There’s a fantastic moment in Half-Life 2, during the “Water Hazard” section of Valve’s FPS game, when you first arrive at one of the resistance outposts, Station 12. Previously, you or, if you prefer, Gordon Freeman, you have been told that communications with Station 12 have mysteriously ceased. Overlooking the irradiated river of City 17, the Station stands on stilts. Immediately you know something is wrong. The river is silent. No one comes out of the station to greet you. A large wooden vessel hangs ominously from a pulley: the grand piano above Buster Keaton’s head; a raw realization waiting to fall.
When you walk in, of course, everyone is dead. A few levels ago, you saw a missile land in front of you, then it split open to release its payload: various headcrabs, used by the Combine to turn the Resistance into zombies. Here you find the same rocket design and a single, still-living headcrab. The voice of a distant resistance fighter crackles on the radio: “Come in, station 12”. Without anyone saying what happened, you can piece it all together intuitively.
This is where Half-Life 2 excels. We have a simple sci-fi horror story: a scary building, everyone has been killed by monsters, but it’s all told without words. If Gordon Freeman’s view as the silent protagonist is that we as players can more easily put ourselves in his shoes and react to events in our own way, that follows and adheres to the story of Half-Life. 2, and these are small isolated side stories. , like Station 12, are also silent and understood through our own commitment.
Gordon does not speak. The game does not speak. Looking around, taking things in, and independently finding your own stories and conclusions becomes one of the “mechanics” of Half-Life 2.
But just past Water Hazard you come to Black Mesa East. And Alyx is there. And Judith is there. And Eli is there. And they all talk to Gordon about the fact that they haven’t seen him in 20 years, how dangerous his trip was, and what happened after the events of the Resonance Cascade. And he just stands there watching, he can’t do nothing else.
In theory, I guess we’re supposed to respond to these characters in our heads. “Gordon Freeman! said Eli. “Let me watch you, man.” And I guess we’re supposed to think to ourselves “Eli!” Good to see you!” But of course we don’t, because we don’t know who Eli is, or how Gordon knows him, and we can’t just cobble together the proper line of dialogue and say it in our heads to whenever Half-Life 2 commands it.
So you get these weird silences; a character who seems withdrawn and inhuman; and a bunch of minor characters who inexplicably adore Gordon, oblivious to the fact that he doesn’t even talk to them.
Maybe if it only affected one scene or content aspect of Half-Life 2, it would be allowed, it would be something you could accept, under the agreed suspension of disbelief rules. But Gordon’s silence and the rest of the cast’s inexplicable eagerness to see and talk to him undermines the game’s narrative and fiction.
It’s hard to feel, for example, any particular sympathy for Gordon when he behaves so inhumanely. Not only do we as players essentially have nothing to hold on to or recognize his personality, but we’ve seen Gordon repeatedly refuse to talk to anyone, staring blankly at everything and acting like a weird, rude, aloof robot. I don’t think it’s too much to ask of a game to make the central character, our avatar, our protagonist, at least A little emotional.
Otherwise, without at least a semblance of something, a bit of personality, nice or not, it’s hard to care what happens to them. In terms of gameplay, the central tension of Half-Life 2 is that Gordon might die – you better do well in that shootout, or you better successfully navigate that section of physics-based platforming, or Gordon will die. And? Gordon is not a person. In many scenes, Gordon barely seems sensitive. And while it’s true that his silence and emptiness allow us to project ourselves onto him, and in the same way that Gordon becomes a symbol of the Resistance in the universe, that dynamic is also skewed by his silence.
Gordon Freeman’s survival in Half-Life 2 and the completion of his quest becomes a metaphor for the entire battle between humanity and the Combine. He is a flag. He is a statue. It’s an icon. To that extent, the character works. The “Follow Freeman” level, where you automatically recruit freedom fighters wherever you go, illustrates how each member of the Resistance sees and uses Gordon as a blank slate, onto which they can project their individual hopes.
When they see Gordon Freeman, devoid of ideas or words of their own, they are able to see themselves. But again, when these people try to talk to Gordon, he says nothing. He is the leader of humanity, but by definition he has no charisma, no vision and, more tellingly, no humanity. We see the inhabitants of City 17 being beaten up, queuing to eat, sobbing in each other’s arms. In later levels, under the command of Gordon Freeman, they are seen dying in the streets.
And yet Gordon has nothing to say, not a syllable, about it all. Following your orders, half of your team in later levels could be blown up with a Combine grenade, and while the other half is watching, all you can do as Gordon is look back, not say a word and get moving. . Like nothing ever happened.
A good leader, someone the people can believe in and support, can lead well by action, but Gordon Freeman, because of his perpetual silence, can only lead by action, singular: shoot and kill the Combined. It presents you, once again, with those absurd moments of absorption and ruin, when all around Gordon Freeman is spectacular human drama, and all he does is watch in silence.
Half-Life 1 has better writing than Half-Life 2, simply because it has less writing. The narration is more direct. There are fewer characters who talk to Gordon Freeman (and, by association, fewer characters Gordon watches). And Gordon, as a character, has no emotional baggage to bear or acknowledge.
In Half-Life 2, we have scenes where Alyx is angry or sad, where Barney is telling jokes, where Eli is warm and welcoming: all these little emotional moments, framed by a larger narrative in which Gordon is hope for all. . humanity. In Half-Life 1, for the most part, you’re on your own and with the simple objective of escaping Black Mesa. A physicist and engineer, who does not speak and can only interact with the world by opening doors, turning valves, flipping switches and firing weapons, Gordon Freeman is all action, all practice.
In Half-Life 1, that’s all you need. The game is designed around your silence. In Half-Life 2, Gordon deals with interpersonal, dramatic, and human issues, all of which should be a fundamental part of any game’s story, but his character hasn’t changed. It is a set of socket wrenches and a gun, with which the rest of the cast talk about their feelings.
Similar to Water Hazard, the writing and story delivery work best in Half-life 2 when, like Gordon, they’re at a loss for words. The solution, perhaps, is still to design the Half-Life games (if Valve makes another one) around Gordon Freeman alone. Either that or let him do the talking.
Reading the classic Half-Life series may make you want to read other great old games. Alternatively, you might want to find out what happened to Half-Life 3, or maybe take a look at some of the other strong story games available on PC.