Speed run of Half-Life 2 on normal difficultly in 68 segments. Demos were captured to AVI, appended into one file and compressed to one 320x240 and 640x480 version. The in-game demo files are also available in a rar file, but require protocol version 7 to play.

Author's comments:
This is my second run through HL2 and it is better than my original in every conceivable way. That's right, there is a solid 40 minutes cut off via tricks, shortcuts, and outright optimization. The quality of both movies has also been improved, particularly the high version.

After my first run I found a couple breakthroughs, but most of the heavy lifting was done by others, mostly those at the HL2 Done Quick site (http://www.hl2dq.tk/) or in my SDA thread (before transferring to the former). The credits are at the end of this page for those of you who are curious (consider them spoilers if you haven't seen the run yet).

To review the problems with demo playback:

1. Alyx ice-skates everywhere she goes.
2. Friend and foe alike randomly assume a "scarecrow" stance.
3. Some posters do not appear on walls (e.g. the Breen poster near the beginning that Alyx comments on)
4. The higher your velocity as you jump, the more violently the screen shakes and distorts. So if you're about to lose your lunch you know the guy in the demo is going fast!
5. The "gun down" glitch after Nova Prospekt.

Added entertainment:

I attempted to be entertaining during the 'boring' parts of the game, mostly the dialogue (first 10 times it was interesting, then...). If nothing else, the parts where I play fetch with dog, talk/follow Alyx in Nova Prospekt, and the second turret gun sequence were all, I think, improved with regards to viewer pleasure. You'll see what I mean in Nova Prospekt, especially -- there's even an easter egg I'm sure will be lost on most people.

Specific technical nuances of this run:

1. I captured the movie myself and I have a DX8.1 card and I couldn't be bothered to get the patch so...no quasi-photorealistic water reflections for you. You'll live.

2. In "Route Kanal," after leaving the vortigaunt and rebel in the red car I lose one armor because after the load screen I briefly touch the nearby fire.

3. In "Route Kanal," in the seesaw room there is a loading screen point a little bit after the ramp. However, I use a trick to jump and thereby skip the room. Since I am in midair as I load I have to take the next demo of me landing, and since I want to save I have to sit there for a moment to save AND make a new demo. This causes me to lose a small amount of time.

4. In "Follow Freeman," after crossing the skybridge and falling into the next area my health drops because, well...it wasn't a soft landing onto the ledge.

5. In "Our Benefactors," after the strider something bad happens. For some reason my computer keeps crashing in that area UNLESS I do a manual "map" load command, which loads the map with a default health of 100/45...I tried to hurt myself using the command "hurtme" but I couldn't get my health down to the correct value. However, it doesn't even matter since there's just dialogue until the next recharger.

The coast and bunny hopping in general:

My biggest weakness of this run is the coast. It is done on foot and is nothing but huge open areas, so someone that is good at bunny hopping will wipe out anyone of lesser skill. I could maintain a good hop on even ground for a long time, but the coast is nothing but small hills and uneven terrain. This actually helps sometimes (since going uphill seems to speed you up) but usually hurts since I tend to lose my hop as I go downward.

I honestly don't understand the hopping in this game. I only go hyper speed (and hyper speed is very...well, fast =], and requires a bit of a runway to reach) in a couple areas, the ones I remember most are the FIRST coast area and in the antlion beach area after the lighthouse where I have so much speed and altitude my last jump causes me to take damage. You'll know when it happens because the screen will be shaking like an earthquake.

I'm honestly confused how you reach hyper speed...it seems random, since I don't remember doing anything in particular doing those instances. The better hoppers (those that can sustain hyper speed throughout the level) whoop up on me during this phase. I wouldn't be surprised if the HL2DQ guys shave off up to two or three whole minutes compared to me (especially since they'll spend a lot of time making sure they never lose their hop).

The Strider section:

I find this very funny and sad. The climax of the game in terms of battle and music is reduced to barely a minute of grav and grenade boosts, then the last two striders are just destroyed like tinker toys. It's so fast even the music doesn't come in! =( I was cautious with the striders, however, since when they're together like that they tend to focus fire on you and you will get smoked.

"Why didn't you..." moments:

1. Route Kanal - Hey, the shortcut where you jump out of the water onto the boardwalk is extremely random and annoying after the difficult segment. This is a good compromise.

2. Highway 17 - Suga found an awe-inspiring trick wherein you abuse a rollermine and use it to boost approximately 200 feet across a ravine and land on the other side, skipping a good 20-30 seconds of running. He found all this all when I was in Nova Prospekt, of course. =]

3. Anticitizen One - Oh god, in general this is the worst area for performance in the game for me and I don't know why since others look much better. Chop, chop, chop, stutter, chop! I apologize for sucking in general, I let a lot of things slide (like completely missing a metro cop with a point blank shotgun -- hey, you try it with 10fps).

3. Follow Freeman - I know you can barrel boost over the second field. I don't care -- after the first it's too difficult and I've never done it the first try and I was getting ready to commit myself to a clinic after listening to Barney for so long. It only saves a couple of seconds, whereas the first saves a huge amount.

4. Follow Freeman - First strider section. Suga owns this -- his little hop (he goes right, I go left) is his specialty. I'm not sure if anyone else can do it at this time. It looks easy, but then you go to do it and...got curveball?

5. Dark energy - In the final chamber it is possible to ride an elite's energy orb to the top. However, I did not do this because you have to wait so long for the conditions to be right there it only saves 2-3 seconds compared to my method. So suck on that, Chib!

I hope you enjoy the run.

Credits:

LightningX - discovered a lot of major things, such as the huge saw blade/box jumps in Ravenholm or walking on the skybox/ceiling at the end of the coast. He also found that it's faster to go through the coast without the buggy (that is, on foot).

Suga - he found how to skip the dialogue with the girl as you get the airboat, and the jump shortcuts in the first strider area. He also found the rollermine trick, which I did not get to use in this run.

Chib - found how to skip the lighthouse siege on the coast and how to neglect poor Barney and not save him from the snipers.

Naz - found that it's possible to fly over the dam before Black Mesa East.

Chomp - he found the major boost over the forcefields before the museum.

Geaowe - found that explosive boosts are quite worthwhile; also led to skipping the door at the propaganda television part in Aniticitizen One (instead of making a silly tower like me).

marshmallow - I found out how to skip Alyx in the plaza using the tire, skip the fan puzzle in Nova Prospekt, found the second box boost in Nova Prospekt, found the boosts in the last two strider sections (grav and nade), found how to kill both Striders simultaneously, and the way I skipped the bridge forcefields on the coast.

In many instances the speed can not be attributed to solely one individual. For example, I initially discovered you could grav jump and get through the sky bridge (museum roof) much faster, but then Lightning found a better way to do the earlier jump and that you can run across the invisible floor between the bridge connectors. In other cases many people worked together to bring the final versions of the strategies you see.

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