Would it have been a satisfying conclusion to the Half Life story? How mad are you that you will never experience being on the deck of the Borealis before the sheer might of the Combine, a blinding Dyson Sphere?
EPISTLE 3
Carter James
Carter Nguyen
How mad are you that you will never experience being on the deck of the Borealis before the sheer might of the Combine, a blinding Dyson Sphere *in VR?
Joseph Jones
would have opened up paths for HL3 at least.
I'm more mad that I'll never experience Portal 3, because the ending with wheat fields is a clear "fuck you, we're done with the franchise" sign.
Nicholas Perry
How can he survive outside the spaceship.
Landon Sanders
>because the ending with wheat fields is a clear "fuck you, we're done with the franchise" sign.
Why is Valve like this? Why don't they like exploiting their properties and making games?
Adrian Cooper
>protagonist has literally no chance of winning
yeah no, finishing a series should make you satisfied and not pissed of because you literally can't win the game
Jaxson Russell
I liked it. Felt like older sci-fi where the stories don't always pander to "I must have a good end and nothing else at all!"-fags like
Jace Adams
if I have to find excuses for them, there's only so much you can write about the premises of Aperture Science without hitting a creative dead-end, and the gameplay would get a bit repetitive.
Christopher Watson
>dude give me infinite sequels lmao
Sebastian Cruz
HEV suit
Levi Gutierrez
What are you going to do against a space faring Type 3 Civilization as a dude with a crowbar.
Sure, send your time-bomb into the Combine Homeoworld, maybe it will do so damage, but how many other worlds have the Combine colonized and built up? The fact of a Dyson Sphere alone pretty much shows you that its hopeless, The amount of resources to crate one and maintain one would be astronomical.
Jose Johnson
HL explicitly has a "protagonist winning against all odds" theme.
A single nerdy dude with a crowbar against a platoon of highly-trained marines and aliens? He wins.
The same dude against the entire Transhuman arm of the Combine Overwatch? He wins.
Isaiah Robinson
>Portal to Earth permanently closed
>Humanity surviving and recovering from the disaster
>Gordon gets to live a normal life instead of fighting 24/7 as he has been doing since the Black Mesa incident
Is literally the most happy end that can happen in this situation
Jaxson Walker
No worries, now we will get a more optimistic ending that caters better to the mainstream
>Gordon gets teleported to Kombayn homeworld to stop their portal network
>fights through the structures to the OG citadel
>shoots Kombayn Overlord in head with Colt Python
>see from the windown that the portal network closes down
>Kanye West’s ”Power” starts playing, credits roll
Easton Baker
>Kombayn
Ryan Jackson
>no questions answered
>all that effort for nothing
>major plot point turns out to be nothing of importance in the grand scheme of things
>cheap plot armor
>freeman is forgotten
>most of his friends are probably dead
>resistance is dead
What a cheap nihilistic ending would that be. Talk about unsatisfying conclusion to the trilogy. Glad they are changing it. Imagine waiting 15+ years for HL3 just to get this kind of bullshit.
Noah Watson
I think it'd be impossible to pull off, there's no way they can make an actual Dyson Sphere so huge in everything that the only reaction from the player would be dreadful realisation that they can't win. You'd have to put Alyx or another character telling that shit for us an that kills the entire reason why this ending's good.
If they pulled it off tho? K I N O
Justin Gutierrez
Well then that would require multiple sequels, because the influence of the Combine is massive. Maybe you can relish the victory of not letting the Combine have the Borealis?
I agree that it does have a "winning against all odds" theme, but come on now, How are you supposed to beat that? Maybe if you destroyed the Dyson Sphere, that would be a much larger blow to the Combine.
Luke Stewart
Ian Nguyen
Yes and now Valve is fucked because they're going to have to try and top it as a conclusion to the series thanks to their retcon.
Jeremiah Anderson
not really. Can end up with just a local defeat resulting in a victory on Earth but not against the whole Universal Union.
Colton Fisher
But it's deeper than just some pro-humanity story.
The nerdy scientist guy who's capable of defeating impossible odds is turned into a puppet for some intergalactic bureucrat in a war beyond the stars. He's literally put into a situation he can't win, and doesn't get out through his sheer will or the triumph of the human spirit, he's broken out of jail by some schlubby aliens immigrants.
Even with space for the human spirit to trive, there's still forces much larger than simple humanity.
HL2 is more of a constant struggle, like everyone's in this permanent state of final push, and Gordon showing up is just the breath of fresh morale they needed. It really is the spirit of 1 but aplied to everyone else.
And even then the victory comes at a cost, we find more and more about how big this whole thing is, and even through all the death and sacrifice, all we did was stop the enemy from getting to us.
It's a story less about overcomming it all but more about small victories. Silver lining and shit, which is why I think this would be a nice ending for it all.
In the end you truly can't defeat the Coombeans, not alone, they're galactic level and you're just one guy. There's no way for (You) to do it, but see it like sees it and you'll find it's not a nihilistic ending at all. It's as happy as you can get when facing odds on a universal-level, it's human in that way that it's the biggest thing even if it's kinda small. And I find it much more interesting than just uniting the worlds against the ancient evil desu
In a way it could be a nice little bookend, this whole shit started with opening a portal and discovering things we shouldn't mettle in, and it ends by just shutting ourselves out. Closing a portal and asking to be left alone.
