Half Life

The original Half Life was a first person shooter that shaped what modern video games are today. It had several things that stood out from other games at the time at brought it to fame, marking it as one of the most important video games.

One way it stood out from other games at the time was the way the character was portrayed. In Half Life you play as Gordon Freeman, a simple middle aged scientist that doesn't seem necessarily special, but what made him important is that he was more of a vessel for the player to put themselves onto. One way they did this is by having the character never talk, so it keeps the player in character, and it also had no points where you can't control the character, in things like cutscenes.

Another thing that made it stand out was the combat, instead of just shooting everything you see, you had to think about what you're doing, health and ammunition were much harder to come by, making it so you had to use weapons sparingly, and if you run out of guns to use, you always have your crowbar.

One last thing that stood out was the story. In Half Life you work in Black Mesa Research Facilities, a government owned underground base reserved for research. However a test you were involved in went wrong and opened a portal to the world Xen, where aliens came from. What makes it interesting is that what you're outright told isn't all there is to it, exploring the facility you discover experiments with aliens that were there before the accident.

Thayden DeChambeau