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Half-Life 2: 20th Anniversary Update

(www.half-life.com)
566 points Philpax | 1 comments | 15 Nov 24 22:18 UTC | HN request time: 0.229s | source
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endoblast ◴[15 Nov 24 23:54 UTC] No.42152727[source]▶
My claim to fame on the 20th anniversary (84 views thus far) is to have completed Ravenholm without inflicting any deaths or receiving any injury:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_XN_RwjnqM

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derbOac ◴[16 Nov 24 00:49 UTC] No.42153106[source]▶
I've played through HL2 and its expansions so many times as a kind of meditative relaxation thing I couldn't tell you how many times.

I could never get used to Ravenholm though. Thinking about it even now years later stresses me out a tad.

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kartoffelsaft ◴[16 Nov 24 01:43 UTC] No.42153407[source]▶
For whatever reason, Ravenholm didn't particularly unsettle me. I don't know what it is, maybe expectation from the praise it receives left me underwhelmed, or maybe it's the fact that I was quite literally a toddler when the game came out and only first played it in 2019?

To be fair, I did enjoy it and could feel the intent of it being the horror section. I could see it usettling me if I played it at the time, but I see a lot of people saying it holds up really well so I still feel I've missed out on something.

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1. derbOac ◴[18 Nov 24 14:17 UTC] No.42172461[source]▶
Trying to think about it, I think it was the dynamics of the "fast zombies". I think if you plunked me in a crude pixelated FPS with abstract enemies, but with the same sudden accelerating approach dynamics I probably would have a similar stress reaction. I've always preferred FPS gameplay that's more focused on problem-solving without time limits, or where there's more of a strategic dynamic, like Portal (reading about HL2 has actually if anything made me want to play Portal 2 again, although HL2 as well).

I definitely think the atmosphere of Ravenholm contributed to my feelings about it, but I suspect if it was just the slow zombies or was all puzzles or something I would actually really enjoy it. There was something about the atmosphere + claustrophobic spaces + fast zombies in places I didn't like. Or rather, I did like it but not as much as the rest of it.