as any reader has gathered, i have been playing through half-life 2 recently, and have, for the second time, realized it might be one of the best games ever. right up there with the super mario bros., ocarina of time, and starcraft.* it’s an amazing feat that just keeps getting better and better. it also gets very creepy and atmospheric at just the right moments. and it’s in these right moments that you run into the poison headcrab, which looks like a giant spider. now, it’s no secret that fred is afraid of spiders; he’s made this clear many times.

now, i myself am afraid of the water. not the water itself, more so the countless things that could be living in it. namely the sharks, colossal squid, and sea monsters. i still take careful surveys of pools before i jump into them, also while i’m in them, and waste no time getting out of them. i won’t even get in natural water unless someone is near (the beast will obviously take them over me). however! going against my instinct, i have, countless times, ventured into water – not only in real life, where things are very safe and these fears are ballooned quite a bit, but also in a virtual medium. the first instance being the in the sewers of imperial city in the nintendo 64 game shadows of the empire. in this level you fight that thing that grabs luke in the trash compactor in some very murky water. the whole thing scared the shit out of a twelve-year-old me. since that moment, it’s been an uphill battle.

point in case the ichthyosaur. in the first half-life game, there were certain parts that took place underwater, a task that had me on edge even before i saw a razored fin sticking out of the water. once under the surface this fish, if you want to call it that, attacks constantly. all you can see is a giant, gaping maw. then you die. it’s terrifying. yet, here i sit, having completed the game.

now, all of this is quite moot. i’ll admit that. but the punchline is this: mr. beukema did not finish half-life 2, but instead skipped ahead to it’s follow-up, half-life 2: episode 1. not only is he ruining things for himself, he’s ruining everything for everyone everywhere in existence. why not simply fly to valve headquarters and spit in gabe newell’s face, fred. then shit on the lawn and bring an electromagnet into their database department.

* here are some other games which i would include in a list of best ever:

• super metroid
• resident evil 4
• chrono trigger
• half life
• star wars: TIE fighter
• sid meier’s civiliazation
• sim city
• super mario world
• legend of zelda (original, link to the past, link’s adventure)

the name of the game (no pun intended) is immersion. personally, that’s what draws me to gaming and film. the prince of persia series revels in well-crafted story-telling, the metroid prime games replicate the feeling of physically being the main character, shadow of the colossus makes an absolute art out from it’s feelings of isolation, and half-life 2 excels at making you care about it’s supporting npcs and actually invest in their well-being. aside from great level design and well-crafted writing this can be credited to the stellar voice-acting and realistic character animation. they’re not doing anything groundbreaking in this realm, nothing that hasen’t been done before (as a committed studio of pixar or the like), but simply bringing it to an interactive realm. this is something noteworthy in and of itself. especially given that the player doesn’t simply watch these characters, but interacts with them. a wayward glance towards a “bit-part” comrade during a mission briefing for a task that will almost certainly lead to death may seem like nothing; but it’s when that no-name character matches your thoughts with the same grim tidings and shakes his head at you as if you two are actually having a moment that it becomes something more than what a film can be.

portal executed this same maneuver but on a much smaller scale, and therefore, in my opinion, became something much more. leaving holes to be filled in by the player is something they’re not used to doing. so, inherently, it’s better.

roger ebert has always stated that video games, by their nature will never be true art and always considerably inferior to film and literature because:

“by their nature [video games] require player choices, which is the opposite of the strategy of serious film and literature, which requires authorial control.”

i’d rather not stray into a monologue about art being without definition, because it is. however, most consider art to be something that causes an emotional response. emotional. in film, this would be akin to crying when a character dies, or an injustice running unrequited causing anger or resentment for the antagonist. however, these exact same things can happen in a game. they just have yet to take the notice of any opinion-maker.