Work and Half-Life 2
My two week holiday has fast drawn to an end as tomorrow I'll be back behind my desk. Can't say as if I'm looking forward to it that much.
Half-Life 2 has occupied me for the last couple of days. Actually getting into the game was a slight chore though. Installing the game required a key...then Steam ((Valve's online distribution network)) had to slowly unlock all the game files...then when running the game, it has to authorise the DVD and this kept failing! Finally I found that if you kept retrying the authorisation process long enough, it would manage to read the data correctly and launch the game. However before working that out, I'd gone to support, updated firmware, checked drivers, disabled anything that might be conflicting with it ((namely virtual drives et cetera)) and generally getting cross.
Anywho, all is forgiven now and after over six years since the original Half-Life, I was able to get my teeth into Half-Life 2 and boy oh boy has the wait been worth it! Doom 3 was a technical masterpiece, something nobody could deny without being shot down in a spectacular ball of flames - however Half-Life 2 is a work of art and despite some flaws and a couple of long sleep educing segments ((the boat run had me yawning towards the end)) I'd have to call this the best game in the FPS genre I've played this year...and I haven't even completed it yet ((I get the feeling I'm almost there though)). Yes yes, Doom 3 was flawless and scared the sweet b'jebus out of me at times but Half-Life 2 is so varied and so realistically represents the real world ((some poor sods are reportedly suffering some serious motion sickness as a result)) that it steals the crown.
To learn more, head over to GameSpy's featurette. Of course, there are millions of other places to go for info - just that I prefer GameSpy ;)
Half-Life 2 has occupied me for the last couple of days. Actually getting into the game was a slight chore though. Installing the game required a key...then Steam ((Valve's online distribution network)) had to slowly unlock all the game files...then when running the game, it has to authorise the DVD and this kept failing! Finally I found that if you kept retrying the authorisation process long enough, it would manage to read the data correctly and launch the game. However before working that out, I'd gone to support, updated firmware, checked drivers, disabled anything that might be conflicting with it ((namely virtual drives et cetera)) and generally getting cross.
Anywho, all is forgiven now and after over six years since the original Half-Life, I was able to get my teeth into Half-Life 2 and boy oh boy has the wait been worth it! Doom 3 was a technical masterpiece, something nobody could deny without being shot down in a spectacular ball of flames - however Half-Life 2 is a work of art and despite some flaws and a couple of long sleep educing segments ((the boat run had me yawning towards the end)) I'd have to call this the best game in the FPS genre I've played this year...and I haven't even completed it yet ((I get the feeling I'm almost there though)). Yes yes, Doom 3 was flawless and scared the sweet b'jebus out of me at times but Half-Life 2 is so varied and so realistically represents the real world ((some poor sods are reportedly suffering some serious motion sickness as a result)) that it steals the crown.
To learn more, head over to GameSpy's featurette. Of course, there are millions of other places to go for info - just that I prefer GameSpy ;)
posted by Matthew E Cornish at
15:29
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