Deep enough story?

[Yellonet]

How "deep" is the story? Enough (to get some serious killing done)? Is it just the main story that is going on or are there several other side storys that you can sometimes get a glipse of?

And how much of a personality does the NPC's have? Are the good guys all good and the bad guys all rotten? Or will we see yin and yang personalities, like real people have?
Will we see the result of Alyx being raped by a Combine soldier come out as she tortures a captured enemy to death? A defecting Combine Assasin who just couldn't stand the sensless killing any more?

Personally I don't think we'll see that in this game, It would just go over the heads on the majority of players... sadly enough.

What do you think?

 

[Pi Mu Rho]

Yes .

 

[Yellonet]

Yes.

I don't believe you.

 

[Hectic Glenn]

I'm just looking forward to all the laughs we can have with the physics, and cool guns available. Im honestly not that overly interested in the story. I dont watch soaps, action keeps me interested...thats the type of gamer i am now give me a shotgun to put in your mouth, and ill use you to paint the wall! See i find that more fun than talking! (im slightly sadistic...)

 

[Cynical]

How "deep" is the story? Enough (to get some serious killing done)? Is it just the main story that is going on or are there several other side storys that you can sometimes get a glipse of?

And how much of a personality does the NPC's have? Are the good guys all good and the bad guys all rotten? Or will we see yin and yang personalities, like real people have?
Will we see the result of Alyx being raped by a Combine soldier come out as she tortures a captured enemy to death? A defecting Combine Assasin who just couldn't stand the sensless killing any more?

Personally I don't think we'll see that in this game, It would just go over the heads on the majority of players... sadly enough.

What do you think?

i think it would be a pleasant surprise if elements like that were in the game. hl1 had more story and mystery than all games combined (e.g. the origins and intentions of the Gman). so i think hl2 will continue on this path, answer many of the questions and produce alot more. as for NPC personality we should expect the majour characters to have some degree of individualism, since valve realised that the characters in hl1 were one of the reasons people fell in love with it.

 

[Yellonet]

It would just go over the heads on the majority of players... sadly enough.

Told you so.

Edit: And that's Yellonet, not Yellownet :hmph:

 

[Absinthe]

R - E - S - E - P - C - T

What does that spell?

...

Resepct?

 

[Chris D]

I have just had to delete over 20 posts from a single thread. This isn't acceptable at all.

If you want somewhere to spam, go to another site. If you want somewhere to start fights and insult people, go to another site. We just don't want you here and that will be harshly reflected in any of you I see posting like this again.

You might not have anything to contribute to his discussion, but be logical about it and just don't bloody post!

Now, please, get back on topic.

 

[we11er]

Hopefully the fact that they have written a whole in-depth storyline of the HL2 world, this will come through in the game. It's like watching the harry potter films, even if you haven't read the books, you can sense there is a load of story behind what you see onscreen.

 

[affen]

The PC Gameplay reviews says the story is quite a standard 'rebel'-story with some minor story deviations, not bad but not fantastic either. The power of HL² seems to be the intensive and original action moments.

 

[Yellonet]

The PC Gameplay reviews says the story is quite a standard 'rebel'-story with some minor story deviations, not bad but not fantastic either. The power of HL² seems to be the intensive and original action moments.

Ok.. was kind of hoping for something more. Oh well... I still have my imagination

 

[Cynical]

The PC Gameplay reviews says the story is quite a standard 'rebel'-story with some minor story deviations, not bad but not fantastic either. The power of HL² seems to be the intensive and original action moments.

i dont think it would get 97% from pc zone if it was just a standard story. it feels like pc gameplay were very harsh in their review, or at least i hope so.

 

[perrkele]

Half-Life didn't have an amazing story either, it was just told in a brilliant manner. I'm sure they'll manage to do it again in HL2 despite the plot being "just your regular rebel story". Just having convincing animation and facial expressions in a game helps a lot.

 

[Asknoone]

Trust me, yes, it is

 

[Yellonet]

i dont think it would get 97% from pc zone if it was just a standard story. it feels like pc gameplay were very harsh in their review, or at least i hope so.

There might be some subtle details (which hightens the experience) that the reviewer missed in the haste to get the review done

 

[Cynical]

There might be some subtle details (which hightens the experience) that the reviewer missed in the haste to get the review done

probably right. i heard they had to play the game in valves offices, so they musta been in a rush to get it done.

