Prince

So, what's going on with Half-Life 2 now, about six months (I think) after its release?

I haven't played the actual game. I downloaded a free demo from Valve's site some weeks after the game was released. Look nice enough, a train stops at the train station, there's a guy on a video screen. I approach some guards, they are talking amongst themselves about whatever, chit chat... then unexpected errors fly, the screen turns into a violent blend of funky lines and colours, and the whole thing crashes. Great.

I really hate giving my machine a cold reset, so I haven't touched HL2 since. I figured I am not going to pay $50 for something that won't run further than 5 minutes, especially when it is so commonly known that getting refunds for video games is practically impossible. Buyer Beware.

So now I am thinking, maybe there were bugs that Valve was aware of. Maybe there's been some huge SP1 kind of thing released. I don't know. Fill me in, guys.

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Spritebox

I only had a problem with the guns flashing. Downloading the newest video card driver fixed that right up. I suggest that.

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Redjake

It never screwed up with me once, never crashed, never did anything out of the ordinary, except it kicked ass.

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cyrnel

It crashed my laptop a few times but I was amazed it ran at all. It killed my older Win desktop but so does a strong crosswind. My gaming box ran it just fine. Most HL2 complaints are with steam and that the game is fairly easy and repetitive, especially the final levels. Still a fun game overall and worth the ~$29 street price.

Coppertop

I'll second that.

Prince

Those of you that didn't experience any issues, what sort of machines did you run HL2 on?

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cyrnel

My gaming machine at the time was a 3200+ AMD 64 (socket 754), Nvidia 6800, ATA 133 disks, 512MB, running XP. Transitions were better with 1GB RAM, and steam is steam, but overall it was very nice. The 2GHz P4 laptop with old Radeon Mobility video had very slow transions and didn't look nearly as nice, but it still played well.

Edit: transisions?

aberkok

I'll have to go to bat for this game. The only thing that really bugged me was on the dune buggy level, while in the dark tunnels, when each section would load (long load times) I would'nt know which way I was heading, so I'd guess. I kept going in the wrong direction so I'd go backwards and wait again while the game loaded the part I had just done! Once I turned around about 5 times going through this damn situation.

The rest of the game was sweet, though, and I have to commend Valve for their efforts to make the game run so well on a mid-range system.

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Krycheck

Mods are starting to come out. And some of those are great already. Gary's Mod is a extremely fun single player mod. A CTF mod came out that I'm hearing alot about but I have yet to try out. DM right now is tons of fun for me though. Just love throwing shit at people with the grav gun. To kill someone with a fly toilet is priceless.

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Coppertop

I have a 2.4 Ghz Pentium 4, 512 RAM with an ATI 9800.

The game ran perfectly with setting tweaked slightly higher than defaults. Load times weren't a hassle but I did get the audio quirk when quicksaving. I even played the game while offline, when Steam wasn't connected. I honestly didn't experience any of the things others have complained about.

Suave

Ran really nicely with high settings on an Athlon 3000+ with 768 meg PC2700 RAM and an ATI Radeon 9600XT. Only problems I had were that it was a little choppy for the first 5 seconds after loading, and sometimes it would crash randomly if I performed a certain action in a certain area (such as throwing a nade at some sentries in a specific hallway right after saving).

By the way, try picking up nades thrown at you with the gravity gun and throwing them back at the Combine troops. Nothing gives a greater feeling of accomplishment. Must be the DoD player in me.

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jujueye

Well, hell, I guess I'm the only one who had problems. And Boy Howdy did I have problems! Crapola.

P4 2.8 @ 3.4
1 G RAM
TI Radeon 9800 Pro
SoundMax Sound (onboard)
XP Pro SP1

If I am killed during a game and hit the mouse button or F9 to reload, it hangs the machine. It does this on any level and seems to occur more often when there are more sounds going on. For instance, if I die and the HEV suit is yakking, the combine are farting around with the radios and a headcrab is munching, I know it'll hang. But I get no stuttering like many online have complained about. Last night I would play a tough level, get killed, then hit the reset button on my hungup machine. The average was five minutes of play and five minutes of reset. Not fun.

Yes I have the latest drivers. Yes, I have turned down video and audio settings. I work with computer hardware and software every day. I'm no dork! I refuse to have good hardware and turn every setting down just so the damn thing will run right. Why have good hardware just to turn it down. That's like taking your Ferrari to the corner store and not exceeding 25 MPH. Bland.

I'm so glad others here are having good experiences running the game. I seriously have never had so many problems running a game. Hell, HL1 runs better than this one! LOL. So does System Shock 2 from 1999, Q3 Arena, Clive Barker's Undying and more.

