@@jd_kreeper The gun is on the container that carries soldiers. If you destroy the container, the gun is also lost and the dropship becomes harmless by itself.
I feel like the drop ship species may not be sentient but they could’ve just been a random deep sea dwelling species on a moon or planet like Europa. If elephants or rhinos were a more hardy species or if they all didn’t go extinct in the half life universe, I’d imagine the combine would turn them into some badass piece of war machinery :)
@@ezrabraman6437 The only animals wee see in half life 2 are birds and thats pretty much it and the wasteland outside of cities isnt really suited for earths fauna/creatures.
honestly it's one of the reasons im glad they didnt go for the old Alpha style with the cremators and child factories. It was so over the top and not subtle at all. At first glance it doesn't look that bad but when you really dive into it you realize how truly terrifying the combine really is
definetly one of the things i love about the dropship the most is its biological engine, it screams from so faraway and has such a deep tone, what could be powering this creature?
Well, to be fair. Judith Mossman (Spoilers for HL2, sorta.) Did say that The Combine rely on local transportation when on Earth, hence the APC's (The cars that use the machine gun and rockets.) And dropships, this also includes the Construction Striders. They're figuring out transportation (In the part where you fight against The Combine Elites, with Alyx and with the extra set of Combine Turrets.) However, it takes a while (As it takes a week apparently, this is the part where you get into the teleporter with Alyx.) And plus, Space Whales is more funnier and cuter.
My head cannon is the combine figured out long range teleportation, such as from their home world to the citadel like at the end of two, but their shorter range teleportation was still wonky, like the nova prospekt teleporter taking a week to go a distance Gordon went by in around a day and a half and mostly on foot. It explains why they invaded earth in the first place. I think they first realized we figured out teleportation so they wanted to wipe us out to remove the competition, but when they realized we figured out local teleportation (like those teleporting orbs in HL1) the realized they hit the jackpot but couldn't wipe us out completely otherwise the technology would be lost. Imo this is the deal Breen made with them to spare Earth. He was an administrator at black Mesa so he wouldn't know the science behind it but he'd know they could teleport small and large distances. That was enough for the combine to stave off full on extermination for a while at least
@@pravkdey I like to think he used the Displacer Cannon from Opposing Force as base evidence for this. And was simply stalling them with his previous employees, Kleiner, Eli, such as else. Even Gordon Freeman, which is probably why the Combine Overwatch seems to remember who Freeman even is. (Of course, not physically, just how smart Black Mesa Employees were.)
You guys are pretty much correct. It’s actually the established lore that the combine can teleport dimensionally, but not locally. They are rumoured to have sensors that can detect dimensional rift activity, that’s why when the resonance cascade happened at Black Mesa the combine immediately saw Earth as a juicy target. Opening all those portals to Xen was literally like putting the one ring on right in front of Sauron 😆. Anyway, in all the worlds they had conquered they still hadn’t figured out local teleportation tech, that’s why when they realised we had somewhat figured it out they started working with Breen and Mossman rather than just murdering everyone and stripping the earth (completely) bare etc. Thats also why they were SO SO SO interested in the Borealis ship. (The ship which had all the Teleportation technology on it that disappeared!!!) If I remember correctly Episode 3 was going to be about a sort of race between the resistance and the combine to see who could find the Borealis first, which would have been cool. Anyway hope this cleared some stuff up for you ! 🙂
@@4TheWinQuinn We see one Combine local teleporter in Nova Prospekt. It's gigantic, consumes fuckton of power, takes eternity to recharge and was known to have side effects.
I was surprised myself that such an inconspicuous enemy can have so much behind him, I admit that the earlier concepts looked even more terrifying, and in general I hope that in the next Half-life games (if they come out) we will see different types of this creature as well as its greater use.
The fact we don't know much about this species is sad on a meta level. This poor thing's history and culture (assuming it's sentient) have effectively been wiped out; it is nothing more than an organic tool to be used by ruthless and uncaring conquerors.
Humanity would’ve ended up like the drop ship had it not been for Freeman…… merely just another disposable, perverted tool of the Combine to conquer more worlds to defile the inhabitants of.
@@Gxaps that's the problem. Half life came out in the late 90s and now we're in the early 2020s and the behavior of the game entities /npcs is either the same or worse.
don’t blame developers. programmers, writers, artists, musicians & designers are still putting everything into these games that come out- they’re just being given less time & resources for increasingly larger scopes. it’s the publishers demands that make games worse.
A lot of people don't realize that the "creatures" of the combine are not actual creatures, but synthetically made using the biological design of the original creatures (hence the term "synth"). Striders, gunships, dropships, hunters, etc. are all built/produced using the original designs. Maybe they're grown in some ways, but it's hard to tell.
The combine could theoretically Use the most intelligent or strong of the original species and use its dna to grow near identical copies and repeat constantly until they reach the perfect evolution for the combine, they would have to fit the mechanical stuff in the creatures in the growing process so the synths body adapts to the attachment without needing surgery. I don’t think the combine can just make creatures but they most likely can grow them and selectively breed them
At first I would've disagreed based on stalkers which were directly made from humans but that could just be the combine jury rigging something that was readily and abundantly available on earth, and the psychological aspect of it. But if the combine really are galactic or universal conquerors they would need to mass produce their war machines pretty quickly, so artificially making them like u said makes sense. I doubt there are combine dropship farmers tending herds of those guys until they're grown enough for synthin' haha.