 

[SFLUFAN]

I have no doubt that by contemporary FPS standars, HL2 will have an engrossing story. Note that I said by FPS standards - comparing it to an RPG would not do justice to either genre. Just don't expect for this to be "Deus Ex Redux" because it won't be. But it will certainly have more depth than "Far Cry" or "Doom 3".

One must also consider that science fiction is largely based on archetypes that we've seen before so we won't necessarily see original content per se but we'll see it presented in an original format.

 

[Uranus]

How "deep" is the story? Enough (to get some serious killing done)? Is it just the main story that is going on or are there several other side storys that you can sometimes get a glipse of?

And how much of a personality does the NPC's have? Are the good guys all good and the bad guys all rotten? Or will we see yin and yang personalities, like real people have?
Will we see the result of Alyx being raped by a Combine soldier come out as she tortures a captured enemy to death? A defecting Combine Assasin who just couldn't stand the sensless killing any more?

Personally I don't think we'll see that in this game, It would just go over the heads on the majority of players... sadly enough.

What do you think?

Yes. No. Maybe. Yes. Yes. No. NO. Yes

actually, I didn't even read the questions right (lots of questions tho!).

 

[alehm]

Are the good guys all good and the bad guys all rotten? Or will we see yin and yang personalities, like real people have?

You mean like Adolph Hitler? Sure, he killed and tortured millions of people but he could make a to die for German Chocolate Cake. People tend to forget that.

 

[Yellonet]

You mean like Adolph Hitler? Sure, he killed and tortured millions of people but he could make a to die for German Chocolate Cake. People tend to forget that.

That is exactly what I mean.

Edit: And it should be Adolf with an "f".

 

[Asuka]

I think we will see a very deep story. hoping its as deep as Deus Ex.

 

[Yellonet]

I think we will see a very deep story. hoping its as deep as Deus Ex.

Everyone keeps going on about Deus Ex. Personally I hated that game, it just hadn't the right feeling. And feeling is something very important to me.

Edit: But then again, maybe I just didn't give it a chance (Was I just mad because the 120+ Mb demo I downloaded on my 33.6kbps modem didn't play on my computer? Who knows?)

 

[The Monkey]

I have just had to delete over 20 posts from a single thread. This isn't acceptable at all.

If you want somewhere to spam, go to another site. If you want somewhere to start fights and insult people, go to another site. We just don't want you here and that will be harshly reflected in any of you I see posting like this again.

You might not have anything to contribute to his discussion, but be logical about it and just don't bloody post!

Now, please, get back on topic.

Sorry about that. :angel:

 

[Cynical]

my mind is having an information overload. i remember vaguely someone from valve (i think it was Doug) saying that alyx has her own back story, and it could be in an expansion pack or something. u guys remember anything like this?

 

[Asuka]

Everyone keeps going on about Deus Ex. Personally I hated that game, it just hadn't the right feeling. And feeling is something very important to me.

Edit: But then again, maybe I just didn't give it a chance (Was I just mad because the 120+ Mb demo I downloaded on my 33.6kbps modem didn't play on my computer? Who knows?)

You should play the whole game. Not the demo. Its hard to get use to for the 1st time playing it. But it had the deepest best story out there. It also never gets old (beaten it 6+ times) The feeling of the game is very good just give it another chance. This time go with it longer, its a VERY long game.

 

[cadaveca]

How "deep" is the story? Enough (to get some serious killing done)? Is it just the main story that is going on or are there several other side storys that you can sometimes get a glipse of?

And how much of a personality does the NPC's have? Are the good guys all good and the bad guys all rotten? Or will we see yin and yang personalities, like real people have?
Will we see the result of Alyx being raped by a Combine soldier come out as she tortures a captured enemy to death? A defecting Combine Assasin who just couldn't stand the sensless killing any more?

Personally I don't think we'll see that in this game, It would just go over the heads on the majority of players... sadly enough.

What do you think?

You've brought up a fantasic point...just how complex are the people's live's in HL2? Is it good vs bad, or do extreme physcological factors motivate the characters, as in real-life? Are we going to play a FPS, or a VIDEO game.

I enjoyed MYST when it came out, purely along those thoughts...the interaction and the end of sanity amidst the storyline was surreal enough that you WANTED one of those three endings...

