Half-Life & Portal series, general discussion (v3) - Games

Late to the party, but I'll go ahead and toss my own thoughts in on the Portal-HL connection. I think that nonsensical Aperture-style environments could work in the next game, depending on how they're played. Wheatley doing schtick with Alyx might not fly, but imagine the Combine bearing down on you and Alyx as you try to get through a locked door, only for the ship's AI to tell you that your password does not match the randomly generated password created every five seconds. "Password Attempt FIVE of FIVE has failed. Activating Turrets. Have a Nice Day." [QUOTE=nightlord;39276901]Aperture having some form of portal gun in the 50s is not an issue. All we know about it is that is a large, bulky device that we see in a picture ingame. That's it. We don't know if it works properly, we don't know if there's a chance of it blowing everything up when it's used, we don't know if there was a chance of it horrifiying mutating people that use it. We know nothing about their 50s portal gun other than it worked in SOME form and what it looks like. There are plenty of possible explanations for why it didn't gain them any funding. [/QUOTE] I think it would be very fitting of Aperture if they built an entire testing track for a 1950's Portal gun that then proceeded to blow up the second it was turned on.

[QUOTE=Coffee;39289353]The combine aren't a race.[/QUOTE] the combine aren't a race. But the combine do have an original species.

[QUOTE=Ereunity;39287034]Black Mesa uses [i]Displacement Field Technology[/i], Aperture Science uses a [i]Quantum Tunnelling Device[/i] They're two completely different areas of research, Aperture's mostly being made up and unexplained whereas Laidlaw often attempts to ground Black Mesa's tech in reality a little.[/QUOTE] Quantum Tunnelling does exist, our noses use that effect to smell.

Half Life does has it's occasional funny moment, but not to the extent of Portal 2. Some of Aperture's funhouse stuff might make it on the Borealis, but for the darker tone of Half Life, I imagine that there will be a serious, and probably intentional reason. (Something on the Borealis was incredibly dangerous, Aperture decided to teleport it somewhere where it would do no harm.) It's not that all of Aperture was off the wall, but Cave's direction was off the wall. Sometimes it seems the scientists at Aperture were perfectly rational people, but Cave's direction, or lack thereof, squandered their talent into the Aperture we know today.

[img]http://images.wikia.com/half-life/en/images/8/89/Underground_oldportalgun.png[/img] The prototype portal device people have been talking about.

If half life [B]videogames[/B] are serious, it doesn't mean that there can't be something silly in the universe, not shown in the game. It doesn't matter how silly Portal 2 was. It's the same universe. From the lore point of view they made huge underground labs to contain all the silliness in them exclusively so it doens't affect Half-Life universe. Black Mesa and D0G demonstrates that advanced technology and AI is not exclusive to Portal games either. From the realism point of view it's normal too. Do you guys think that something like that doesn't happen in real world? Our world is very huge silly. Not everything that happens is printed in the news or filmed in a video. A crazy guy had a lot of money, he then paid the money to people to do crazy things for him, then he went bancrupt when he ran out of money, someone smarter took over the labs and they thrived before GlaDOS killed everyone. tl;dr: Half-Life Earth is not the same as our Earth + combine. It's our Earth + advanced technologies, including teleportation and AI + corporations are usually acting silly + Combine. Black mesa was as silly and neglectant of safety as aperture science if you view it under a different light, even if you ignore the funny level design that wasn't probably in the lore as shown here at 2:40 [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADkcj7JHKH4[/media] "You know, when they invented the atomic bomb, they were afraid that it was gonna catch the atmosphere on fire and burn up the whole earth. But they did it anyway" Sounds like something Cave J. would do.