@@pravkdey stalkers are just humans but instead of the combine having a death penalty or having prisons they turn captured rebels that cannot be brainwashed or have been particularly devastating to the combine into stalkers. Also in nova prospect at some point on a monitor you see someone being turned into a soldier, to me it looks like they turn rebels into soldiers (or at least some)
I personally have the headcannon that a majority of combine synths come from the same planet, as they all seem to retain that same crustacean/arthropod sort of features. The colors of their hard shells, the makeup of their underbellies and soft tissue, etc. I think the noises they produce may not be natural, and could be vocal modifications added to them. Seeing how similar hunter are to striders, I have reason to believe they are also related. Also, seeing that artwork of the dropships being able to walk around like crabs further solidifies my own headcannon. These creatures seem to come from a world were the most militaristically viable species seemed to be crustaceans, possibly that crustaceans were the dominant lifeform. The sharp appendages the hunter has underneath its head are also very reminiscent of crab mouths, despite all of the synths having their mouths closed/replaced.
I think there are definitely parallels, but not all combine creatures are related. Note the different number of limbs- striders and hunters have three, while gunships have two, and dropships have a large but even number. In our own evolutionary history, the number of limbs present diverged Very early, and only starfish are left of the lines that used odd numbers of limbs. The crablike flesh and shell seems to be applied to all of them, suggesting it is not natural, but one very proven modification
It's a good analysis on the level of detail in HL2 lore.. Given these are units/entities one would probably forget after a time, only being encountered seldom a time in the games- it can be completely unnoticed that they're part of a well thought out and reasonable and factual existence based on the game lore... Interesting tripedal thin legged creatures.. Survived better on their home world due to whatever kinds of dangers near ground.. So many possibilities, so who really knows... I wonder why they are tripedal though.... Maybe they were originally something like jelly fish..... But tripods are best for putting all weight on the back leg, and the two in front being for stability... Very very interesting.... Perhaps they recoiled from something or used their V shaped heads to bash or something.. In regards to the strider at least... Cool cool stuff.
I dont think they're all from the same planet but it is possible, but they've assimilated so much worlds that I dont think that the majority are from the same planet, possibly they find the crustacean-like exoskeleton armor effective for their mass produced shock troops and smaller scale logistics. They do seem to use things like Fungi and Gas Giant inhabitants as another hierarchy in the Combine too after all.
I'd love to see more of these based on the Gunship, Strider, Hunter and other things. I think the 'armored scanner'/minelayer might also be some kind of cyborg, it seems much more alive than the city scanners. I love pretty much all of the synth designs in Half Life's universe. They're all so strange and fascinating to imagine what they once were.
Love your videos, man. When I played Half Life 2 back in 2006 I never thought there was this much to the game. I used to think drop ships were just weird flying machines and I never gave it a thought. The lore just keeps getting deeper.
I enjoy this type of video quite a bit! The theories give a jumping off point to think about what we could go with on what could have happened to them and the solid lore bits in between help ground us! Very good!
I really appreciate how you use all these cool free cams and scenes that aren't just straight gameplay in your videos. It really makes your vids more interesting than just narration over base gameplay.
I still remember my first encounter with the dropship in the canals. I realised immediately it was bringing reinforcements but then had a "wait, what?" moment when I realised it was a living thing.
Pro tip. Take cover until the drop sip is about to land then Sprint to the loading dock the combine will jump out of. They all jump out one at a time so equip your shotgun and double barrel blast them one at a time, turret will not shoot you when you are close enough. You'd be amazed how easy it is especially on hard difficulty! Sadly this strategy is very much broken and I'm amazed I don't know anyone else who tried it
I still don't understand, if the Combine are so very incredibly technological, and are able to make higher Militaristic Variations of Mechanical or Bio-Mechanical Technologies' of other species home worlds, I don't get what the benefit of using the Combine Dropship has over the Combine Helicopter - A Helicopter which has improved Combine Technologies melded into the Helicopter along with their CPU's, Networks, and Computer technology.. The cannon appears to be the same between the Dropship and the Helicopter, both transport 4 - 8 (only 4 for Heli) troops, but the Helicopter can drop Smart Landmines. Before the Vortigaunt Mural, I always expected that the Combine used different technologies from the one's we saw during the 7 hour war, and being lower tier technology, as I always though that "Combine Higher Tier Technology" was NOT worth the Combines' Time & Resources to Deploy to Earth.. So the question is: What are the benefits of a dropship that wobbles while flying over an attack helicopter that can potentially be armed with Smart Missiles and have an Artificial Network installed..? It seems like a downgrade to me... But, perhaps I have bias cause I'm human and despite the Combine "assisting" in developing technologies such as the Combine Helicopter and Assault Rifle, I still see them as Human Technological Evolutions lol.
I think that they use dropships and other synths because they are simultaneously self-repairing and can be run on much cheaper energy sources (like grass or other organic materials they probably eat.)
