Taste of Thomas

I liked it. I went in to it knowing that it is considered a disappointment compared to Opposing Force. It doesn't have all of the enemies or weapons from the games that came before. But it is very short, clocking in at three hours for my playthrough. The game felt like the easiest of the three with ammo being abundant, health being about as common as in the original, and quick deaths non-existent. Even though for me there wasn't much novel, the pacing felt very good, never giving you a chance to get bored. There are more military character models; the enemy engineers can break through doors to attack you; there are new puzzle elements. Nothing in this game feels like a dud, except that the military AI seems to be worse than usual with them sometimes running away from me in broad daylight. The game is consistently quality whilst not having as many exceptional moments as HL1 and Opposing Force. Blue Shift probably has the best Xen levels of the three, showing us new ideas...

It's really good. What made me write the Half-Life 2 review was the fact that so much of what I was enjoying about Opposing Force while playing it were things that Half-Life 2 did not have. Opposing Force has much more enemy variety than HL1 and HL2. It has more weapons. It is a short game and it feels shorter because it's so fun. It solves all of the main problems I have with the other games. Opposing Force is proof that someone understood what the best elements of HL1 were and knew it was a good idea to put only that and nothing more into a sequel. That someone wasn't Valve, but Gearbox. I wish Valve had learned something from this game before making HL2. Pretty much all enemies from the previous game return with a handful of new enemies. They knew it was cool to make security guards and soldiers into Zombies. You are never fighting the same enemies over and over. And they made the black ops less obnoxious. The weapons weren't just varied but exciting. Parti...

They're not bad. The games are pretty. They have the best water I've seen in any video game. I wish they'd found a way to put in Lost Coast. The introduction to the world was compelling. I love the premise of Earth under Orwellian occupation by aliens. And for me it was a good surprise because I thought humanity won HL1. The scanner drones in civilian areas were cool. Being photographed just for existing in public and having the screen go an unpleasant #FFFFFF was a great piece of immersive world detail, but they should have had the sense not to put them in fights amongst other enemies. Unfortunately I was soon aggravated by the fact that you immediately leave this setting and go do what we spent HL1 doing: fighting the same enemies in drab industrial environments. Maybe it's my fault for not waiting years between instalments. There are good refreshing new locations — particularly the citadel, the abandoned villages, Ravenholm, the beach. HL2 has even less enemy...

The beginning and end are strong. The beginning in particular has great atmosphere. The game is at its best when it's surprising you. Most of the middle is repetitive filler. The middle 40% or so has no new enemies or mechanics. There's like 2 new weapons, but we're talking across ~8h. The enemy variety already felt lacking even before the middle. My reference point for that era is Spider-Man 2 for the PS1 (2001). Maybe for some people it's an upgrade from military shooters in that regard. There are only a few points of plot progression (including the subtle ways information is given to you), which would be fine in a much shorter game. Felt like giving up on it many times; nearly didn't do the end because of a glitch with Gonarch that stopped it from entering the boss arena. I started HL2 at some point, but it annoyed me so I went back. For some reason I kept feeling determined not to be bested by it. There are times when it seems like something might change for the...