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With its mishmash of beating action and nonstop, immersive storytelling HALF-LIFE launches a thunderbolt through the game industry back in 1998. Valve's debut title wins more than 50 game-of-the-year awards on its way to being named as “Best PC Game Ever” by PC Gamer, and launches a franchise with more than eight million retail units sold worldwide.

HALF-LIFE 2 is possibly the most revolutionary FPS since they went fully 3D way back in the Nineties. What makes it revolutionary is lifelike graphics similar to what's possible in Hollywood and is in no doubt better than a lot of the computer graphics used in movies; the characters are in no way photo-realistic, but I suspect games will never have characters that look like real people. The environments however have succeeded in matching photo-realism in their standards, which is no doubt due to the physics employed in the game, down to the smallest detail, like telephone wires that are no longer perfectly ridged.

These environments incorporate City 17, a derelict city slowly being consumed by the ever expanding citadel. Ravenholm is the first place object physics become effective, as you're wielding the gravity gun. This means that you have lots of sharp objects like buzzsaw blades to fire through packs of zombies. My favorite area is the beaches that are inhabited by the ant lions, which live underground and listen for the movement of people on the sand above; it gives me the nostalgic feel of the sandworms in Frank Herbert's Dune and is no doubt homage to him, as the Combine forces keep them away with objects resembling thumpers.

The physics aren't only applied to the environment; to supplement the graphics, every character model is given a skeleton and muscles to control their movement and expressions making movement realistic and smooth. The weapons use physics in their bullet fire, which is more confined to the mods like Counter -Strike, but they're used in the grenade bounces and, one of my personal favorites, the plasma rifle's energy grenade that bounces around rooms like a high power bouncy ball until it hits someone and explodes throwing the unlucky victim and companions through the air, leaving them sprawled out on the edges of crates and desks.

The weapon that uses the physics engine the most is the gravity gun, which can push or pull most objects, giving the ability to pick up radiators to deflect bullet fire, great when advancing on a gun turret, or just beating someone to death with blunt objects and that probably forms the most entertaining portion of the game. The heavier the object, the more damage it does, but the weaker the effect the gravity gun has, so you can't pick up a car or a dumpster and drop it on someone's head.

The sound in the game does help the movie feel, but I have to say that the best use of music is where they leave it out. In movies you get the cliché music that is nearly as effective at telling you where a scary bit is as putting a big sign up with the words 'SCARY BIT' plastered over it. It's crawling through a dimly lit passageway with no music and no sound except for the short-circuiting radio and then WHAM! The game stutters because it decides to load from the DVD drive and the hard drive at the same time, as it tries to simultaneously load a dozen sounds. Nothing kills the suspense like that, I guarantee it.  The final part of the game to give a movie feel is the character graphics. The most detailed of all has to be the G-Man, who has eye bags, possibly a side effect of manipulating time and travelling across dimensions and deep set wrinkles. The next most detailed characters are Eli and your ex-employer and now combine leader Dr Breen, who's gone down in the world, mostly because of all the wrinkles and beards that look almost photorealistic. The women, Alyx and Mossman, are smooth skinned and curvy, while looking realistic and I can't imagine the modellers having that much to do than tweak dimensions to make them look, ahem, 'authentic'. 

The intense, real-time game play of HALF-LIFE 2 is made possible only by Source®, Valve's new proprietary engine technology. Source provides major enhancements in:

• Characters: Advanced facial animation system delivers the most sophisticated in-game characters ever seen. With 40 distinct facial "muscles," human characters convey the full array of human emotion, and respond to the player with fluidity and intelligence.

• Physics: From pebbles to water to 2-ton trucks respond as expected, as they obey the laws of mass, friction, gravity, and buoyancy.

• Graphics: Source uses Shader-based renderer, like the one used at Pixar to create movies such as Toy Story® and Monster's, Inc. ®, creates the most beautiful and realistic environments ever seen in a video game.

• AI: Neither friends nor enemies charge blindly into the fray. They can assess threats, navigate tricky terrain, and fashion weapons from whatever is at hand.
 
HALF-LIFE 2 is a groundbreaking first person shooter that is every bit as innovative and entertaining as the original, with astounding graphics, fantastic use of sound and a story that compels you to follow through to the very end. The long load times are the only negative point, but once in Ravenholm you'll appreciate the loading times, as they stop you having a stroke! Even if you're not a running and shooting kind of person, this is still a must have game and it may even convert you to the genre.