As someone with an autistic special interest in biology (and specifically palaeontology) I'm gonna put out what I think the original species of the Dropship was like. The mouth brings to mind filter-feeding species, such as baleen whales and whale sharks with both the shape and the almost grill-like features within it, and assuming that its size didn't change too much between their original form and the Combine-adapted form, this fits in with the general theme of filter feeders being relatively quite large. The grasping limbs beneath could have been used for either mating purposes or for either resting upon undersea rocks or movement upon land, they certainly seem stout enough to do so, and perhaps the "teeth" visible on them could have been there to provide greater grip than just the suction they also seem to be capable of could have done so. The hind limbs are perhaps analogous to the paddle-like limbs of Eurypterids, providing locomotion underwater before being modified from their (likely) flattened, paddle-like shape that they originally were. The other sets of limbs, the ones with the smaller thrusters between them, could have accomplished the same thing that the grasping limbs could have, before being modified into thruster limbs, or (assuming they were intelligent) could have been used for communication or manipulation. Or they could just be vestigial leftovers from their evolutionary history, given another purpose by the Combine. The very front set of limbs, the wing-tipped ones, I feel like they provided steering underwater, suggesting that original species Dropships could move at decently high speeds or could have needed to evade predators (this needing to evade something could also be why they have such thick carapaces, to further protect them from something). The softer underbelly suggests that they spend a lot of time either on the sea floor or just above it, and were able to quickly hunker down upon it to avoid being eaten. Or perhaps the shell wasn't as thick as it currently is, and was also a vestigial leftover from when they were a smaller species, but has been given strength by the Combine's genetic manipulation. They do not seem to have eyes, or any sensory organs, so maybe the Combine removed them as they deemed them unnecessary or they never had any to begin with. Maybe they found their way through water with echolocation, and now do the same in the air. That could be the sound that they make whenever you're near one, the kind of BUWOOP-WOOP sound they make.
imagine the combine world where all the aliens and different races Slaves to the combine and are Combined and modified to be part of the Combine as well and killing others and relying on the combine to survive, probably even Gman knows how powerful they are that he needed to make contract with the likes of Gordon Freeman
I like to imagine that these guys were never aquatic animals but are from a planet or place where its atmosphere is so thick and dense that they could just swim in that. Like big flying whaleshark crabs
My take on it is that the homeworld of the dropship was originally a gas-giant. Their natural flight mechanisms (likely some sort of gas-propulsion if we're going the gas giant route) would then have been modified to allow flight in any atmosphere.
I wonder if the striders, gunships, and the dropships originated on the same planet. What's left of their biology looks like they could be distant relatives, or maybe the similar carapace just tricks me into thinking so? As for your question: Yes, I think some hypothesizing and such are a fun thing to have in the video, and I would like to see more of it (^_^)
The dropship and gunship especially, the strider seems almost unchanged save for a gun mounted on it, but continuing this theory, the hound eye may have also been from the same planet, it has a similar color pattern and the tripod biology definitely strikes me as similar, though how the hound eyes got from the strider homeworld to xen before the combine showed up is beyond me
Even though they look like ocean creatures on Earth. I would bet the were flying creatures where they come from. First because it would make no sense for the Combine to turn an aquatic creature into a flying one.. but in Xen we see flying creatures that look like Earth's ocean creatures as well.
love these videos, half life and portal series are by far my fav games as i grew up w them, so these r always really really cool to watch. keep up the good work!!
@Skyrionn you know, that does make me think a bit more. The Striders have some Spider Crab influences for sure, and the Barnacles are... uh... Barnacles :D Antlions might be harder to figure out, but they kinda remind me of Giant Isopods a little with their crabby, buglike appendages and affectations.
Aw yiss, made a couple of sandwitches, warmed up some soup, time for some quality content to go with it - thanks for making cozy evenings like this even cozier!
Please make a video about the Ichthyosaurs. 🙏 I feel like they are very underrated species and they deserve the recognition as one of the most terrifying aliens in the Half-Life universe. I still get nightmares about them and I refuse to play levels that include them.
@@rokcris7313 Oh, that’s really interesting. I didn’t know that. I thought they were aliens from Xen since they could be found there. If that is the case then it’s amazing because it would make them one of Earth species that ended up inhabiting the borderworld.
Could've sworn that he went over it before in an older video. It's a demoralization tactic to displace entire populations into lands that they don't know.
Well in HL alyx there is a globe and America was crossed out. This suggests that it either became a literal wasteland or just simply got wiped out during/after the seven hour war
Us only seeing like 3 alien species is subtally really cool. Imagine all the different peoples who make up the combine proper. A multidimensional empire surely has more than 3 or 4 different groups. Also the efficiency of only needing what basically ammouts to machines (hunters, striders, dropships) and the local population to conquor an entire planet speaks volumes.
you should have cover the creature who lives in tower , walking with 4 legs , like larger headcrab or something from half life 2. I was seen under the glass bridge.
Ya know when i was little my fav games were the half life games on xbox360 never knew how much lore there was to unravel in just a few games. Glad i found the channel got to see how much lore there is behind such great games
I hope one day we find out qhat the combine species actually is. Its clearly not advisors seeing at how they arent even capable of breathing air that isnt that of their home planet
I believe that the dropship are the creatures from Xen that fly (unsure the name, they're the big ones with wings) I believe this due to the small grid on their fronts, these are also seen on the Xen creatures.
