Install Steam
login
|
language
简体中文 (Simplified Chinese)
繁體中文 (Traditional Chinese)
日本語 (Japanese)
한국어 (Korean)
ไทย (Thai)
Български (Bulgarian)
Čeština (Czech)
Dansk (Danish)
Deutsch (German)
Español - España (Spanish - Spain)
Español - Latinoamérica (Spanish - Latin America)
Ελληνικά (Greek)
Français (French)
Italiano (Italian)
Bahasa Indonesia (Indonesian)
Magyar (Hungarian)
Nederlands (Dutch)
Norsk (Norwegian)
Polski (Polish)
Português (Portuguese - Portugal)
Português - Brasil (Portuguese - Brazil)
Română (Romanian)
Русский (Russian)
Suomi (Finnish)
Svenska (Swedish)
Türkçe (Turkish)
Tiếng Việt (Vietnamese)
Українська (Ukrainian)
Report a translation problem
Discussions Rules and Guidelines
Report this post
Not to mention, there are many unfought species in the Combine army that may be more durable or hardy than the ones deployed on Earth in Half Life 2, that could have fought in the War.
Based on what we can see in the newspaper clippings and common sense, the Combine certainly didn't keep their entire invasion armada on Earth forever. They created new types of soldiers and weapons adapted from Earth's natives and tech (Combine soldiers, razor trains, pulse-rifles...) and of course it would make much more sense to use stuff that they know for sure works with the fabric of our dimension, Earth's gravity, etc. Without the sheer numbers of Combine pouring in from the portal storms during the Seven-Hour-War, they can stand a chance. As Eli said in Episode Two, "It'll be the Seven-Hour-War all over again! But this time we won't last seven minutes."
Also, we don't know that the Earth couldn'tve fought on for longer. Dr. Breen just surrendered the Earth to the Combine before its inevitable doom.
Had they not needed certain members of it humanity would already be extinct.
Dr. Breen ended the war by "managing" Earth's surrender. Perhaps the very fact the UN couldn't plan or communicate with its members is the very reason Dr. Breen was chosen to manage surrender in the first place--assuming his surrender involved the UN at all.
Don't forget they also took advantage of the portal storms to invade the Earth. If there's anything important about these portal storms to take advantage of, I'm guessing they're different from the ones in Episode Two that basically just sent out earthquakes every few hours. Perhaps it was like global HL1 with Combine units. (striders teleporting onto streets, gunships appearing out of thin air, etc.)
As I have said before (a year ago by now), the war officially ended after 7 hours thanks to the efforts of Dr. Breen. Who said humanity was finished? It probably wouldn'tve survived the next few weeks without the surrender, but it's not like all of humanity just held hands and recited a pinkie promise. Fighting could've gone on for months afterwards. A lot of people probably didn't even know humanity surrendered.
In the end, what it all comes down to is that, in the Half-Life universe where storyline is left to the players, there is no definitive answer that isn't just wild speculation. The Seven-Hour-War could've gone completely differently from this, but if I know anything about Half-Life and can predict anything about where it may go in this topic, this is the most accurate answer you will find.
Now please leave us alone.
Also, Do other citadels have the same combine units or different ones?
Never got a good enough answer. >_<
You do not choose a relative no body to give the order for surrender. If the UN can not do it, nobody would and him just prancing up to a podium would not work either.
I will take the teleporting in massive troops part, but not the part of Breen just handing earth over to them. As I said before it does not work that way. Even those in charge of the United States, Russia and China, the three most powerful nations on Earth could not and would not decide that, much less some science guy. Sorry.
No and no.
The citadels should all have the same stuff. Although it would be interesting to hear coming from the comm of a Combine solider Chinese...
Why not?
Who said they did?
This is a series made up of eight video games with linear, heavily retconned storylines written by a sci-fi writer and a dev team who put game design before storyline. They leave the details to the players, so everything I said is speculation based on Half-Life's style and evidence. If you want an acceptable answer, come up with one yourself.
What do you mean why not? Do have any notion how life is actually like outside of video games? I mean I know it is a video game, but we have to have some kind of rationality of the real world as much effort in how the game is and plays reflects that.
You just said they did or "had" since it was a while ago.
And I am working on it hence the whole reason for the thread. ^_^ But I need something more plausible then Mr Breen walks up on stage and says "we surrender". The US would be like- "♥♥♥♥ You!" Russia would be like- "Да пошёл ты!" And China would be like- "♥♥♥"! Not to mention all the others.
1. Global air burst EMP saturation shuts down all comms and transportation consider the damage from air sea and ground transport losing power at once. No eyes, ears or power, Earth is thrown back to pre industrial. Consider what happens to people 24 to 36 hours after a storm kills all electricity in an area during mid winter or summer. Food supplies gone, medical supplies gone soon if not stolen; people become their own enemy without combine interference.
2. Throw in natural disease contamination from all the exposed dead, remember Katrina and Maria? Season with a pinch of NBC warfare manmade and or combine and adios amigos.
According to the wiki the combine have already conquered multiple universes and seek to conquer all universes, a force with that kind of power and goals likely has access to weapons of mass destruction on a scale that make Earths WMDs look pathetic, for all we know many of Earths major nations may have been obliterated in the first few minutes of the invasion. Depending on where HL2 takes place there may be no UN, US, China or Russia.
