Imho, they should toy with the player in the following way:
-At the start of EP3 you loose all your weapons -Barney appears and hands you a bucket (or an equally useless meelee weapon) saying: "Sorry, but I couldn't find a crowbar." -Right before the end the gman appears and hands your crowbar -Alyx fuses the crowbar, with the your portal gun and the grav gun, forming some kind of super crowbar, that allows you to beat the advisors back into their own dimension.
Yep, that would be an awesome "Guys, it's just a game" statement.
locallyunsceneFeeder of TrollsJoin Date: 2002-12-25Member: 11528Members, Constellation
<!--quoteo(post=1661378:date=Nov 20 2007, 11:08 PM:name=GWAR)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(GWAR @ Nov 20 2007, 11:08 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1661378"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Killing a advisor with his artificial leg. Unlikely, but awesome in so many ways.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> <!--quoteo(post=1661395:date=Nov 21 2007, 05:20 AM:name=Faskalia)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Faskalia @ Nov 21 2007, 05:20 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1661395"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Regarding weapons in EP3:
Imho, they should toy with the player in the following way:
-At the start of EP3 you loose all your weapons -Barney appears and hands you a bucket (or an equally useless meelee weapon) saying: "Sorry, but I couldn't find a crowbar." -Right before the end the gman appears and hands your crowbar -Alyx fuses the crowbar, with the your portal gun and the grav gun, forming some kind of super crowbar, that allows you to beat the advisors back into their own dimension.
Yep, that would be an awesome "Guys, it's just a game" statement.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> <!--quoteo(post=1661399:date=Nov 21 2007, 06:41 AM:name=Retales)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Retales @ Nov 21 2007, 06:41 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1661399"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Or better yet, a crowbar with a scope and a silencer<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> Yes. To all three.
moultanoCreator of ns_shiva.Join Date: 2002-12-14Member: 10806Members, NS1 Playtester, Contributor, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Gold, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
Late to the party I know, but I just beat this, and I have a theory to how they iterated on the plot.
My theory is this. In the original writing of it, Alyx was killed by falling from the bridge, and eli was killed by a heart attack. Then Valve decided that they needed to bring the emotional center back to the enemies so they changed both scenes.
We know clearly that Alyx was going to fall from the train trestle because it was in the trailer. There a lot of foreshadowing of eli having a heart attack. When he grabs his chest and has to sit down before the final battle, when Alyx tells him "prepare for unforseen consequences" etc. Also many people have commented on the advisers seeming coming from nowhere as a "deux ex machina." I think that's because they were added later.
It's worth pointing out, however, that the advisors have been in the game since HL2. They're occasionally seen on monitors in that game, though it may just be the same one in all cases. So while it is arguable whether or not their role was expanded later on, they were there from the beginning.
<!--quoteo(post=1666714:date=Jan 8 2008, 07:37 AM:name=moultano)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(moultano @ Jan 8 2008, 07:37 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1666714"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Late to the party I know, but I just beat this, and I have a theory to how they iterated on the plot.
My theory is this. In the original writing of it, Alyx was killed by falling from the bridge, and eli was killed by a heart attack.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> I don't think they planned to have Alyx die from falling off the bridge. Rather, that was what would cause her injury instead of a Hunter stomping her.
I buy into your director's cut theory, because I'm one of the ones who think the ending of ep. 2 seemed a bit deus ex machina. yeah, sure, advisers exist in the hl2 universe, they're entitled to barge in and kill a core plot character, right? why all of a sudden when they could have glided in at any time? why didn't they kill frickin' GORDON and slurp his brains when they had him there on a silver platter? oh noes, an alarm went off, we can't take an extra 5 seconds to kill the one guy who is the biggest threat to our invasion...
