Eureka!

I always thought one of the toughest part of Half-Life 2 is to get past
the whole mother load of combines and manhacks at Nova Prospekt, when
you had to set up three turrets and wait for Alyx to hack the combine
shields.

It took me so many failed attempts before I managed to survive the
onslaught. I experimented with different places to set up the
turrets, but the combines always knocked them over quickly. Then,
it suddenly occurred to me that the best way to set up the turrets is
to place them inside the storage space. Just pick them up and
turn them facing outward.

This way, they are extremely difficult to knock over. The storage
space protects them from bullets and grenades, and it also forces the
combines to come to the little hell hole that I set up. There are
four storage space areas, so I reversed all three turrets and then hide
in the fourth one myself, holding a shotgun.

I barely had to do anything, but to watch the turrets do most of the
killings. Occasionally, a combine runs across, and I just fill
his face with shots.

In addition, I carried one of the turrets with me as I went to the next
area. So I basically got myself an automatic firing weapon with
endless supply of ammos. How convenient. :smile:

Anyways, I just want to share my little insight with the rest, because I was so excited about this discovery.

That is hillarious. I remember that as being the 'hardest' part of the game, too! I DID remember being in one of the open slots did pretty much render me invisible to the combine, though...but sitting in it didn't help al that much without the aid of turrets. Thats some great work, Satch!

btw....Is there a an ?bersweet video for HL2 depicting someone cruising through the entire game in less than an hour, like there was for HL1? (There were actually two different ones I saw for HL1). That would be fun to watch if anyone has came across them. My fav part of the HL1 vids was finding out how wicked tau+tripmines were for skipping plarge oarts of the game :smile:

That surely was the hardest part of HL2, but also one of the funniest.
Especially when I came up with my solution. I tried this suggestion
your making one of the first times I tried this but I failed miserably,
suppose I was just unlucky.

What I did is I took first took two of the turrets and put them in a
prison cell pointing outwards. Then I took all the barrels and crates
in the area and put them outside a cell as a wall on the right side. I
layed the barrels down in the doorpost in a certain way that blocked
the opening so the combines couldnt run in but the turrets could shoot
out. Then I took the last turret, jumped into the cell and put it
pointing outwards aswell.

When the combine came, the ones on the right side wouldnt see me
because of the crate wall so they all ran over to the left side where
theyd get instantly shot by the turrets. The lying barrel outside the
door blocked them from running in and when they threw grenades I shot
them out at them again. It took a few tries but at last it worked and
when it did, I laughed so hard.

I wish I hadnt formated my comp since, Id show some screens from it.

I did exactly the thing you suggested as best solution, from the first try on.

<div style="text-align: justify;">I'm so smart.

</div>

I just put them at the top of the stairwells I think, I don't recall
having too much trouble so I guess it must have worked :biggrin: I also
carried those gun turrets around with me quite a lot, and often shot
them into rooms or around corners so they would fire blindly and do a
bit of damage :smile:

I can't say that area strikes me as being one of the hardest areas, but
maybe I just got lucky. For me the toughest part would probably be
running around some prison ground type area at Nova Prospekt with some
guard towers and a combine helicopter or two flying about. I had pretty
low health at that point and getting hit much by the helicopter's gun
on hard pretty much spelt death, so it took me quite a few tries.

The first time I played everytime I came across Turrets I carried them
with me from area to area. I had 2 in the first area, 5 in the
second (the one you're talking about), and then 7 or 8 in the
last. It made it way too easy... but hell it was fun to watch 7
turrets rip apart the combine super soldiers as I was teleporting
away...

The hardest part of the game for me was the area where first you have
to get past the combine arty, and then fight through the big
building... destroying three power cores. I died a bunch here.

I hid myself in a cell and took the combine out one by one. I also
positioned two sentries by the cell-door and a 3rd one around the corner
where the chargers are.

i just ran around like a psycho (with nades) and shooting the combine
soldiers with the python (aka 357) and cutting them with the hacks,
thats pretty funny, when you grab a hack and run into the soldiers :biggrin:

I ran out and there is a place where there are some stacked boxes that
lead to a little room, I ran up there, and it was really really
easy. They couldn't get up, so all they did was toss nades, which
I Gravity Gunned back to them.

