Contract J.A.C.K

a second wind review

No One Lives Forever is one of FBT’s fave games. Contract JACK isn’t.

There’s many games I’ve disliked, loads I’ve given up on and a fair few I hated for what they were, but Contract J.A.C.K. is the only one I hate for what it isn’t.

There’s two things that set NOLF apart from any other FPS game; it’s celebration of the Sixties spy genre, and Cate Archer. CJ doesn’t have either and does nothing to replace them. It is a spin-off without the spin. It’s just off.

Set before / alongside NOLF2, John Jack is ‘just another contract killer’ who escapes a bunch of Mafioso thugs only to be tricked into a to-the-death shootout with waves of HARM troops – the super-villain group Cate fights – and discovers it’s actually a fairly extreme job interview to work for HARM itself. Hired, JJ is sent to uncover what ‘Danger Danger’, a rival super-villain group is up to. Essentially our mission is to stop them finding a mad scientist and deliver him to HARM instead, and that means us raiding military bases, a secret rocket facility, NOLF1’s Moon Base and assaulting Danger Danger’s headquarters in Italy. Considering the universe CJ is set in, you can’t help but think you’re in for some fun with the eccentric, surreal inner workings of HARM; at least more of the sixties tv love and silliness. Nope, nothing. Not a thing. Amazingly, what sounds like a fun romp and reboot of NOLF’s plot is a straight shooter without any of of NOLF’s charm, ingenuity or commentary.

There’s nothing to this at all but shooting. Endless, repetitive shooting in badly paced missions that just won’t end, facing waves of henchmen like some close-quarter Serious Sam. CJ has none of the spirit of NOLF, it just happens to look like it, and so you’re constantly reminded of how sublime that was. Cate Archer was a brilliant character. Smart-as, beautiful, capable and able to bat away rampant sexism with a deft one-liner. In her place we have JJ, a standard silent hero – an opportunity to explore the inevitability of being a nameless NCP? Surely he’s called ‘just another contract killer’ for a reason? He should be Sam Rockwell’s character in Galaxy Quest, constantly terrified of getting killed because his character doesn’t even have a name. Or continue NOLF’s commentary on sexism, and parody the unbeatable male hero? No, none of that, JJ isn’t just another killer, he’s just another arm in a shooter.

CJ doesn’t even take the opportunity to repeat Cate’s experiences from the POV of the villains. Hang out with the henchmen, suck up to the Director, observe key moments in the background, getting involved in/ruining HARM’s schemes, meeting Isako, recruiting the villains Cate later faces, the creation of the Supersoliders – there’s a whole subplot about Abigail they could have explored. All ignored. We don’t even get to play with the Man-Handler. So much opportunity and instead we have nothing to do with HARM at all, just a self-contained plot to stop Danger Danger – mostly humourless Italian clichés who aren’t a patch on the French Mimes or Indian Evil Alliance. NOLF parodied generic FPS (remember the sewers?) and now here we are in a master-class of what NOLF aped.

There’s so little of NOLF here it’s like a mod (except the fans would have done better). No stealth, gadgets, puzzles, Santa-style Quartermaster; also missing is Cate’s travels as she dismantles HARM. Admittedly, NOLF2 overdoes the India location but CJ is essentially three locations – the base, the moon and the lair (from the outside) and each outstay their welcome, over-long and over-populated with the same villains doing the same things. It’s so repetitive CJ almost ruins NOLF; there’s so many henchmen to fight you notice how scripted they are when they’re not talking about their mother in law or the causality between villainy and alcoholism. It’s just no fun; how do you miss the fun? Why don’t we have a mission where we (try) to silence Armstrong or recruit Pierre the Mime King? Failure could have been a fun option for this game, an anti-hero in the literal sense, but no.

