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[sn00zer]

I dont think any FPS has had a strobg narrative throughout like HL2. Mechanically is been neaten back and forth, but narratively, naw. Hl2 hasnt been touched.

 

[HueyFreeman]

Interesting divide on peoples HL2 experiences in here. Really seems like people take different things away from it.

For my part, doesn't matter how many times I play it, I find it totally engrossing and compelling, from a graphical, gameplay, story, audio perspective.... all of it. To me it's certainly is the best campaign of all time.

 

[Chubzdoomer]

Wolfenstein TNO, DOOM, and Prey mop the floor with it. I would never pick HL2 over any of those games.

 

[Glass Rebel]

Genre purism is a dead end. The arguably unsurpassed Mario 64 is a "platformer" that isn't about "platforming" at all. It's about completing objectives in a semi-sandbox. (GoldenEye was directly influenced by Mario 64, and this trickled down into Perfect Dark.)

Perfect Dark is an objective-driven FPS game. You are presented with objectives, and you complete them. This involves a lot of discovery and intuition. Sometimes problems have multiple solutions. Extremely similar gameplay loop to the Hitman games. The Hitman games are third person shooters that are not specifically about shooting. Nor are they about stealth in the traditional sense.

For its own part, Half-Life 2 is a story-driven FPS game which frames itself around a journey through a variety of locales. You shoot people because they are preventing you from reaching your destination. Shooting is not really your primary means of interaction with the world, but rather traversal, puzzle solving, and even driving.

FPS games where all you do is shoot are a genre of their own, to some extent, and that style of game is arguably better suited to multiplayer than singleplayer.

This is not a new disagreement. Doom was supposed to be story-driven with multiple male and female protagonists and a storyline that gave the player reasons to go from A to B. (Honestly, Tom Hall's design document paints a picture more akin to Prey than the Doom we got. Complete with interactive computer terminals and male/female lead choices.) Tom Hall, the original lead designer of Doom, strongly disagreed with the direction John Romero took the project, where the player spent most of the game engaged in shooting with no point. No character motivations. Not to say Doom is by any means a bad game, but the "no plot, shoot lots of stuff" design template is one of those things that suits a particular style of game. Half-Life 2 would completely collapse without its narrative structure. It simply wouldn't work as a game. Same goes for almost every modern FPS games.

This seems like an entirely pointless distinction. The objectives in Perfect Dark are part of ist narrative.

 

[liunli]

For a certain audience, my fellas, there is no substitute for HL2. Maybe The Last Of Us but hl2 has the power of nostalgia.

 

[purseowner]

Bioshock Infinite was the only thing to surpass Half-Life 2 and nothing has yet surpassed Bioshock Infinite.

 

[hatchx]

I don't know if any campaign has topped HL2 for me. And I did enjoy Doom 2016 and titanfall 2 a lot. HL2 is just so polished and complete. The story and atmosphere are ace. It might be a 'more than the sum of its parts' situation

 

[Leak]

The thing is this is the wrong way around; the HL2 way is how the genre mostly used to be. Even so-called "brainless" FPS like Doom had environmental interactions like traps and puzzles, with exploration in downtime being a major part of the game. It's only after everyone took the wrong lessons from COD4 (which itself took the basis of HL design to an extreme) that it was decided FPS games (and action games in general) should be a railroad to non-stop combat and set-pieces with no other gameplay of substance.

That's why Half Life 2 hasn't still found a reply and neither Halo has. Main videogames used to try to be popular just being better than the others, smarter than the others. But Call of Duty said hello, videogames' popularity just was becoming higher and higher and developers just noticed that most of the players want pop-stylished videogames that don't need to be smarter or better, just "cooler". It's a mess but this is it. Even 343i is trying to surf pop culture with Halo as well as Bungie successed with Destiny. It's just easier and cheapest to success that way and not trying to make great games. Again, it's a mess.

