So are the Striders really the most impressive enemy?

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Manny

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Maybe this would qualify (or any answers to the thread at least) as a spoiler, I don't know. But I've been wondering ever since I first saw the striders in screens and videos and was blown away by them - could Valve already have shown us the game's most impressive foe? Now that HL2 is out, I'd like to ask this to people that are playing or have already finished. Since the reviews came out I've gotten the impression, in any case, that the Striders really are the biggest and the baddest baddies out there; before that I was sure Valve had only shown us the tip of the iceberg. Now I'm not very certain anymore.

I'm not asking anyone to actually name or describe any enemies or portions of the game though, in other words no spoilers please; I'd just like to know whether there's really only one huge, overwhelming enemy like the Strider, or whether you encounter other vast entities like them at certain points.
 
Striders are actually quite dull to fight. I mean, they are fun and it's great to run from cover to cover until you find that next rocket crate, but in the end all you are doing is unloading rockets into them until they die. There's no fancy ATAT/Snowspeeder-like tricks, even if you start aiming rockets at their legs. It's a waste really.
 
yeh its the same for the gun ships u jus run from cover to cover finding rockets
 
And is it me, or do the Striders seem a lot smaller than they did in the videos? Especially once they're down.
 
If they used thier I-Beams more often it would be cooler
 
So are they really the only 'large' enemies in HL2, then? There's no other truly vast entities in the game? :(
 
Gunships are bigger then striders. Personally I think those things are the best looking enemy in the game. Theres so much detail on their underside,.
 
How about the four legged things you see as you're being carried towards the end. Now they looked like they'd be fun to fight... though maybe not all that big. Something for Half Life 3 maybe? I'd be interested in finding out what animations were in the game for them. Maybe we'll see them in an expansion pack.
 
Wraithen said:
How about the four legged things you see as you're being carried towards the end. Now they looked like they'd be fun to fight... though maybe not all that big. Something for Half Life 3 maybe? I'd be interested in finding out what animations were in the game for them. Maybe we'll see them in an expansion pack.
Click to expand...

DONT VIEW THOSE LINKS UNLESS YOU BEAT THE GAME!

Hell yeah, what the hell were those? I wanted to fight those! Also, what the heck were the combine doing to those people? They are so skinny and skeleton like. Two screenshots depicting what i'm talking about.

http://img69.exs.cx/img69/7267/Whatisthis.jpg

http://img69.exs.cx/img69/3679/Whatisthis2.jpg
 
Yeah the only real disappointment in the game for me was the striders, the fights had been so much cooler had they been slow pace with just one strider, like in the very first strider vid, it's just one at a time, they're slow, they're not very powerful, but they are unstoppable. But HL2 they ended up just being; empty rockets in them one by one. And then they throw in four at once, which kinda ruined the effect for me at least.
 
Raziaar said:
DONT VIEW THOSE LINKS UNLESS YOU BEAT THE GAME!

Hell yeah, what the hell were those? I wanted to fight those! Also, what the heck were the combine doing to those people? They are so skinny and skeleton like. Two screenshots depicting what i'm talking about.

http://img69.exs.cx/img69/7267/Whatisthis.jpg

http://img69.exs.cx/img69/3679/Whatisthis2.jpg
Click to expand...

I figured they were the failed experiments. In the Prison Breen mentions that humans are being augmented to be more effective, maybe the process isn't completely successful. I also seem to remember that every time you see them out and about, they have a guard with them, so maybe they're another species who have been enslaved? As for the big Tank walkers, I'm hoping we'll see them in an expansion pack. Maybe a Dog's Day one where you play as, who else? Dog!
 
Just wait, when MP mods come around, it will be like, strider!! No rocket launcher! Ahahahahahah! Run for cover!!
 
The messed up looking people are humans who were sent to Nova Prospekt.


They are called stalkers.
 
I liked fighting the Striders although it was a dissapointment for me. I was expecting something much slower paced and much more creativity required to take them down.
 