What about something to tie it in? Naa – when CJ does reference the original it’s getting it wrong; the moonbase is a repeat of NOLF’s trip but without any of the cool 2001-inspired spacesuits or, unforgivably, the nightclub. JJ gets blasted into space and has to fight off other space-villains, repeating the fall from the plane in NOLF, except there’s no henchman yelling ‘please be full of hay’. It’s just a straight shooter using NOLFs assets. There’s no quotable lines, quirky behaviours, in-jokes, references. The only reason I’m persevering is in the hopes Cate might make an appearance. And kill me.

And then, after a too-little, too-late fun ending where we use cannons to take out Danger Danger’s base (which was a slog to get to, enlivened only by a short ride on a Vespa), JJ gets double-crossed by HARM and takes his revenge on Volkov, explaining his pained reappearance in NOLF2. It doesn’t even make sense, other than to explain why Cate doesn’t face off with JJ in NOLF2. Plus, JJ is supposed to be a stone-cold killer and his revenge is ruining Volkov’s holiday? That’s our NOLF payoff? There’s one scene where we torture a Danger-Danger henchman but although it’s played for laughs it’s actually more painful for us, and not an ounce on the scene where Cate tricks a HARM henchman into telling her where their base is.

What were Monolith thinking with this? I can understand some other developer being given the franchise and missing the point but this is inexcusable – they made the original. I mean, CJ is built entirely on NOLF2’s assets, so why did they drop the one thing that made NOLF special? Everyone in HARM is an eccentric, why is JJ a cliched silent hero? He should have been a parody of ill-fated henchmen, or a Frank Drebin type, at least a satire on the silent, masculine heroes. At the very least, it should have been a NOLF game. Contract JACK is one of those straight to video sequels starring Joe Estevez and Don Swayze. It’s Highlander 2.

The most annoying moment is during the opening of JJ’s first mission where, from the back of a truck, we briefly glimpse Cate on her way somewhere far more interesting than we are. That’s like briefly seeing the shark from Jaws then realising you’re in Sharknado. Contract JACK is just a loud, relentless, mindless slog of a shooter and aside from being thankfully short, there’s nothing redeeming about it – I was even more pissed off when in researching this, I discovered something I didn’t know. The PS2 version of NOLF contained an additional level called ‘Nine Years Ago…’ which featured The Fox, Cate’s burglarising alter-ego before her capture by Bruno. How do we have Contract JACK and that’s not available? How could they not have made that prequel instead of this ‘side-quel’? I can’t think of a game that has more spectacularly backfired – and I’ve played Mass Effect Andromeda.

2003 | Developer Monolith Productions | Publisher Sierra Entertainment

Platforms; Win/Internet

Stranglehold

a second wind review

FBT goes Woo for Fat in the sequel to Hard Boiled. Cue the doves and slo-mo.

Ever since ET almost destroyed the game industry trying to phone home, games based on movies have been generally lame. For every decent ‘based on’ like Mad Max or The Warriors you get something like 007 Legends; Tie-Ins are always without question, shit. And then there’s the game-sequels. Alien Isolation might have made a good go of it, but then Colonial Marines ruined it, as did Robocop (2003), Ghostbusters the Video Game, even Wreck-It-Ralph; a sequel based on a movie based on video games? The game sequel genre isn’t littered with greats. But this is Stranglehold, exec’ed by John Woo, who’s atheistic shooters have attempted to emulate since Max Payne. We’re ‘Tequila’ Yuen, a cop who, in slow-motion, burst onto our screens dual-wielding his way through Hard Boiled. It’s got slow-motion doves in it. That’s a movie I can play.

The setting, Hong Kong. The case, a missing policeman. The Captain’s orders, send a team. The Tequila, goes alone. After surviving the trap, Tequila get sucked into a Triad war while dealing with police corruption and a personal reason to go rogue.