I'm pretty sure those "wings" on the forelimbs are also engines. The same kind of metal slat engines seen on the Gunship. Also I wonder if the reason the invasion used smaller pods is that they didn't yet know the conditions on Earth. If the gravity had been much higher, the Dropships wouldn't have been able to carry pods as large as we see in HL2. Once they knew Earth's environmental parameters, they scaled the pods' specs up appropriately.
I love both Dropship and the Gunship, amazing plot and terrifying at the same time; funny enough, on Half Life SMod Redux, if you shot the Strider Cannon on a Dropship it won't be destroyed, neither vaporized, it'll just spin infinitely and faster by every second, it's funny XD
What did it carry & drop during the 7 hour war? The combine hadn't started using humans yet for its combine soldiers & combine elite during the 7 hour war.
Which is your favourite Combine unit?
This video does contain theory and speculation. Would you like to see more content like this?
Maybe Strider, or Hunter-Chopper
My favourite is the Strider or Hunter.
They are cool.
The Strider or the combine shotgun soldier
Suppressor.
The ground units, mostly the Grunts, Ordinals and Default OTA soldiers.
For a being that doesn't attacks on it's own, the presence of a Dropship sure inspires dread for what it might be carrying around.
I know right!
Facts
It does have a gun
@@jd_kreeper The gun is on the container that carries soldiers. If you destroy the container, the gun is also lost and the dropship becomes harmless by itself.
sure*
GUORDEN, THE DROPSHIP'S COMING RIGHT FOR US
- famous last words
AAAAAAAAAAAA *explosion*
Very dark and gritty
@@Buzzle69 dark and griddy
"The HL2-Beta is dark and gritty."
The HL2-Beta:
gordon who are you get out of the citadel
I feel like the drop ship species may not be sentient but they could’ve just been a random deep sea dwelling species on a moon or planet like Europa. If elephants or rhinos were a more hardy species or if they all didn’t go extinct in the half life universe, I’d imagine the combine would turn them into some badass piece of war machinery :)
Interesting thought
Elephants and rhinos are extinct in half life? Where did you hear this I have never heard it mentioned
@@ezrabraman6437 The only animals wee see in half life 2 are birds and thats pretty much it and the wasteland outside of cities isnt really suited for earths fauna/creatures.
@@Apex_pred_TDX there's cats and rats in alyx, and honestly you don't see other animals than birds in the coast IRL too frequently
@@sebaprime6411 Yeah.
Half Life 2 really had some of the best subtle worldbuilding of any game ive ever played
Your profile pic is amazing.
@@themrfives lol thank you :D
@@AshleySOAD *T o A S t*
honestly it's one of the reasons im glad they didnt go for the old Alpha style with the cremators and child factories. It was so over the top and not subtle at all.
At first glance it doesn't look that bad but when you really dive into it you realize how truly terrifying the combine really is
Could use a few more entries to actually enjoy that world they built.
8:36 rebel really just did a 360 rpg noscope
Man, what a gamer.
he definitely played counter strike before the 7 hour war
definetly one of the things i love about the dropship the most is its biological engine, it screams from so faraway and has such a deep tone, what could be powering this creature?
maybe it scream in pain
@@origami83 considering the combine, i doubt they'd have left it able to scream in pain
@@Spooglecraft true
@@Spooglecraftlikely because they made them not feel pain
@@origami83Dutch flag
"Hey, we got teleportation technology. Shouldn't we use that?"
"No. Deploy the Space Whales."
Well, to be fair. Judith Mossman (Spoilers for HL2, sorta.)
Did say that The Combine rely on local transportation when on Earth, hence the APC's (The cars that use the machine gun and rockets.) And dropships, this also includes the Construction Striders. They're figuring out transportation (In the part where you fight against The Combine Elites, with Alyx and with the extra set of Combine Turrets.)
However, it takes a while (As it takes a week apparently, this is the part where you get into the teleporter with Alyx.)
And plus, Space Whales is more funnier and cuter.
My head cannon is the combine figured out long range teleportation, such as from their home world to the citadel like at the end of two, but their shorter range teleportation was still wonky, like the nova prospekt teleporter taking a week to go a distance Gordon went by in around a day and a half and mostly on foot.
It explains why they invaded earth in the first place. I think they first realized we figured out teleportation so they wanted to wipe us out to remove the competition, but when they realized we figured out local teleportation (like those teleporting orbs in HL1) the realized they hit the jackpot but couldn't wipe us out completely otherwise the technology would be lost.
Imo this is the deal Breen made with them to spare Earth. He was an administrator at black Mesa so he wouldn't know the science behind it but he'd know they could teleport small and large distances. That was enough for the combine to stave off full on extermination for a while at least
@@pravkdey I like to think he used the Displacer Cannon from Opposing Force as base evidence for this. And was simply stalling them with his previous employees, Kleiner, Eli, such as else. Even Gordon Freeman, which is probably why the Combine Overwatch seems to remember who Freeman even is. (Of course, not physically, just how smart Black Mesa Employees were.)
