Back in the day, the games were ground breaking. Valve used them to push the limits of games and what they were capable of. Half Life 2 for example was really big on showcasing physics and how they operated.

But aside from that, for a lot of us growing up, it was one of the best sci-fi titles in all of gaming, and that stuck with us. It's still one of my favorite series of all time.

I never played the original, but Half Life 2 was genuinely just really fun and had a great story, writing, and characters. It had cool action set pieces, sections that scared the absolute shit out of me, and plenty of memorable moments. It's maybe not the best game ever or anything, but it did so much right and had so much variety that it's certainly stuck with me as a sci fi nerd. It helps they left us with a cliffhanger ending for basically forever.

Alyx though? Good fucking god. That's one of my favorites of all time as a fan of half life. Playing through that in VR was fucking magical. There's genuinely nothing else like it and it's so well done. All the things that made Half Life 2 great, but you get to immerse yourself in it.

Play half life 2 dude trust me. Don't read anything about it. There's no way you won't be into it after the first level. Get really high if you like getting high first tho lol

It’s pretty ok. Had some innovations for the time like the scripted events and the gravity gun in the sequel, but it’s fundamentally a corridor shooter.

Half-Life was extremely well-produced. It has a really cool story that's a bit vague so you're always hungry for more. I think one of their big innovations was in storytelling because there were no cutscenes or text to read at all. You'd just organically pick up details for the most part. The graphics were also great for the time and the settings were more realistic compared to other games of the time. Gordon Freeman wasn't some superhero, he was just some fuckin' new guy at the company that got roped into a bunch of bullshit.

There was a modern remake by a 3rd party that was really good, check it out: https://store.steampowered.com/app/362890/Black_Mesa/

There had better be.

Alyx was the most immersive, detailed, and stressful game I have ever played. It wow'd me harder than HL2 did 2 decades ago.