Loved all the Half-Life games but...

[temps]

Don't you guys have a problem with playing for the bad guys in this?

[1upD]

Publicado originalmente por ECO:

I remember the days when gaming wasn't infested with overly moralistic losers who think they're special.

Publicado originalmente por ghostoftexas:

The 🤓 and 🤡 runs through this one.

Did you guys happen to read my post?

[Dess]

Poor bait, I give it a 5/10.

[пubbiп]

So be based and just don't play the game.

[DatWut?]

Even though Bad Cop is a villain, I somehow don't think he's a bad guy. Instead, I think he's "simply" driven by anger and sadness, desparate for answers.
Chapter 0 gives a really good and deep insight into his past and what people did to him. Especially the loss of his daughter is what drives him and motivates him.
The combination of the bullying and his sad past is what made him join the Combine; he gets to have revenge on people (which, to be fair, is what makes him a bad guy in the truest sense, but at the same time the people who outcasted him and locked him up for no reason are also bad people), and he hopes to find out what happened to his daughter by getting the perks he wants.
And that last part is what makes me pity 3650, at least to some extent.

[Gravemind1]

Publicado originalmente por Nobelissimos:

Publicado originalmente por Gravemind1:

I'll cope just fine, clearly you can't say the same.

Your profile tells us all we need to know about you and why you act like this lmao.
Sneed.

I could say the same for someone so desperate for a comeback he searches through ones profile ;)
But instead I think I'll just say cope, since again you've yet to prove you capable of doing so.

[76561198268536306]

Its fun and interesting to play the other side of a game

[XanDer-XTX]

Entropy Zero did what Combine Destiny and Combine Combat achieved (playing as the bad guys) but better. I think most people are missing out in great mods the like the ones I mentioned unless they are released on Steam.

There's nothing weird or strange playing as the perspective of the villain in the HL2 universe if you have played other mods before.

[CAT PRIME]

Not particularly, It's like playing a stormtrooper in a star wars game.
Bad Cop seems more like he's severely mentally disturbed rather than just evil for the hell of it, and the Combine keep enabling and reinforcing his sociopathic behavior because, y'know, violence is their language. I haven't played past Apprehension because the game keeps crashing so IDK about the ending.

Of course one issue with Half Life 2 is there really is no moral ambiguity. The Combine are a force of destruction, consumption and oppression and barely pretend to be anything else. They're also aliens lead by a bunch of giant flying potatoes with psychic powers as far as we know, so understand their own internal logic is probably impossible. This isn't like a setting where you could argue the big militaristic empire provides stability and security to its territories and does some things for the common good. The Combine are just interdimensional pillagers that take what they want and exterminate what they don't. You're either a biologically and technologically engineered slave that barely resembles the organism you used to be, or you're an obstacle that must be destroyed. Half Life 1 was a bit different in that the Nihilanth was trying to hide from the Combine, and Black Mesa was constantly prodding his realm with expeditions that would take stuff. So from his perspective Earth was invading his world and risking his cover with their careless experimentation. Of course psionically enslaving the Vortigaunts was definitely evil.

But it is pretty neat to have the striders, hunter-choppers and hunters on my side.

It doesn't bother me but it creates some narrative dissonance where I can plainly see that 3650 is just a novel tool that'll be thrown away when he's no longer useful and yet he continues to vehemently deny it despite other characters repeatedly trying to get through to him.

I have no idea why I wrote a thesis for a thread that's probably just fishing for arguments.

[Icemax]

I actually prefer it - it's a little more interesting. Also, I wouldn't exactly say Walker is a bad guy per se - it's all about perspective.

PS: Devs, I encourage you to create more content like this as - from a storytelling perspective - it is really compelling. Fantastic game.

[Maximizer]

I don't even understand why this discussion takes place. Also wtf trigger warning at the beginning? This is wokeism at one of its purest forms amnd it made me immediately uninstall before even playing the game. All this stuff is pure political ideology which has no place in games aside from irony or sarcasm. What a shame.

[calembredaine]

you can't be truly moral if you only antagonize the villains ;^)
(i just enjoy virtual bloodshed regardless of the side i am on)

Publicado originalmente por 1upD:

Publicado originalmente por -miss Alic-<3Hi:

Thats your opinion but how on earth one could take this serious? Despite the memory switching piece in the beginning ( "They took everything from me" ) which seems to be written by someone with talent everything else story and character wise is on teenager-fiction level.

The dialogue afterwards made me think this game is supposed to be a parody of C-movies or bad action games. There should be rather a Warning: You are playing parody instead of uneccessary trying to pander to twitter non-gaming witchhunters by posting this snowflake take or disclaimers everywhere.

I don't know who these people are that you think we're pandering to. That's not something I'm concerned with. We just made the game we wanted to make.

idk if you will ever need it, but have my appreciation for being so patient with us.

[Fellow gamer]

Publicado originalmente por 1upD:

As a developer, yes, sometimes it did start to bother me. Especially with how much time I spent with the game, testing over and over and over again. I think the further we went into development the more important it was to me that we always framed Bad Cop as being in the wrong and never glorified him.

I can see that different people treat the relationship between themselves and the morality of video game characters differently. Some people are uncomfortable playing with a character whose morality doesn't align with their own, while others are content to completely separate what happens onscreen from their own sense of right and wrong.

I would not blame anyone for not wanting to play EZ2 because the protagonist is a villain. I think that's understandable. It's regrettable, because I like it when people play and enjoy the mod, but it's a valid preference.

Personally I hope you will give the story a chance and still be able to enjoy it even though it shows the perspective of a bad guy.

The Combine cop here Is two steps away from being Duke Nukem now, and then he got a wisecracking comic relief sidekick.

[Twister_Timmy]

no, I love it

[Darkstar]

No, I don't have a problem with it.

Also I just wanna say, shoving Natalism (procreation) into your face as politically "neutral" but forced sterilisation as evil IS POLITICAL.
Even if you agree with it.

Honestly, humanity is much worse than the combine in terms of creating pointless suffering, and the Combine's suppression fields are SUPER USEFUL tech for keeping populations down, human beings just complain about not being able to have children, even if all the children have to look forward to, is to fuel their parents desperate desire to feel like they will be ok and their lives have meaning.

Breen was right about them being ruled by instinct, he also said there would be a time when it could be turned off (when they are ready), could just be propaganda, but that suppression field saved a lot of lives from pointless suffering.

As much as the Combine wanted to use humanity, humanity rebelled mostly with instinct and ideology more than anything.

The suppression fields are a wonder tech that humanity needs and would so SO many problems.

Turning them off was a serious mistake, even if you don't like combine oppression.

[Frog Soup]

Actual 3 year old mentality