Stranglehold does call to mind Max Payne. They’re similar cops with the same outside the law reasoning that justifies killing endless hoods along with bullet-time and shot-dodge mechanisms. But while Max Payne was inspired by John Woo, this is John Woo. Literally, he’s in it, reprising the bartender in Hard Boiled. But Stranglehold soon surpasses Max Payne for cinema references. There’s so many it’s hard to keep track; vendetta-driven cowboy cop trapped by an offer he can’t refuse, involved with a bad girl from the wrong side of the tracks that’s connected to the larger plot and used as leverage? Check. Double-crossing panto villain with a revenge-connection to Tequila who has an infinite source of bag-men and wants Tequila DEAD, check. A surprise betrayal followed by regret before they die, contemptuously dropping guns when they run out of ammo, ignoring orders from an Alka-Seltzer guzzling shouty captain? Check. Awesome cool? Check.

Once Tequila’s on the case, our 3rd person view does everything it can to make us believe John Woo is going to yell ‘cut’ at some stage. You name it, we can cinematically interact with it – surf down bannisters and on trolleys, leap over boxes, slide across counters, shoot things to create runaways or creative ways to take out hoods, crash through practically anything and destroy the rest. The problem is, if something can be Tequila’ed, it shimmers or glints and there’s so much of it you’re distracted by the epileptic fit it all triggers. The art design is really detailed but it’s covered in white lines demanding you leap, slide, roll or jump on them or repeatedly flashing shoot me. There’s nothing like shooting a neon sign and watching it swing around and take out a bunch of baddies, but you end up looking everywhere at once, wondering what’ll happen if you shoot this or activate that and is it really going to help if I – by the time you’ve decided to run up a wall or just shoot the guy, you’ve been riddled with bullets. It becomes one big overwhelming novelty like an arcade rail shooter; leaping and sliding along firing is great unless it happens to take you in the opposite direction or you slide along a counter into the face of a crouching mobster and you’re stuck with your legs in the air getting pummelled. You have to trigger Tequila to get on and then to get off again but he’ll only do it if there’s room for a cinematic roll or leap so you wind up yelling at Tequila like a parent in a park; ‘get down from there!’ The villains are top notch hard work, fast and unforgiving; but they must be wondering why you’re pirouetting on a lamppost instead of returning fire.

Of course, Tequila has more than enough ways to return his own fire; while he only carries two at a time, there’s pistols, uzis, machine guns, heavy machine-guns, grenades, rocket-launchers lying about everywhere and the smaller weapons he can dual-wield naturally. Once a weapon is spent he’ll drop it and auto-pick up anything nearby which more than once saw me smugly switch to the heavy machine gun only to see him pull out a puny sidearm, having not noticed the switch during the mayhem.

As he progresses, Tequila unlocks more opportunities to give it the ol’ razzle-dazzle; Tequila-Time is standard Bullet-time but the real killers are the Tequila Bombs; Precision is bullet-time from the point of view of the bullet, while Barrage just lets Tequila have a bullet-fuelled tantrum and Spin lets him twirl and fire while doves fly. Then there’s Stand-Off; when Tequila gets surrounded there’s a moment where they all eye each other and grip triggers, then the bullets start flying. You can shift Tequila from side to side to avoid bullets and return fire – it’s all charged by the destructive antics Tequila gets up to, so the more you break, slide and generally make like an action star the better.

So, we’re Chow Yun-fat in a John Woo film, how is that not the coolest thing ever? Because although you’re leaping in slow-mo through flying debris with a gun in each hand, you’re also in a constant state of frown, trying to see through the wreckage, distracted by the highlights, working out if the flashing thing will help; it takes you out of the moment by giving you pre-set moments and never lets up, it gets exhausting; meanwhile, Tequila insists on new things to be cinematic about; at one stage he’s swinging from chandeliers. It’s to frenetic and busy, the infamous 2min 42seconds from Hard Boiled extended into some seven hours game play. Once you take a breath you realise Stranglehold is a very thin shooter, trading style over substance; Stranglehold is a new example of why movies don’t work as games; if, on the big screen I saw Chow Yun-fat take out a posse in slo-mo while swinging from a chandelier, I’d go ‘cool, wish I could do that’ but when I do it I end up looking like a four-year-old on a swing with no one to push him. It’s too staged, I feel like Chow’s stuntman. It doesn’t feel natural the way parkouring about in Assassin’s Creed does; games are supposed to let me live vicariously but Stranglehold just reinforces why I’m not an action star popping up for five minutes in the latest Expendables movie.

