Uh, okay... Let's recap the Half-Life 2 storyline and then discuss what we learn in Episode 1.
What a completely biased and absurdly unfair comparison... you skimmed over almost everything of HL2, yet your description of Ep1 is an essay in verbosity. Don't even pretend that that was a fair comparison. To say that Ep1 had more plot than HL2 is downright delusional.
One of the main and most interesting plot points of the Half-Life series is the Gman and yet he only has a token role here. The rest of the game is more what I consider padding, what I expect inbetween the plot points. The plot didn't progress, it just did more of the same... nothing was revealed, just more questions asked. The biggest issues I had were the lack of freedom and the gimmicky gameplay:
Covering Ant-lion holes with cars; turning on power generators; firing energy balls into receivers; etc.Don't get me wrong it's still an alright expansion. It was enjoyable to play (apart from the Citadel section, which I found dreadfully dull). Alyx is a great character and, whilst some of her gestures were a bit crude (they were playing heavily on her flirting with Gordon, like in HL2 at the end), she was actually enjoyable to play alongside. I don't feel ripped off as the asking price was quite cheap. I just would have liked more open space; more plot progression; more gameplay; and new locations. HL2 was vague, and that worked, it's just I need an actual plot to feel involved in. Half-Life is about the conspiracy theories and mystery and yet none of that was touched upon here.
Sorry for the rant.
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Emotinomicon: Emoticons of the Dead
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance."