Hl1 and hl2 are not really connected plotwise and can be enjoyed separately. There’s some small references and a couple characters you wouldn’t necessarily know even if you played HL1, because HL1 didn’t have much of a focus on that kind of story-telling.
The series is certainly a must play because of how much it influenced the industry. Going back to it now may not seem like it’s all that great; but you gotta keep in mind, it was one of the very first FPS games designed this way. Before Half-Life, FPS games were all just basically Doom clones.
I got super prepared for Oblivion to be as complex and difficult as Morrowind and was severely disappointed by it even at launch. Skyrim was slightly better than Oblivion in terms of mechanical complexity (dual wielding, how magic works, the forts, etc), but also even more streamlined in others (like how skills and leveling work).
I’ve played the absolute shit out of all 3 (as well as FO3, NV and 4) though. There is just some inexplicable draw to them. And it’s that very thing that Starfield lacks that had me rush the MQ and just stop playing once it was over.
Damn… Wish I still had it because I wanna check out what that Death Note game is like. Though it does sound like it’s basically Among Us but with a Death Note skin.
Yeah, but it’s not like an LLM or nueralnet thing. The kind of AI used for video games doesn’t need all that to feel smarter/harder.
Making a bot harder is actually easier than making it easier. It’s super straightforward to make one that always wins and is perfect. It’s more involved making a bot that doesn’t always take the best path or the most efficient way of completing the thing. I, personally, could make a Rocket League bot that plays the game better than any human since it’s all just math, and the computer is a calculator. I don’t think I would be able to make one a human player could actually beat though.
L4D has a mechanic like what the OP wants. It’s just not very good (IMO it overcorrects way too hard in both directions). Every time you win or lose or this happens too much, and this happens too little, it keeps track of that and then just adjusts things to change it up. Like if you sprint through one stage without resistance, the next stage will have more infected to deal with. They even gave it a name: the AI Director.
The alien in Alien Isolation is like that; but it is better done.
I mean, I played all of them as they released, at least from 3 onward. I picked up GTA2 for PS1 from a discount bin way before 3 was even announced which is what had me so hyped for 3 in the first place. Though for 3 I waited until it was on PC as I didn’t have a PS2 then; but by VC I had a PS2 and had SA on pre-order (I still have the bandana bonus from it somewhere).
My recollection of when things happened is fuzzy AF though lol
I mean, many of us are trying. It’s fuckin’ hard tho when your opposition has billions of dollars and politicians in their back-pocket and our side’s greatest asset is the voice of Gordon Freeman from Ross’s Game Dungeon presents Freeman’s Mind.