 

[Iva Demilcol]

I must've been half sleeping while I played HL2 because I don't remember that amazing narrative everyone's talking about.

 

[tesqui]

I must be the only person who really likes the game BLACK. Something about the weapon feel and enemy feedback that makes this game so much fun to replay. In terms of gameplay I think it might be my favorite FPS. Wolf TNO is pretty close as well though.

 

[Arion]

DOOM 2016 has surpassed every FPS campaign ever made.

Bioshock Infinite was the only thing to surpass Half-Life 2 and nothing has yet surpassed Bioshock Infinite.

How can you say that with that horrid ghost boss fight you had to do over and over?

 

[Dr. Carroll]

DOOM 2016 has surpassed every FPS campaign ever made

Doom 2016's campaign consists of:

Enter arena.
Doors lock behind you.
You're forced to kill every single enemy whether you want to or not.
Doors unlock.
Walk down a corridor. Through a door.
Which locks behind you.
You're forced to kill every single enemy whether you want to or not.
Doors unlock.
Rinse.
Repeat.

Doom 2016 appeals to a very specific kind of gamer. People who really, really enjoy multiplayer arena shooters. For whom being locked in arenas over and over and over for 10 hours isn't boring. For players who prefer variety, Doom 2016 is a game that just never... goes anywhere. I think the game hits its peak meh when you get to Hell and you start pressing buttons that... lock the doors behind you and cause waves of enemies to teleport into the room so you can kill them all.

Shooting repetitive waves of enemies in an arena is not universally fun singleplayer FPS design. Some people find it fun. Good for them. But the deeply repetitive nature of Doom 2016 is going to bite it on the arse with wider audiences a few years from now, just like Donkey Kong 64 -- Metacritic Score of 90 -- got bitten on the arse by its multicoloured bananas that totes and beaver bother minigame seemed like a good idea at the time.

 

[Nasbin]

Not many. Half-Life 2 has become increasingly underrated with age, and that style of action-adventure has largely transitioned to third person.

The only FPS campaigns I'd put up there with HL2 are the first Crysis and Metro: Last Light.

 

[Radical Edward]

A lot

 

[Kevin Shields]

Gosh I wish I could enjoy wolfenstein and Titanfall 2 along with you people. Just got finished on second play through of Titanfall 2 and the story and atmosphere of which has been done countless times in the past 4 years just didn't excite me. I'm a gameplay first kind of dude but I still don't see it as "best fps ever" as people in here. I wish I could.

I actually wasn't originally a fan of half life 2 but Ive been replaying it and half way through once this thread was made and I'm really into it. The bad hit reactions are my biggest complaint but the world has wrapped me up more this time.

Also about to finish Metro Last Light and it may just be in my top 5 campaigns of all time. Awesome stuff.

Wolfenstein TNO had a lot of annoyances, didn't think gunplay was that great and the story/atmosphere didn't capture me. However, I can certainly see a second play through changing my mind more then Titanfall 2 ever will. I really don't get the high praise on gad. I didn't dislike it at all, I enjoyed it but for a 5-6 hour romp that didn't leave an impression. Maybe One day my brothers and sisters. One day.

P.S. Love these threads for new fps games to try. Prey is on my radar for sure.

 

[Blam]

Titanfall 2 and Doom both smashed it out of the park.

But if Valve was to ever hire someone to do it. I prey they give Respawn that option.

 

[big fake]

How can you say that with that horrid ghost boss fight you had to do over and over?

Because maybe the poster wasn't fed up with a boss that really doesn't last long for most of the game and really doesn't detract from the experience?

 

[Kevin Shields]

Because maybe the poster wasn't fed up with a boss that really doesn't last long for most of the game and really doesn't detract from the experience?

I need to play bioshock infinite again. Thought it was good but not as good as previous games, but now that it's really cool to hate it, I bet it's better than I remember it. I remember really being into the ending but I can't remember it!!

Man crysis was a great game to. Although it always makes me want to play far cry 3 instead. Damn islands.