I have to confess. I'm obsessed with the Half-Life series!
I've played everything possible in the Half-Life universe. The first game, the second one and its episodes, amazing fan-made projects like Entropy: Zero... I even bought a VR headset just to play Alyx.
Soon enough, I re-read and re-watched every part of the Half-Life iceberg, watched dozens of videos that hinted at the development of a new installment in the series.
I watched Let's Plays... I don't even know why. I read the comic A Place in the West, bought items from other games dedicated to HL, music, posters, keychains, collected memes, gifs, and prayed to Gabe to release Half-Life 3.
I... I even watched hentai based on the game… where a Vortigaunt is doing things to Alyx.
Oh god... I think I even tried to download the game to my phone... I must be sick... and I need help.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3blO7GiuHiE

"The Great Combine Deception"
After decades of social tension, technological leaps, and geopolitical instability, the global elite began working on a new method of controlling humanity — the establishment of a New World Order. But direct dictatorship or warfare would have caused mass resistance. They needed an external threat — undeniable, overwhelming, and total.

Thus, the idea of the Combine was born.

Combine Don’t Exist
The Combine is a fabrication, created by world governments and black-budget organizations. Humanity was made to believe it lost a so-called Seven Hour War, but in reality, there was no such war. All the "alien technology," suppression, and control come from humans themselves, masquerading as extraterrestrials.

The goal? Complete submission. People obey because they believe they’re under the rule of a superior alien force — not realizing it’s just a mask worn by their own rulers.

Staged 7-Hour War
The war was a false flag operation. Mass media spread the narrative: "instant invasion," "total surrender," "new order." It’s possible advanced holograms, mind-control technology, or strategic strikes were used to fabricate destruction and terror.
This allowed the swift implementation of a global regime with minimal resistance.

New World Order
Under the guise of the Combine, Earth now lives under a single totalitarian regime, controlling reproduction, movement, information, even thought. The Combine is just a front for a human-controlled global power structure that finally achieved absolute dominance.

Resistance movements like the one Gordon Freeman joins may themselves be manufactured, a safety valve to give people the illusion of hope or choice — while the system remains intact.

Great Deception
Everything we’ve been told is a lie. Gordon Freeman himself may be nothing more than a pawn in a larger game, manipulated by the mysterious G-Man — not an interdimensional entity, but a high-level agent of the very system he claims to be outside of. His presence ensures controlled chaos — a narrative of rebellion, masking the true permanence of the regime.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxBZz5T9EK8