In Half-Life 2: Episode 1, you fight the Eye of Sauron……just kidding.
I ended Half-Life 2 on such a high note that I decided to jump straight into Episode One (though Episode Two will have to sit on the sidelines for a while since Modern Warfare 2 is out!). Half-Life 2 ended on an incredible cliffhanger, so I can’t imagine having to wait to see what happens next. Luckily, these games came out years ago so I could just move my cursor over one game to the right on the Orange Box and see what Episode One had to offer. Was this groundbreaker in “episodic gaming” (/sarcasm) as good as its predecessor?
The first thing that stood out to me while playing through Episode One was how tight the experience is. The game picks up right where Half-Life 2 left off, and changes the stakes within the first minute. The story concerns the continuing human rebellion, and a mass exodus of humans from City 17 which is in danger of being destroyed by an unstable Citadel reactor. Like Resident Evil 5, you go through the game with a female partner (Alyx), and the game just follows you as the two of you make your escape from City 17.
The game is pretty much Half-Life 2 without the long boring sections. There’s very little fluff here - you go from scene to scene without too much repetition (unlike the original). Puzzles aren’t as annoying and momentum-breaking as Half-Life 2 either. There is a cool achievement which involves beating the game firing only one bullet (which you use to break a lock), and I had a lot of fun figuring out how to fight off hordes of enemies using only grenades and my gravity gun. Also, fighting with Alyx is pretty fun - it’s kind of weird since Gordon Freeman never talks, but you really feel like he and Alyx are forming a strong relationship. Plus, she knows kung fu.
What I loved about Half-Life 2 is the same thing I love about Episode One: Valve has done an amazing job of crafting a world and helping me understand that world without any cutscenes taking me away from the action. It’s marvelous. You are never taken out of Gordon Freeman’s HEV suit - for all intents and purposes you ARE Gordon Freeman. It’s something that very few first person shooters do.
There’s not much more to say here, it’s just more Half-Life 2. There are complaints that the game is too short, which I could understand back then, but now that you can get The Orange Box for $20, it’s a non-issue. So I will reiterate what I’ve said a thousand times before on this site: BUY THE ORANGE BOX.