You guys are pretty much correct. It’s actually the established lore that the combine can teleport dimensionally, but not locally. They are rumoured to have sensors that can detect dimensional rift activity, that’s why when the resonance cascade happened at Black Mesa the combine immediately saw Earth as a juicy target. Opening all those portals to Xen was literally like putting the one ring on right in front of Sauron 😆. Anyway, in all the worlds they had conquered they still hadn’t figured out local teleportation tech, that’s why when they realised we had somewhat figured it out they started working with Breen and Mossman rather than just murdering everyone and stripping the earth (completely) bare etc. Thats also why they were SO SO SO interested in the Borealis ship. (The ship which had all the Teleportation technology on it that disappeared!!!) If I remember correctly Episode 3 was going to be about a sort of race between the resistance and the combine to see who could find the Borealis first, which would have been cool. Anyway hope this cleared some stuff up for you ! 🙂
@@4TheWinQuinn We see one Combine local teleporter in Nova Prospekt.
It's gigantic, consumes fuckton of power, takes eternity to recharge and was known to have side effects.
The 8:35 360 rocket launcher shot really got me 😂
They were just showing off
I was surprised myself that such an inconspicuous enemy can have so much behind him, I admit that the earlier concepts looked even more terrifying, and in general I hope that in the next Half-life games (if they come out) we will see different types of this creature as well as its greater use.
The fact we don't know much about this species is sad on a meta level. This poor thing's history and culture (assuming it's sentient) have effectively been wiped out; it is nothing more than an organic tool to be used by ruthless and uncaring conquerors.
Humanity would’ve ended up like the drop ship had it not been for Freeman…… merely just another disposable, perverted tool of the Combine to conquer more worlds to defile the inhabitants of.
Too much pity not enough it's a cool animal used for warfare.
Doubt it was sentient. Probably smth like a whale or deep sea creature that feeds on planktons.
It doesnt exist...
@@jamesbaker3153but if you really think about it, it is kind of sad
It’s absolutely insane how much effort devs used to put into games.
And still do
More than devs do today, hell even half life 1 had cockroaches with thought out behavior and "ai"
@@srdjanrikic978Cockroaches are one feature that the devs chose to work on. If you quantify the work put into games, it's about the same nowadays.
@@Gxaps that's the problem. Half life came out in the late 90s and now we're in the early 2020s and the behavior of the game entities /npcs is either the same or worse.
don’t blame developers. programmers, writers, artists, musicians & designers are still putting everything into these games that come out- they’re just being given less time & resources for increasingly larger scopes. it’s the publishers demands that make games worse.
A lot of people don't realize that the "creatures" of the combine are not actual creatures, but synthetically made using the biological design of the original creatures (hence the term "synth"). Striders, gunships, dropships, hunters, etc. are all built/produced using the original designs.
Maybe they're grown in some ways, but it's hard to tell.
still creatures
The combine could theoretically Use the most intelligent or strong of the original species and use its dna to grow near identical copies and repeat constantly until they reach the perfect evolution for the combine, they would have to fit the mechanical stuff in the creatures in the growing process so the synths body adapts to the attachment without needing surgery. I don’t think the combine can just make creatures but they most likely can grow them and selectively breed them
At first I would've disagreed based on stalkers which were directly made from humans but that could just be the combine jury rigging something that was readily and abundantly available on earth, and the psychological aspect of it.
But if the combine really are galactic or universal conquerors they would need to mass produce their war machines pretty quickly, so artificially making them like u said makes sense. I doubt there are combine dropship farmers tending herds of those guys until they're grown enough for synthin' haha.
@@pravkdey stalkers are just humans but instead of the combine having a death penalty or having prisons they turn captured rebels that cannot be brainwashed or have been particularly devastating to the combine into stalkers. Also in nova prospect at some point on a monitor you see someone being turned into a soldier, to me it looks like they turn rebels into soldiers (or at least some)
These advisors making wack in the citadel rn
I personally have the headcannon that a majority of combine synths come from the same planet, as they all seem to retain that same crustacean/arthropod sort of features. The colors of their hard shells, the makeup of their underbellies and soft tissue, etc. I think the noises they produce may not be natural, and could be vocal modifications added to them.
Seeing how similar hunter are to striders, I have reason to believe they are also related.
Also, seeing that artwork of the dropships being able to walk around like crabs further solidifies my own headcannon. These creatures seem to come from a world were the most militaristically viable species seemed to be crustaceans, possibly that crustaceans were the dominant lifeform. The sharp appendages the hunter has underneath its head are also very reminiscent of crab mouths, despite all of the synths having their mouths closed/replaced.
one of the unused synths is literally called "crab synth" so i guess youre right
I think there are definitely parallels, but not all combine creatures are related. Note the different number of limbs- striders and hunters have three, while gunships have two, and dropships have a large but even number. In our own evolutionary history, the number of limbs present diverged Very early, and only starfish are left of the lines that used odd numbers of limbs. The crablike flesh and shell seems to be applied to all of them, suggesting it is not natural, but one very proven modification
@@jobelplayedminecraft3700you can actually see it in half life 2 walking in the citadel
It's a good analysis on the level of detail in HL2 lore.. Given these are units/entities one would probably forget after a time, only being encountered seldom a time in the games- it can be completely unnoticed that they're part of a well thought out and reasonable and factual existence based on the game lore...
Interesting tripedal thin legged creatures.. Survived better on their home world due to whatever kinds of dangers near ground.. So many possibilities, so who really knows... I wonder why they are tripedal though.... Maybe they were originally something like jelly fish.....
