are special. Because they are purple.