Makarov's Blog

Half-Life 2 is a work of science fiction presenting a dystopian alternate history of Earth, where the resources of the planet, including the human race itself, are being harvested by an oppressive multidimensional empire, known as the Combine. The game is set around the fictitious City 17, somewhere in Eastern Europe, roughly 20 years after the events of Half-Life. During Half-Life, the scientists at the game's Black Mesa Research Facility cause an interdimensional instability, known in the series as a resonance cascade, which Gordon tries to resolve. However, by killing the overlord of the attacking "border-world", Xen, Gordon unwittingly widens the dimensional rift, which leads to disasters on Earth. This became known as the "Black Mesa Incident".
Some time after the ending of Half-Life, this instability attracts the attention of the Combine, and they invade. Humanity surrenders at the conclusion of the resulting Seven Hour War. City 17 becomes the home of the gigantic Combine Citadel, and Dr. Wallace Breen, the Administrator of Black Mesa who had negotiated the surrender, is appointed representative and Administrator to supervise the survivors on behalf of the Combine. Unable to breed due to the Combine suppression field, humanity matures (i.e. no children remain, as seen in the first chapter). The Combine implements a brutal police state of Civil Protection officers and Overwatch soldiers, and the underground Lambda Resistance forms.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 |
300 MB    300 MB     245 MB