Based on Valve’s flagship Half-Life franchise, this little hidden gem of an add-on won’t actually require any pre-existing understanding of the series’ lore, although there is admittedly little chance of you coming across this in your Steam library without any prior experience with the exhilarating sci-fi adventures of Gordon Freeman and co.
In this purely multiplayer-focused experience, the player assumes control of either an unassuming Human Rebel or anonymous Combine Peacekeeper for a surprisingly fun time racing around ruined-industrial themed arenas taking potshots at your fellow player or AI bots with all the usual weaponry found in the base-game Half-Life 2. And forget the underwhelming gunplay in the main series’ two main instalments (there, I said it), because this is the first time the Half-Life arsenal as implemented in Valve’s Source Engine has really been given the chance to shine.
Game runs well under practically any conditions, is up to Valve’s typical high standard. Looks good, sounds nice, controls and responds smoothly. Well worth a go, so you might as well install it and give HL2 Deathmatch a go, if enough new people do try it out, it might aid one of the game’s few flaws - it’s apparently so underground these days, that the servers could stand to pick up some new blood.
Recommended.