I think not. Alyx was pretty clearly going to have been hurt from falling from the train, but the whole heart attack thing is pure speculation. Someone grabbing their chest might mean "heart attack" in real life but for game animation you have to overexaggerate everything because you're dealing with soulless NPCs, not real actors, so actions like grabbing your chest or something have to be telegraphed and animated with a lot of exaggeration. That combined with how lame it would be to just kill off Eli with a stupid heart attack makes me think that there's no way that was ever intended, or if it was, there's nowhere near enough evidence for us to have reasonably concluded that. And like lolf pointed out, the Advisors had been around forever, and if you recall, <span style='color:#000000;background:#000000'>you actually had a 10 minute sequence earlier in Ep2 where an advisor levitated you and Alyx and some other dude and sucked his brain out, then you fought a bunch of Combine after taking out the advisor's machinery and stuff</span> and if that's something that can be added at the last minute than Valve clearly works much faster than we suspect and is simply mean to us when it delays things.
moultanoCreator of ns_shiva.Join Date: 2002-12-14Member: 10806Members, NS1 Playtester, Contributor, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Gold, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
<!--quoteo(post=1666764:date=Jan 8 2008, 12:21 PM:name=TychoCelchuuu)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(TychoCelchuuu @ Jan 8 2008, 12:21 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1666764"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I think not. Alyx was pretty clearly going to have been hurt from falling from the train, but the whole heart attack thing is pure speculation. Someone grabbing their chest might mean "heart attack" in real life but for game animation you have to overexaggerate everything because you're dealing with soulless NPCs, not real actors, so actions like grabbing your chest or something have to be telegraphed and animated with a lot of exaggeration. That combined with how lame it would be to just kill off Eli with a stupid heart attack makes me think that there's no way that was ever intended, or if it was, there's nowhere near enough evidence for us to have reasonably concluded that. And like lolf pointed out, the Advisors had been around forever, and if you recall, <span style='color:#000000;background:#000000'>you actually had a 10 minute sequence earlier in Ep2 where an advisor levitated you and Alyx and some other dude and sucked his brain out, then you fought a bunch of Combine after taking out the advisor's machinery and stuff</span> and if that's something that can be added at the last minute than Valve clearly works much faster than we suspect and is simply mean to us when it delays things.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> I don't think it was added at the last minute, but when alyx said the whole "Prepare for unforseen consequences" line, for some reason it felt to me like a kill switch of some sort, given the way that eli shuddered afterwards. I think eli was originally going to die of a heart attack and we were to understand that it had been caused by the G-man.
<!--quoteo(post=1666772:date=Jan 8 2008, 12:19 PM:name=moultano)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(moultano @ Jan 8 2008, 12:19 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1666772"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I don't think it was added at the last minute, but when alyx said the whole "Prepare for unforseen consequences" line, for some reason it felt to me like a kill switch of some sort, given the way that eli shuddered afterwards. I think eli was originally going to die of a heart attack and we were to understand that it had been caused by the G-man.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
What I'm trying to communicate is that what you interpreted as a passphrase that started some sort of crazy reaction in Eli's body leading to his death is actually just a look of surprise and fear that he gets when he hears that phrase again. It's not some sort of heart attack, it's him thinking back to that day at Black Mesa where everything went oh so wrong.
Yes, the "killswitch" theory sounds far-fetched. While the G-Man is purposefully kept so vague that we can't guess at his motives and it might or might not therefore be in his interest to kill the resistance's most important figure, Eli's reaction is perfectly plausible considering the context he last heard that sentence in.
moultanoCreator of ns_shiva.Join Date: 2002-12-14Member: 10806Members, NS1 Playtester, Contributor, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Gold, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
<!--quoteo(post=1666776:date=Jan 8 2008, 01:40 PM:name=TychoCelchuuu)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(TychoCelchuuu @ Jan 8 2008, 01:40 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1666776"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->What I'm trying to communicate is that what you interpreted as a passphrase that started some sort of crazy reaction in Eli's body leading to his death is actually just a look of surprise and fear that he gets when he hears that phrase again. It's not some sort of heart attack, it's him thinking back to that day at Black Mesa where everything went oh so wrong.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--quoteo(post=1666791:date=Jan 8 2008, 04:14 PM:name=lolfighter)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(lolfighter @ Jan 8 2008, 04:14 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1666791"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Yes, the "killswitch" theory sounds far-fetched. While the G-Man is purposefully kept so vague that we can't guess at his motives and it might or might not therefore be in his interest to kill the resistance's most important figure, Eli's reaction is perfectly plausible considering the context he last heard that sentence in.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I agree that it seemed plausible, but I'm wondering at the G-man's purpose for hypnotizing Alyx into saying that. It certainly seemed like his intent was insidious, but then it always does . . .