But tripods are best for putting all weight on the back leg, and the two in front being for stability... Very very interesting.... Perhaps they recoiled from something or used their V shaped heads to bash or something.. In regards to the strider at least... Cool cool stuff.
I dont think they're all from the same planet but it is possible, but they've assimilated so much worlds that I dont think that the majority are from the same planet, possibly they find the crustacean-like exoskeleton armor effective for their mass produced shock troops and smaller scale logistics.
They do seem to use things like Fungi and Gas Giant inhabitants as another hierarchy in the Combine too after all.
“Gordan that dropships coming right for us”
AAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!
Love the deep cut species lore. It definitely raises more questions than answers about the many species that have been assimilated into the Combine.
lore goes deep
For the most part. These are still lacking deep lore sadly!
I'd love to see more of these based on the Gunship, Strider, Hunter and other things. I think the 'armored scanner'/minelayer might also be some kind of cyborg, it seems much more alive than the city scanners.
I love pretty much all of the synth designs in Half Life's universe. They're all so strange and fascinating to imagine what they once were.
The “armoured scanner” is called the shield scanner btw (I didn’t know that until I played gmod 💀💀💀)
@@youtubeguy5454 Had a feeling I was getting it wrong, haven't heard the name in a while. Nobody ever really talks about them.
Love your videos, man. When I played Half Life 2 back in 2006 I never thought there was this much to the game. I used to think drop ships were just weird flying machines and I never gave it a thought. The lore just keeps getting deeper.
Dude I was born in 2006. Damn
Playing HL2 in 2004 was mint tho :3
I'd love to see some concept art on what the biologically modified creatures of the combine looked like before they were mutilated.
If I remember correctly, in the Raising the Bar book, they only talk/show the post-Combine appearance.
@@Poodleinacanyeah, IIRC there is a sketch of a Gunship without its armor. It looks like a cross between an insect and a fish.
I enjoy this type of video quite a bit! The theories give a jumping off point to think about what we could go with on what could have happened to them and the solid lore bits in between help ground us! Very good!
I really appreciate how you use all these cool free cams and scenes that aren't just straight gameplay in your videos. It really makes your vids more interesting than just narration over base gameplay.
I still remember my first encounter with the dropship in the canals. I realised immediately it was bringing reinforcements but then had a "wait, what?" moment when I realised it was a living thing.
Pro tip. Take cover until the drop sip is about to land then Sprint to the loading dock the combine will jump out of. They all jump out one at a time so equip your shotgun and double barrel blast them one at a time, turret will not shoot you when you are close enough. You'd be amazed how easy it is especially on hard difficulty!
Sadly this strategy is very much broken and I'm amazed I don't know anyone else who tried it
I still don't understand, if the Combine are so very incredibly technological, and are able to make higher Militaristic Variations of Mechanical or Bio-Mechanical Technologies' of other species home worlds, I don't get what the benefit of using the Combine Dropship has over the Combine Helicopter - A Helicopter which has improved Combine Technologies melded into the Helicopter along with their CPU's, Networks, and Computer technology..
The cannon appears to be the same between the Dropship and the Helicopter, both transport 4 - 8 (only 4 for Heli) troops, but the Helicopter can drop Smart Landmines.
Before the Vortigaunt Mural, I always expected that the Combine used different technologies from the one's we saw during the 7 hour war, and being lower tier technology, as I always though that "Combine Higher Tier Technology" was NOT worth the Combines' Time & Resources to Deploy to Earth..
So the question is: What are the benefits of a dropship that wobbles while flying over an attack helicopter that can potentially be armed with Smart Missiles and have an Artificial Network installed..? It seems like a downgrade to me...
But, perhaps I have bias cause I'm human and despite the Combine "assisting" in developing technologies such as the Combine Helicopter and Assault Rifle, I still see them as Human Technological Evolutions lol.
Money
I think that they use dropships and other synths because they are simultaneously self-repairing and can be run on much cheaper energy sources (like grass or other organic materials they probably eat.)
I always loved the way the drop ships came in, and the alarm sound they made.
As someone with an autistic special interest in biology (and specifically palaeontology) I'm gonna put out what I think the original species of the Dropship was like.
The mouth brings to mind filter-feeding species, such as baleen whales and whale sharks with both the shape and the almost grill-like features within it, and assuming that its size didn't change too much between their original form and the Combine-adapted form, this fits in with the general theme of filter feeders being relatively quite large.
The grasping limbs beneath could have been used for either mating purposes or for either resting upon undersea rocks or movement upon land, they certainly seem stout enough to do so, and perhaps the "teeth" visible on them could have been there to provide greater grip than just the suction they also seem to be capable of could have done so.
The hind limbs are perhaps analogous to the paddle-like limbs of Eurypterids, providing locomotion underwater before being modified from their (likely) flattened, paddle-like shape that they originally were.
The other sets of limbs, the ones with the smaller thrusters between them, could have accomplished the same thing that the grasping limbs could have, before being modified into thruster limbs, or (assuming they were intelligent) could have been used for communication or manipulation. Or they could just be vestigial leftovers from their evolutionary history, given another purpose by the Combine.
The very front set of limbs, the wing-tipped ones, I feel like they provided steering underwater, suggesting that original species Dropships could move at decently high speeds or could have needed to evade predators (this needing to evade something could also be why they have such thick carapaces, to further protect them from something).
