This game does feel like the natural evolution of all the ideas that Half-Life 1 was built on, which is really great. Nearly every level feels distinct and fresh, the story is pretty good and the gameplay is great besides the semi-wonky physics interactions. My only real complaints is that certain sections of the game can drag pretty hard, usually the sections in which its mainly combat for an extended period of time with nothing else to break up the monotony. As for the episodic expansions, I felt as though the first episode was the weakest part of the entire game, while the second was pretty good, having a lot more of the unique gameplay sections that were standard in the base game. Overall, really good, if a little inconsistent at times.