moultanoCreator of ns_shiva.Join Date: 2002-12-14Member: 10806Members, NS1 Playtester, Contributor, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Gold, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
<!--quoteo(post=1666872:date=Jan 9 2008, 07:54 AM:name=lolfighter)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(lolfighter @ Jan 9 2008, 07:54 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1666872"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Or maybe it was, y'know, a warning to be careful.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> OK, you win. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile-fix.gif" />
Rather late entry but I finished it, I did buy the orange box a month or so ago. I got a little way through before my mother board decided to crash and burn, so It's all getting fixed so I'm stuck with my macbook and it really isn't so good with gaming, so I got bored of waiting for my pc and deicded to have a bash on my macbook the results utterly unremarable graphics but thats my mac not the games fault. I shall replay the episdoe on my pc when its all back. Well enough back story.
I in fact rather enjoyed it I found that valve had indeed pulled off a master piece again I never really found my self bored and found my self really getting attached to the characters and getting involved with the plot. Once I start I couldn't stop until I finished the game. In my opinion I think they seemed to have got the mix just right between story, action and the odd puzzle. I was never a really big fan of half life 2 when it came out I never thought of it as a new innovation in gaming only a average game with physics sure it had some cool points but I never really felt like I had had a good fill, it left a bit of a hunger pang. The engine its self was a great bit of tech it's just I never felt encased as I did in the first half life.
I can't wait until episode 3 because I know it can only get better. Now there was still the odd glitch and crash I came across but still overall it's one of the few games I've played recently that I've really enjoyed and could go back to again (which I often don't) maybe I am praising it a little too much but of late valve are showing some good content and are heading in a good direction for gaming working with indie devs and releasing some good games with some good ideas behind them.
Can't remember if I mentioned this already, but I thought it was superb except for the last scene. I just didn't think the voice acting was quite up to par considering what had just happened. I think of how this scene would have played out in a film and I feel somewhat underwhelmed at the lack of intense emotion in the character's voice. That character has always been strong-willed and vocal, so it was bizarre to see the character plead so pitifully and breathlessly. For me, it was an unconvincing performance in a crucial scene and it didn't meet the huge highs of the rest of the voice acting, animation, sound effects, graphics and design.
X_StickmanNot good enough for a custom title.Join Date: 2003-04-15Member: 15533Members, Constellation
She is strong willed and vocal when she is fighting an oppressive alien organisation bent on controlling the world and making everyone on the planet as miserable as possible.
However, I think "pitiful and breathless" is the right reaction to <span style='color:#000000;background:#000000'>just seeing your father, who is also one of the best hopes for humanity's victory in the war against said alien organisation, have his brain torn out by an evil giant psychic space slug.</span>
She's a tough woman, yes. She's not heartless, cold and uncaring.
Comments
Killing a advisor with his artificial leg. Unlikely, but awesome in so many ways.
Imho, they should toy with the player in the following way:
-At the start of EP3 you loose all your weapons
-Barney appears and hands you a bucket (or an equally useless meelee weapon) saying: "Sorry, but I couldn't find a crowbar."
-Right before the end the gman appears and hands your crowbar
-Alyx fuses the crowbar, with the your portal gun and the grav gun, forming some kind of super crowbar, that allows you to beat the advisors back into their own dimension.
Yep, that would be an awesome "Guys, it's just a game" statement.
Perhaps one of the 'exotic' weapons of HL1 could return, like snarks or gluon/egon gun.
<!--quoteo(post=1661395:date=Nov 21 2007, 05:20 AM:name=Faskalia)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Faskalia @ Nov 21 2007, 05:20 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1661395"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Regarding weapons in EP3:
Imho, they should toy with the player in the following way:
-At the start of EP3 you loose all your weapons
-Barney appears and hands you a bucket (or an equally useless meelee weapon) saying: "Sorry, but I couldn't find a crowbar."
-Right before the end the gman appears and hands your crowbar
-Alyx fuses the crowbar, with the your portal gun and the grav gun, forming some kind of super crowbar, that allows you to beat the advisors back into their own dimension.
Yep, that would be an awesome "Guys, it's just a game" statement.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--quoteo(post=1661399:date=Nov 21 2007, 06:41 AM:name=Retales)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Retales @ Nov 21 2007, 06:41 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1661399"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Or better yet, a crowbar with a scope and a silencer<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yes. To all three.
