Half Life 2 was about 5 years too early to be considered "basically beyond imptovement". The graphics are a little dated now, and maybe the gameplay is a little simpler than a modern FPS, but ultimately it's pretty close to the mark. I haven't been surprised by FPS mechanics or graphics in 10 years, so there's basically no way for Half Life 3 to surprise us. Dishonored 1 and 2 were basically identical. If you told me the second one came out immediately after, I'd believe you.

We are lucky coz Half-Life 3 is currently in development 😏

I was with you until your last sentence.

Fallout 76 is better now. The monetizing is little ew, but there are lots of content and they fixed a lot of the big caveats i had with the game.

Id put that game just under a Noman sky and Cyperpunk 2077 as a game that turned around.

Also valve did not origaninally make portal. Its roots came from Kim Swifts senior project. Valve gave resurces to add the shine, but the concept did not originate from Valves offices.

They did not invent vr stuff either. First vr stuff crude as it was comes allthe way from the 60's in the 90's Sega had their Sega vr in some arcade racings games and oculus rift from Carmack + team was first modern style vr set on the markets.

Lots of games use similar mechanics than left for dead to make the maps and spawns feel different.

Here few from the top of my head: Vermintide 2 (maybe 1, havent played that) Pay day 2 Back 4 blood Ane could argue Alien isolation is similar because it has same kind of game director controlling the game. Remnant 1 & 2 Gunfire reborn.

• games like Helldives 1 & 2 and deep rock galactica where the whole map is generated.

One could argue even most extraction shootters do that because the exctraction zones change place.

Yeah all wants just catcha games. Thats why games like Clair Obscur, Death Stranding and now Dispatch have done so poorly.