Do you think Half-life's story could be nonsense all along?

[hardcore_gamer]

This is something I have often thought about as a result of being tired of waiting for Half-life 3 which for all we know might not even ever happen. But this has got me thinking...could it be that Half-life's story is overrated and possibly just made up on the spot anyway?

I mean when I think about it, Half-life's story and characters have always been very shallow. I honestly don't understand why it gets so much massive praise. I think a lot of it has to do with the "Halo effect", where something appears better than it actually is because it looks pretty or belongs to something that is already beloved. Had Half-life 2 been released under another name odds are it would have gotten nowhere near as much praise as it did. Sure it had good graphics at the time, but that alone doesn't make it a flawless game. But anyway that isn't really related to the story which is what this thread is about...

I can't help but fear that Half-life's story is basically like Lost, in that all the mystery makes the story look like its complex and has depth, but in actual reality the only reason there is so much mystery is because the writers are pulling things out of their ass all the time and don't even know where they intend to take the story. A perfect example of this would be the G-man. Even after 2 games and 4 expansions we still know NOTHING about who this guy is. Sure, it was cool that he was this mysterious supernatural guy at first, but now I just can't help but suspect that the primary reason he has remained that way for so long is because even Valve has no idea who this guy even is or what they should do with him. Ditto for the Combine. Who are the combine? Where do they come from and what are their motives? We don't know anything about this either, other than the fact that they enslaved earth and that they are depriving it of it's resources. Even after all the games we know barely anything about the bad guys in the series or what their true motives are.

And the characters in the games are also paper thin as well. Alex is a generic love interest for Gordon, Kleiner is a stereotypical scientist, Barney is arguably the only character that isn't completely generic. And that's just Half-life 2, since Half-life 1 arguably had no real characters in the first place since all the NPC's were just copy pasted, other than the G-man, whom doesn't even speak until the end of the game.

So yea, while I do like Half-life I can't help but feel that the story is all nonsense and that there was never any real plan here at any point in time. Do you agree or disagree?

[wildweasel]

half-life is fun

[Melodica]

I always found the story of half-life to be pretty straight forward, specially the first game. I never really cared that much about half-life 2, for some reason, since it just never appealed to me, specially since pretty much everyone in that game treats Gordon as if he was the next coming of Jesus, wich, thinking about it, is probably the case in that game. But I really enjoyed how in the first game he was just some dude in a power suit and stuff. Kinda like how doomguy started out in the original Doom, except he had actual weapons training and stuff because marine I guess.

[SouthernLion]

No.

[Herr Dethnout]

No.x2

[Caligari87]

The thing is, it doesn't matter if the story is made up as they go, if the characters are shallow 1-dimensional cutouts, or if it's cliche as all hell.

I'll tell you what, I've never finished HL1, and I went most of my adult life having never played beyond Ravenholm. That is, until a couple years ago when I made myself sit down and play through HL2 and both sequel chapters. When I got to the end of the last one, when they left us sitting on that cliffhanger, I didn't care if it was the greatest thing since sliced bread or not. I wanted to know what happened next, what happened to the characters. Valve crafted an whole experience that hooked me through the world, the immersive storytelling, the gameplay and everything else. I was invested, and that's what matters.

Now, if it doesn't grab you like it grabbed me, that's okay. Not everyone has the same reaction to the same piece of media. But whether the story was random BS or the characters were shallow or whatever, it still managed to resonate with a lot of people, and that's what matters.

[lil'devil]

1) I don't think HL's story is nonsense. It's not one of my favourites, but it's certainly not bad. Many people like it, that's why everyone was so hyped for Episode Three, which never came out...
2) And even if the story's nonsense, it doesn't mean it's bad at all. There're many games with very vague/weird storyline and are good. Story shouldn't matter much, if the gameplay's good. I mean, you're playing Doom, a game with no plot, and you care about Half-Life's story? :þ

[OmniT00]

Half Life had a good story that was mostly told with what was going on, rather than shoving it down your throat with cutscenes.

Besides, even if the story made literally no sense I didn't care because I was kept interested nonetheless.

[PlayerLin]

No, I never think it's non-sense, it's more like too many things unexplained and leave for players to think.

The only problem with HL story is Valve was let it stuck on cliffhanger on the end of HL2EP2, but even they did, it most likely still have a lot of things never explained...

[Scripten]

Half Life never really went for a strong plot. Even Episode 2, arguably the most plot-heavy entry of the series, is told mainly through environmental storytelling. Now that the era is long since past for those kinds of stories, especially in FPS games, we'll probably never see another Half Life game.

Plus, it's been long enough for people to forget the context of when Half Life and HL2 came out and go for hot takes.

[SouthernLion]

Now that the era is long since past for those kinds of stories, especially in FPS games, we'll probably never see another Half Life game.

That has 0% to do with why we may never see another Half Life game.

[Enjay]

Personally, I enjoyed HL and thought it was a great game with an interesting story/setting without too much narrative, allowing the player to fill in whatever blanks with whatever reasoning they wanted.

To me, HL2 felt like an almost totally different game in a different setting with a resurrected Gordon Freeman for no better reason that he was the protagonist of the first game. All the stuff about the Combine and whatever felt like a totally new story and was a massive scenario to be simply missing from the original game (unless you go with all the retro-fitted fan fiction (IMO nonsense) that tries to explain it all and link it together). I'm not saying they are a bad enemy, just that they appeared out of nowhere and had a totally different feel to any of the antagonists in HL.

On top of that, I found HL2 to be a good to mediocre game that barely held my interest a lot of the time with far too many "look what our physics engine can do" sequences and endless bad vehicle sections. And it was my first brush with Steam. I still enjoyed it more than that other game that came out around about the same time though. You know, the one that is an anagram of 3MoDo.

[Scripten]

Now that the era is long since past for those kinds of stories, especially in FPS games, we'll probably never see another Half Life game.

That has 0% to do with why we may never see another Half Life game.

Well, sure, there's the fact that Valve have no interest in the franchise (or single-player games as a whole), but what HL2 did, in a narrative sense, isn't really so revolutionary in the genre at this point. They (Valve) have never really seemed too interested in stuff that follows the status quo, save for maybe DOTA 2. Plus, silent first-person protagonists are becoming a bit of a relic and suddenly giving Gordon Freeman a personality/voice would never go over well, so you've got a Catch-22 there.

If anything, I expect Half Life 3 to be a VR title, once that tech is more stable and pervasive. (This is half sarcasm.)

[NeuralStunner]

There's really two reasons why there hasn't been another official Half-Life:

1. No interest. Valve moved away from singleplayer games in the last few years.
2. The Firefly effect. It's been so long, there are far too many player expectations that would have to be met. The result would probably be disappointment for most.

However, things do change!

[Matt]

All good stories grow in the telling.