Biggest flaw in HL2 was the lack of Xen aliens

GargantuaVirus

GargantuaVirus

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There is just headcrabs, barnacles and headcrab zombies but no Garg, tentacle, houndeye, bullsquid and others.

This must be improved in EP3 of half life 2.
 
We'll get right on that.
 
Oh, so this is why HL2.net went down for 4 hours.

/facepalm
 
GargantuaVirus said:
Are you god
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Only on the forums and if he knows, or can find out where you live.

I thought that there was a good variety of enemies, especially with the addition of a couple new types of headcrab.
 
Higlac said:
Only on the forums and if he knows, or can find out where you live.

I thought that there was a good variety of enemies, especially with the addition of a couple new types of headcrab.
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And true, it would definitely be nice for some Xenian creatures to come back. I definitely wouldn't mind some new (old) enemies to fight; it would be even cooler if Valve made variations of other creatures like they did for the headcrab.
 
I wouldn't call it a flaw, but I don't think anyone would have complained if there were more critters.
 
I'm pretty sure Valve just got rid of the monsters that players generally didn't like or found annoying, as well as ones that were kind of gimmicky/minibosses that just wouldn't have the same impact if they were brought back. Like the tentacles and gargs.
 
All of the Xen aliens that weren't parasitic in nature were prolly killed of by the Combine.

That said, the only major flaw I found was the pitiful Combine AI.
 
Vegeta897 said:
I'm pretty sure Valve just got rid of the monsters that players generally didn't like or found annoying, as well as ones that were kind of gimmicky/minibosses that just wouldn't have the same impact if they were brought back. Like the tentacles and gargs.
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Yeah buddy. I'm sure glad Valve decided to take out those terrible annoying minibosses like the garg. Nobody liked him.

Now the hunter chopper that follows you around through the canals and the fifteen hour boat ride that you can't properly fight back against until the end, there's a good boss. Who doesn't love that hunter chopper and its wily antics?

And when it showed up again in Episode 2?! OH MAN!

I'm sure glad they didn't do something annoying like have you driving toward White Forest, coming across an area of curiously-felled trees, the silence being broken by a thunderous BOOM, BOOM, BOOM and all of a sudden a group of rebels spill from the copse, firing wildly behind them as a gargantua tears through the remaining woods, setting the area alight with flame. That wouldn't have had much of an impact, IMO.

But when that hunter chopper showed up and I had to use its own bombs against it, AGAIN, except with the gravity gun?! Holy shit. I could NOT have expected that. I mean, if there's one thing I can say for Valve at least their bosses in HL2 aren't gimmicky. That scene was so great I'll remember it forever and won't ever forget what chapter it's even in, because it was so memorable.
 
Hey man. Whether or not Valve actually succeeded in coming up with good replacements for those enemies/encounters in HL2 is irrelevant to my point.
 
It is relevant. You're saying that they got rid of things that people "didn't like" or "wouldn't have had an impact." How exactly would HOLY SHIT GARGANTUA RUNNING FREE IN THE WILD JESUS CHRIST IT'S RIGHT BEHIND ME not have an impact? It would've made more impact than another chopper fight. Probably would've made more impact than the fight with the antlion guards in Ep2 also. People love that big blue night-indestructible bastard.

Furthermore if players "generally didn't like" Xen creatures or "found them annoying," why is it that everybody and their mother clamors for houndeyes and bullsquids? Six years people been asking for those two. Hell, the bullsquids were originally in Route Kanal, and Lost Coast. Why they were cut I'll never know.
 
I have to agree with darkside here. A garg in the forest would be awesome.
 
I'm not saying it wouldn't, but there would be people who be like "ok wow, it was shocking the first time I saw the garg in hl1, couldn't valve come up with another big enemy for me to fight?"

I am just stating the reason why Valve did this, I am not defending their decisions.
 
Vegeta897 said:
"ok wow, it was shocking the first time I saw the garg in hl1, couldn't valve come up with another big enemy for me to fight?"
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NOBODY would say this. Besides, Valve HAD a chance to give us a new big enemy in Episode 2. Where was my antlion king, Valve?!

I am just stating the reason why Valve did this, I am not defending their decisions.
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And I'm saying I think you're wrong, that Valve didn't think, "Oh, players wouldn't like these things, so we won't put them in there." If anything I'd chalk it up to omission by neglect, or for the purpose of focusing on player vs. Combine less than player vs. Xenian wildlife. The antlions, of course, being the exception, because they're the NEW Xenian fauna. And of course you can't get rid of headcrabs.

But everything else, fuck 'em. YOU KIDS LIKE-A DA STRIDERS, DON'T YOU?!
 
It would have been nice if Half Life 2 had a final boss.
 
The thing is. They could have thrown many kind of things in game and set up many kind of situations, but would they have supported the story? Personally I think the way they did it was the best way when thinking about the story.

In Half-Life 1 we saw weird stuff so much because it was so close to the incident and therefore it went deeper to the Xen stuff. But Half-Life 2 while partly being about the same happening it was mainly about dealing with the compound. I think the balance between our world and aliens in half-life 2 was quite perfectly balanced.
 
I for one support ALL Xen fauna returning to HL2. **** yeah a Garg in the forest would be awesome. So would coming across a huge ****ing tentacle monster in some old quarry back in the mountains like a Sarlacc or some shit.
 
Xevrex said:
And true, it would definitely be nice for some Xenian creatures to come back. I definitely wouldn't mind some new (old) enemies to fight; it would be even cooler if Valve made variations of other creatures like they did for the headcrab.
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Agreed
 
Xevrex said:
...it would be even cooler if Valve made variations of other creatures like they did for the headcrab.
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I'm lobbying for Motorbike Bullsquid.