[QUOTE=Chrille;39288147]You realize that the Department of Defense would have nothing to gain from interdimensional teleportation, right? Both Black Mesa and Aperture were working on local teleportation. The way Black Mesa's worked, they had to have a relay on Xen so that they could slingshot (Mossman's words) the subject back to their destination on Earth. But their ability to do (half-way) inter-dimensional teleportation was discovered by accident. This ability to do local teleportation was also a huge plot point in Half-Life 2, because the Combine wanted it. And Aperture had this in 1950. A different way of doing it, sure, but it was still working local teleportation. It doesn't even matter that it was faulty back then, there's no reason they couldn't improve upon until Black Mesa got their technology in the 21st century, except maybe a huge gaping plot hole. And they evidently did continue to work on it, because they kept making test chambers.[/QUOTE] The department of defense would have plenty to gain, xen held hundreds of potential bio weapons (like how the combine used the headcrab), and this dimension was also apparently filled with oxygen or breathable gas, also healing pools. Don't forget that they were also discovering Race X species that also hailed bio weapon potential. And black mesas version of inter dimensional travel could place you anywhere on earth if improved enough, like xen creatures use it, however the portal device aperture had would only get you places if you look at the right place, this place was big enough for a portal and had no huge bumps, and was a portal surface (non metal). This would be advantageous in the field, but in the long run Black Mesa would be a far superior choice if you wanted power. Also Black Mesa already had potential weapons like the H.E.V Suit, and the Tau Cannon, The Displacer Cannon (Which also provides interdimensional travel where ever you are, for little energy), and the Gluon Gun.

[QUOTE=supersoldier58;39290882]The department of defense would have plenty to gain, xen held hundreds of potential bio weapons (like how the combine used the headcrab), and this dimension was also apparently filled with oxygen or breathable gas, also healing pools. Don't forget that they were also discovering Race X species that also hailed bio weapon potential. And black mesas version of inter dimensional travel could place you anywhere on earth if improved enough, like xen creatures use it, however the portal device aperture had would only get you places if you look at the right place, this place was big enough for a portal and had no huge bumps, and was a portal surface (non metal). This would be advantageous in the field, but in the long run Black Mesa would be a far superior choice if you wanted power. Also Black Mesa already had potential weapons like the H.E.V Suit, and the Tau Cannon, The Displacer Cannon (Which also provides interdimensional travel where ever you are, for little energy), and the Gluon Gun.[/QUOTE] The military didn't know about Xen to begin with, nor did they at Black Mesa. They gave Black Mesa funding to develop local teleportation, Xen was discovered, Black Mesa started investigating. I'm guessing they didn't know a whole lot about the place, apart from the few specimens we see that they retrieved, considering that most of the scientists that ventured there were killed. Xen most likely used a different method of teleportation. Black Mesa needed an anti-mass spectrometer to analyze the Xen crystals, meaning that they contained negative energy, also known as exotic matter. Exotic matter is theorized to be a requirement when creating a wormhole and keeping it open. So when Nihilanth was keeping the dimensional rift open, he was drawing the negative energy from the Xen crystals. That's what I think anyway, with my layman understanding of the science behind it. @nightlord: The Gameinformer Half-Life/Portal timeline suggests that Black Mesa got their technology in 1998, which we know is false, and has been corrected by Wolpaw when someone sent him a mail about it ages ago. Sent Marc Laidlaw an e-mail anyway, hoping that he responds this time. There are still things in it that doesn't contradict what goes on in Portal 2, so you don't have to worry about retcons.

[QUOTE=supersoldier58;39290882]The department of defense would have plenty to gain, xen held hundreds of potential bio weapons (like how the combine used the headcrab), and this dimension was also apparently filled with oxygen or breathable gas, also healing pools. Don't forget that they were also discovering Race X species that also hailed bio weapon potential.[/QUOTE] And an alternate dimension has a ton of other uses the DoD would love to have, even if no local flora/fauna could be weaponized. They could use it for storage, allowing boats and bases to be smaller on Earth, but having massive Xen areas linked to a portal inside. They could hide military equipment in it, so other nations couldn't use spy satellites to see top-secret equipment. The bioweapons and healing pools are just bonuses.

