Hands down one of the most stressful boss battles ever. Especially if you are just a little too slow and let too many buildings with Magnusson devices get destroyed.
Stressful, yes, but still REALLY DAMN SATISFYING when you finish - particularly if the last Strider is just feet from the base and about to fire its disintegration ray!
@@chrismedina9571 playing through this for the first time and i'm about to just give up. i always get to the last stryder and then the bomb just doesn't stick even though it does the yellow glow thing like it does every other time
They do a really good job at making this feel like an actual invasion. The fight felt desperate and tense. It never felt like you were on top of the combine, just barely scraping by and beating the odds. Brilliant if you ask me. Also, well done on the gameplay, super immersive, and kept me engaged the entire time.
I remember this whole part completely blew me away when i played it back in 2007. That sawmill explosion still looks epic. And the moment when the music kicks in sends shivers down my spine every time. Best final battle in any game ever and it still holds up.
13:08 my favorite music + gameplay combination in the entire series. Really makes you feel like a badass. And I think you showed it really well by syncing the gameplay perfectly with the music
Best final battle in any Half-Life game ( I only wish Valve kept the Gunships and soldiers that would've also been attacking the base). Driving the Muscle Car around the Valley, picking up Magnusson Devices, running over Hunters and launching them onto Striders to blow them up is such a satisfying gameplay loop, especially with how you're now able to one-hit kill the Striders after so many games where the strongest weapon you had against them was an RPG that took 7 hits to down them. Here's hoping Half-Life 3's ending battle is as epic as this one is :)
@@Sexy_Nutella Dude, you won't believe how hard and annoying that part was for me, I've spent almost 3 hours trying to pass this part, mostly because of those annoying hunters, your best bet against them is running the over with the muscle car, but they keep shooting and dodging, making you lose HP
0:08 Fun Fact: Valve accidentally made a oversight for the hands of the Rebel Male_09. If you look closely that his hands, they're a dark skin tone. This is because they're the same hand texture as Male_01 which has the same thing. Valve most likely forgotten to change that for Male_09 and didnt notice 😅
Still holds up to today. The sounds, the urgency, the ominous feel just prior to the music kicking in and the desperation when a Strider gets a tad too close to the base but you're busy battling it out with a Hunter.
"Magnussons Misgivings about the Freeman Are completely justified. The game now ends." Absolute disappointment not just in Freeman, but in the entire resistance
My personal headcanon is that Gordon Freeman in Canon has the skill to take down all the strikers without and buildings being destroyed first. This is mainly due to my having practiced "Neighborhood Watch" for so long that I can't play any other way.
I debated if I should keep the buildings intact, but I didn't think that Freeman would've been able to unless he knew where the Striders were going in the first place (which was how I did the Neighborhood watch achievement). Plus I loved showing off the building destruction :P
I played through episode 2 a few years ago, Made it to this point and just rage quit. Few days ago, I completed it the first time. My heartbeat was fucked for around 15 minutes.
man our mutual fiend is one of my favorite half life battles in general but DAMN it is stressful to let one strider get away because of the hunters. i remember constantly saving and loading because i forgot about the map on the car but when i finally beat it it was satisfying as all hell, especially hearing the rebels at the end. amazing music too, just i suck at aiming magnusson devices.
Nobody got this on their first run. You had to memorize where each location was + the Magnusson spawn points to head to each spot as efficiently as possible, then deal with striders and hunters (both of which are a pain) ASAP so you can efficiently move to the next Magnusson spawn point to face the next team of striders and hunters. Once you get the hang of it, the music starts. They don't make fights like this anymore, there is only the last step: kill efficiently.
I'm a bit sad Valve didn't put Combine soldiers during this fight like we saw in one of the demo, even if they are at 10% of their original healthbar and prioritize the rebels rather than us. That would make 100% more of a last dish effort from the combine to stop the launch.
Ah, someone else who likes the Shotgun. I'm mentally saying "Pull!" whenever I launch the Magnusson device. Running down Hunters with the car is _soooo_ satisfying.
That's the comment i was looking for lol... Everyone is talking about the badass car kill at 11:30 but none mentioned that kill i also find it just as badass as the first one 💀💀💀
Watching this for encouragement to face the Striders (again) because the first time I played this it was extremely stressful, just one wrong move and it’s game over, not looking forward to it but I want to send that gnome into space.
well this was a glorious battle. Truely fitting for me finally catching up to your content production. Easily the best fight in the entire half-life series to date for me. I think most people agree with that..and..the way you pinned that one hunter to a tree with your car? that kill in particular just stuck with me really well. Excellent work, excellent entertainment. Now to launch that rocket and call it a day.
It's been said before but this section (and your playthrough) is just fantastic. I agree that it's the best final battle of any Half Life game. I really like how it feels like a last ditch effort for both sides. Since the start the Resistance has been desperately fighting to survive, but this time the Combine are desperate as well. They've dominated every battle and encounter up until now, and even when the Resistance has "won" the Combine has managed to turn it to their advantage (e.g. the Citadel being destroyed). But now? The Resistance has the power to leave them stranded pretty much indefinitely, and for the first time ever, they're actually afraid. It really does make you feel like a badass.
It does! At the same time I do wish that the Gunships and soldiers that were shown mobilizing alongside the Striders would've made an appearance in this battle, as it does seem weird that the Combine would only send Striders one by one to destroy the rocket.
@@Sexy_Nutella no No NO! This battle is hard enough, the last thing we need is to kill the last strider just for a shotgun soldier to sneak up behind you and blow a hole in your chest.
