Do You Need To Play HL1 Before HL2?

Do I have to play HL1 before HL2?

  • DEFINITELY!

    Votes: 15 23.4%

  • No, but it would help to know it's story.

    Votes: 45 70.3%

  • DEFINITELY NOT!

    Votes: 4 6.3%
  • Total voters
    64
A

aaronfuhrer

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I know I'll probably get a lot of hate for not playing Half Life 1, but I've always been a Mac user so I could never play it, but now that Half Life 2 and all it's episodes have come out for Mac on Steam I can finally play them! :thumbs:

But then I realized Half Life 1 wasn't available for Mac... :x And it's also not included in the Orange box for the 360... :x

So I was just wondering, can I play Half Life 2 before Half Life 1, or do I have to wait and see if I'm lucky enough for them to release it for Mac?

:afro: (I had to add that...)
 
HL 1 was one of the best games ever made. You should defininitely find a way to play it
 
You can buy it on Steam.

It's not required to play, though. Half Life 2's storyline is entirely seperate from the original Half Life, save for a few characters like Eli (generic scientist 1 in HL), Dr Kleiner (generic scientist 3 in HL) and Barney (extremely generic security guard).

You, the character, Gordon Freeman, is really the only direct relation between Half Life and HL2...
 
Ridge said:
You can buy it on Steam.

It's not required to play, though. Half Life 2's storyline is entirely seperate from the original Half Life, save for a few characters like Eli (generic scientist 1 in HL), Dr Kleiner (generic scientist 3 in HL) and Barney (extremely generic security guard).

You, the character, Gordon Freeman, is really the only direct relation between Half Life and HL2...
Click to expand...
Well, it sucks because Half Life 1 isn't available for Macs on Steam, only PC. :(
 
If you have a windows emulator it might run.

I played Half-Life 2 long before I played the original, and in my opinion it's not really a requirement. However it might help if you learn some of the backstory before you start if you choose to skip 1. You can actually get a feel for the plot (although you won't know the ending for a while yet) if you watch Freeman's Mind (www.accursedfarms.com/Series.php?series=2), if you can't find a way to play the game.
 
rjthrog said:
HL 1 was one of the best games ever made. You should defininitely find a way to play it
Click to expand...
It definitely was, I still remember all game magazines being very enthusiastic about it. I recently played it and now I find it's graphics to be horribly outdated, though... A shame, 'cause the story's fine.
 
Frits said:
I recently played it and now I find it's graphics to be horribly outdated, though... A shame, 'cause the story's fine.
Click to expand...

Dude, It's a 98' game, what did you expect? I still love it though, never gets old to me.

@ aaronfuhrer

I advise you to find a way to play HL1 first, there is so much related to the HL2 series that you'll be missing and the first time you play HL2, you wouldn't know what's happening.. so yes, do so.
 
I would advise anyone who hasn't played it yet to play it as soon as they can.

I have a strong feeling EP3 or HL3 (or HL4 whichever it is supposed to be) will be pertinent to Xen in some way or another.
 
Thanks guys, I'll try and run in on a Windows emulator like Avoidist recommended.
 
If you wait a little while awhile black mesa source is coming out soon. Black mesa source is a completely redone version of the original half-life with the new source engine. I won't play half-life 1 again until this is released.

More information can be found at www.blackmesasource.com. All you need to play it is some version of half-life 2. This is all assuming that you will be able to play it on a mac.
 
I use bootcamp... No complaints. I tried installing Team Fortress in OSX during the initial mac weekend, but I'm not happy with the performance.
 
Escaep said:
This. I have a 24" inch late 2007 model iMac and I have a 225gb Win7 partition. Runs any game like its native Windows, no emulating at all.
Click to expand...

I actually never thought trying that, I'm going to do that.
 
ramsfan said:
If you wait a little while awhile black mesa source is coming out soon. Black mesa source is a completely redone version of the original half-life with the new source engine. I won't play half-life 1 again until this is released.

More information can be found at www.blackmesasource.com. All you need to play it is some version of half-life 2. This is all assuming that you will be able to play it on a mac.
Click to expand...

Don't hold your breath. The Black Mesa mod team hasn't even had a new TWEET since December 09.
 
MuToiD_MaN said:
Don't hold your breath. The Black Mesa mod team hasn't even had a new TWEET since December 09.
Click to expand...

Not to discredit, but no one tweets about ep3 and that doesn't mean it isn't being made, just maybe not out in december
 
rjthrog said:
Not to discredit, but no one tweets about ep3 and that doesn't mean it isn't being made, just maybe not out in december
Click to expand...

News-flash: The highly dangerous and mobile Valve flu has now spread amongst the BM dev team, shutting dozens of mouths to the public. The state of alertness can not be stated as we have not heard from Valve in relation to Episode Three yet.