<img src="http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/4940/1183383338780eq4.png" border="0" class="linked-image" />
My theory is this. In the original writing of it, Alyx was killed by falling from the bridge, and eli was killed by a heart attack. Then Valve decided that they needed to bring the emotional center back to the enemies so they changed both scenes.
We know clearly that Alyx was going to fall from the train trestle because it was in the trailer. There a lot of foreshadowing of eli having a heart attack. When he grabs his chest and has to sit down before the final battle, when Alyx tells him "prepare for unforseen consequences" etc. Also many people have commented on the advisers seeming coming from nowhere as a "deux ex machina." I think that's because they were added later.
Thoughts?
My theory is this. In the original writing of it, Alyx was killed by falling from the bridge, and eli was killed by a heart attack.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I don't think they planned to have Alyx die from falling off the bridge. Rather, that was what would cause her injury instead of a Hunter stomping her.
I think not. Alyx was pretty clearly going to have been hurt from falling from the train, but the whole heart attack thing is pure speculation. Someone grabbing their chest might mean "heart attack" in real life but for game animation you have to overexaggerate everything because you're dealing with soulless NPCs, not real actors, so actions like grabbing your chest or something have to be telegraphed and animated with a lot of exaggeration. That combined with how lame it would be to just kill off Eli with a stupid heart attack makes me think that there's no way that was ever intended, or if it was, there's nowhere near enough evidence for us to have reasonably concluded that. And like lolf pointed out, the Advisors had been around forever, and if you recall, <span style='color:#000000;background:#000000'>you actually had a 10 minute sequence earlier in Ep2 where an advisor levitated you and Alyx and some other dude and sucked his brain out, then you fought a bunch of Combine after taking out the advisor's machinery and stuff</span> and if that's something that can be added at the last minute than Valve clearly works much faster than we suspect and is simply mean to us when it delays things.
I don't think it was added at the last minute, but when alyx said the whole "Prepare for unforseen consequences" line, for some reason it felt to me like a kill switch of some sort, given the way that eli shuddered afterwards. I think eli was originally going to die of a heart attack and we were to understand that it had been caused by the G-man.
What I'm trying to communicate is that what you interpreted as a passphrase that started some sort of crazy reaction in Eli's body leading to his death is actually just a look of surprise and fear that he gets when he hears that phrase again. It's not some sort of heart attack, it's him thinking back to that day at Black Mesa where everything went oh so wrong.
<!--quoteo(post=1666791:date=Jan 8 2008, 04:14 PM:name=lolfighter)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(lolfighter @ Jan 8 2008, 04:14 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1666791"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Yes, the "killswitch" theory sounds far-fetched. While the G-Man is purposefully kept so vague that we can't guess at his motives and it might or might not therefore be in his interest to kill the resistance's most important figure, Eli's reaction is perfectly plausible considering the context he last heard that sentence in.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I agree that it seemed plausible, but I'm wondering at the G-man's purpose for hypnotizing Alyx into saying that. It certainly seemed like his intent was insidious, but then it always does . . .
OK, you win. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile-fix.gif" />
I in fact rather enjoyed it I found that valve had indeed pulled off a master piece again I never really found my self bored and found my self really getting attached to the characters and getting involved with the plot. Once I start I couldn't stop until I finished the game. In my opinion I think they seemed to have got the mix just right between story, action and the odd puzzle. I was never a really big fan of half life 2 when it came out I never thought of it as a new innovation in gaming only a average game with physics sure it had some cool points but I never really felt like I had had a good fill, it left a bit of a hunger pang. The engine its self was a great bit of tech it's just I never felt encased as I did in the first half life.
I can't wait until episode 3 because I know it can only get better. Now there was still the odd glitch and crash I came across but still overall it's one of the few games I've played recently that I've really enjoyed and could go back to again (which I often don't) maybe I am praising it a little too much but of late valve are showing some good content and are heading in a good direction for gaming working with indie devs and releasing some good games with some good ideas behind them.
Thanks for reading.
However, I think "pitiful and breathless" is the right reaction to <span style='color:#000000;background:#000000'>just seeing your father, who is also one of the best hopes for humanity's victory in the war against said alien organisation, have his brain torn out by an evil giant psychic space slug.</span>
She's a tough woman, yes. She's not heartless, cold and uncaring.