Does the story of Half Life really NEED a definitive conclusion or is it best left where it's at?

>series dead for over a decade
>comes back with Alyx and is awesome and exciting again
>but it flops due to being VR-only and is dead again

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I'm worried about the Duke Nukem syndrome. No half-life game would justify close to 20 years wait, not counting episodes, o ever live up to the hype. Besides, I wonder if old-school Half-life playstyle with so many weapons available to Freeman would fit modern audiences.

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They still have emotions, albeit limited. You can see this whenever you throw a grenade at them. Sometimes they'll scream "Shit!" in fear. You can also hear some combine soldiers stutter in the nova prospekt radio chatter. Also, let's not forget Breen congratulated and berated them, something mindless drones wouldn't comprehend or understand.

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Aren't they just regular people?
Barney's a cop and he hasn't been mindbroken or anything. I don't think it's explained if they were chosen or volunteered for the job but it's still just a regular cop job in a dystopian hellhole under invasion where the only other option may be getting executed.

Human, but hilariously detached from reality and psychopathic because of their brain modifications
youtu.be/V7Hf2FG3WqU
youtu.be/eNZZwV1ppuI?t=53
youtu.be/9h-dJ6SX66o?t=6
youtu.be/C5bN5ICd94g

I used to want real explanations for the G-Man and the vortigaunts but I grew up and realized that those things are best left as mysteries.

I kinda groaned when I played Black Mesa and ended up in the vortigaunt village.

metro cops have free will
the further you go up the ranks the more they brainwash and modify you until you are pretty much a flesh automaton powered by unholy Combine biotech

and if you do well enough promotion is mandatory btw

Barney is one step below being brainwashed. If he accepted memory replacement, he'd basically get promoted to Overwatch.

It would just be a weapon wheel like console nudoom.

>hl2 bothered having a bunch of cool lines for both the soldiers and overwatch
>it's all drowned out under the sound of gunfire
>subtitles don't work for that
kinda sucks

>Ending
>Gordon in SPACE discovers dyson sphere under construction
>Kneels
>Union won, roll credits
The End

It that hard to guess? G-Man is obviously an agent of a rival multiverse empire of the Combine, or an empire who is more powerful than them. There are hints here and there that the Combine is aware of him. He also mentions that some disagreed with his fixation on Alyx.

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>Does the story of Half Life really NEED a definitive conclusion or is it best left where it's at?
Epistle three confirmed the combine are a tier 3 civilisation with dyson spheres, and that whatever was inside the Borealis would not stop the combine. Gman found Alyx more valuable than Gordon. It's hopeless.
Episode 2 ended on a good note for humanity aside from Eli's death. The combine portal is shut and the only thing they have to worry about is whatever combine forces are left and adapting to living with xen wildlife.

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It doesn't need a definitive one but it needs something more than where it is now, you can make a satisfying open ending.

Half life having a good story is made up shit by fags, the game was only big because of the graphics and tech in it. And because it was pushed heavily on valve's own marketplace

>It was all a dream

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nah the combine and whatnot are decently compelling as far as videogame sci fi.

The "story" of Half-Life was concluded at the end of the first game. The expansions gave different points of view of the same progression of events.
Half-Life 2 ruined it, by making Freeman "The One Free Man" Celebrity Crowbar Science Jesus, saving an eastern European city full of Americans from a bad American in an evil tower.
What the fuck is that? It never felt like Half-Life to me.

>tier 3 civilization
>cant open a portal to earth without a resonance cascade

I always wondered about that

was just an excuse to show off the new tech they had made for engines and since HL1 was a good game and people liked it... you make HL2 and it is even more likely to sell well!!!

The story itself is competent, if simplistic. What makes Half Life compelling outside of the gameplay is the setting and atmosphere. It's a lot like Half Life 1 and Black Mesa in that sense.
I attribute that to the Combine being sterile as a "race". They're great at conquering and adapting, but can't really seem to create anything of their own. Most stuff in Half Life 2 are human stuff but tweaked to be better, for instance.