The softer underbelly suggests that they spend a lot of time either on the sea floor or just above it, and were able to quickly hunker down upon it to avoid being eaten. Or perhaps the shell wasn't as thick as it currently is, and was also a vestigial leftover from when they were a smaller species, but has been given strength by the Combine's genetic manipulation.
They do not seem to have eyes, or any sensory organs, so maybe the Combine removed them as they deemed them unnecessary or they never had any to begin with. Maybe they found their way through water with echolocation, and now do the same in the air. That could be the sound that they make whenever you're near one, the kind of BUWOOP-WOOP sound they make.
you sound cute as hell damm
I think they just have really small eyes like snails
@@owlpatrol8376
🥺
👉👈
Hey I have the same autistic interest! I couldn't agree more and thought the same thing about the filter bristles they had on their mouths
8:36 dude hit a 360 on that combine
imagine the combine world where all the aliens and different races Slaves to the combine and are Combined and modified to be part of the Combine as well and killing others and relying on the combine to survive, probably even Gman knows how powerful they are that he needed to make contract with the likes of Gordon Freeman
A truly terrifying thought but something I would love Valve to explore in a future game.
4:14 All these years and I'm still finding out new things about this game. I never noticed it has mouths on its limbs.
The sheer amount of Half-Life content you make impresses me. I really appreciate that a lot.
Oh there's so much more to cover too!
I like to imagine that these guys were never aquatic animals but are from a planet or place where its atmosphere is so thick and dense that they could just swim in that.
Like big flying whaleshark crabs
"Powerful suckers"
- Skyrionn 2023
haha!
cool! a video just when i saw your last video, love the lore and how you tell it, i really love half life and your content about it makes me happy
Glad you enjoy it!
My take on it is that the homeworld of the dropship was originally a gas-giant. Their natural flight mechanisms (likely some sort of gas-propulsion if we're going the gas giant route) would then have been modified to allow flight in any atmosphere.
My favorite part of the combine was the flying synths, both so incredible and aquatic-inspired
It may not be the Manta Ray from Xen, but it sure is an awesome replacement.
I wonder if the striders, gunships, and the dropships originated on the same planet. What's left of their biology looks like they could be distant relatives, or maybe the similar carapace just tricks me into thinking so?
As for your question: Yes, I think some hypothesizing and such are a fun thing to have in the video, and I would like to see more of it (^_^)
The dropship and gunship especially, the strider seems almost unchanged save for a gun mounted on it, but continuing this theory, the hound eye may have also been from the same planet, it has a similar color pattern and the tripod biology definitely strikes me as similar, though how the hound eyes got from the strider homeworld to xen before the combine showed up is beyond me
That would make sense looking at the three creatures
It would make sense, it would also make sense that the devs reused the same asset and played around with the color values to change it.
Even though they look like ocean creatures on Earth. I would bet the were flying creatures where they come from. First because it would make no sense for the Combine to turn an aquatic creature into a flying one.. but in Xen we see flying creatures that look like Earth's ocean creatures as well.
When your technology is so advanced it borders on magic and you can travel between universes but the portal gun eludes you
There's something about the music you use in these videos which gives the footage such an eerie vibe to the point where it gives goosebumps..
8:36 pro moves
This man can make me go to sleep, in a very good way not being mean at all. Your voice is just soothing to me
Love this channel. At the end of every video I feel sad that Valve abandoned one of the greatest sci-fi franchises of all time.
I am still amazed how you do these scenes
The home world of the dropships is probably a big dessert now, seeing it was once an ocean, and we all know what the combine do to oceans.
I never noticed how cool the dropship was. amazing video. like always.
love these videos, half life and portal series are by far my fav games as i grew up w them, so these r always really really cool to watch. keep up the good work!!
This guy has the best voice for videos. I listen to his videos later at night and helps me fall asleep after I get hi
Always good to see more content about the Combine, thank you!
i would love to see a full lore on the combine rollermine and conscripts, great video btw
Very inspiring that you make these videos for us that never played the games back in the day ❤
Gordon that dropship coming right at us
I love your videos they are always so entertaining
Thanks for watching them!
8:36 360 no scope rocket. The Ai is advancing.
it looks more like it lived on surface because of the fingers
-Hey, what if we took a lobster… And turned it into a plane?
-*Say no more fam*
GORDON THAT DROPSHIPS COMING RIGHT FOR US
It has a filter feeder similar to a whale so we can assume that its diet consists of small creatures, which provides some insight into its home world
8:36 HE HIT A TRICK SHOT
the 360 rocket blast had me on the floor
It just needs a giant pole sticking out of it to hit unlucky conscripts into a giant pit.
Then it would be the perfect weapon.
Captain Vance actually
The old Beta Dropship almost resembles a Horseshoe Crab, whereas the one we got looks sort of like a mix between a Lobster and a Whale Shark.
Thanks for that. More solidification that they are based off sea creatures
@Skyrionn you know, that does make me think a bit more. The Striders have some Spider Crab influences for sure, and the Barnacles are... uh... Barnacles :D
Antlions might be harder to figure out, but they kinda remind me of Giant Isopods a little with their crabby, buglike appendages and affectations.
