History Awesome / HalfLife

* The entirety of Surface Tension in the original ''HalfLife''. Gordon Freeman finally makes it out of Black Mesa... only to discover that the marines and aliens are still fighting, and the marines are constantly bombing the area. So he goes through, fighting, marines, aliens, helicopters, turret placements, and ''main battle tanks'', all while the aliens and soldiers fight one another (and in a small CMOA for the Marines, they usually win). Particular highlights include the battle against the squad of soldiers, turret placements, and helicopter at the Dam, the area where the marines Osprey continually drops soldiers to kill a group of alien grunts, and Freeman calling in an airstrike on a Gargantua.
* ''Half-Life 2 Episode Two'' had the first Hunter battle. Alyx hears the Hunters outside and gets all scared, having almost died from her last encounter with them, only to turn around and take a badass pill before commencing to slaughter them all.

* The fan remake VideoGame/BlackMesa. Not only was it SavedFromDevelopmentHell, Valve and the community greenlit it to be on Steam for FREE.

** It is perfectly possible to kill a hunter with a crowbar and don't take damage.

*** The G-man does get get his own back in ''Episode Two'', with his own CMOA. ("Doctor Freeemaaan. I realize this moment may not be the most convenient for a 'heart-to-heart', but I had to wait until your... 'friends' were otherwise occupied."), topped only by his TakeThat to Gordon regarding his actions in ''Half-Life'' ("There was a time they cared nothing for Ms... Vance; when their only experience of... 'humanity' was a ''[[WeaponOfChoice crowbar]]'' coming at them down a steel coridor".)
*** What the troper above failed to mention was that his TakeThat not only was of Freeman but of the Vortigaunts as well. G-Man's ''Episode Two'' speech is whole cutscene of awesome. The Vorts knocked the SmugSnake down a peg at the end of ''Episode One''. What does G-Man do? The second he is able to pass the Vorts unnoticed, he gives his badass speech, reveals how he was the one to save Alyx from Black Mesa, and wants Freeman to pay up for his survival by bringing Alyx to White Forest, and gets her to relay a message of doom to Eli as a form of TakeThat ''from the man's own daughter''. The closest G-Man comes to losing his cool is the occasional tone of anger expressed when enunciating.

** For further illustration on that, at one point in ''Episode 2'', Gordon and a vortiguant are infilitrating an Antlion hive. The vortiguant feels the need to specifically tell Gordon not to kill the Antlion Guard, an insect monster the size of a truck that can throw cars around, laugh off grenades, and the glowing green stuff on it? That's a neurotoxin. About ten minutes after they get what they need from the hive, Gordon gets the go ahead and kills two of them, with little more than a shotgun and the trash that was laying around the valley.
** And for even further illustration, the first definite objective Gordon is given in ''Half Life 2'' aside from "escape" is to infiltrate a Combine prison and rescue a high priority prisoner, and no-one considers [[Main/OneManArmy one man]] doing this to be unusual (granted he later receives a Main/RedShirtArmy of Antlions, but they don't know that). After he succeeds, the resistance takes this as their cue to begin a ''worldwide revoltion'' and as soon as Gordon appears they follow behind him unquestionally, because things in ''front'' of him have a tendency to ''die''.

* [[http://archive.org/details/HalfLife2_13657 Half Life 2 speed run]]. The shortcuts taken and techniques used are mindblowing. For an average player, this game can last in the area of 6 to 10 hours. The speed run completes the game in less than half an hour.

* [[http://archive.org/details/HalfLife2_13657 Half Life 2 speed run]]. The shortcuts taken and techniques used are mindblowing.

**** Hell, it's even a TakeThat 'to the player'; the message he uses Alyx to deliver is a TitleDrop of the [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall first chapter title]] of Half-Life 1 after the Resonance Cascade.

*** Hell, it's even a TakeThat *to the player*; the message he uses Alyx to deliver is a TitleDrop of the [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall first chapter title]] of Half-Life 1 after the Resonance Cascade.

* [[http://speeddemosarchive.com/HalfLife2.html Half Life 2 speed run]]. The shortcuts taken and techniques used are mindblowing.

* The fan remake BlackMesa. Not only was it SavedFromDevelopmentHell, Valve and the community greenlit it to be on Steam for FREE.

