Classic FPS Half-Life 2 just got a surprise update that finally fixes a problem that’s been frustrating players for the past 18 years.
Half-Life 2 is considered one of the best games of all time and is often ranked among the most important first-person shooters ever made. Even 21 years on from its original launch, many of today’s biggest and best releases are still influenced by Valve’s masterpiece.
In the more than two decades since it arrived, it’s received several add-ons and updates, although the long-rumored remake and sequel are still nowhere to be seen.
On July 23, a brand-new update rolled out to address just a small handful of problems, including one that has been in place for the better part of 18 years.
Half-Life 2 players can finally beat the train again
On top of two minor bug fixes, the July 23 update “restored [the] speed of the train near the end of Highway 17 to better match the original shipped difficulty.”
This may sound like a tiny tweak on paper, but it’s actually much deeper than that. You see, at launch, the driving mission, Highway 17, featured a heart-pounding moment where you had to avoid an oncoming train coming towards you through the fog.
Players soon worked out that you could speed ahead and swerve out of the way of the train before it arrived, just like in this video.
However, when Half-Life 2 Episode 2 dropped in 2007, a change to the driving physics ramped up the difficulty, making it much trickier to pull off. That being said, some players have still managed it over the years.
Since then, most players have had to sit back and wait for the train to pass, so you’d be forgiven for thinking that this is the way the devs always intended the mission to be played.
However, thanks to this update, the feat is possible once again, and we now know that beating the train is how Highway 17 was always supposed to be.
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