I remember reading a very, very long time aho, that Valve headquarters had living fossil pets and the artist was inspired by that.
In my opinion I think the dropship and the gunship came from the same planet
Wonder what kind of soldiers they'd drop off before they made humans into the ones we fight and they drop off...
We'll find out in HL3
still waiting on hunter-choppers but i am happy with this while i wait
One day :D
08:36 Rebel pulling a 360° RPG shot is my favorite rebel from all of these videos.
the front of a dropshhip reminded me of whale sharks also
GORDON, THE DROPSHIP'S COMING RIGHT FOR US!
UUUAAAARGH
*Explodes*
I believe the Dropship and the Gunship come from the same planet, considering they both look very similar
I agree completely.
Aw yiss, made a couple of sandwitches, warmed up some soup, time for some quality content to go with it - thanks for making cozy evenings like this even cozier!
Please make a video about the Ichthyosaurs. 🙏 I feel like they are very underrated species and they deserve the recognition as one of the most terrifying aliens in the Half-Life universe. I still get nightmares about them and I refuse to play levels that include them.
iirc the ichthyosaur is not an alien but just a very rare earth sea creature found in the challenger deep or something like that
@@rokcris7313 Oh, that’s really interesting. I didn’t know that. I thought they were aliens from Xen since they could be found there. If that is the case then it’s amazing because it would make them one of Earth species that ended up inhabiting the borderworld.
@@rokcris7313there were Earth native ichthyosaurs 250-90 million years ago. The ones in the games are just named after them. Source, half life wiki
They where meant to stop you from going outa bounds but the damn leeching bastards got the job
@@sa-amirel-hayeed699 Ah, I can see why anyone would get confused, thanks 👍
More like these. I've always wanted to see a deeper dive into all of these synths.
Noted :D
As a suggestion, you could look into why everyone was migrated from America to Eastern Europe in the time of the Resonance Cascade and Half Life 2.
Could've sworn that he went over it before in an older video. It's a demoralization tactic to displace entire populations into lands that they don't know.
Well in HL alyx there is a globe and America was crossed out.
This suggests that it either became a literal wasteland or just simply got wiped out during/after the seven hour war
@@bakatom142 interesting
Us only seeing like 3 alien species is subtally really cool. Imagine all the different peoples who make up the combine proper. A multidimensional empire surely has more than 3 or 4 different groups.
Also the efficiency of only needing what basically ammouts to machines (hunters, striders, dropships) and the local population to conquor an entire planet speaks volumes.
Your videos are great, keep up the good work!
This video does not deserve a dislike. It deserves many likes.
nothing makes me more happy then more half life lore
The Dropship is the ultimate logistics unit,its agile,its fast,its flying it can transport all kinds of cargo to anywhere and land anywhere
What did the combine use as infantry before they got humans
bro did a 360 8:35
I vote for more like this, little vignettes about specific things. I enjoyed it!
you should have cover the creature who lives in tower , walking with 4 legs , like larger headcrab or something from half life 2. I was seen under the glass bridge.
The Striders?
@@Skyrionn its called Crab Synth and they only appaired in the tower. As I always wondered this is gonna be uncommon and very interesthing topic.
@@Skyrionn there are also Mortar Synths in same section in the game.
I call them lobster whales, also this is like a new level of body horror, like cosmic body horror for aliens.
Ya know when i was little my fav games were the half life games on xbox360 never knew how much lore there was to unravel in just a few games. Glad i found the channel got to see how much lore there is behind such great games
We need more insight into the Synth
YES ANOTHER HALF-LIFE VIDEOS. THESE ARE MY ADDICTIONS AHHHHHH
I hope one day we find out qhat the combine species actually is. Its clearly not advisors seeing at how they arent even capable of breathing air that isnt that of their home planet
I believe that the dropship are the creatures from Xen that fly (unsure the name, they're the big ones with wings) I believe this due to the small grid on their fronts, these are also seen on the Xen creatures.
I love any half life related video! great work!
Wide ahh frog car
8:36 360 RPG shot lmao
I'm pretty sure those "wings" on the forelimbs are also engines. The same kind of metal slat engines seen on the Gunship.
Also I wonder if the reason the invasion used smaller pods is that they didn't yet know the conditions on Earth. If the gravity had been much higher, the Dropships wouldn't have been able to carry pods as large as we see in HL2. Once they knew Earth's environmental parameters, they scaled the pods' specs up appropriately.
"Gordon, that *Dropship* is coming right for us!"
-Captain Vance shortly before his demise via an Unnamed Dropship
4:00 I Need a model of this now
Looks similar to the camera drone at the end of ep 2. The animation of it spilling its guts/cables is so unsettling.
I absoloute love your half life videos
I love playing them in the backround while i play games
love listening to your vids while i do the dishes haha ❤️
I love both Dropship and the Gunship, amazing plot and terrifying at the same time; funny enough, on Half Life SMod Redux, if you shot the Strider Cannon on a Dropship it won't be destroyed, neither vaporized, it'll just spin infinitely and faster by every second, it's funny XD
What did it carry & drop during the 7 hour war? The combine hadn't started using humans yet for its combine soldiers & combine elite during the 7 hour war.
There was a humanoid species they used that we haven't seen yet. Shown in the Vortigaunt mural.
We also see them carry striders during the uprising