An-Other Preview of Half-Life
By - Alex 'Alvin' Vincent - 13th Sept 1998
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(Serious Health Warning: This document contains many instances of the word smooth)
Well it was just one week ago today that I was scrambling my way through the doors of Londons Olympia Showground, me being just one of many of the like-minded punters all gagging to get their eyes, not to mention ever-so-nimble fingers, on all the lastest great looking games, gossip and girls! (and peripherals, but its doesnt rhyme ;-)
After some initial confusion brought on by firstly walking into the massive Olympia building, jammed with thousands of people, computers, scantily dressed women and music/gaming noises attacking from all directions... has that set the picture?
I set out to get every flyer, poster, freebie, peice of gossip and at least a good 20 minutes playing time into every new PC Game I could find!
Anyways, ltes get back to the reason you're reading this!
Half-Life...
To be honest I was eager to see many things at ECTS, but I'll readily admit that going to see how well Half-Life had progressed since my last view of the game some months earlier was most certainly top of my agenda, and from reading a few of the other articles recently released, it would seem quite a few others had their priorities set the same as me!
I walked up to the Cendant stand, half expecting to see a massive section devoted entirely to Half-Life, but then it dawned on me that there were _other_ games in this world!!! ;-) Anyways, I quickly eyeballed the stand and made my way to the PC demoing Half-Life.
To my disgust I saw immediately that Half-Life was just running a rolling demo... damn! I took a glance at the screen....... after re-catching my breath after seeing the smooooooothness of the game, asked Robin Walker of TeamFortress Software if I could 'have a go', to which the answer was a resounding 'no', he explained that it was better to show off the game in a quick, action-like format without people struggling re-defining keys to get their configs right... etc... etc...
I didnt mind really, especially when Robn said that the demo was about 45 minutes long!! It was demoing on a P2 300 with Dual Voodoo IIs Sli so as you might expect it was very very smooth, maybe not the best processor for maximum frames per second, but it wasnt really needed as it was just demoing the monsters, their AI, the deformable landscape, the cutscenes, the beam effects, more cutscenes, different scenarios in the game, even more cutscenes, cool really really gory bits, lovely attention to detail, not so much as a 'tiled texture' in sight, rather cool funny bits and the even more cooler cutscenes... need I go on :) Yes I think I will!
Its hard to start anywhere and explain to you what I saw of the game, one part of me wants to tell you everything about it, on the other hand that would really spoil it for you... Ok, so if you dont want me to spoil it for you look away now!
AI - Artificial Intelligence
I'll start with the big selling point of Half-Life to date, the Artifical Intelligence of the monsters. Yes its good. Yes its probably better than good! And yes it kicks every other FPS AI that I've ever played/seen. Robin explained one demo section which up-to-a-point showed exactly the same room, and same configuration of monsters which was recorded twice, just to show how each of the fight scenes differed in their outcome.
It was between a squad of grunts and three aliens, I forget their names but they were smoooth, in the first demo the soldiers entered the room and split up just as proper soldiers should do. One went for cover whilst the other too went into action pummelling the monsters with bullets from their hefty MP5s. The monsters just started to get the upper-hand when the third, previously unseen, grunt recruit managed to get a clip in from behind and hence split up the enemey offensive.
The grunts won.
The second time it wasnt as lucky for the grunts, the grunts entered the room and immediatly the aliens took out the the grunt squad leader, the one wearing the red beret in all the screenshots. When he was killed almost immediately the squad-behaviour (as I suppose its called) fell to peices. One grunt stood his ground whilst the other played the fool and took un-necessary cover.
The grunts lost.
This was the best example I was shown, but simply from this my assurance is that all the enemies will give you a run for your money!
Effects
The 'Beam Effects' were fantastic! Thats the only word for them!
Looking at the screenshot of the left you just cant imagine how cool this all was when it was happening! The cool looking energy bursts, combined with ample use of func_explosive and p[lenty of excellent deep sounds managed to overall make me choke with disbelief! It was amazing! And what makes it even better EVERY level seems to be FULL of such outrageous effects!
In another clip, you were in a very early level, escaping from the collapsing structures and surrounding machinery which was falling apart after the failed experiment. For those of you who thought the final mission on Quake2 Mission Pack : The Reckoning was cool, what with all those explosians and things blowing up and falling over... you aint seen nothing yet! In this level power conduits were breaking free down the walls and the engergy was friing out destroying all in its path... ever so cool. Some dead barny was lying on the ground, the energy beam tracked over him... yuck! Messy!
One thing I've always fancied doing in Quake, was a movie but it was soo hard... and you needed lots of people to help you out. Not so in Half-Life with this