Anyone here going to get Half-Life 2?

Brando70 · Post by **Brando70** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 2:36 pm

I think it's going on my Christmas wish list. I am really looking forward to it, but I'm finding XBL games like Halo and GR2 have me slightly more excited. Plus I know I need to finish the Call of Duty expansion first before I dig into this.

Wilkie33 · Post by **Wilkie33** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 2:41 pm

This game is flat out nuts. I pretty much agree with everything DChaps said, but I don't think I'll be getting bored with it. I'm pretty much still in awe.

Newness factor or not, I have not felt this way about a new game in a very long time.

Post by **ScoopBrady** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 8:33 pm

This is such f#$king bullsh!t. I pay $54.99 for a game and I can't even play it. This Steam nonsense it utter crap. I can't even play the single-player game because I can't create a Steam account. I'm really pissed right now. This better be fixed quick and this game better not disappoint.

TheTruth · Post by **TheTruth** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 8:56 pm

ScoopBrady wrote:This is such f#$king bullsh!t. I pay $54.99 for a game and I can't even play it. This Steam nonsense it utter crap. I can't even play the single-player game because I can't create a Steam account. I'm really pissed right now. This better be fixed quick and this game better not disappoint.

Yea..I just got done installing and am now sitting here waiting for it to unlock my files. It let me create an account (was very slow) but when I went to verify my CD Key it said it couldnt right now because steam was too busy but that I could go ahead and play. So it is now unlocking my game.

I want to add you guys to my steam friends list. What are your names?
Mine is hogskinsdisease

Post by **ScoopBrady** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 8:56 pm

Well, after several hours I was able to create an account. Then it took 15 minutes to authenticate my cd key. Then it took 20 minutes to unlock HL2 files. Now it is taking several minutes to update HL2. If this is the future of PC gaming I will never buy another pc game in my life.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 9:58 pm

Yeah I'm in the middle of setup right now...I'm afraid to see what happens when I try to get authenticated and whatnot when it's done. This is definitely a step in the WRONG direction in terms of piracy protection. It shouldn't be easier for the pirates to play a game than it is for the common folk who go and spend their hard earned 50+ dollars for the game.

DivotMaker · Post by **DivotMaker** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 10:09 pm

ScoopBrady wrote:Well, after several hours I was able to create an account. Then it took 15 minutes to authenticate my cd key. Then it took 20 minutes to unlock HL2 files. Now it is taking several minutes to update HL2. If this is the future of PC gaming I will never buy another pc game in my life.

This is what happens when we buy a piece of software that is highly anticipated by millions who also had the same idea of buying the day it was released....

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 10:15 pm

Half Life 2 was highly anticipated?

DChaps · Post by **DChaps** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 10:24 pm

Wow, I had no idea it would require unlocking and steam account even if you bought the retail CD. That does sound like a crock. At 3:00am this morning, there was no wait time at all for unlocking the files.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Tue Nov 16, 2004 10:56 pm

First of all...WOW. This game is RIDICULOUS. Been playing for the past hour or so and it's pretty freakin' crazy so far.

It runs beautifully on my rig too...gotta love it at 1280x960 w/ 4x Antroscopic and 8x Antialiasing. Freakin' beautiful game.

DivotMaker · Post by **DivotMaker** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 12:06 am

dbdynsty25 wrote:Half Life 2 was highly anticipated?

If your response was not tongue-in cheek, where have you been?

Post by **ScoopBrady** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 12:19 am

DivotMaker wrote:
ScoopBrady wrote:Well, after several hours I was able to create an account. Then it took 15 minutes to authenticate my cd key. Then it took 20 minutes to unlock HL2 files. Now it is taking several minutes to update HL2. If this is the future of PC gaming I will never buy another pc game in my life.
This is what happens when we buy a piece of software that is highly anticipated by millions who also had the same idea of buying the day it was released....

I bought Halo 2 on release day and didn't have a single problem offline or online. And I'm willing to bet Halo 2 sold more on launch day.

Post by **ScoopBrady** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 12:26 am

Truth, I sent you a friends request. My username is ScoopBrady if anyone wants to hook up for some Counterstrike.

