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PaperclipPerfector  22hr ago (text post)   725 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for July 10, 2026

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Name the games that did what HL1 and HL2 did, better than they did, between 2004-2016.

Portal?

Doesn't really qualify. It's not a shooter, IS made by Valve, IS using the excellent engine that helped HL2 be a success.

Far Cry (1 is more analogous to HL, and from 2 onwards they go more open world, but they still sometimes funnel you through to segments that are more like Half-Life), the Crysis series, Singularity, Call of Duty 2 to... I don't remember which, FEAR, Wolfenstein 2009 and New Order...

I'm not saying these are better games in their context than HL1 and HL2, and they all owe a lot to what HL1 and HL2 did, but if all these games, and HL1 and HL2, released for the first time today, HL1 and HL2 would be to me at least some of the least interesting and impressive of that bunch. I feel like arena shooters and "boomer shooters" aged better because their appeal is more tied to addictive game mechanics and high skill ceilings than "being impressed by seeing what would have usually been a video cutscene done in-engine, in first person while being able to move for the first time" or "being impressed by seeing a physics puzzle for the first time in an FPS".

The Half-Life games, particularly HL1, had pretty good mechanics and were quite similar to those movement shooters/boomer shooters of yore... In fact I'd say one of the chief draws of the first game is that it does have a satisfying feel to it mechanics wise. You have lots of mobility, your movement carries weight, as do the effects of the weapons you wield. You dodge a variety of projectiles. You dart in and out with your shotgun. It's not as mobile as something like Quake, but for a solo campaign based game it ranks among the best in my experience.

Compare with Halo or CoD, where things are much more sluggish, weightless, etc., all in order to play better with a controller. Those games have their own merits, of course, but as far as the feel of movement shooters goes, which I'd say is their chief virtue, HL does a much better job.

Even Half-Life 2 does pretty well. The vehicles are clunky but, again, they carry momentum, they dispense and absorb shocks, get yoinked down by gravity. There's an enjoyable physics to everything.

Beyond that, and this goes beyond mechanics and simplicity, but their other key asset is their personality. Their mix of capital w Weird elements, hodge podges of relatively exotic sci-fi ideas, their departure from rote action genre fare (burritos getting blown up in microwaves; involved characterizations; crowbars), sets them apart narratively from most other offerings. There's maybe a Twin Peaks vibe to it if I'm not mistaken, a bit offbeat. Games like Halo do the full-on action game approach very well, and that's what most shooters aspire to, but Half-Life's got it's own little niche storywise, and so gives us something of variety.

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