Half-Life 2 was really revolutionary for it's time, but when you revisit it you see that it really didn't age well. Modern games wouldn't be possible if it wasn't for this super ambitious title, but Half-Life 2 just doesn't stand up on it''s own, when I played it for the first time I thought it was amazing especially for a 2004 game, but when I replayed it I noticed things that I didn't notice before. This game is the perfect mix of shallow and generic weapons, repetitive firefights, braindead AI, and boring puzzles. And the fact that you can't skip the cutscenes where the characters just talk about something that I could have already done if they weren't talking about it still really does make the game that much more boring because the story SUCKS, all these people have never seen you in person and they're risking their lives for you to get to the next part of the level, it baffles me that these people somehow know who you are when you were in a coma for 100 something years, all the people who would have known you are already dead. And you aren't even the main protagonist, most of the cool stuff is done by your overly sexy girl companion, you just watch her do things you could have done if the game wasn't so poorly designed. Another thing is that the combat is boring and repetitive, even on the hardest difficulties the firefights are easy as hell, the AI can't actually shoot you if you're hiding behind a prop, and they're always placed next to an object that you can blow up and kill them. And somehow these alien super soldiers can die to some random rebel guy with a gun nowhere near as advanced as alien technology? Overall, the game is very important to the history of first person shooters and other source engine games, but Half-Life 2 just isn't that good to stand up on it's own.
Review of Half-Life 2