Really the fact that Eli thinks a second invasion would only last 7 minutes implies the Combine would be more than capable of just decimating the surface of the Earth. Their first invasion was to conquer the Earth and not destroy it, but after Earth proves to be too much of a hassle the second invasion would likely just be to destroy.
Maybe Breen just jumped in after the most powerful nations were destroyed, negotiated surrender and the Combine declared that to be humanities official surrender regardless of what the remaining nations thought, it's not like they had the power to oppose such a declaration in the face of nearly limitless forces. Breen wouldn't have had to even be officially appointed to negotiate surrender for that, he'd just have to be in the right position to take advantage of the situation.
Then the larger invasion force packed up and left, leaving a comparatively tiny force to maintain their authority on Earth.
Obviously this is all speculative, I'm just saying it's plausible.
I don't remember if it was shown in old concept art or described in an outdated script but I remember that the original concept of what Earth surrendering looked like was Breen with a headset hooked up to a skyscraper antenna, talking directly to the Combine leaders. That doesn't seem like something a person speaking in the name of the entire world would do to me.
Considering all we know about Breen, he may have very well been expecting the invasion and could have just jumped at the first opportunity to strike a bargain with the Combine behind everyone else's back. Hence why even years later there is still a major resistance movement of people who opposed that idea and Breen is seen as a traitor.
It's also worth pointing out, as others already have, that we've never seen anything close to the Combine's full potential. Gordon fights an occupational force left behind to maintain order on a dying world with a small population, not an army prepared for taking on the combined forces of all of the Earth's nations (although Earth's defenses must have already been weakened severely in the aftermath of the Black Mesa incident, with hostile alien creatures infesting the entire world and so on). After all, the entire point of Episode 2 is that the portal to the Combine Overworld has to be closed if the Resistance is to stand any chance at all, since the backup forces that would arrive through it would be unbeatable.
But the point I am trying to make is Breen has no authority to surrender Earth. Earth is not even one conglomerate yet, even with the UN. We are many nations, each with our own ways of doing things and languages which are very foreign to the others. Some are allies with one another, some are neutral and some are enemies of each other. That is like you or anyone else saying you are in charge of the EU now because you said so and the EU is no longer together but has become one with Antarctica, which everyone would laugh at you or simply pay you no mind. Breen has no power what so ever, PERIOD. He is not a president, an emperor, a king or a leader of any nation, much less all or even half of the almost 200 nations on Earth.
Sadly I think the writer(s) just thought that the “7 Hour War” sounded apocalyptic enough and left it at that. Since there is no more evidence of anything and I think it was just poorly written. I mean had they said Seven Years, Seven Months, Seven Weeks, maybe and I mean maybe even Seven Days possibly, but Seven Hours... no. That is only one third of a day. Even if we wanted to surrender there would be no conceivable way to get Earth to agree as a whole or even half to do so. It is impossible. Even the G-Man can not manipulate the rest of the world like that so quickly. Maybe put in a few whispers or ear weevils here and there. But there is no way he could of gotten Breen in charge of Earth and again all the nations of Earth would not of agreed to anything he had said even if G-Man some how had gotten him that lofty position.
Although... perhaps if the G-Man some how whispered sweet nothings in all of the world leaders ears or at the UN all at once (Although the leaders of the world would not all of gathered at the same time like this anyway for national/world security.) and did his “magic”, perhaps... But there are just too many holes in that hypothesis because potentially there would be coups if things swayed too far from the norm or what was considered the norm at that time. I mean it is a cool concept like I said, 7 Hours... WOW!!! But if that was true he could of saved them all the 7 Hours of Hell in the first place and just had them surrender. Does his effect on the human mind only work so far and a catastrophe has to occur before he can nudge them in the right direction?
But then again why would the world think him a traitor if they all agreed to let him do it in the first place? An after thought? The alternative to the extreme, such as total annihilation or there was a more peaceful deal brokered, but then the UU had different plans and besides just occupying Earth, also did the horrific experiments and human augmentation later when most of the military was dismantled and nothing left to really stop them?
Or has simply the Breen water made people forget history and some how the 7 Hour War was manifested into their subconsciousness as a fear tactic. “Don't mess with us or you will all die in seven minutes or seconds next time...”... Then again would all those scientists who are intelligent who escaped like Eli some how eluded that water... and also the nonstop propaganda TV and radio Breen casts...That is “food for thought”...
Or what if the Combine showed up and immediately obliterated half the human population in a matter of hours. Governments wouldn't even be able to maintain any semblance of order let alone actually fight a massive Combine force, the governments themselves would basically be powerless in the ensuing chaos and the fact that the combine are offering a way to restore order (albiet under their thumb) would be an enticing offer considering the alternative.
Granted I get that it seems unreasonable that all of Earth could reach that decision in 7 hours, but Breen could. He could have made that announcement "for humanity" even without having the actual authority to speak for the whole human race, it's not like the human race can really fight back at that point anyways. It would basically be the Combine telling the human race that they surrender whether they actually do or not.
And as others have pointed out, the combine invasion may have simply been the last straw, before they even showed up the Earth was being plagued by all sorts of Xen aliens released by the portal storm. The human race was already doing very poorly by the time the Combine showed up. It was so bad the remaining population was forced to relocate exclusively to cities (which may say something about number of humans left at that point), which would only make them easy targets for the Combine.