Half-Life 2: The Very First Look (PC) After nearly five years, Gordon Freeman is set to return along with a few thousand of his headcrab buddies.
By Sal "Sluggo" Accardo | May 8, 2003
Four years, five months, and sixteen days. That's how long it's been since I first finished
Half-Life and sent Gordon Freeman into the void for an uncertain future with the mysterious G-Man. At the time, I was running a semi-popular website for
Quake 2 modifications and -- against the judgment of one of my buddies at
PlanetQuake -- I'd decided to branch out to
Half-Life mods as well. His argument: While we both thought Valve Software's trip through the Black Mesa Research Facility was one of the best games we'd ever played, it was still unknown what the future held for the
Half-Life community. Odds are you know what happened next:
Half-Life went on to win just about every "Game of the Year" award for 1998, and in its wake also spawned a number of successful expansions such as
Opposing Force. More importantly, it also gave birth to a multiplayer community that continues to dominate the Internet today, spinning off retail games such as the mega-successful
Counter-Strike and the just-released
Day of Defeat. It's been recognized by several pubs as
THE greatest game of all time, and has remained at the peak of the PC gaming universe for nearly five years.
But somewhere, lost in this sea of accolades, expansions and modifications, remained an unanswered question: What about
Half-Life 2? Since the day we finished the single-player game, Valve had yet to say a single word about the game we all knew they'd get around to making one day; even getting someone to go on record and acknowledge the game's development was a near-impossible task.
Finally, that silence has been broken, and we recently visited the new offices of Valve Software in Bellevue, WA, for our first look and details on the game we've all been waiting for:
Half-Life 2. The best news? It's just a few months away, scheduled for release on September 30, 2003.
Straight From The Source The story of
Half-Life 2 starts with its technology. While the original
Half-Life was created with
Quake technology licensed from id Software, Valve spent most of the last few years developing their own brand-new engine, dubbed "Source." In fact, most of what we got to see while at Valve were proof-of-concept tech demos finished around September 2002 to show off the capabilities of the Source engine; only later did the team start constructing levels for the actual game.
To show off the new engine, Valve's Doug Lombardi took us through a number of tech demos, starting with an impressive physics display. Using a special anti-gravity weapon, Lombardi lifted up a nearby barrel and bounced it off the wall a few times, eventually moving on to smaller cans and bottles. By throwing the objects, we watched them react realistically to walls as well as each other. To create the physics code, Valve started with Havok code (a leading software package used by several current game engines), but have added considerable modifications of their own.
During this demo, Lombardi mentions that instead of the traditional texture set, the Source engine goes a step further with they call a "material set." In other words, not only does every surface have a certain look to it, but specific properties as well, be it metal, wood, tile or brick. In doing so, objects react different when in contact with different surfaces -- we were able to scrape a barrel against a wall (creating some sparks in the process), drop it to the ground with a thud, or bounce it off other barrels for a more metallic sound. The same could be said for the bottles and cans each item produced a unique sound when dropped to the ground. Wood also reacts in a complex manner, as it splinters into smaller and smaller pieces when shot, and burns when set on fire.
Lombardi next showed us the Source engine's
ragdoll physics, picking up inanimate characters at varying points on their body and flopping them around. Perhaps the best compliment we can pay is that the models looked completely soft and pliable as they were dragged around, appearing to carry real weight and mass. To further illustrate the point, we moved to another part of the makeshift level, where a series of wooden planks protruded from the wall, a limp body resting at the top. Shooting and shattering the top plank brought the body falling through the series of planks, flailing around like a body in a life-size pachinko machine.
Gordon and Alyx are saved by a "friend" from below.
Still in the demonstration level, Lombardi showed us a 30-foot mechanical contraption with large pistons pumping away. (What is it with these guys and valves and gears, anyway?) Hanging above was a massive metal wrench, which Lombardi released to drop into the works below, subsequently wedging itself in the machinery and bringing everything to a complete halt. Even a gas canister took off when the top was shot off, spinning around on the floor in unpredictable patterns. We've seen shades of this in
Half-Life and successive expansions, but with the new physics system it looks like Valve is set to bring the idea of real-world exploration and problem solving to the next level.
We got to see a small snippet of gameplay tying all these aspects together in a more traditional setting. Starting out on a wooden pier, water realistically shimmering all around, our character moved forward to meet a zombie, who picked up a metal barrel and flung it our way. Using the shotgun, we could pick the barrel out of the air (sending it hurtling back at the zombie), as well as shoot out wooden planks on the pier.
With all of these considerable graphical upgrades, we were pleased to hear that the minimum system specs are currently targeted at a 700 MHz PC with 128 MB RAM and a DX6-level video card, meaning you won't need a NASA supercomputer to run
Half-Life 2. Of course, you'll want to have something better to fully reap the benefits of the new tech, but gamers who haven't upgraded in a while shouldn't have to worry about breaking their budget.