If only the Gravity Gun was hardcore enough to punt the Strider Buster up in the air while the Strider's still being carried by the Dropships... 👀 Nonetheless, this was such a nerve-wracking fight, especially for my dumb ass more than ten years ago who just wasn't able to surmise that the Flechettes could destroy the Strider Buster. :'D Still, killing the Hunters by my car is just... [*chef's kiss*] nice. Also I just have this sense of panik whenever a Strider is "squatting". It's just downright CREEPY smfh. And another great gameplay, bro! Now I can't wait to relive all this, someday.
Yeah, this is probably the best final battle in any Half-Life game for me, though the Strider fight in HL:A or the revamped Nihilanth fight in Black Mesa is also up there. I agree that squatting Striders are intimidating, especially when they use the lower position to move faster.
The song that plays during that final wave is such a good representation of how players must have been feeling at that point - "Really?? More of them? Alright, time to end this"
Now I wonder how would it be the battle if gunships were around, with combine Elite soldiers in those packs, Biotics missiles, even APC's and Hunter-Choppers like shown on that bridge on Freeman pontifex. Anyways, the Magnusson Device is a heck of a good tool, it would be completely useful against all of that. Bringing some epic transitions to the game. The playtesters are really noobs, lmao.
Yeah, I'm so sad we never got to see that. Would've made the final battle more epic for sure. Love what we got in the final game but it doesn't really feel like the Combine's throwing everything they have at the Resistance given that this is their last chance to destroy the rocket.
Me: This isn’t that hard, I don't know why everyone says that this was one of the most stressful boss battles they’ve ever experienc-“ *sees multiple red dots on the radar*. Me: Oh. *That's why.*
The ambush is just so intense that i was just panting so hard and when I heard the siren I was just sweating as if i was about to die (virtually I guess) I'd even sometimes even say my favorite music is the second ambush after the first one. (Last legs)
I found the Entanglement section in HL2 harder personally, that last turret standoff before Alyx reunites with you was brutal. But this is tough as well for sure
That second strider is really quick. I had to land a trickshot with the Magnusson to stop it from destroying the Sawmill when I was getting the Neighborhood Watch achievement. Also, 13:16, that drift tho.
Yeah, if I recall that was the only way you could destroy it in time, other than having one prepped already near it. I love drifting in the muscle car, it's so satisfying to drive :)
first time i played this i sat at the silo and let everything else get destroyed. and on my second i tried it the correct way and: I had way more fun, and it was way less stressful really amazing battle tho
I showed this to my family, and they were FLABBERGASTED by how stressful it all looked. Then I told my parents that this was Half-Life 2 Episode 2, and my father remembers the original, and he never thought it would actually get a sequel or expansions, but here we are.
I remember being so satisfied after completing this mission and only getting the antique building destroyed. Although I was playing on normal, I still feel like a badasss
got on a weird Half-Life kick and have been watching Nutella all the way from Black Mesa Definitive to this video and this is the ONLY video I skipped really any part of but I definitely skipped most of this video lmao excited to get to Alyx also, maybe I need to replay HL2:E2 🤔
The most stressful thing about this part of the game is that there is an achievement (that I managed to get after about 6 tries) where you have to keep EVERY SINGLE BUILDING intact, including the hut at the start. Absolutely ludicrous
Oh okay so the sticky bombs are supposed to attach to the underside of the strider, not just the carapace. Yup. Thanks, MMOD, for making this shit more annoying than it needed to be. As you tend to do.
I am so glad they didnt add soldiers and elites in the battle too,it was already stressful with rushing to each strider shd dealing with the hunters,it felt so rewardong when i finished it and i dont think i couldve beat it if there were other combine crap there too
Yeah, I basically ran through this again and again until I got results that were satisfying to me. Tried to make it as intense as it could be in my eyes
On my first playthrough at some point I just stayed near the base and let the striders come to me because I didn’t want to have to drive around and potentially miss a strider
I recently replayed all of Half Life 2 (except Lost Coast) and during strider battle I was shaking like a bitch! Lost 2 buildings but still beat them in first try, without dying. Such an intense moment, is there actually anything like this in other games from FPS genre? I think not. Edit: also music in Half Life games feels weird, it doesn't plays often but when it does I wish it would loop for a bit. When Last Legs stoped playing I haven't even killed any striders from second wave.
Probably because there is a heavier Resistance presence at the rocket - they can probably shoot down the Dropship with RPGs before it can unload the Strider.
I just thought of something 1. Lure Gordon freeman to the sawmill(far away from base) using strider 2. Send Multiple drop ships with striders to the base, they can’t destroy all of them 3. Strider(s) destroy rocket 4. Humanity is screwed
@@somethingenthusiast Haha, maybe that would've worked, though maybe the Rebels would've shot the Dropships out of the sky or something (they do show a downed Dropship where Dog fights the Strider).
people say that the gnome achievement is the hardest in all the games, but i think that Neighborhood Watch is, after years of trying, I've always come so close, yet so far, if anyone has any tips, please give them.
Ngl, i never managed to beat this last part without losing at least the saw mill That second strider was WAAYY too close to it and would always demolish it lol
It's tough but once you know the patterns of which Striders walk fast, then you can just get to that position before they do and kill them before they blow up the buildings :)
![Half-Life 2: Episode Two - 06b - Our Mutual Fiend [Hard]](/img/logo.svg){kind=logo}