Wilkie33 · Post by **Wilkie33** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 12:54 am

ScoopBrady wrote:
DivotMaker wrote:
ScoopBrady wrote:Well, after several hours I was able to create an account. Then it took 15 minutes to authenticate my cd key. Then it took 20 minutes to unlock HL2 files. Now it is taking several minutes to update HL2. If this is the future of PC gaming I will never buy another pc game in my life.
This is what happens when we buy a piece of software that is highly anticipated by millions who also had the same idea of buying the day it was released....
I bought Halo 2 on release day and didn't have a single problem offline or online. And I'm willing to bet Halo 2 sold more on launch day.

I'm sure HALO 2 did sell more games on launch day, but HL2 was a highly anticipated game. I wouldn't be surprised to see HALO 2's sales take a huge dive while games like HL2 and GTA: SA continue steadily with much less of a dropoff. When it's all said and done I think HL2 will sell more than HALO 2. Speaking long term here. Hell, HL is one of the most successful PC games to date.

Pre-loaded this game two days ago and had no problems unlocking it today. Took about 10 minutes to unlock and then I was playing.

Awesome damn game.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 1:20 am

Yes I was kidding divot...people have been drooling over this damn game and rightly so. I never played the original and now I'm pissed I didn't...it's been brilliant a couple hours in.

bdoughty · Post by **bdoughty** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 1:41 am

Was watching the roomate play on his supercharged PC and I must say it is one nice looking game. Something I just noticed as he was scanning across the walls.

Minus the text of course.

LAking · Post by **LAking** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 2:15 am

dbdynsty25 wrote:Yes I was kidding divot...people have been drooling over this damn game and rightly so. I never played the original and now I'm pissed I didn't...it's been brilliant a couple hours in.

I'm surprised you never played the original db, you being more of a PC guy and all. Oh and i'm curious what the specs of your rig is db, for comparisons sake since despite my pretty darn good computer, i still get the occasional hickup in frame rate. The original was brilliant. Not sure if it would have the same impact today as it did back then, but it's still something to see. It changed the way games were made and judged, especially FPS. When i first played that game it blew me away. the first half hour or so was the greatest begining to a video game ever. The way it drew you in was incredible.

As for HL2. I preloaded it a couple days before release. Then last night at midnight I unlocked it. Took between 10 and 15 minutes to unlock the files. Kind of annoying but not that bad if you consider that if i had bought the retail version i would have had to wait until the next day and of course spend the time and gas to drive to the store and get it. Plus, it was $5 cheaper than the retail version and i didn't pay any tax. So it's really not THAT bad.

Of course it sucks if you bought the retail and couldn't do the registration thing because Steam was screwed up. I think in the future things like this will just get better and there will be less problems. For now it's still a work in progress so you have to expect some bumps in the road.

So how is the game? I'm probably around an hour into it. I've just got the gravity gun and i'm heading into Ravenholm where all the zombies are. BTW, awesome fun when you test out the gravity gun. The graphics are the best i've ever seen. Better than Doom 3. D3 may have had better shadowing and lighting effects, but HL2 aren't far off. HL2 puts it's graphics to better use than D3. A lot more planning, thought, and creativity went into the art design and it really shows. The water effect might be even better than Far Cry.

The Further i get into the game the more the physics based gameplay shines. And to think i haven't even used the gravity gun on any enemies yet. I'm only an hour into it and i think i've seen just as many "holy $@!t, that was F'ing cool" moments than I did in all of Far Cry. I just don't get how Gamespot gave HL2 the same score as Far Cry. I liked that game but it did NOTHING new. It just beat D3 and HL2 in the race to the next generation of FPS graphics and it was the first FPS since HL1 to have truly great AI. Unless HL2 gets really crappy for the rest of the game, i can't see it being only on par with Far Cry.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 2:28 am

LA,

I've got a decent rig:

Athlon 64 3000+ overclocked a bit to 2.2 gig
1 gig of Geil Ultra DDR400
ATI Radon X800 Pro
Gigabyte nForce3 mobo

It's running strong...and I agree...the water effects are freakin' amazing. They did a DAMN good job on this game from an artistic standpoint especially. I haven't gotten to the gravity gun yet...I'm looking forward to it.

