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Thread: Half - Life1/2 n00b!

  1. #1
    Senior Member Nemeliza's Avatar
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    Half - Life1/2 n00b!

    1st of all let me apologise for knowing nothing about this game other than its apparently 'the best pc game ever' so not to the point:

    I want to play this half life game and see what all the fuss is/has been about. i needs me a good game to absorb some of that precious time i cant afford to waste.

    A few questions i have:

    1. is this game (HL2) ONLY playable online?
    2. whats a 'steam' ?
    3. how are people playing it before its 'out'?
    4. how does one download it?
    5. will it blow up my 9800 pro?
    6. where is the best place to get it?
    7. is it worth gettint the 1st one?

    Thanks.
    Nem

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    Senior Member Kezzer's Avatar
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    1) You need an internet connection to ACTIVATE the game, other than that, no you don't.
    2) Steam is the program which allows you to interface with the game. You create an account and it forever stores what games you own so you can download them anywhere anytime in the future
    3) Warez
    4) Through steam, get the steam client at http://www.steampowered.com/
    5) No, it will run fine
    6) Either through steam (you can order it without the CD through steam but there's a 4.2GB download with it or you can get a boxed copy
    7) Yes, you can get the first one if you buy the silver package through steam

    Hope that's everything you need

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    Senior Member Pete's Avatar
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    good day mister Nem

    1. is this game (HL2) ONLY playable online?
    A1. Nope, singleplayer, it has a very deep and long storyline, the developers 'valve' are saying it will take someone 30 hours to complete, that is without fiddling with all the extra stuff such as the havok engine (petty much any object can be moved around the world and/or damaged) and some cool weaponry (theres a gadget which is used to pick up objects and fire them at other things....) so will prolly take me about 2 months to complete because i will be in such a dreamy state-been waiting for this game and its physics for nearly 2 years.
    and there will be a MP game available with i think 1-50ish players on a map

    2. whats a 'steam' ?
    A2. A steam is a program that people load onto there pcs - i think it was primarily made for auto updates for hl one....it used to be fairly rubbish

    however now it is used as well as for updates also to buy new valve games online and download them legally onto your hardrive....which is good for those of us who have very fast connections. It is starting a new era of game retailing in my opinion

    3. how are people playing it before its 'out'?
    A3. There has been some specualation and rumour over the past few days that people have bought it in certain shops in texas, america and instaled it on there computers. however this is balder crap because vivendi the distributers have told valve that they do not want anyone to play the game until 8am on the 16th of december GMT-the game will be officially released at the exact same time in every part of the world....cunning but can you imagine the amount of servers that will break because of the huge amount of people wanting to 'unlock' there hl2 game. Unlocking it is how people who downloaded of steam and people and who bought it retail will register with valve and valve will open the gates to hl2 for all! yay

    4. how does one download it?
    4A. Through steam get it at www.steampowered.com (is that the right link?)

    5. will it blow up my 9800 pro?
    5A. nope depending on your other pc components your 9800pro should run it just fine.....it was orignally designed to be running on these excellent cards. when it was going to be released 2 months ago last year (sigh)

    6. where is the best place to get it?
    6A. Steam is the easiest option if you are lazy like me....but otherwise just get it from play.com for around 35 pounds, or amazon

    7. is it worth gettint the 1st one?
    7A. Yes i would recommend you buy the platinum half life one pack, if its out yet when you purchase hl2
    you dont have to play hl one first but that will be alot more gaming for you
    in the platinum pack there is hlone and lots of other modification games, where you play as the enemy from hl one and as the security guards.
    most fun

    if you havnt done already do not go on any sites that hype the game up alot, you are very lucky in that you havnt listened to some of the hype that people (including myself) churn out
    for people like me who are expecting a masterpiece it will probably dissapoint
    for people like you who are expecting anything it will be incredible (whoops hype) sorry!

    good luck with you half life adventure, believe me it is only just beggining for you buddy


    edit (damn you kezzer, you posted before me! argh) ps are you gonna be in portsmouth tomoz, you might see me im the one walking down the street crying with joy
    kezzers post is proably much better than mine though, he goes to university....OAHHHHH!
    Last edited by Pete; 16-11-2004 at 12:38 AM.

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    Comfortably Numb directhex's Avatar
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    all pretty comprehensive, but to better answer the steam question, it was designed as a replacement for much of the way games work today - to remove patch days, where everyone on the net struggled to download 110mb patches. it was designed to allow gamers with fat internet connections to download the games they legally owned, on any pc anywhere, without fuss. it was designed to allow small talent onto the scene, selling their mods and games for a small amount of money and publishing via steam rather than trying to picth their game to the big boys like EA or Vivendi. it was designed to allow episodic gameplay, whereby a game is released in chunks every few weeks or months, for as long as people are interested, rather than a static 1, 2 or 3 cd's worth on a shop shelf. it was designed to eliminate piracy, with a working authentication system.