Beleive in whatever you want..
 
pNp_Oski said:
News-flash: The highly dangerous and mobile Valve flu has now spread amongst the BM dev team, shutting dozens of mouths to the public. The state of alertness can not be stated as we have not heard from Valve in relation to Episode Three yet.

Beleive in whatever you want..
Click to expand...

I believe that I wanna play Half Life... ;(
 
aaronfuhrer said:
I actually never thought trying that, I'm going to do that.
Click to expand...

If you haven't already done it, its a really easy process. Just make sure you print out the user guide if you're not sure how to do it (or pull it up if you have a laptop handy.) It says back up your stuff, which I'd recommend, just in case. I've never backed up and I've done it probably 4 times and nothing has gone wrong.

But make sure you make the partition big enough. If you're only going to use it for half life then you don't need much. But I started out at a 55gb partition and have gone to 125gb then to 225 where I am now.
 
Honestly, I think Half-Life is now at that age where new players have to play its sequels in order to appreciate it and get the motivation to see it through, not the other way round. It's not merely a visual thing, there's just a lot of gameplay and design stuff in there that dates it. You may have more joy if you're used to other late 90s FPS games.

Edit: Valve and Source on Mac.
Whilst Left 4 Dead / 2 will probably precede it by some way, remember that there is an official source conversion of Half-Life out there. People have their grievances about products Valve haven't supported so well, but I don't think it's entirely unreasonable to propose that one day, they'll Mac up HLS.
 
kupocake said:
Honestly, I think Half-Life is now at that age where new players have to play its sequels in order to appreciate it and get the motivation to see it through, not the other way round. It's not merely a visual thing, there's just a lot of gameplay and design stuff in there that dates it. You may have more joy if you're used to other late 90s FPS games.

Edit: Valve and Source on Mac.
Whilst Left 4 Dead / 2 will probably precede it by some way, remember that there is an official source conversion of Half-Life out there. People have their grievances about products Valve haven't supported so well, but I don't think it's entirely unreasonable to propose that one day, they'll Mac up HLS.
Click to expand...

I hope you're right. The first time I heard Half Life was coming to Mac I got REALLY excited because I've always wanted to play the series, then I found out the first wasn't on and I kinda got mad that Valve didn't support that game that much.
 
While kupocake has a good point, I think you should play it. Half-Life 2 is a vastly superior game, in my mind anyway, but Half-Life is still a lot of fun. Ultimately, the events of first lead to the second, so story wise, it helps.
 
Herr Mike said:
While kupocake has a good point, I think you should play it. Half-Life 2 is a vastly superior game, in my mind anyway, but Half-Life is still a lot of fun. Ultimately, the events of first lead to the second, so story wise, it helps.
Click to expand...

Okay, thanks. I'll try and find a way to play it! :)
 
Half life 1 is the best game ever made. Ever. Of all time. EVER. You're doing yourself a disservice by not playing it.
 
Hl2 was made so that you don't have to play hl1 prior.

But HL1 is a game that stands it's time, and it's graphics aren't to bad either. Anyone who likes PC Gaming should try it.
 
otis said:
Hl2 was made so that you don't have to play hl1 prior.
Click to expand...

I'm 100%.. opposed to this! HL2 was an expansion to HL1 , not a story-shortener in a way. Yes, it starts in a way.. newbie-friendly so that new players could cut effort to learn the background, but HL1 is still the first, and should be played first.
 
Offcourse you don't HAVE to play it but if you want to understand the back bone of HL which is the story you should play it at some point.
 
You can read almost the entirety of Half-Life's story on the blurb of the box.
 
You don't have to play the first Half-Life to get an idea of the story, but I would recommend it if you're not the type of person who likes to read Wikipedia articles to find out things.
 
Shem said:
You don't have to play the first Half-Life to get an idea of the story, but I would recommend it if you're not the type of person who likes to read Wikipedia articles to find out things.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I don't mind reading them so I'll probably just do that since I can't play it..
 
aaronfuhrer said:
Yeah, I don't mind reading them so I'll probably just do that since I can't play it..
Click to expand...

Wow, really? You'd rather read a wiki article, which by the way wiki isn't always accurate, than play one of the best games ever made?
 
rjthrog said:
Wow, really? You'd rather read a wiki article, which by the way wiki isn't always accurate, than play one of the best games ever made?
Click to expand...

Seconned.

Yes, the story is available on Wikipedia in it's full lenght; yes, it isn't available on Mac yet and oh God, yes - it is quite plain, but in order to understand the whole series, you really need to play it.
 
Here's my advice: Throw that mac away, get a cheap $350 PC, and play HL1.


Then throw that away and get the mac back from the garbage yard.

I played HL2 first, then HL1, OPFOR, etc. etc. I don't really think that not playing HL1 beforehand would hamper the gameplay experience, but it wouldn't hurt to know who the **** Gordon is.
 
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