LAking · Post by **LAking** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 2:39 am

dbdynsty25 wrote:LA,

I've got a decent rig:

Athlon 64 3000+ overclocked a bit to 2.2 gig
1 gig of Geil Ultra DDR400
ATI Radon X800 Pro
Gigabyte nForce3 mobo

It's running strong...and I agree...the water effects are freakin' amazing. They did a DAMN good job on this game from an artistic standpoint especially. I haven't gotten to the gravity gun yet...I'm looking forward to it.

You've got a better rig than mine. I've got an athlon XP 3000+ and it's not overcloced. I'm using a Geforce FX 6800 GT. Supposidly the ATI cards work better for this game so that might make a difference. Basically if there is a big explosion or something like that i get a little shutter in frame rate. It's enough to annoy me. I might have to turn the resolution down to 1024x768 which i really don't want to do. I already have the AA on only 2x and the AF on 4x. I've got vsync disabled. But i couldn't even tell you what that really does, so.....

GROGtheNailer · Post by **GROGtheNailer** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 2:40 am

I'm running this game very well on a 1.8 mhz and a Radeon 9800 pro, just got offline playing some Counterstrike and what a p1ss load of fun that was. We are going to have to hook up on for mplayer for sure.

HL2 the single player game is freaking amazing, this is a must buy for anyone....anyone.

LAking · Post by **LAking** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 2:45 am

GROGtheNailer wrote:I'm running this game very well on a 1.8 mhz and a Radeon 9800 pro, just got offline playing some Counterstrike and what a p1ss load of fun that was. We are going to have to hook up on for mplayer for sure.

HL2 the single player game is freaking amazing, this is a must buy for anyone....anyone.

I'm up for some counterstrike with fellow DSPers. I generally don't like playing with strangers because everyone else is so much better than I am. Some people are so good it's not even fun for me. I loved CS when it was still in beta and you generally didn't see many people who were clearly better than anyone else. But it's just not like that anymore. Could be fun with you guys.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 2:48 am

LAking wrote:I've got an athlon XP 3000+ and it's not overcloced. I'm using a Geforce FX 6800 GT. Supposidly the ATI cards work better for this game so that might make a difference.

The fact that I've got the Athlon 64 compared to your XP is a much bigger deal than the video card. The 6800 GT is actually a better card from top to bottom than my X800 Pro, I've just been partial to ATI as of late and I was having problems with the 6800 GT I bought, so I switched. The XP to 64 is a much bigger jump performance wise than the video cards, that's for sure.

LAking · Post by **LAking** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 3:10 am

dbdynsty25 wrote:
LAking wrote:I've got an athlon XP 3000+ and it's not overcloced. I'm using a Geforce FX 6800 GT. Supposidly the ATI cards work better for this game so that might make a difference.
The fact that I've got the Athlon 64 compared to your XP is a much bigger deal than the video card. The 6800 GT is actually a better card from top to bottom than my X800 Pro, I've just been partial to ATI as of late and I was having problems with the 6800 GT I bought, so I switched. The XP to 64 is a much bigger jump performance wise than the video cards, that's for sure.

Oh yeah i know that. I was just thinking about my own set up and wondering if an ATI would have made a difference, at least on this game. I'm very happy with my nvidia choice. This the only game where i would have liked to have an ATI card.

Oy yeah, and one more thing. The Character animations (both body and facial) are amazing. Right before you get the gravity gun you get to see a lot of character interaction. I really get a kick out of watching the characters react to eachother. Man this game is great.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 3:21 am

I got a kick out of shooting a guy on the stairs and watching him slump over and the roll down the stairs realistically...I thought I was watching a real body. The physics engine is just amazing.

TheTruth · Post by **TheTruth** » Wed Nov 17, 2004 11:28 am

HOLY CRAP!

This is why FPS were meant to be for the PC! This game is awesome..even on my machine I built 3 yrs ago. I'm running a AMD 1700+, 9800pro, 512mg DDR and it still runs great. I think my old game theatre xp sound card is causing some hiccups but still. The physics are just crazy. I will probably sell Halo2 now and pick it up later when its cheap so I can finish the campaign.

DB, LAKing, and others...what is your account name so I can add u to my friends list for some CS? Mine is hogskinsdisease