    the client was a bit iffy to start with, but it's come along somewhat from its early days, and has helped shake off a lot of its bad image. as it stands, it can be used to play one free game (codename gordon, a side-scrolling flash version of hl2), some older games (half life 1 and assorted officially endorsed mods such as day of defeat and opposing force) and forthcoming games (half life 2, day of defeat source, etc). said games can be bought online via steam with a credit card, or you can enter a physical world cd key - however, with cd keys, there is a chance somebody has already thieved your key, e.g. guessed it or copied it in the shop, whereas steam purchases are guaranteed thief free

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    Senior Member Pete's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by directhex
    the client was a bit iffy to start with, but it's come along somewhat from its early days, and has helped shake off a lot of its bad image. as it stands, it can be used to play one free game (codename gordon, a side-scrolling flash version of hl2), some older games (half life 1 and assorted officially endorsed mods such as day of defeat and opposing force) and forthcoming games (half life 2, day of defeat source, etc). said games can be bought online via steam with a credit card, or you can enter a physical world cd key - however, with cd keys, there is a chance somebody has already thieved your key, e.g. guessed it or copied it in the shop, whereas steam purchases are guaranteed thief free

    wtf? you mean i can by hl2 with my hlone cd key?
    or am i too tired? and seeing things wrong?

  6. #6
    Comfortably Numb directhex's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Pete
    wtf? you mean i can by hl2 with my hlone cd key?
    or am i too tired? and seeing things wrong?
    the latter, silly boy

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    Senior Member Nemeliza's Avatar
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    Wow. come detailed posts there thanks people.

    Quote Originally Posted by KeZZeR
    you can order it without the CD through steam but there's a 4.2GB download with it or you can get a boxed copy
    Now if u buy the game online surely they can let u download the copy to use as well as send u a pretty box. do you have to choose 1 or the other...is one cheaper than the other?

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    Comfortably Numb directhex's Avatar
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    you can buy it from steam, which has no physical cd supplied (but steam has a function for backing up the downloaded game onto cd), or you can buy it in a shop. what's cheaper depends on which versions of the game you get, where you live, how much your shop's charging

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    Hexus.Jet TeePee's Avatar
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    Wait a sec. The major reason for development of steam was money! Under the old system, games developers like valve recieved around $8 for each copy of a game sold for $30+. The rest went to the publisher, like Vivendi, who take care of duplication, packaging, shipping etc. The development of a content delivery system like steam means the developer gets a much bigger slice of the pie since you deal with them directly. They, of course, have to run the servers, etc. This is the root cause of the huge lawsuit between Valve and Vivendi. It also has potential to come full circle. Do the smaller developers need to run their own content delivery system? Or will they more likely release their work through Valve and Steam (or indeed DiStream's Gamexstream service), giving Valve a slice of their pie?

    mmm, pie

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    Senior Member Nemeliza's Avatar
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    I took ur advice a d got the silver package from steam and....OH MY DAYS!!!!

    THIS GAME IS HORRIFIC!!! was worth every penny of my £37 ($70)
    and counter-strike source is NUUUUUUUUUUUUUUTS!!!! GAME IS BRILLIANT

    I JUST CANT STOP PLAYING IT.

    Best (bundle of) games iv ever purchased!!!!!!

  11. #11
    Asking silly questions menthel's Avatar
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    I can't wait to play it! Its sat at home, and I couldn't activate it last night because steam went belly up!
    Not around too often!

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    Quote Originally Posted by directhex
    all pretty comprehensive, but to better answer the steam question, it was designed as a replacement for much of the way games work today - to remove patch days, where everyone on the net struggled to download 110mb patches. it was designed to allow gamers with fat internet connections to download the games they legally owned, on any pc anywhere, without fuss. it was designed to allow small talent onto the scene, selling their mods and games for a small amount of money and publishing via steam rather than trying to picth their game to the big boys like EA or Vivendi. it was designed to allow episodic gameplay, whereby a game is released in chunks every few weeks or months, for as long as people are interested, rather than a static 1, 2 or 3 cd's worth on a shop shelf. it was designed to eliminate piracy, with a working authentication system.
    to add to that it also helps Valve get more money by cutting out the middle man. When someone buys a game from a retail store Valve get about $7, but with Steam they get $30 per sale.

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    Comfortably Numb directhex's Avatar
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    hl2 isn't valve's property, it's vivendi's. even if you buy any existing valve game on steam, vivendi still get most of the money

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    *shrugs* I just got that from Gamespots "The Final Hours" article

    Instead, he began working on other projects, like Steam, Valve's ambitious online distribution platform. Newell unveiled the platform at the Game Developers Conference in March 2002. Onstage, Newell positioned himself as a new-age Robin Hood who wanted to take from the greedy publishers what independent game developers deserved: a larger piece of the revenue pie. Newell told the crowd that, under the current system, most developers make only about $7 for each game they sell. But an online distribution platform like Steam--which cuts out the middleman and delivers a game directly to the consumer's desktop--could net developers more than $30 per copy. Newell announced that, while Valve still planned to ship its future games to retail, it would also start releasing games over Steam.
    http://www.gamespot.com/features/6112889/p-8.html

    edit: ah right, not necessarily HL2 then. My bad.
    Last edited by Tarffie; 17-11-2004 at 06:00 PM.

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