Hahaha :razz:

I didnt notice the turrets first time round (im retarded) and by some miracle, still managed to survive :razz: Then when i found the turrets second time round it was like, oh :razz:

How does that work? They don't start attacking until after you place the last turret.

i did set-up the turrets and started running around like a mad man killing combines and keeping the turrets alive!

SPOILERS:

I'll tell you what part of the game was ALSO extremely hard: Stopping Dr. Breen from teleporting by destroying the teleporter. Oh wait....the ending was incredibly easy and completely gay, taking no more than 1 try to do it I'm sure for anyone. What happened to actually TRYING to figure out HOW to beat the boss and then STILL being hard even after you do figure out how? Half-Life 1, anyone? There wasn't even a chance you could die....even if you wanted to. I played the ending again just to let that dick Breen do his thing and see how long it would take for an idiot to die. It was approx. 3 1/2 hours I think. That's how long Valve gave us to find out you need to throw hairy balls at the teleporter.

So no one knows of an ?bervideo for HL2 showing someone beating the game?

There is one, dunno where though. Ravenholm in 8 minutes or something?

actualy, the first time i played the last level, i just threw balls at the gunships, and when they die you loose.

The part when you get trapped in the corridoor the guards dont wait for you to place the turrets, not on hard anyway. The office bit with the stairs they do.

Destroying the teleporter was easy, anyone who says anypart of this game is hard is a loony. :razz: dont mean to offend anyone, but i find it extremely easy.

Ravenholm, the record is under 2 mins i think, or just under 3.

www.hl2dq.tk half life 2 done quick, i think will weigh in under 2 hours at least.

Ravenholm in 2-3 mins?? How is that possible? it took me 6-7 hrs on normal (about a week to complete the whole game)

eh, took me 3 days on normal, thats what i hate most about good games,
they are so good that you spend uber much time on them, and then youre
done in about 3 days

i now know a few people who have completed in a about 3 days, im beginning to feel a little left out...

maybe its becuase two of the days was holiday, so i went to bed about
5:30 in the morning, and the got up again about 10 i the morning, its
good that gaming doesn't need so much physical movement, because i was
rather...unmoveable.

I just downloaded and watched the Ravenholm run done in 1:36.63.

They used some sort of hoverboard trick... as described in the readme:

"This new video shows LightningX performing a single contiunous run
clocking in at 1:36 on hard. The new strategies involve heavy use of
the flying trick: Using a flat object to hoverboard across thin air."

Basically they break a wooden box and then pick up a particular piece
(w/o the gravity gun) and use it to ... fly around. I'm not sure
how, but I'm going to try it now.

For anyone who cares, here is a link to an official site that is all about finishing Half-Life 2 in a very short amount of time:

http://www.hl2dq.tk/ "Half-Life 2 Done Quick"

I beat the Nova Prospekt part by getting in the console and turning up the repeat rate on my guns so i fired a whole clip from the SMG in about 2.5 seconds. and then i set the reload time really fast so it was like a one-shot-one-kill weapon basically, then i did like satch and if one got past my turrets, I shot them with my uberSMG.

But what's the point of playing the game if it's done so fast?
For me at least, I always get a bit sad when I finish a good
game. It's like reaching the end of a good movie or book. I
wanted more.

And I was just reading the e-Guide that Valve is selling.
Supposedly you can shoot a flying grenade with the Magnum and send it
back to the tosser. I imagine that would be extremely
difficult. But obviously, some have done it.

And about hording the turrets, I found that if you have turrets from
more than one map in the same area, they sometimes shoot at each
other. It's kinda interesting to see how the AI is set up.

Reminds me of Resident Evil 4 satchmo, plenty of shooting sticks of
dynamite and crossbow bolts as they come flying toward you in that
game. On that note, if you haven't played Resident Evil 4, you are
severely missing out. Best game I've come across in a long time, and
all Gamecube owners owe it to themselves to buy it :smile:

I dont think its fun to beat games really fast, I love to take my
time. I think I have messed up if I run through a level faster
than it takes to load the damn thing.

I was playing ravonholm the other day and was just having a blast
tricking those silly zombies into walking into traps and stuff.

I took my time with HL 2. It took me close to a week to beat it. I played it about 2 hours a day till I finally completed it.

