Multiplayer & Problems

Half-Life 2's multiplayer is... Counter-Strike: Source. Not that CSS is a bad game, it's just that we've all played it - to death - back when it was known simply as Counter-Strike. Oh sure, the improved graphics and minor use of the physics engine make a favorable impression, but Valve should really have considered even Half-Life 2 deathmatch, or TFC: Source. Well, perhaps that's an exaggeration, but it would be nice to simply have something new to go along with the old (and maybe something blue).

Other than the fact that everyone's played Counter-Strike, the biggest issue with CSS is that it is so full of exploits. All the old ones, like skywalking, are still in the game. There are new ones too, many of them very serious, being discovered daily it seems. With all the problems that Counter-Strike has had with cheating and hackers, one would have hoped that Valve would at least eliminate the old exploits.

Half-Life 2 also has other problems not directly related to the gameplay. The first of those is Steam. It actually works better than most people could have expected, but it's not without flaws. Hit a gaming forum and you're sure to hear a complaint about how long Steam took to unlock a copy of the game, which brings up another point - you need to have internet access at least once after installing Half-Life 2. This obviously isn't a big deal for most people, but it's not as if the boxed version goes out of its way to point out that internet access is required.

Speaking of the boxed version, there are other issues with it as well. The most famous is these is the 4th CD error, which occurs if the user tries to install HL2 without Counter-Strike. It won't work. You need to install HL2 and CSS, and later uninstall CSS if you don't want it. There've been scattered reports of authentication failures for the CD version as well, though these aren't consistent enough to harp over. However, after all this extra development time, the last problems we were expecting were such basic installation issues. Oh and Vivendi - why do a CD check if Steam authenticates anyway?


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