As if the sheer amount of destruction and QT moments weren’t enough to prove how incredible the Unreal engine is, the work done to make Tequila look like Chow Yun-Fat is brilliant, in both the cut scenes and the action, and he’s voiced by the man himself. The locations are great looking too; an island that’s been turned into a drug factory, dirty back-streets of HK, a museum (bye-bye antiquities), and a restaurant with panicked extras running between the bullets; this is a very faithful game that tries hard to put you in Tequila’s shoes, but I’m the wrong shoe-size. It’s so busy being Hard Boiled it forgets to be a game; Max Payne knew when to pull back, to be cinema when it counted and game when it needed to be. Stranglehold makes you realise movies and games are mutually exclusive. An hour with Tequila is great fun but any longer and it gives you a hangover.

2007 | Developer Midway | Publisher Midway Games

platforms; Win | PS3 | X360

Half-Life 2

FBT half-returns to half-life with a half-baked conspiracy theory and gets so annoyed he has a psychotic episode or two. But not three.

The Past

If I’m honest, I always had a nagging doubt that HL2 was the Avatar of gaming. Greeted orgasmicly by critics -Maximum PC gave it ‘11 out of 10’- us gamers were whipped into a rabid fury; we auto-loved it and it was gamer-suicide to say otherwise. Even now, nearly 15 years later HL2 is the God of gaming. But was it really all that?

Part of the appeal was Valve and its emperor, Gabe Newell. He put himself about as a geek like us, claiming Valve is a loose collective of developers; it wasn’t some evil mega-corp like EA or Ubisoft, it was by gamers for gamers. Never mind Valve insisted we install Steam, a more intrusive and invasive DRM platform than anything previously to play HL2; they’re geeks like us. Meanwhile we screamed the place down any time a competitor tried a similar platform. GFWL? Spam! Origin? Malware! Uplay? Ransomware! GOG-Galaxy? … okay, they’re cool. You either accepted Steam or didn’t play HL2. It was emotional blackmail but such was our desperation we sucked it up and Steam has been on our machines ever since.

I was caught up too. Overwhelmed, I contemplated a Crowbar tattoo. But after a few replays, HL2 started to feel contrived. At the time it wasn’t the insidious Steam install that made me suspect Valve’s intentions; HL2 felt like a demo for the Source engine, like playing through a showroom. It was a façade and like the emperor’s new clothes, HL2 hasn’t got anything on.

You just don’t dislike Half-Life 2 though. I kept my doubts quiet and ensured no one suspected me by constantly replaying it, buying the Episodes and looking forward to HL3 like all the other sheeple. Then, the magic bullet; the more successful Steam got, the less HL3 was mentioned, until Valve stopped acknowledging Half-Life at all. It had served its purpose. But Gamers aren’t stupid – and they’re not forgiving either; one wrong sidekick and you’re into Daikatana territory. HL2 must be doing something right. It is more than just hot air?

Still a Blast?

While Xen’s invasion was contained to Black Mesa, the world is now under the control of interplanetary strip-miners the Combine. Turns out Nihilanth, the big baby baddie from HL1 was holding open the portal so the Xen lot could escape them. Instead, killing it drew their attention and the Combine rocked up and took over. Thanks, Gordon.

