What do you think of Episode One so far?

[Don Maddox]

Is it living up to your expectations? I was surprised to see they are selling it as a stand-alone package, no need to own Half-Life 2.

[RobAPol]

I'm suprised they released it as a single episode for the price they are asking for. In the Uk this episodes retail price is £19.99. When you consider that HL2 had 14 episodes in it that would mean to get the same amount of content as HL2 I would have to spend a whopping £279.86!!!!

Maybe the new episode is longer? I don't know, but it all smells of a bit of a rip off. Add steam to the equation and it makes this purchase a no no for me.

RobP

[Ruthless]

I'm suprised they released it as a single episode for the price they are asking for. In the Uk this episodes retail price is £19.99. When you consider that HL2 had 14 episodes in it that would mean to get the same amount of content as HL2 I would have to spend a whopping £279.86!!!!

Maybe the new episode is longer? I don't know, but it all smells of a bit of a rip off. Add steam to the equation and it makes this purchase a no no for me.

RobP

I think you are thinking of "chapters"; Episode One has several chapters. However, it is much, much shorter than Half-Life 2. I'd say it's probably about as long as the expansions for HL1 were. You could finish Ep 1 in a few nights, maybe a week's worth, playing a couple hours per night (depending on how good you are and how much you try to explore and such rather than just get through it as fast as possible.) Bottom line on length is that it isn't terribly long, though.

*** VERY MINOR SPOILERS ***

However, if you liked HL2, you'll probably enjoy Ep1. And if you didn't especially like HL2, then you won't like Ep1. Personally, I liked that it continued the story rather than just being a meaningless add-on.

Also, Ep1 pairs you up with Alyx pretty much the entire game and you are required to work together; this works well because since you need Alyx, you have to protect her and so you actually tend to sortof care about keeping her character alive. However, there is only so much that can be done with FPS's, and many scenes will seem quite familiar, but they are well done and some of the settings are reasonably original. There aren't many new types of things to fight, but there are a fair amount of harrowing moments. (The scenes with the flashlight that keeps running out of juice is really cliche' and ridiculous, but it makes for some good, intense scenes.)

I liked Ep1; it continued the HL story and it was as much fun as HL2, IMO, though it won't seem as "new", just as HL2 didn't seem as "new" as HL1 did. And it isn't very long.

[DarkSora]

Yeah, i completed Ep1 on the same day i got XD I went mad on it for around 5 hours, lol. The HDR lighting was pretty cool and some parts were pretty hard. The ending was pretty epic too but its been such a long wait for ep 2. XD What actually is the current release date for it?

[Yazuac]

sup darksora