An expansion is still an expansion, even if you call it an episode - and there's not much expansion happening here.
The Source engine, despite a whole host of tweaks and upgrades, occasionally looks tired (especially indoors), and it's becoming harder and harder to avoid a seen-it-all-before sense of cynicism. Episode Two just doesn't seem to have that single moment of impact, despite having the perfect environment for it. Take Far Cry's beach, Oblivion's sewer exit, Half-Life 2s town square - each of these are moments in which the visual spectacle of a large area impresses the player. One more paragraph of moaning before I start to explain the 82% at the end of the review. The polish is beginning to dull, and with minimal plot progression throughout the whole game, the appeal of episodic instalments of Half-Life 2 is waning. To have you fighting old enemies and arbitrarily picking up all your old weapons (which you somehow lost again, and were somehow scattered along the first level again), well, it feels like we're retreading old ground, fighting fights we fought in Half-Life 2 and Episode One. It's not an entirely bad section of the game, but it whiffs of Xen, and leaves you feeling deflated - especially after the stunning intro showing off the Source engine's newfound ability to explode really large things.įor the game to be touted as taking a new direction towards grand, open vistas and rolling, beforested hills, only to send you almost immediately down a mine shaft, is disappointing. A wholly more annoying sort of antlion which vomits acid on you, not unlike the original game's bullsquids. Valve have decided to have the mute Gordon Freeman spelunk a giant antlion cave, full of not just antlions, but a new sort of antlion. If you're like anybody else, and had had enough of the limitless, hive-minded cannon fodder by the end of Half-Life 2, then you won't. If this sounds like you, and you'd marry an antlion, then you'll love the first section of Episode Two. So Who Likes antlions? And I mean really likes antlions, enough to marry one.
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