These guys are insane, that's all there is too it. I can't
believe it's humanly possible to do what they do... they must put so
much time into it. I just watched a guy beat the entire game in 3
hours... and I'm pretty sure he did it in one run. The part with
the bridge, he was sprint jumping from tiny metal beam to tiny metal
beam like it was a piece of cake.... and when when I walk and jump
carefully I still fall down and die.

I like to savor a game, tasting all its nuances and secrets. I don't want to miss out on any detail. Walking around in a beautifully made level and stopping to smell the roses (after you've killed the Combines, of course) is part of the whole experience for me. Sometimes, I just get mesmerized by the beautiful lightin and shadows, and I love how light plays on the surface of Dog's metallic surface. It's just so beautiful... It's my wallpaper at the moment (a nice portrait of Dog near the Citadel).

It took me three months to finish Half-Life 2, and it took me four months to finish Far Cry. Not because I couldn't do it faster, but because I spent a long time just to soak in the scenary.

It's funny, that's how I usually start out playing a game. Taking
everything slow. Admiring the architecture and the art. But
then as the story progresses, and I get closer and closer to the
ending, I start picking up the pace. I almost get frantic,
because I want to beat the game and see the ending. That's why I
enjoyed the last levels of HL2 so much, the weapon you get just makes
this frantic play so much easier.

I was just looking through the Prima eGuide right now, and am I the only one who doesn't know that the shotgun has a secondary fire feature? I wish I had known this when I was fighting the antlion guard back at the Sand Trap or Nova Prospekt. It's mighty handy for those enemies.

Is there a secondary fire for the crossbow too? For the rocket launcher?

satchmo said:
Is there a secondary fire for the crossbow too? For the rocket launcher?

Is DM different than SP in HL2?

personally, i miss the option of turning off the laser on the RPG as a secondary. :sad:

I really need to break down and play the single player game. Since I survived never playing the HL1 SP game.

I'm playing hl1 source now.

I really need to break down and play the single player game

What's holding you back from playing the best game ever made? I don't quite understand. I am playing through HL2 for the second time right now (on my uber-new computer with sky-high framerates).

Well the crossbow just zooms.

There's no secondary fire for the rocket launcher, but like Orpheus
said in HL1 you used to be able to turn the little red dot off.
Sometimes it was easier to pop out and dummy fire it without having to
stand and paint the target. It's definitely something I miss.

It's amazing you got through the game without using the shotgun's
secondary fire. The double shot is key for taking out combine.

I played through HL1 maybe 4 times, and I played through HL1:Source
once. It's well worth the time, and I think many areas are very
fun. Most of the game is better than the buggy/hovercraft stuff
from HL2.

satchmo said:
<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quote:</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>I really need to break down and play the single player game

What's holding you back from playing the best game ever made? I don't quite understand. I am playing through HL2 for the second time right now (on my uber-new computer with sky-high framerates).

</div></div>

You are new, so you may not know yet. I have severe motion sickness symptoms when I play any FPS games. The fact that these type of games are my all time favorite types not withstanding. With MY NEW UBER machine I can achieve somewhat longer durations before the onset of puking, but the results eventually rear their ugly heads.

I will prolly eventually play it.. who knows. shrugs

BTW, I am really glad that you finally worked out the bugs in your new machine. I had lost track of the thread you had that was working through your troubles.

I can only tell you this, it is so nice to see many double, and triple digit numbers on the frames per readout. especially after fragging HL1 for so long at 12-15.

better than the buggy/hovercraft stuff

Does that mean you didn't like driving those vehicles? I thought they provide important addition to the variety in gameplay. I didn't like driving any sort of vehicle in FPS at first, but I got into it once I became better at manuevering them.

I was hoping that I could commandeer a strider in HL2. Wouldn't that be just the coolest? Sitting on top of this ginormous monster and watching the little Combines below perish as cannon fodder. Maybe they should add the sound "mua-ha-ha-ha" to this ride as well.

<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quote:</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>BTW, I am really glad that you finally worked out the bugs in your new machine. </DIV></DIV>

Thanks. Yeah, those first few days were some of the best days of my life. I was so happy and relieved. I am giving those Kingston memories to my friend who helped me solved the problem.

