The lights are on
November 16, 2004: Gordon Freeman wakes up on a train barreling into City 17 en route to crowbarring a few hundred head crabs and blowing up the terrifying Citadel that looms over the blasted hellscape that used to be Earth. Valve has released two minor episodic installments since that blessed day that Half-Life 2 first came out, but we’re still waiting for news – any news! – about a proper Half-Life 3. To fill the void created by Valve’s stony silence, here’s a list of what we hope to see in the continuing adventures of Gordon, Alyx, and DØg.Answers about the G-manThe enigmatic G-man is, in some ways, more of a central character to the Half-Life saga than Gordon Freeman himself, yet we don’t know anything about him other than that he has an unexplained interest in Gordon. He’s saved Gordon from certain death multiple times only to drop him right back where the action is hottest. What reason does he have to oppose the Combine, even if indirectly? Is he a remnant of some long-forgotten race that was assimilated by the Combine in centuries past? An extra-dimensional being trying to fight the ennui of immortality by watching humanity’s last gasp? One of the central figures in Half-Life has been a closed book since the series’ inception. It’s time to end that.** If you hide G-man clues behind an obscure ARG, Valve, we will hate you forever.**** Not really. But please don’t.
Pick up where it left offOne of the great things about Half-Life is that each entry has picked up more or less exactly where the previous one ended. Valve is full of creative types that no doubt have plenty of ideas that they’d love to make into games, but would require a cop-out “ten years later, when humanity has repelled the Combine invasion…” interstitial to fit into this universe. Please don’t put those into Half-Life 3. It’s not that we don’t want to play those other games that exist in Valve’s heads, but they shouldn’t be Half-Life 3. We want to know what’s up with Gordon and Alyx, not what’s way down the road in the fictional timeline.
[Next up: Hands and Hunters]
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Right, about the platforming point, I have to completely agree, and feel like I'm one of the very few that enjoyed the incredibly alien environment of Xen in the first game.
That said, I had a rad idea (inspired by what I thought the Combine Homeworld/Dimension would be like, mostly due to their methods of transportation, and the apparent verticality of the structures they create, eg Citadel) for platforming sequences.
Essentially it was an offshoot of the gravity gun, and for lack of better title (I'll come up with one eventually) I merely deemed them anti gravity boots.
I envisioned them as scaled down gravity guns mounted (not too differently than Chell's Long Fall Boots) to the calf/ankle area of the Hazard Suit.
It would have it's own independent charge meter (much the same as the sprint/flashlight charge meter) that would function very similarly to how Force Jump worked in Dark Forces 2:Jedi Knight. Hold the jump button down and let go once you've achieved the desired charge for height.
I figured this could be coupled with sprint for distance jumping as well (hence an independent charge meter).
...A release date.
1. to exist.
2. see number one.