The world does have a grim Orwellian feel to it, with masked cops, screens displaying reassuring messages from earth’s ‘administrator’ (Breen, our unseen boss from HL1), processing areas and propaganda on the walls. This is an occupation, an oppressive hellhole that brings to mind real-world ‘internment’ camps; or at least a glimpse of post-Brexit Passport lines. I’m taken away by a guard – who offers to buy me a beer. Barney! You look a lot more detailed. Although the graphics are over a decade old, HL2 holds up insanely well, although that might be the constant updates and refreshes Source goes through. Can’t complain about that. It’s detailed, rich and real. I like HL2 so far. A solid looking game set in a compelling, tyrannical world. Time to Free it, man. I don’t last long. Trying to quietly pass through a depressed town, I seem to have become Harry Styles; we constantly hear ‘It’s Freeman!’ – that’s not helping. I get tasered, then I come around and fall in love.

Alyx Vance, daughter of a scientist we saved, has returned the favour. Alyx is both in awe of Freeman and way cooler than him. To be fair to HL2, Alex did change sidekicks and female characters in games. She’s not wearing an armoured bikini for starters and isn’t a Vasquez-clone either. She’s just a capable character and half the time we’re her sidekick. Having grown up during the occupation she’s excited to have found the man everyone expects to save the day. Freeman however, doesn’t even say thanks.

In the original, it made sense to have a silent hero; not a lot to talk about, or talk to other than the headcrabs, but HL1 did occasionally imply he spoke or at least gestured; NCPs would respond with ‘yes lets go’. But in HL2 it seems odd Freeman isn’t talking; it’s cleverly done, people chat in a way that his silence can be taken as an answer but why doesn’t he tell them where he’s been, about the G-Man? Instead, characterisation is filled in by the support cast. Besides Alyx and Barney, who has a nice line in cynical backchat, there’s absent-minded professor Kiener, who keeps Lamar, a ‘debeaked’ headcrab as a pet (“she’ll try to copulate with your head, fruitlessly”), Alyx’s dad Eli and Dr Mossman, who Alyx dislikes so we do too. They’re kind of a rebellion Gordon joins – well, he never agrees to it. But first, I’ll need a HEV suit. Wait a second, am I naked? Why did G-Man strip Gordon before placing him in status? That explains why Alyx keeps making small talk and glancing down.

Now suited up and set free, I’m off to reach Eli and help take down the Combine using a mix of shooter and adventure experiences. We make our way through decrepit buildings and sewers which give way to a barren countryside and receding seas, all of it layered with Combine machinery and industry as they tear apart earth for resources. It all looks very real. Between us and Eli are dozens of Headcrabs, now a Combine bio-weapon. There’s a more skittish version that grows into the Xenomorph-like Fast-Zombie, or as Alyx might say, a Fambie. Those spindly things go. Spotting them leaping across buildings headed for you is exhilarating stuff. Then there’s their poisonous siblings – the rattle-hiss signifying one’s about is so terrifying; a bite reduces your health to 1, which is a brilliant/evil trick. We also meet poor, horrible, groaning victims who are covered in them. Those things really get under my skin with their pitiful, pained calls as they’re eaten alive and I waste valuable grenades making sure they’re out of their misery as soon as possible.

The Combine are out in force looking for Freeman – they are scripted and samey but as far as human-type villains go, they do the job. They also have machinery-infused creatures, including a gunship that can shoot your missiles out of the sky – being tactical with an RPG is a nice touch – and Striders, War of the Worlds Tripods. We also deal with ‘Antlions’, the bugs from Starship Troopers which are swarming pains. So HL2 looks good and fights well; what was I bitching about? After we escape the slums, Freeman gets an airboat to cut across country. This is what I was bitching about.

The boat sequence is all fine and dandy, but it fast becomes filler. It goes on for ages, and we only have Source’s rendering for company. It just feels like it’s showing off, demonstrating different abilities; I have to dive into a pond and place a load of floating barrels to make a ramp so I can jump a wall. It’s just a Source buoyancy showcase. Later I have to swing a girder to knock open a floodgate. During the similar go-kart level, I stop to use a magnet crane to move the kart. It works, but it just feels like I’m playing a demo. And it’s incredibly linear, so those moments feel like I’m at some tech-convention moving between booths; pause to get harassed by magnetic beach-balls that don’t do anything, try to balance cinder-blocks to reach higher levels, look at this magnifying glass; the puzzles, the physics, the locations – those are key to any game but in HL2 it just somehow feels like we’re pausing for a word from our sponsors.