Orph, so you don't have problem playing multiplayer then? It's so unfortunate. It's like Bethoveen, who was unable to hear his own composition towards the end of his career due to aspirin poisoning.

satchmo said:
Orph, so you don't have problem playing multiplayer then? It's so unfortunate. It's like Bethoveen, who was unable to hear his own composition towards the end of his career due to aspirin poisoning.

Of course I have problems, tis why I can only frag for maybe 20-30 minutes tops. Playing a single player campaign can last days/weeks and I cannot do that. Most times I forget where I was last and give up in despair.

I made it to the point in HL1 where the tentacles were in the missile silo and you needed to burn'em and quit. I was sick most always. Single player maps are not as optimized as MP maps are so my frames were even lower than the average 12-15 I had then.

My new machine is a powerful somebitch, I imagine I could play it, but am afraid to find out.

anyways, glad you got a new machine workin.

In that case, have you considered playing the custom single-player maps? In particular, my Justice-SP map (http://www.snarkpit.net/maps.php?map=1643)?

It'll only take about forty-five minutes to an hour to complete, so if you break it down to two sessions, it shouldn't cause too much problem for you. I do want to warn you that it's quite challenging though.

whispers Dramamine

Out of curiosity, do you have other forms of motion sickness as well? I presume you don't get car sick since you drive for a living.

I didn't particularly like the hovercraft/buggy levels because... well
it was just holding down W and steering. It did create variety..
and the areas and the speed looked great, but I'm more of a fan of
Ravenholm than any other area. I like walking. And throwing
saw blades at zombies. :biggrin:

Tracer Bullet said:
whispers Dramamine

Out of curiosity, do you have other forms of motion sickness as well? I presume you don't get car sick since you drive for a living.

you presume incorrectly, i do get sick, if i look/stare in the wrong directions, or distances.

i have to keep my attention out far enough so that there is little fast moving going on. i especially have to look forward most of the time as looking sideways is like being on a merry-go-round.

my problem seems located in my visual area. as i grow older i cannot seem to see as fast as i did say, 4 or 5 years ago. i cannot explain it any clearer, but for instance.. right now, i am typing. i have to look at the keyboard to do so. i am not gifted enough not to. anyways, i type very fast IMO but i have to look at the keys and i actually get dizzy after about a minute or two and have to stop.. after a moment i can continue, but it always happens again..

i am ever so slightly near sighted, the doctor says its not even worth prescription glasses, but i insisted so he prescribed some to ease my headaches while driving.

my vision is still 20/15 with the glasses, and near that without.

i personally think its my muscles in the eyes. i spend hours each day looking 100's of yards in front of me while driving. my eyes are lazy so to speak. the muscles that focus at close range are atrophied i am thinking.

anyways, enough about my stupid health issues. :/

The secondary for the rocket launcher in HL1 didn't simply "turn the dot off" it removed controlability of the rocket after you fired (in HL2 that'd be pretty pointless, since the rocket launcher is only useful when controlled.)
The crossbow doesn't have a secondary in hl2 because there's always a zoom button.

I haven't read anything people said, I just thought I'd "inform".
I apologize if someone pointed it out already. :smile:

Oprh, you could probably figure out the frequencies that give you motion sickness. It's probably something to do with the frequency of your lights and the game with the monitor.

The thing is, how did you people ever figure out the secondary fire mode for the shotgun in the first place. Father Grigory didn't tell me anything about the secondary fire. The only thing he said was "aim to the head" and "be vigilant". It would be a lot more helpful if he mentioned the secondary fire.

I guess everytime I get a new weapon I should've experimented with the secondary fire button. Oh well, at least I'm not done going through HL2 for the second time around yet. It's still useful.

The crossbow does have a secondary zoom. It zooms in closer than the default zoom you can do by pressing "z" by default. :smile:

Satchmo: said:
The thing is, how did you people ever figure out the secondary
fire mode for the shotgun in the first place. Father Grigory didn't
tell me anything about the secondary fire. The only thing he said was
"aim to the head" and "be vigilant". It would be a lot more helpful if
he mentioned the secondary fire.
I guess everytime I get a new weapon I should've experimented with
the secondary fire button. Oh well, at least I'm not done going through
HL2 for the second time around yet. It's still useful.

I just knew from HL1 that the secondary fire was a double shot, and
when I fired up HL2 it was just instinct for me to right click.
When it did let out a two shell burst I was like "Oh, cool! They kept
the shotgun basically the same!"