There’s a unbelievable second in Half-Life 2, throughout the ‘Water Hazard’ part of Valve’s FPS recreation, if you first arrive at one of many resistance outposts, Station 12. Beforehand, you – or, in case you want, Gordon Freeman – have been instructed that communications with Station 12 have mysteriously ceased. Overlooking Metropolis 17’s irradiated river, the Station is supported on stilts. Instantly, you understand that one thing is flawed. The river is silent. No-one exits the Station to greet you. A big wood container dangles ominously from a pulley – the grand piano over Buster Keaton’s head; some stark realisation simply ready to drop.
Whenever you go inside, naturally, everyone seems to be lifeless. A few ranges in the past, you noticed a missile land in entrance of you, then confide in launch its payload – a number of headcrabs, utilized by the Mix to show the Resistance into zombies. Right here, you discover the identical design of rocket, and a single headcrab nonetheless alive. The voice of some far-off Resistance member crackles over the radio: “Are available in, Station 12.” With out anyone saying what’s occurred, you’ll be able to piece all of it collectively intuitively.
That is the place Half-Life 2 excels. We’ve a easy, sci-fi horror story – creepy constructing, everybody’s been killed by monsters – but it surely’s all instructed with out phrases. If the purpose of Gordon Freeman as a silent protagonist is that we, as gamers, can extra simply put ourselves in his place, and react to occasions in our personal approach, it follows and coheres that Half-Life 2’s story – and it’s small, remoted sub-stories, like Station 12 – are equally wordless, and understood by our personal engagement.
Gordon doesn’t converse. The sport doesn’t converse. Trying round, taking issues in, and independently discovering your individual narratives and conclusions turns into one in every of Half-Life 2’s ‘mechanics.’
However then, simply after Water Hazard, you arrive at Black Mesa East. And Alyx is there. And Judith is there. And Eli is there. They usually’re all speaking to Gordon concerning the reality they haven’t seen him in 20 years, and the way harmful his journey will need to have been, and what occurred after the occasions of the resonance cascade. And he simply stands there, staring – there’s nothing else he can do.
In idea, I suppose we’re meant to answer to those characters in our heads. “Gordon Freeman!” says Eli. “Let me get a take a look at you, man.” And I assume we’re imagined to suppose to ourselves “Eli! So good to see you!” However after all we don’t, as a result of we don’t know who Eli is, or how Gordon is aware of him – and we are able to’t simply improvise the suitable line of dialogue and say it in our heads at any time when Half-Life 2 instructions.
So, you simply get these weird silences; a personality who appears eliminated and inhuman; and a gaggle of supporting characters who inexplicably adore Gordon, ignoring the truth that he gained’t even discuss to them.
Maybe if this impacted only one scene, or one contained side of Half-Life 2, it will be permissible – it will be one thing you may settle for, below the agreed guidelines of suspension of disbelief. However Gordon’s silence, and the remainder of the forged’s inexplicable eagerness to see and discuss to him, compromises the narrative and the fiction of the sport.
It’s laborious to really feel, for instance, significantly sympathetic in direction of Gordon when he behaves so inhumanely. Not solely can we as gamers have basically nothing to connect to or recognise about his persona, we repeatedly watch Gordon refusing to talk to anybody, observing all the pieces blankly, and performing like a weird, impolite, aloof robotic. I don’t suppose it’s asking an excessive amount of of a recreation to make the central character – our avatar, our protagonist – not less than considerably emotive.
In any other case, with out not less than a semblance of one thing, a little bit of persona, likeable or not, it’s troublesome to care what occurs to them. In gameplay phrases, the central stress of Half-Life 2 is that Gordon may die – you’d higher do nicely on this gunfight, otherwise you’d higher efficiently navigate this physics-based platforming part, or Gordon will die. However so what? Gordon isn’t an individual. In loads of scenes, Gordon hardly appears sentient. And whereas it’s true that his silence and his vacancy permit us to challenge onto him, and likewise, for Gordon to change into an in-universe image for the Resistance, that dynamic, too, is skewed by his silence.
The survival of Gordon Freeman in Half-Life 2, and the completion of his quest, turns into a metaphor for the complete battle between humankind and the Mix. He’s a flag. He’s a statue. He’s an icon. To this extent, the character works. The extent ‘Comply with Freeman,’ the place you mechanically recruit freedom fighters wherever you go, illustrates how every member of the Resistance views and makes use of Gordon as a clean slate, onto which they will challenge their particular person hopes.
Once they see Gordon Freeman, absent of concepts or phrases of his personal, they’re able to see themselves. However once more, when these folks try to discuss to Gordon, he says nothing. He’s the chief of humanity, however by definition, has no charisma, no imaginative and prescient, and, most tellingly, no humanity. We see the folks of Metropolis 17 being crushed, queuing for meals, sobbing in each other’s arms. Within the later ranges, below Gordon Freeman’s command, we see them dying within the streets.
And nonetheless, Gordon has nothing to say – not a syllable – about any of it. Following your orders, half your squad within the later ranges may get blown up by a Mix grenade, and because the different half stand there you, the one factor you are able to do as Gordon is look again, say not a phrase, and transfer on like nothing occurred.
chief, somebody folks can consider in and get behind, could nicely lead with actions, however Gordon Freeman, due to his perpetual silence, can solely lead by motion, singular – shoot and kill the Mix. It presents you, as soon as once more, with these absurdist, absorption-spoiling moments, when throughout Gordon Freeman there may be spectacular, human drama, and all he does is silently stare.
Half-Life 1 has higher writing than Half-Life 2, then, just because it has much less writing. The narrative is extra simple. There are fewer characters who discuss to Gordon Freeman (and, by affiliation, fewer characters at whom Gordon weirdly stares). And there’s no emotional burden for Gordon, as a personality, to bear or recognise.
In Half-Life 2, we now have scenes the place Alyx is offended or unhappy, the place Barney is cracking jokes, the place Eli is being heat and welcoming – all these small, emotionally pushed moments, framed by a wider narrative whereby Gordon is the hope for all humanity. In Half-Life 1, for probably the most half, he’s on his personal and with the easy purpose of escaping Black Mesa. A physicist and an engineer, who doesn’t discuss, and may solely work together with the world by opening doorways, turning valves, urgent switches, and capturing weapons, Gordon Freeman is all motion, all practicality.
In Half-Life 1, that is all he wants. The sport is designed round his silence. In Half-Life 2, Gordon is confronted by interpersonal, dramatic, and human issues, all of which needs to be essentially a part of any recreation’s story, however his character hasn’t modified. He’s a set of socket wrenches and a handgun, that the remainder of the forged discuss to about their emotions.
Like in Water Hazard, the writing and supply of story work finest in Half-life 2 once they, like Gordon, are wordless. The answer, maybe, is at all times to design the Half-Life video games (if Valve ever makes one other) round Gordon Freeman being by himself. Both that, or simply let him discuss.
Studying concerning the traditional Half-Life collection might need you within the temper for another nice previous video games. Alternatively, you might wish to know no matter occurred to Half-Life 3, or possibly check out another sturdy story video games out there on PC.
