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ExploreHalf-Life 2 is a first person shooter video game. It is a single player game but it still requires a lot of skill to master, so we decided to share some of the combat techniques, tips and tricks.
1. Take cover
In a lot of the battles, especially the ones where the enemy is shooting at you, your best defense is to hide behind an object. When the enemy reloads, dart out of your hiding place and do some shooting of your own, then duck back into cover.
2. Head Shots
Like in most of these games, head shots do a lot more damage. They’re a bit trickier and they take a bit more accuracy and practice, but they’re well worth it, especially is your faced with a lot of the same kind of enemy. If the enemy has a head, try to shoot it off. Over a long distance, the best weapons for it are the pistol and the .347 Magnum. Over a short range the best are the SMG and the shotgun.
3. Watch your surroundings
There are often explosive barrels or gas canisters in the area. Make sure you stay well out of their way, and if you see a group of enemies near them, shoot at the barrels to make them explode and cause massive damage to the enemies without wasting too much ammo. Leater in the game you will get a gravity gun which you can use to push and pull objects. Push the explosives close to your enemies. Just be careful they don’t explode while you’re holding them.
4. Strafing
Strafing or moving sideways is always a good strategy to help the enemies miss you, especially if they’re not too close. The further away they are, the more likely they are to miss anyway, but if you use an accurate weapon like the pistol or the .347 Magnum, it shouldn’t be a problem for you to make a head shot.
5. Skip the reload
Normally when you run out of ammo, you will need to reload your weapon. You can however skip this by shooting one weapon, then when it runs out of ammo, switch to a different weapon. When you come back to the first weapon, it will be reloaded automatically, as long as you have enough ammo for it.
6. Switch the weapons instantly
You can switch your weapons faster by going into the options, click on the keyboard tab, then advanced, and finally select Fast weapon switch. That will speed up the process a bit. But to make it really instant, you need to pause the game, press your keyboard shortcuts for the weapon you want to select, and unpause. You will immediately have the new weapon locked and loaded and ready to go.
7. Gravity
The gravity gun is your best friend. Use it often. As I already mentioned before, you can use it to move explosives closer to an enemy, but you can also use it to make some cover for yourself. Or even better, remove a cover for an enemy. Or just block their path while you run away. If you want to switch to the gravity gun quickly, the keyboard shortcut is G.
8. Enemy of my enemy is my friend
Sometimes when human enemies spot zombies, they are gonna start fighting each other. Do not interrupt them. Just let them fight it out until there’s only one of them left.
9. You can shoot through some stuff
There’s some things you can’t shoot through, but there’s things that you can. Wire fences, bushes, some gates etc. can be shot through. But don’t try to throw a granade through it, since it will just bounce back at you.
10. The devil you know…
It’s usually a bad idea to have nowhere to run or hide, but sometimes, if there’s just too many enemies, it might be better to have your back against the wall, so they can’t hit you from behind. And if you can, you can also use narrow passages, to force the enemies to come at you one by one.
11. Use your zoom
It’s not for some time that you actually get a weapon with a zoom scope on it, but you will get a suit with binoculars before that. You can’t snipe anyone while you’re using binoculars, but it is pretty useful for examining details that are further away.
12. Use your saves
Some might call this cheating, and I’ll leave that decision to you, but there is the option to save the game before you enter a new area, run through it to see what’s going on, and then reload after you die. That way, when you enter for real, you know what to expect.
13. Pick stuff up
You have a “use item” key. By pressing it, you can lift most small things up. You can throw them with the primary fire button, set them down by pressing the secondary button, and even stack them and use them to reach places you can’t jump to. When you get the gravity gun you can even pick up heavier things.
14. Set things straight
If an object has fallen over, you can pick it up and set it straight by dropping it in a way that will make one end of it hit another object. You can also use a wall to help you. If the ceiling is high enough, and you have the gravity gun, you can pick up an object, lift it above you, drop it and grab it again before it hits the ground.
15. When you can’t go on…
The game progress is pretty much a straight line. But there’s two directions you can take on a line. When you’re almost dead, and you fear the worst by going forward, you can often go back instead, and get a health kit that you left behind earlier when you didn’t need it.
16. Everyone has baggage
You could backtrack quite a long way before you get to your health pack. But you could also pick it up, and carry it with you until you bring it to a better place, let’s say a strategic position where you could keep a bunch of stuff that you might need later on, and you can access easily.
17. Lambda’s secrets
When you’re exploring areas, look for spray painted Lambda logos. These usually mark a secret area or an area with a stash of supplies. Be careful though, there are some secret areas that don’t have the logo (which actually makes them more secret).
18. Jump, jump, jump
When you want to get to a place faster, you can run, but for some reason, you’ll get there even faster if you keep jumping.
19. Don’t drown
If you’re running out of air, you will get your health back if you go back up to the surface. Also, your suit should allow you to breathe underwater for a short while.
20. Use ladders
Sometimes it can be tricky to get on a ladder. Especially if it’s a long ladder going a long way down. One way to do it, is to step back and hit the Use item key. That should make you grab the ladder with more confidence.
21. Get t-shirts
There are some amazing t-shirts below, hit the Use item key and grab some of them.