*** What the troper above failed to mention was that his TakeThat not only was of Freeman but of the Vortigaunts as well. G-Man's ''Episode Two'' speech is whole cutscene of awesome. The Vorts knocked the SmugSnake down a peg at the end of ''Episode One''. What does G-Man do? The second he is able to pass the Vorts unnoticed, he gives his badass speech, reveals how he was the one to save Alyx from Black Mesa, and wants Freeman to pay up for his survival by bringing Alyx to White Forest, and gets her to relay a message of doom to Eli as a form of TakeThat ''from the man's own daughter''. The closest G-Man comes to loosing his cool is the occasional tone of anger expressed when enunciating.

* Nobody's mentioned all the great moments from the original Half-Life? COME ON! Taking out the tentacles with a rocket, killing the Gargantua, destroying helicopters, getting past the trip mines, hell the entire Surface Tension chapter is one big ass CMOA!

* If you want to give yourself a CMOA, it is entire possible (through a combination of agility and persistence) to kill an Ant-Lion Guard with a ''crowbar.''

* ''Episode 2'', when about sixteen million [[BigCreepyCrawlies Antlions]] come pouring into the chamber where Alyx is being healed. Just when you're running low on ammo, the turrets are frazzled and the mines have run out, three Vortigaunts bust through the ceiling. One of them murmurs, "We will quiet them," and they turn to face the Antlions, revealing that for all their enigmatic proverbs and general butt-ugliness, Vortigaunts are fucking ''badasses.'' They proceed to unleash all manner of green-lightning-fueled fury on the Antlions, stunning them with bolts of electricity, frying them with concentrated beams, even judo-throwing them to the ground and ''exploding'' them with balls of energy. Needless to say, this troper considered this the CMOA for all video games, ever.
** ThisTroper once deliberately went down to the lowermost point by the operating table and then just stood in a corner, hands off the controls. Sure enough, ''the vortigaunts killed the entire antlion rush without needing any help''. Really, as soon as they show up the desperate battle effectively turns into an extended cutscene where you're allowed to shoot people if you feel like it. (Disclaimer: the game was on standard difficulty.)
** This troper was more impressed with their actions in ''Episode One'', where they [[spoiler:temporarily free Freeman from the G-Man]]. Up until that moment, the G-Man was a Main/SmugSnake with no apparent weaknesses, in constant control of the situation, and most of the cast didn't even know he existed. The expression on his face when he realizes he's lost control: priceless. "We'll see... about ''that''."

* Alyx Vance has a number of moments. There's her intro, where she beats up about a dozen [=CPs=] and all you hear are the sounds. There's when she goes toe-to-toe with a zombie in Episode One. But for this troper, her Crowning Moment of Awesome was the scene in Breen's office. [[spoiler:Alyx is currently held captive and immobile. She spits in Breen's face when he mentions her mother. Breen comments on Alyx's stubborn nature. Alyx: "You don't know the half of it."]]

* Storming Nova Prospekt. You are entering an an enemy base, while having an army of antlions at your hands. Plus, Apprehension and Evasion (which is this troper's favorite theme in [=HL2=]) plays at the right time.

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* Okay, so, top of the frelling list here, folks: Father Grigori. Nothing you say can stand up to the fact that he's an [[Main/BadassPreacher Orthodox priest with a shotgun]] and has a problem with [[ZombieApocalypse his flock.]]

* Okay, so, top of the frelling list here, folks: Father Grigori. Nothing you say can stand up to the fact that he's an [[Main/BadassPreacher Orthodox priest with a shotgun]] and has a problem with his flock.

* Storming Nova Prospekt. You are entering an an enemy base, while having an army of antlions at your hands. Plus, Apprehension and Evasion (which is this troper's favorite theme in HL2) plays at the right time.

* The entirety of Surface Tension in the original ''HalfLife''. Gordon Freeman finally makes it out of Black Mesa... only to discover that the marines and aliens are still fighting, and the marines are constantly bombing the area. So he goes through, fighting, marines, aliens, helicopters, turret placements, and ''main battle tanks'', all while the aliens and soldiers fight one another (and in a small CMOA for the Marines, they usually win). Particular highlights include the battle against the squad of soldiers, turret placements, and helicopter at the Dam, and the area where the marines Osprey continually drops soldiers to kill a group of alien grunts.

* Okay, so, top of the frelling list here, folks: Father Grigori. Nothing you say can stand up to the fact that he's an [[Main/BadassPreacher Orthodox priest with a shotgun]] and a problem with his flock.