[QUOTE=J. F. Christ;39290648]If half life [B]videogames[/B] are serious, it doesn't mean that there can't be something silly in the universe, not shown in the game. It doesn't matter how silly Portal 2 was. It's the same universe. From the lore point of view they made huge underground labs to contain all the silliness in them exclusively so it doens't affect Half-Life universe. Black Mesa and D0G demonstrates that advanced technology and AI is not exclusive to Portal games either. From the realism point of view it's normal too. Do you guys think that something like that doesn't happen in real world? Our world is very huge silly. Not everything that happens is printed in the news or filmed in a video. A crazy guy had a lot of money, he then paid the money to people to do crazy things for him, then he went bancrupt when he ran out of money, someone smarter took over the labs and they thrived before GlaDOS killed everyone. tl;dr: Half-Life Earth is not the same as our Earth + combine. It's our Earth + advanced technologies, including teleportation and AI + corporations are usually acting silly + Combine. Black mesa was as silly and neglectant of safety as aperture science if you view it under a different light, even if you ignore the funny level design that wasn't probably in the lore as shown here at 2:40 [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADkcj7JHKH4[/media] "You know, when they invented the atomic bomb, they were afraid that it was gonna catch the atmosphere on fire and burn up the whole earth. But they did it anyway" Sounds like something Cave J. would do.[/QUOTE] I still find it hard to believe he's only at Surface Tension in Freeman's Mind.

[QUOTE=TectoImprov;39295310]I still find it hard to believe he's only at Surface Tension in Freeman's Mind.[/QUOTE] HL1 confirmed to actually take place over 10 years

[QUOTE=TectoImprov;39295310]I still find it hard to believe he's only at Surface Tension in Freeman's Mind.[/QUOTE] There are still two more episodes not out yet, so he could actually be on Lambda Core already (assuming he did some more skipping like when he just climbs over walls).

[QUOTE=Chrille;39291061]The military didn't know about Xen to begin with, nor did they at Black Mesa. They gave Black Mesa funding to develop local teleportation, Xen was discovered, Black Mesa started investigating. I'm guessing they didn't know a whole lot about the place, apart from the few specimens we see that they retrieved, considering that most of the scientists that ventured there were killed. Xen most likely used a different method of teleportation. Black Mesa needed an anti-mass spectrometer to analyze the Xen crystals, meaning that they contained negative energy, also known as exotic matter. Exotic matter is theorized to be a requirement when creating a wormhole and keeping it open. So when Nihilanth was keeping the dimensional rift open, he was drawing the negative energy from the Xen crystals. That's what I think anyway, with my layman understanding of the science behind it. @nightlord: The Gameinformer Half-Life/Portal timeline suggests that Black Mesa got their technology in 1998, which we know is false, and has been corrected by Wolpaw when someone sent him a mail about it ages ago. Sent Marc Laidlaw an e-mail anyway, hoping that he responds this time. There are still things in it that doesn't contradict what goes on in Portal 2, so you don't have to worry about retcons.[/QUOTE] I always thought that the Black Mesa higher ups had told the military about Xen before, it was just extremely classified. Thats why when the cascade happened, the entire military didn't flip out and send everyone at once, they were all very calm about it and sent a specialized unit in to fight it.

[QUOTE=WillerinV1.02;39296256]I always thought that the Black Mesa higher ups had told the military about Xen before, it was just extremely classified. Thats why when the cascade happened, the entire military didn't flip out and send everyone at once, they were all very calm about it and sent a specialized unit in to fight it.[/QUOTE] If Opposing Force is canon, they were even aware it was going to happen.

[QUOTE=hogofwar;39296432]If Opposing Force is canon, they were even aware it was going to happen.[/QUOTE] Isn't the HECU (and the super-secret black leather dudes) some special division that was created specifically for something like what happens in Half Life?

[QUOTE=A B.A. Survivor;39297106]Isn't the HECU (and the super-secret black leather dudes) some special division that was created specifically for something like what happens in Half Life?[/QUOTE] If you take Gearbox stuff as canon, the Black Mesa security team were supposed to support and assist the HECU to deal with whatever threat they were dispatched for (According to the Blue Shift manual) but it doesn't state that they were ever directly associated with Black Mesa. The original HL1 Manual states that the HECU "Don't only want to obliterate aliens, they're trying to permanently silence you and your co-workers, too."