There are standouts to be sure –Ravenholm is still a creepy, horrible, brilliant place while Nova Prospekt, the prison we try to recover Eli from and a suspension bridge we need to clear are great set-pieces, as is the final push to the Citadel, guarded by the huge Striders. There are more subtle elements worth applauding too; Alyx, who is a work of art in every way possible isn’t the only notable character; Ravenholm’s last (human) resident, Father Gregori is an insane change from the usual support acts and his presumed fate is horrible and brings home what’s happening to earth. We get to turn the Antlions into manic soldiers we can order about too, they’re great fun and like Gregori, should have been around for a lot longer. The lolloping Vortigaunts are our pals now, having been oppressed by the giant baby it turns out, while the Human resistance is very believable. But the real stand-out is D0g.

D0g is a great side-kick’s side-kick. Scripted to be adorable and heroic, it’s a huge Gorilla-like mech bodyguard for Alyx and even better than I remembered. The scene where we get the gravity gun and ‘play’ with D0g is the best hidden tutorial of all time. His scripted sequences, leaping onto Combine vehicles and knocking the shit out of the troops are great, but it’s his undying love for Alyx and somehow emotive face that stays with you. Good boy.

But as always, every time HL2 convinces me it’s all that, I see through the lies. For every drainpipe ominously rattling in Ravenholm there’s a moment that feels forced. The gravity gun; critics wet themselves over it, like it was gamer sliced bread. It’s shit. I barely used it first time and this time I’m determined to unlock its secrets. Still shit. The amount of times I try to attract a Buzzsaw blade to eviscerate a zombie only to grab a coffee mug instead. It’s great, if you’re looking to showcase your physics engine; lots of smugly-clever physics puzzles pop up once you get it. Man, Source is cool yeah?

Eventually, we’re inside the Citadel gunning for Breen. Except we had all our guns taken off us. But the G-Gun can now grab and fling Combine soldiers about like ragdolls – all right I get it, Source can ace physics. And to ensure we don’t Skip the Ad, the Citadel vaporises the Combines weapons too. What happens if a soldier puts theirs down? It’s just too convenient. When we finally reach Breen, we stop him escaping by … playing Pong. What the hell is this? This is heroic, flinging balls at a tower? I miss the giant floating baby of HL1. But it’s not over, Freeman’s about to have an episode or two.

Episode One picks up as the Citadel explodes – and it’s about to explode more. So Freeman caused an invasion that decimated humankind and then triggered a blast large enough to finish the rest? Why is this guy our hero?

Hang on, the Combine’s guns are still dissolving, why doesn’t Alyx’s gun? While escaping the Citadel and the G-Gun shenanigans, Alyx uncovers a message about Combine reinforcements leading them into a running firefight with Combine as well as a Ravenholm-style sequence with Zombies, Xen critters and Antlions as we try to escape the city. Ep1 is a quick and clean race once we’re out of the Citadel and a nice little set up Episode Two, where we rejoin Alyx and Freeman freed of the city and lost the countryside. And it does look beautiful. But then Alyx is maimed by new villain, the imaginatively titled ‘hunter’. It’s basically an evil D0g. Thankfully a Vortigaunt is on hand to react more emotionally than Freeman does. We’re then sent into an Antlion nest to evade a marauding Antlion solider until we can reach their ambrosia, which the Vortigaunts need to resuscitate Alyx. It is a beautiful underground labyrinth and a refreshing change in both look and play-style, playing hide and seek with the solider, but it’s followed by a wave battle against now pissed off Antlion drones that feels really dated (there was a similar one at the end of E1). Never fear though, G-Man appears to imply some greater galaxy-wide conspiracy without explaining anything. It’s like one of those middle-management meetings where you realise nothing’s getting done and everyone’s just saying stuff to justify the meeting.