I was hoping that when Gabe said "I can't wait to see how people react to the characters....develop attachments to the characters, like some have to Barney"...this is what i think he may have been refering to...but that remains to be seen.

The original HL captured alot of attention, and a large part of that was that the game drew you so deeply involved with the plot that it was hard to stop playing, becasue you wanted to know what was around the corner. But that was six years ago.

Today, FPS games rule the world, in a very large way. Almost everyone who's played more than one game has had the experience of blasting away some enemies from the character's perspective. Knowing this, I think Valve undertook one of the hardest tasks imaginable...revive an old genre..and perhaps create a new one at the same time. It's taken six years for their plans to come to fruition... i can hardly believe we will be disappointed. Did they flesh out the character's lives as well as they have the graphics? They better have, or it may be "just another eye-candy filled shooter". Having lush, interactive environments to kill people in is nice, but it kinda grows old after a while, at least for me.

 

[dart321]

It's no MGS but it will do.

 

[MultiVaC]

I remember Gabe saying something like "one side is wrong, and the other is extremely wrong" or whatever. I'm sure Dr. Breen won't be out to "destroy mankind forever1!!!!1111" (Like in Doom 3, what the hell was that guy thinking?) and there will probably be some drama between the characters. One of the reviews said there are about a dozen recognizable ally characters, so a few of them are sure to croak at some point. And we know that not all our friends agree with eachother ("we should've listened to my father and done it his way"). And, of course, some people like Father Grigori are just plain weird.

 

[Jadewolf5675]

The plot is one of the things I'm looking forward to the most, and seems to me to be one of the deepest plots in any game.

 

[perrkele]

Everyone keeps going on about Deus Ex. Personally I hated that game, it just hadn't the right feeling. And feeling is something very important to me.

Edit: But then again, maybe I just didn't give it a chance (Was I just mad because the 120+ Mb demo I downloaded on my 33.6kbps modem didn't play on my computer? Who knows?)

Deus Ex is an incredible game! One of those few games that are more than the sum of its parts (rather horrible combat, awful AI etc, bland voice-acting etc...). The first couple of levels are a bit dull, it took me like a week or two to get past the first mission, actually I managed to finish it only because a friend of mine basically forced me to finish it... :E After a few levels, though, I was hooked in a way I had never experienced before, I was loving every second of it. Once the story gets going... IMO Deus Ex has the best atmosphere, world, and characters in a game, ever. In my books it's the second best FPS ever made, only losing to the first Half-Life (with a very narrow margin I might add!).

Besides, how often do you find new stuff/dialogue in a game the sixth time you're playing it through?

 

[KagePrototype]

I'm not so interested in the story as I am with the character interaction in HL2. I'd just like to see what everyone's raving on about in the reviews.

As for Deus Ex, it had a nice plot, but the characters were monotonous cardboard cut-outs. I'm expecting HL2 to be the opposite; more character driven, rather than relying on plot twists.

 

[perrkele]

As for Deus Ex, it had a nice plot, but the characters were monotonous cardboard cut-outs. I'm expecting HL2 to be the opposite; more character driven, rather than relying on plot twists.

EDIT: Eek! Yellonet (or anyone else who hasn't played DX yet), if you're planning on playing Deus Ex, don't read this! Spoilers!

I thought the voice acting for the characters was rather monotonous, but the characters itself (well most of them anyway) I found quite interesting. The AI programs in particular really made an impression on me, it was so great when they started to contact you through the link thingy. One of the best moments of gaming I have ever experienced was in Paris where all of a sudden one of those cool Shodan-like voices starts to spout out something completely unintelligible through the comm link, it really freaked me out! I was like "whoa, what the hell is going on! Who the **** was that!" For some reason it really scared the living shit out of me. It was great!

About your second sentence: I totally agree with you. The character animation and facial expression technology really helps to bring characters alive and thus will take the characters on a completely different level compared to.. well.. more or less any FPS game before. This is one of the main things I'm really excited about HL2, too! :cheers:

 

[KagePrototype]

I thought the voice acting for the characters was rather monotonous, but the characters itself (well most of them anyway) I found quite interesting. The AI programs in particular really made an impression on me, it was so great when they started to contact you through the link thingy. One of the best moments of gaming I have ever experienced was in Paris where all of a sudden one of those cool Shodan-like voices starts to spout out something completely unintelligible through the comm link, it really freaked me out! I was like "whoa, what the hell is going on! Who the **** was that!" For some reason it really scared the living shit out of me. It was great!