I'm frustrated because I think the story is awesome. I think the character models are amazing. I think the environments are immsersive. And while people have found the game to be boring or too linear, I just don't agree. I really want to play the game, it just seems to be a bad combination for my computer. As I live near Kirkland, WA, I could likely bring my gaming box down to Valve, but I think the'd probably turn everything down and fark up a bunch of other stuff to get it to work right. I personally think any user shoudl not need to do very much to get a game to work it's best. Oh well. When my frustrations go away, I play another round of five or ten minute sections of the game...

cyrnel

You aren't the only one. I've heard plenty of cases that needed care & feeding to be playable. Most seem to fix with a reinstall or driver update but only the unlucky have become experts. For me the steam portion was the most painful experience. Similar to dropping a transfer case on my ankle.

Prince

Looks like everyone but me in this world can afford a gaming rig worth something.

P4 1.6GHz
768 MB RAM (DDR PC2100)
SoundBlaster Audigy 2 Value
Radeon 9000 Pro (ViVo)
80 GB HDD
Windows XP Pro SP2

I'm assuming that I'd have to upgrade not only the video card but the processor as well just to run this thing.

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RubenBaraja

That was a pain in the ass, especially if you went the wrong way and the Loading screen appeared again - meaning you were going the wrong way.

I also occasionally got stuck on bits of debris and had to commit suicide as I could not move anywhere.

Overall the best game ever made though

kutulu

My vid card came with a coupon for a free copy of this. Is it too late to cash it in?

SiNai

In reply to Krycheck, I've been playing CTF relentlessly since it's come out. Very fun.

Have had no problems with this game except for some bugginess online. Single player was a great, bug free experience for me, although my machine is pretty new.

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jujueye

That's for sure. I know more console commands, launch parms and tweaks than I could shake a stick at. Oh well. It's not like I'm afraid of tweaking. But sometimes you just want to immerse yourself in it.

Coppertop

I built my PC several years ago. It cost less than $1k when I made it. I have since upgraded the mobo and case, but the machine's performance is still the same. It's quite cheap if you shop around and build it yourself.

aberkok

Dude, I've got an Athlon 2600+ (running at about 1500Mhz) and an ATI Radeon 9200. Otherwise pretty much the same or less, and I got it running just swell. You might be O.K.

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Scorps

My bro ran that game on a Radeon 9700 Pro with no problems but demos always got bugs.

MH73

I can't say it any better....

muckluck

I've got a 2500+ (oced to 3200+ speed if that makes a difference
) and a 9200 and the thing runs 40 fps on medium settings. 40 fps is plenty for me, and I don't care much for alot of eyecandy.Although, the reflections in HL:2 are extremely impressive.

Bratwurst

I ran into the sound stutter after loading during levels a couple times, other than that it ran fairly well on my system. I don't exactly have a high end system anymore either.

p4 2.4 ghz (not oc'd)
1 gig ddr ram pc3200 I think
GeForce FX 5600 ultra

I'm just sitting here patiently waiting for DOD:S to come out.

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frankx

P4 3.0Ghz
512Mb Ram
ATI Radeon 9250

Have had absolutely no problems with HL2. No hiccups, hangups or anything of the sort. Many, MANY hours spent playing this game.

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MageB420666

I guess I'm the only idiot on the TFP that got Half-life 2 to run on a computer with a Radeon 7500.

I must say that I hate Steam, there have been occasions were I have not been able to play the game because Steam refused to admit that I had a copy of HL 2 registered with it and I didn't have an internet connection at the time to let it update, so I couldn't play. And then there are the times that it does automatic updates before allowing me to play a game that ALREADY WORKS ON MY COMPUTER!

But other than steam, and my crappy graphics card I have no complaints about the game itself, and I love the level of interaction there is with the environment, I can even shoot birds out of the sky. It is overall a good game.

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bookerV

Well due to frustration with WoW server stability and general interest I finally caved and got this game. Damn it kicks ass. It runs like a dream on my system, no problems at all. This game looks stunning and it's fun as hell. Played it pretty much all weekend and am looking forward to playing it again when I get home from work. Love the physics engine. This game definitely deserves all the hype...

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Ace_O_Spades

I played through it again on my new computer, THAT was how this game should be experienced... full everything... drooooooool

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Feh.

Xiangsu

I didn't want to play this game until I beat the first one, thankfully I found a copy of the collectors edition which came with the original. The first one was good, I am sure it was amazing for its time, but it was just good from what I played. The second one blows it away. The story is so much more immersive. The graphics also help in the immersion factor. I just got past Ravenmore and so far this is a great. I would say it is worth all the hype it recieved, but I'll have make up my mind once I beat it.

**edit**

I just beat Half-Life 2, it was an amazing experience and one of the best games I have ever played.Spoiler: The end was really bizarre, but at the same time really cool. They still have not fully explained everything so I guess now we wait for a sequel.