After using the gravity gun to rebalance a swaying bridge (‘Sponsored by Source, for all your gaming needs’) we’re in what looks like the car from Driver. Alyx and I go on a lovely tour of Source’s environmental rendering and blunder into Combine traps before a fantastic scripted moment when D0g puts in a surprise appearance just as we’re about to get stomped on. Finally we reach Eli and the resistance and it all gets really annoying. Hot on our heels are the Hunters and they brought their dads; Striders. Now this should be exhilarating but … it’s an irritating chore.

In order to take down the Striders we have to use a ‘Magnusson Device’ which requires you to drive to Device points, get out, grab it with the G-Gun, load it in the boot, drive to the Strider, get out, pick it up with the G-Gun, fire, swap to weapon, hit and explode the Strider. Now, repeat. If you miss or a Hunter hits the device you start again, while keeping up with the Striders before they reach the base. It’s not a race against time it’s a race against the save button, incrementally improving your odds as you watch in awe at all the physics going on. And why has Alex decided to stay behind? Now she chooses to catch up with Dad?

So we discover Episode 3 (slated for a December 2007 release date, can’t wait!) is going to take place in the Artic, but a Combine Advisor (another steal from Starship Troopers) rocks up and leaves us on a heart-breaking cliff-hanger. I may have been largely unimpressed with the game, but I loved the characters and that is affecting. I want to see it through. I want Episode Three. Goddamn Valve. Good guys my ass.

I’m conflicted. HL2 does have some genuinely great moments. D0g, the headcrab victims, the decaying world and misery of those surviving in it but Freeman’s silent act dates it and it all feels at arms-length because he’s not involved. I feel like an observer and it’s frustrating, because it’s a believable world you want to save from the Combine. It’s like having Star Wars toys you don’t take out of the packaging. Alyx is a quantum leap in companions; she’s not a follower – we’re a team. And she’s such a fangirl. Anything remotely heroic triggers a coo’ing comment and you often catch her glancing at you, smiling. But why? Who is Freeman really? He’s not much of a hero in HL2 – In HL1 he was a regular guy but why did G-Man defrost Freeman for this? He doesn’t do anything in HL2 that required a theoretical scientist and he has no personal part to play. G-Man should have unleashed Shepard. Plus there’s the confusion between HL1 and 2, the neatness of it all, that feeling that HL2 just kinda sails along. Nothing actually happens, nothing is resolved, the Combine aren’t exposed and we don’t get anywhere. It’s a really vague game that at best is setting up for a finale we didn’t get. Arguably it doesn’t even really get going until the end of Episode 2, where we prepare to take the fight to the Combine. Let’s do this! Oh.

I’m not conflicted. HL2 is style over substance and all about Source. It’s as epic as it is empty and it doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. But I’m still desperate to know how it ends and it’s insanely frustrating that Valve couldn’t see their way to ending it. It’s a huge betrayal of the fans that made Valve what it is. HL2 certainly made enough money to justify HL3 or at least Ep3 (or both, given Gabe occasionally claims the Episodes are HL3; he just wants shot of it). Come on Gabe -the G-Man- give us back our Freeman. Just one more moment with Alyx.

But it won’t happen. The lack of Ep3/HL3 despite HL2’s success proves Valve just didn’t care – if ever. It might have been all about Source, but in the end it’s all about Steam. I’ll never get over the way Steam was forced on us but now I live on it, and until I and the millions of other gamers log off, until we stop Steam accounting for 75% of all digital gaming, Valve will have no reason to resurrect Freeman. But we won’t. I can begrudgingly live without Freeman but I can’t live without Steam. It keeps prices low(ish), there’s support and links and forums; it’s a gamer community. I have over 250 games knocking about in there; I don’t have that kind of shelf space. The best thing about Half-Life 2 was Steam.

Half-Life 2 – 2004 | Episode One – 2006 | Episode Two – 2007

Developer/Publisher Valve Corporation
Win/Steam, PS3, X360