Stuff that, I'm changing my name to Motorbike Bullsquid.
 
We need houndeyes and snarks gorramit!
 
Darkside55 said:
Yeah buddy. I'm sure glad Valve decided to take out those terrible annoying minibosses like the garg. Nobody liked him.

Now the hunter chopper that follows you around through the canals and the fifteen hour boat ride that you can't properly fight back against until the end, there's a good boss. Who doesn't love that hunter chopper and its wily antics?
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The Hunter Chopper wasn't baddass, it was just plain annoying, dropping those mines that were shit. Now on my first play-through of HL, I got a sweat on in those winding access tunnels because I was too afraid to see if the garg was actually chasing me after taking out the two marines in the garage.
 
DEATH eVADER said:
The Hunter Chopper wasn't baddass, it was just plain annoying, dropping those mines that were shit. Now on my first play-through of HL, I got a sweat on in those winding access tunnels because I was too afraid to see if the garg was actually chasing me after taking out the two marines in the garage.
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Either you're agreeing with his point or your sarcasm detector is teh tragic suck.

Darkside55 said:
And of course you can't get rid of headcrabs.
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I hear they have a shampoo for that.

For the record, I agree about the Garg. Not enough love has been expressed for it yet, even with Darkside's comments.
 
A flaw? I don't know about that. There could have been more done with the enemies though, IMO, and Xen creatures may have been the way to do it. I mean seriously, no one is going to welcome another zombie or antlion level, and ABSOLUTELY no one will be upset if we don't have another gunship/strider/hunterchopper/hunter "boss battle". A new boss is completely necessary at this point. New regular enemies would be welcome as well.
 
MuToiD_MaN said:
Either you're agreeing with his point or your sarcasm detector is teh tragic suck.



I hear they have a shampoo for that.

For the record, I agree about the Garg. Not enough love has been expressed for it yet, even with Darkside's comments.
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Just remember to shave and.....uh....oh yeah, dont let them penetrate your spine.

As for this being the biggest flaw i would say general lack of polish if not continuous inside reference to the first game takes that distinction. The second stage was almost painful as it went from just seeing Barney conveniently to him giving you your old suit with many a pun and even the stinking crowbar. It would have been better served with just a stupid pipe as melee.

As for enemies i say that some Combine parasites or vermin that crept on their Citadel would have made for some good fresh critters. The Combine were much more interesting antagonists and more dangerous. Going back to Xen would be like downgrading. Anything that could follow the Combine from environment to environment would be very hardy.

But the chopper was probably the lamest fight with the tacked on mines that were stupidly weak. That whole section was not up to grade
 
i'd like to see more animation sequences between AI, specifically the zombies...

ya know, just a couple of them slapping each other around, doing what bored zombies do.

is it too much to ask for a child zombies...cahman. if we can't butcher kids in computer games when can we exactly?
 
HL Was about the Xen. That's done now, we're onto new disasters in HL2. We don't need Zombies, Zombines, 3 different head crabs, Combine AND Xen creatures.
 
Xevrex said:
And true, it would definitely be nice for some Xenian creatures to come back. I definitely wouldn't mind some new (old) enemies to fight; it would be even cooler if Valve made variations of other creatures like they did for the headcrab.
Click to expand...

Agreed too.

And one more thing... I was wondering why enemies won't go dead meat like gore. I killed a CP and then tried chopping his body to piece of him and nothing. Old game has one looks almost like Unreal.
 
Noodle said:
All of the Xen aliens that weren't parasitic in nature were prolly killed of by the Combine.

That said, the only major flaw I found was the pitiful Combine AI.
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Quoted for correctness.
 
I agree with Darkside. Xen had a whole ecology. Having another Garg would've shown that it was just a species made for the sake of a Boss fight. Besides, you didn't really fight the Garg in HL1, it'd be nice to see Gordon using the Rocket Launcher and hiding behind rocks as the Garg throws fire centimetres away from him.

They seem like a great Combine "tank".
 
Paskiewicz said:
Agreed too.

And one more thing... I was wondering why enemies won't go dead meat like gore. I killed a CP and then tried chopping his body to piece of him and nothing. Old game has one looks almost like Unreal.
Click to expand...

Yeah, HL2 was almost all ragdolls and no gibs. Quite a shame. Gibs are an essential element of the FPS.

in my opinion.
 
Slicin' and dicin' the zombies was probably as near as you got to a gore-fest, I guess...

Would've liked to have maybe stumbled across a hidden away bunch of xen-characters maybe in HL2, but t'wasn't to be.

More than happy with what was offered though - although as already mentioned - pity the AI wasn't nudged up a few levels. Reminds me of the part at Nova Prospekt where you are meant to set up the turrets whilst Alex is still in another control room trying to sort something out and make her way to you. I just crouched in one of the units that originally held a turret with me' shotgun primed. Blew away every Combine soldier without taking much damage at all as they merrily walked in front of me, turned to fire and were met with a double blast from the shotty. ;) The pile of bodies was ridiculous, heh-heh...
 
yeah - need more of the original Half-Life enemies (and variations of them)...plus a return to Xen and more discussion with Vortigaunts and that in Episode 3...
 
Agreed about the AI and the gibbs and I want more aliens as well. I think they kinda milked antlions, zombies and combine were as half-life was more diverse. We just need some regular aliens like the grunts, shock trooper or vortigaunt or even voltigore. They need to come up with more types of enemies like them. Nothing that requires an RPG. That thing is overused on boss fights and not enough on regulars.

Speaking of which I demand a laser which can be turned off.
 
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