Half-Life is just one of those games that changes the way you think about video games.
The story of Half-Life has always been one of the best in an FPS, and in my opinion one of the best of the best in any game. They game begins with you, Gordon Freeman, going to work. It starts just like any average day. You watch the sites while on your train. You finally arrive at your destination. You head to your locker and put on your H.E.V. suit. You head to the test
chambers to help with a teleportation experiment. The scientists tell you they have a particularly special test today. As the test proceeds, a scientist comments that something seems out of place, but feels it isn’t a problem. Then all hell breaks loose. The experiment goes terribly wrong. The test machine begins to spin out of control, and you’re trapped in the test chamber. Suddenly it goes dark, you reawaken only to find yourself on an alien world, your soon teleported to see another group of aliens around you. After your little trip you finally re-awaken in the test chambers. As you walk out of the chambers you see all kinds of destruction, and worse some of the alien have started to teleport to earth. A fellow scientist tells you that you should make your way to the top, and try to get help. This is essentially the beginning of Half-Life.
What makes Half-Life so good is the pacing of the game. There’s never a dull moment. The game starts out with that slow train ride and vamps up to an ending that is one of the most impressive moments in all of gaming. The game just keeps getting faster, and tougher. It’s constantly introducing new enemies forcing you to quickly adapt to situations, or giving you some sort of new puzzle. This is truly what makes Half-Life so great.
The audio in the game is also great. All of the people in the game have at least something to say, but it’s the sound effects that are the best part of the audio. The guns all sound unique and ambient sounds in the game suit it perfectly. Something different from most games in Half-Life is the absence of music. In most games there’s always some sort of music playing, but in Half-Life it’s rare to hear music, when it does come on though it is usually a techno song that fits the mood perfectly.
Half-Life was also able to achieve something that many games lack. It has one of the best modding communities of all time. There have been literally hundreds of mods for Half-Life. Some of the more popular ones are Counter-Strike, Day of Defeat, and Sven Co-op. This adds near infinite replay-ability to the game, as there’s always a mod you can check out.
My only complaint with the game is a small one. When doing some of the puzzles you are forced to make pixel perfect jumps. It can sometimes be hard to make these jumps as the movement controls can be a little twitchy. This is really my only problem with the game.
Half-Life is by far one of the greatest games of all time. The pace it sets from beginning to end is near unbeatable. It always keeps the action going, it makes you feel apart of the story, and it can be a fairly challenging game, and that’s what makes it so good.