Yeah, the AIs were cool (that bit freaked me out as well, heh)...but everyone else had no personality. At all. The only one with actual character was Bob Page, and he was little more than an evil genius.

 

[perrkele]

Paul Denton? Tracer Tong? Walton Simons? Stanton Dowd? I thought they at least were quite interesting. I have read basically every single e-mail in that game (I think!) and gone through (most of?) the conversations with them many times. I really got the feeling that they were more than just cardboard, but heck, maybe it's just me. I guess I should go play it again! I actually cared about you-know-who and really hated the baddies, or rather the bad guy's right hand man (one of the best meanies in a game ever!). That sort of emotion towards game characters is quite uncommon for me at least. I'm hoping to see more of this in HL2 and to a greater extent, too. But I agree with you that basically all of the non-main characters in Deus Ex had no personality whatsoever.

 

[Cynical]

Paul Denton? Tracer Tong? Walton Simons? Stanton Dowd? I thought they at least were quite interesting. I have read basically every single e-mail in that game (I think!) and gone through (most of?) the conversations with them many times. I really got the feeling that they were more than just cardboard, but heck, maybe it's just me. I guess I should go play it again! I actually cared about you-know-who and really hated the baddies, or rather the bad guy's right hand man (one of the best meanies in a game ever!). That sort of emotion towards game characters is quite uncommon for me at least. I'm hoping to see more of this in HL2 and to a greater extent, too. But I agree with you that basically all of the non-main characters in Deus Ex had no personality whatsoever.

deus ex's characters were brilliant in my opinion, only one thing ruined the game for me: JC Denton (he is the main character u'r supposed to be controlling). everybody around him, including his brother had great characters whilst everytime he opened his mouth he sounded like an idiot.
another spoiler here, if u havn't played the game yet and intend to, don't read this part:

also, the story reached an incredible peak early on when u discovered that paul denton (jc's brother) was working for the ....(what were they called again?). now that was a very good twist, i was like: holy shiznetd! but from there on the rest of the story jsut wasnt in the same quality, apart from a few parts (like when JC was in his brother room and the guys come bargin in, that was brilliant too).

 

[Edcrab]

Yeah, NPC interaction will be the defining feature for me; the story will no doubt be brilliant, but I just want to wander tenements, causing people to react to my seemingly random and destructive nature...

However, I am expecting some sort of twist involving those suspicious wooly hats. Eventually, the hats will be what tears the resistance apart- The Day of Hatred, where they each begin savaging each others taste in clothing and take the slightest criticism to heart. Again.

 

[Cynical]

Yeah, NPC interaction will be the defining feature for me; the story will no doubt be brilliant, but I just want to wander tenements, causing people to react to my seemingly random and destructive nature...

However, I am expecting some sort of twist involving those suspicious wooly hats. Eventually, the hats will be what tears the resistance apart- The Day of Hatred, where they each begin savaging each others taste in clothing and take the slightest criticism to heart. Again.

roflmao

 

[Uranus]

I think we will see a very deep story. hoping its as deep as Deus Ex.

oooh, I've been assured it's VERY VERY deep

(pun intended ;P)

 

[NB.]

I dunno, personally I'm not really expecting a 'deep' story, i thought HL1 had a cack sory myself, it was just a fun game. From what ive seen so far of HL2 it seems like they have focused on making the game fun to play but i dont see any evidence of real depth to the world. Everything seems weighted towards interesting weaponry, large fun environments, imaginative enemies etc.. Its not much to go on admittedly, and i'm not saying that fun gameplay or deep stories are mutually exclusive things, but i think the game will have just enough of a story to keep you interested and wondering whats going on, but the bulk of the game will be in the doing, not the thinking if you know what i mean.

The fact that theyve taken the same approach of Gordon being an 'observer' like in HL1 also makes me think this. Its an interesting gameplay mechanic, but it means that you cant go snooping into whats going on yourself by asking npc's etc.. you just have to get parts of the story when valve say so.

 

[flo_Orian]

as long as its enjoyable gameplay i dont care about the storyline