Half-Life – Video Game Canon

Halo 2, Half-Life 2, and the Month That Changed Gaming Forever

Halo 2 burst onto the scene exactly 15 years ago and changed the way we look at online multiplayer, but it might be just as well known for the weird and wild “I Love Bees” ARG (alternate reality game) that preceded its launch. While Master Chief has faded a bit from the forefront of gaming’s most popular characters (along with the Halo franchise as a whole), this milestone anniversary still gives us a great excuse to talk more about another one of the most influential games of all time.

And believe it or not, it wasn’t even the biggest blockbuster to emerge from amongst the new releases of 2004’s penultimate month.

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Introducing the Finalists for the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2019

The World Video Game Hall of Fame, which is overseen by The Strong Museum of Play, has announced the finalists for this year’s crop of inductees. We’ll have to wait until May to find out which games make the final cut, but we now know that a dozen classic titles will be in the running for the Class of 2019.

This year’s finalists include several games that are taking one more shot at immortality, including Midway’s Mortal Kombat, Cyan Worlds’s Myst, Microsoft’s Windows Solitaire, and Valve’s Half-Life. All four have a strong claim to “Hall of Fame” status, as Myst helped popularize CD-ROMs, Half-Life pushed narrative games to new heights, Mortal Kombat’s controversial violence is still discussed today, and Windows Solitaire may just be the most-played game ever.

But they’ll have to compete against a slate of other titles that includes King’s Candy Crush, Atari’s Centipede, William Crowther’s Colossal Cave Adventure, Konami’s Dance Dance Revolution, Sega’s NBA 2K, Sid Meier’s Civilization, and Nintendo’s Super Mario Kart and Super Smash Bros. Melee.

Gaming fans from around the globe will be able to influence which games will be eligible for induction this year through the Player’s Choice Ballot, which will be open from March 21st through the 28th. The remaining ballots will come from the Hall of Fame’s International Selection Advisory Committee, which is comprised of journalists and scholars who are “familiar with the history of video games.”

The World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2019 will announced on May 2, but you can learn more about this year’s finalists after the break.

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A Brief History of Video Games – Half-Life

It’s just another day at work for Gordon Freeman. The well-groomed scientist is running late for an important meeting and he’s forced to board the tram alone as he travels to the secure wing of the Black Mesa Research Facility.

The latest VGC Essay looks at how Half-Life’s opening tram ride changed first person shooters (and may even have created an entirely new genre). Here’s a teaser…

“Good morning and welcome to the Black Mesa Transit System. This automated train is provided for the security and convenience of the Black Mesa Research Facility personnel.”

It’s a rather lowkey introduction to one of the most ambitious games ever created, but easing the player into the game’s world was a big part of what made Valve’s Half-Life so ambitious. You’re free to move about the train car as you’re ferried from the facility’s living quarters to the research levels belowground, but for those five minutes, you’re also at the mercy of the developers and how they want you to interact with their game.

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Listology 2.0: Exploring the Best Games From the 2000s

You could probably say this about any ten-year period, but the 2000s (AKA “The Aughts”) were a strange decade for video games. The era was bookended on one side by the angular blockiness of the waning days of the PlayStation and on the other by the return of pixel-perfect platforming with Jonathan Blow’s Braid. In between Sony launched the PS2, Sega exited the consolemaker’s club, PC gaming died (only to be reborn), and gaming entered a new era of online connectivity and high definition graphics.

Whew.

But the one constant throughout the entire decade was Valve. Half-Life was originally released in 1998, but Valve pushed the story further with multiple expansion packs in the early 2000s, as well as a PS2 version of the game in 2001. It’s most popular mod, Counter-Strike, also originally launched during the previous decade, but Valve brought the multiplayer shooter in-house in 2000 and released the game’s definitive version (Counter-Strike 1.6) in 2003. From there, Valve stepped up their game considerably with the launch of Steam, and then a murderer’s row of unique offerings: 2004’s Half-Life 2 (#1), 2007’s Portal (#8), 2007’s Team Fortress 2 (#31), 2008’s Left 4 Dead (#42), and 2009’s Left 4 Dead 2 (#53).

But Valve wasn’t the only company to make their mark on the decade. Capcom brought back the Resident Evil franchise in a big way with Resident Evil 4 (#2), Irrational changed the way we look at a game’s story with BioShock (#3), Blizzard birthed the most popular MMORPG ever with World of Warcraft (#4), and Infinity Ward took the Call of Duty franchise to the next level with Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (#5).

Going further down the list, you’ll find two from Team Ico (Shadow of the Colossus at #6 and Ico at #14), Bungie’s Halo: Combat Evolved (#7), Harmonix’s Rock Band (#10), and the mighty Minecraft (#13). And outside the Top 15, you’ll find Rockstar’s revolutionary Grand Theft Auto III (#16).

“The Aughts” were a great decade for games, and you can see where the rest of the decade’s best games landed on Version 2.0 of the Video Game Canon after the break.

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12 Finalists Announced for the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2018

Curators at the International Center for the History of Electronic Games and the Strong Museum have announced the finalists for the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2018.

Curators at the International Center for the History of Electronic Games and the Strong Museum have announced the finalists for the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2018. Eight games will get their first chance to be inducted into gaming’s inner circle this year, including Asteroids, Call of Duty, Dance Dance Revolution, Half-Life, King’s Quest, Metroid, Ms. Pac-Man, and Spacewar!

Two other games, Final Fantasy VII and Tomb Raider, were previously in the finalist pool for the Class of 2017. They’ll get another chance this year alongside John Madden Football and Minecraft, which were previously on the ballot in 2016.

The World Video Game Hall of Fame will announce the inductees for the Class of 2018 on Thursday, May 3, at 10:30 AM. But this year, fans will get a vote in the first-ever Player’s Choice ballot. According to the rules, “the three games that receive the most public votes will form one “Player’s Choice” ballot, which will join the 27 other ballots submitted by members of the International Selection Advisory Committee, a supporting group composed of journalists, scholars, and other individuals familiar with the history of video games and their role in society.” Fans can make their voice heard through the Player’s Choice ballot once a day until April 4th. So vote early and vote often!

If for some reason you’re unfamiliar with this year’s finalists, the World Video Game Hall of Fame put together a helpful cheat sheet…

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