Hey guys, this is probably way late, but I didn't think it was worth making a shit thread over so... I was wondering, if i already own the original half life and the expansions, is there any way i can get the high definition pack for them all without having to re-purchase them? (Downloads, ect.) I'm fine with re-downloading the games, but re-buying them is what I'm trying to avoid. This is more for the convenience and eye candy and I don't find it worth re-buying the games just so they'll look prettier. Already have Black Mesa for that. [B]Edit:[/B] I'm not asking for warez, I'm asking for legal links and options, if they're available. [B]Edit:[/B] Sorry, NM. Found the download on steam. :D

[QUOTE=Neo Kabuto;39295670]There are still two more episodes not out yet, so he could actually be on Lambda Core already (assuming he did some more skipping like when he just climbs over walls).[/QUOTE] Man i can't wait to see the first Xen episodes. That stuff will be hilarious.

[QUOTE=CAPT Opp4;39299291]I was wondering, if i already own the original half life and the expansions, is there any way i can get the high definition pack for them all without having to re-purchase them? (Downloads, ect.) [B]Edit:[/B] Sorry, NM. Found the download on steam. :D[/QUOTE]You should never use the High Definition Pack available through Steam. Valve didn't use Gearbox's patched versions of the models and their Steam implementation is crap and will cause problems. A fixed version of the HD Pack for use on Steam was released on Planet Half-Life here: [url]http://planethalflife.gamespy.com/fullstory.php?id=105708[/url]

[QUOTE=Marphy Black;39301863]You should never use the High Definition Pack available through Steam. Valve didn't use Gearbox's patched versions of the models and their Steam implementation is crap and will cause problems. A fixed version of the HD Pack for use on Steam was released on Planet Half-Life here: [url]http://planethalflife.gamespy.com/fullstory.php?id=105708[/url][/QUOTE] Well, that would explain why the normal pack doesn´t have HD models for the expansions, but i never had problem with the mods (except Azure Sheep and Sweet Half-Life, which force you to have the default pack).

Why were we discussing Portal? We have a Portal Megathread, go to it

[QUOTE=ojcoolj;39303433]Why were we discussing Portal? We have a Portal Megathread, go to it[/QUOTE] The events of Portal happens in the Half-Life universe, and what we were talking about has to do with Portal 2 and Half Life 2 at the same time, so it's safe to get it in the discussion.

[QUOTE=ojcoolj;39303433]Why were we discussing Portal? We have a Portal Megathread, go to it[/QUOTE] I dunno why people get so butthurt about this. Theres nothing else to talk about and portal is atleast semi-half life related.

We were discussing the Borealis, which was supposed to be parked at the underground docks at Aperture, which the Combine in the Half-Life series want to grab for local teleportation. There's your reason.

Would people be upset if the next discussion thread was Half-Life and Portal discussion so everything is free to discussion?

[QUOTE=supersoldier58;39304531]Would people be upset if the next discussion thread was Half-Life and Portal discussion so everything is free to discussion?[/QUOTE] Might as well. The Portal thread is pretty dead.

[QUOTE=Marphy Black;39301863]You should never use the High Definition Pack available through Steam. Valve didn't use Gearbox's patched versions of the models and their Steam implementation is crap and will cause problems. A fixed version of the HD Pack for use on Steam was released on Planet Half-Life here: [url]http://planethalflife.gamespy.com/fullstory.php?id=105708[/url][/QUOTE] Uh, crap. I already installed the (crappy) steam cover. What do I do? If I download your link, will it just overwrite my crappy one, or what? [B]Edit:[/B] Nevermind, I read the info. Says steam hd pack must be un-installed for this one to work. Got it.

[QUOTE=CAPT Opp4;39304659]Uh, crap. I already installed the (crappy) steam cover. What do I do? If I download your link, will it just overwrite my crappy one, or what? [B]Edit:[/B] Nevermind, I read the info. Says steam hd pack must be un-installed for this one to work. Got it.[/QUOTE] there's a Steam FAQ page for installing and uninstalling

[QUOTE=supersoldier58;39304531]Would people be upset if the next discussion thread was Half-Life and Portal discussion so everything is free to discussion?[/QUOTE] there you go

Yay the two are merged! Also, does anyone have a link to the Blue Shift Instruction Manual, the Half-Life Instruction Manual and the Opposing Force Instruction Manual so I can see those letters that were written?