Has that effect we see in the binks where before the strider shoots some energy ball thing, everything looks like it gets sucked into it been removed? I didnt see it in the game.
 
It only happened when you got to a certain spot, then the strider would fire that at you but only to destroy something like the conrete around you. It never did any damage either...

I was really looking forward to battling those things, but the above issue and the fact that you have unlimited rocket caches makes the battle kind of anti climatic. It would have been cool to set up a trip to trip it into some explosives or something abit more creative.
 
From the faceplates, I guess that the skinny things in the Citadel are combines outside their armour.
 
i got hit by the thing a flew to the next poart of the level it did plenty of damage to me :)
 
Varsity said:
From the faceplates, I guess that the skinny things in the Citadel are combines outside their armour.
Click to expand...
Hmm, not sure if that's true. I noticed a spraypaint image somewhere in Nova Prospekt that showed a comparison of Combine to Human to an Ape. The difference between the Combine and Human was the fact that
they seemed to have mechanical parts in their brain (and the mask, of course)
 
The "stalkers" are different from the Combine troops. They are essentially humans that have been degenerated into slaves. Their shape, structure, and movement is different than that of a Combine soldier.

You can see a suit-less Combine soldier in Nova Prospekt on a security screen. Do not confuse it with a stalker.
 
AJ Rimmer said:
Yeah the only real disappointment in the game for me was the striders, the fights had been so much cooler had they been slow pace with just one strider, like in the very first strider vid, it's just one at a time, they're slow, they're not very powerful, but they are unstoppable. But HL2 they ended up just being; empty rockets in them one by one. And then they throw in four at once, which kinda ruined the effect for me at least.
Click to expand...

exactly what i was thinking, i hope remakes of the binks come out as custom maps, and maybe the striders would be more fun then...
 
I agree, in the videos the Strider fights looked like they took place in much more open environments that would let you think creatively about what to do with them.

Plus, weren't we promised more destructable environments in this game? The Strider bits seem to be the only ones where they can destroy things, and those things stand out quite a bit. It was like watching a cartoon where you can tell in advance where the loose rock was because it was coloured differently to the rest of the surface.
 
Absinthe said:
You can see a suit-less Combine soldier in Nova Prospekt on a security screen. Do not confuse it with a stalker.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I saw that. It's the same model...
 
The first picture is a
Stalker, its what happens to you IF you boarded the train to nova prospekt. the combine turn humans into stalkers for slaves. In the stolen build you fought against early version of them(they had lazer beams on their heads) but then they took out fighting them. You use to fight them on the borealis
The next picture is a
Crab Synth/Mortar synth. These were another result of combine experiments. Inhuman contraptions.
 
Yeah, I remember that one now. :) There's no reason why they aren't BOTH 'naked' combines though.
 
Well, a few more reasons...

The stalker is more weak, thin, and seemingly fragile. The other person has more bulk and muscle. Even with the armor, I doubt that the stalker would be able to take much punishment. It seems more suited to the kind of menial tasks you'd see them taking care of in the citadel.

They sound different. The Combine soldiers, aside from the garbled nature of their radio chatter, seem to communicate in English. Their yells and speech is very human. The stalker, on the other hand, lets loose bloodcurdling screams and sounds very inhuman.

There a few more things I could think of that shows differences between the two, but I'm kind of getting sidetracked by real life atm. They could very well be the same thing, but I doubt that's the case.
 
One of the coolest surprises for me was when I was on top of the red lighthouse at the end of the coast level (right before Sand Trap) and I could see the dropships from above - and realized that they were large yellow-beige alien creatures holding (or, perhaps, they were merely attached to) engines and weapons and cargo holds. The striders seem to be of a similiar alien creature, adapted for street fighting (not unlike the Elephant armies of ancient Persia).
 
I dont think you would really want to fight striders in open areas without cover becuase you would be dead before you could say "OH SH*T!"

If you recall that one area where there was a strider in an open area, then youll understand what I mean.
 
missed more fighthing in city 17, more striders, and where did those cool helicopters go? did they take the day off? fighting the striders was a blast!
 
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