Half-Life 2 Speedrun by waezone – Master the Gravity Gun and Take Down the Combine!

Watching the Half-Life 2 speedrun by waezone is an eye-popping experience. If you re as big of a fan of Half-Life 2 as we are (welovethis game), you won t want to miss this! We ve played almost each and every version of Half-Life as soon as they were released. Half-Life 2 introduced new weapons, characters, and exciting levels of previously unseen graphics.

It s a testament to Valve Software and the Half-Life 2 developers that we restilltalking about andplayingHalf-Life 2, almost twenty years after it was initially released. Indeed, this feat alone places Half-Life 2 in a very elite realm of gaming awesomeness.

A Half-Life 2 speedrun is an entirely different way to play the game than the original first-person shooter. The players aren t focused on the minutiae of gameplay at regular speeds; they re interested in the minutiae of gameplay at lightening fast speeds! Ready to jump into the land of Half-Life 2 speed runs? Let s go!

Half-Life 2: Speedruns

The goal of a speedrun in Half-Life 2 is to complete the entire game (we use the term entirely rather loosely) as fast as possible. Half-Life 2 speedruns that are world records focus on finishing the game as quickly as possible and do not emphasize completing all tasks and maps.

Other speedruns from different games focus on a 100% completion speedrun category (Doom,Quake, etc.). There are four different types of Half-Life 2 speedruns. Let s look at each type in conjunction with the current Half-Life 2 worldspeedrunrecord holders.

Half-Life 2 Speedrun Hall of Fame

Several variations of gameplay qualify for the Half-Life 2 Hall of Fame. While some of the variations include movement automation scripts, keep in mind that the players still need to have mad (mad) gameplay skills to speedrun as fast as they do!

Half-Life 2: Old-Engine

Let s peek under the hood of speedrun gameplay with the Old Engine. We ll look at just a few items, but there are many components to an Old Engine speedrun:

• Bunny hopping, holding the W key, and jumping up and down repeatedly allows you to move through the maps faster than simply walking or running
• Prop-climbing and prop-flying: Tweak the code a bit, then jump up and down on an object to climb a wall (when you re standing next to it). Do the same thing when standing in the open, and Gordon will climb vertically as he stands on the object.

Old Engine With Scripts

Year	Best Time	Who	Record Place
2022	41m 51s 699ms	iNSM	1st
2023	43m 05s 190ms	jorikgrozniy	2nd
2021	45m 09s 940ms	maddavid123	3rd

A scripted run allows the game player to add software scripts that make the gameplay a little bit easier. Some moves usually require perfect timing of pressing the up, jump, and forward buttons simultaneously.

A script would allow the game player to combine all three moves into a single button, like the up button. Common scripts are auto bunny hopping, Duckroll, and light intensity boosting.

Old Engine Scriptless

Year	Best Time	Who	Record Place
2021	1h 18m 07s	VehicleRonald	1st
2022	1h 33m 54s	iNSM	2nd
2016	1h 40m 11s	deathwingus	3rd

It s just you and your pocket mouse working your way through the game. A quick look at the finish times indicates that scriptless runs take longer due to the lack of scripts.

Half-Life 2: New Engine

There are significant differences between the New Engine and the Old Engine. Again, we re just touching on a few differences, but there are many variances between the Old and New Engines:

• Bunny hopping has accelerated movement (compared to the Old Engine) in the backward, sideways, and forward hopping directions.
• Prop-climbing and prop-flying are still allowed, but it s more complicated than the Old Engine version.

New Engine Any% No Voidclip

Year	Best Time	Who	Record Place
2022	43m 02sec	maltemller	1st
2023	44m 33s 690m	PenPerson	2nd
2019	48m 53s 061ms	waezone	7th

An any% no voidclip speed run means that the player isn t taking advantage of a glitch to improve their finish time. When a player saves and reloads the game in specific locations, holding specific props, they re able to rise above the gameplay walls and (literally) move through sections of the game from above the game map itself. It s wild and quite disorienting to watch.

New Engine Any%

Year	Best Time	Who	Record Place
2022	40m 42sec	maltemller	1st
2023	45m 53s 850ms	PenPerson	2nd
2019	1h 08m 59s	waezone	7th

An any% speed run is when the player runs through the game as fast as possible. You don t need to complete all the tasks, find all the secrets, or defeat all the foes. Just travel from the beginning of the game to the conclusion as fast as possible.

Half-Life 2 Speedrun: Wrap-Up

We love waezone s Half-Life 2 speedrun. Some speedruns leave us wondering if the gameplayer is cocooned deep in their mother s basement. Waezone s speedrun has him playing HL2 with the New Engine at a gaming exhibition.

Waezone explains the difference between the New and Old Engines and discusses and demonstrates how to perform prop-jumping and prop-flying. Seam-Walking at 38:06 is crazy fun. Who knew that you could beat the Ant monster like this? The grenade boost at 45:06? Freaking masterful! We hope you enjoy waezone s speedrun as much as we do!