Don't get me wrong, it's definately a pro-humanity story, but it's not *just* that.
Angel Parker
>epistle
Why do you people use such retard word?
Jason Campbell
because it's as close as you can get to "episode" without valve suing you for leaking the story ass-sniffer
Andrew James
Lurk more, ESL filth. Christ, all the fucking time with you children.
Easton Edwards
Why hello there new internet friend.
Have you even heard about the fact that it was released by the writer of ALL THE FUCKING GAMES (except Alyx) as EPISTLE 3?No?
Then please stick to reading in such threads, because it seems you cannot add anything.
Justin Nelson
It would suck and wouldn't fit with the half life series up to that point. All the main half life games have hope at the end even if it's still a terrible situation. Epistle just makes the entire game and Gordon's struggle pointless.
Jose Sanchez
All are equally retarded stances, it's not my fault you faggots are too busy sucking dick to use proper words for things
Joseph Campbell
no kid, it's your fault that you have no clue what the actual backstory is but think you little entitled shit of a opinion means anything.
Jeremiah Adams
You cockmuncher! Marc Laidlaw named it Epistle 3 when he leaked it!
marclaidlaw.com
Mason Baker
>Why do you people use such retard word?
Fuck you, epistle is a great fucking word.
Colton Edwards
>epistle
>a poem or other literary work in the form of a letter or series of letters.
Brandon Watson
Do you call halo eldorado as well or are you people being retarded on purpose?
Justin Sullivan
Angel Gray
I posted about Epistle 3 in the sticky and now Bannerlord just finished downloading.
I thought you would like to know
Easton Lopez
>alyx gone
>combine untouchable but will leave us alone
>Gordon saved by vortibros and delivered to peace and quiet after all the shit he's been through (from his perspective, he got sent into c17 right after black mesa, so Gordon literally hasn't had a fucking second to rest and calm down since the resonance cascade)
yeah, it would have been better than Half Life: Strong Female Protagonist Edition
Sebastian Gutierrez
>entire song is about how Glados is tired of trying to kill Chell and now just wants to shoo her along her way
>no but she actually did shoot Chell anyway lolzorz
no
Jonathan Diaz
>epistle
one week ago that word was never used here and suddenly I see it every day
why is everyone parroting it?
Lucas Wood
>Alyx believed that a quick death was more than Wallace Breen deserved, but for my part, I felt a modicum of pity and compassion. Out of Alyx's sight, I might have done something to hasten the slug's demise before we proceeded.
Would you have killed Breebgrub, Yas Forums?
Landon Rodriguez
>one week ago that word was never used here
When will newfags learn?
Benjamin Jenkins
>one week ago
EXTREMELY based bait, a masterclass even
Logan Murphy
youtube.com
>no one posted the song yet
Shame upon ye, Yas Forums.
Shame upon ye and yer clan.
Wyatt James
>ye
Why do you people use such retard word?
Ian Thomas
>being this new
here, let me help you out with this archive of the sticky we had
yuki.la
Robert Smith
>dur its good story bc nothing matters and ur powerless against big stronk aliens
wow bravo phenomenal writing
Anthony Stewart
>dur the story bad bc nothing matters and ur powerless against big stronk aliens
it's fucking EASY these days holy shit
Nolan Sullivan
Asher Thomas
Fuck laidlaw's defeatist ending. What's even the point of continuing the story if the combine are some insurmountable threat? Also fuck screwing over Gordon in favor of Alyx.
Alexander Walker
parroting retards trying to fit in spotted
Brayden Myers
The combine have always been an insurmountable thread, tard. As of Epistle 3 we've managed to get rid of their Earth forces which is all the victory we could ever hope for, since they dont care enough about us to come back and assrape us again. The problem is Alyx was still on about her dad so she tried to take the fight to them and got hosed for it
Isaiah Miller
I liked it because I heard it was going to go in the direction of Gordon fighting on different planets with new kinds of aliens fighting the combine across their space. It reminded me of the original Prey 2 concept.
Landon Rivera
Based Valve dabbing on Marc and HL fans
Austin Johnson
Let Gordon rest goddamnit
Luke Murphy
says the parroting retard
Nathaniel Young
>Defeatist
>The rebels literally achieve all of their goals and get the combine to leave earth alone for good
Fuck off retard
Noah Rodriguez
g man disagrees
Tyler Hughes
Reading comprehension. Before the rebels closed the super portal the Combine built a fucking Dyson Sphere and presumably have millions, if not billions synths still in our Universe.
Liam Jenkins
On one hand, epistle 3 is a dead-end for the half-life story. Where do you go from there? Vortigaunts vs. G-man?
On the other hand, HL:Alyx story is stupid.
Jack Robinson
The only good ending for Gordon is him and Alyx finally doing their part. That would never happen with Epistle 3.
Lucas Powell
>On one hand, epistle 3 is a dead-end for the half-life story. Where do you go from there?
Mad Max style HL3. Hundreds of years into the future, humanity got even further reduced following Episode 3's ending, earth is a total wasteland full of Xen fauna. Combine left earth after draining it, and the remaining humans willingly augmented themselves, creating conflicts between normal humans and mutants.
That's how i'd see HL3 if they made Laidlaw's episode 3 back in 08.
Jason Gutierrez
parroting retard trying to fit in spotted