I wanna help out with the Lambda Resistance, because I've been thinking about a custom Half Life 2 mod about a young autistic 20 year old man who's working with the resistance group to remove the combine from planet earth! But I still haven't figured out on how the story plot should start out but I'm still working on it so no worries.
Given enough time and advancements, humanity would prob become worse then the combine lmao, just imagine if u found another planet with the resources of earth on + humanity would most likely use it to itd fullest for ours
@@deathmaster38interesting theory, the combine could be a remnant of the human race that expanded so hard that it lost all touch with itself if that makes sense
"...They're always departing but they never arrive... and the ones that do arrive... they never leave... you never see them go they're always full... no one ever gets on but they're always... they're always departing but they never arrive..."
The ultimate irony of the Combine's subjugation of Earth is that humans would have become an entity much like the Combine given enough time to evolve and expand unchecked.
I hate that you are right, we think of combine enslavement of humans to be this big scary event. When in fact it is just a larger scale holocaust, we pretend like we didn’t already do exactly what the combine did to us, but we did it to each other. That’s why I love the combine, the scariness in them, is the same horrors we can find if you simply look within
@@jpassa9093Not just the Holocaust. Look at how we treat other species. It's disgusting and it's all because humans were brain washed by industries into thinking it was okay. Humans treat animals horribly in the agricultural and fishing industries
It must be such a pain in the ass to get all of this b-roll footage captured, and in such a cinematic quality too. Just know that your efforts are seen and appreciated a lot, even when algorithm doesn’t do you justice you’ve most definitely earned.
It was a long one to put together but absolutely worth it. While it's nice to see content doing well in the algo sometimes, this does come mostly from a love of the series. I think this one is doing better than normal though
Ahhh, hell yes. I was waiting for something like this. The Combine are some of my favorite villains in any medium at this point. The idea of fusing biology and technology in the way that they have has really expanded and/or awakened something in my mind creatively, and I'm kind of obsessed with the idea of such an entity now. I'm relatively new to the series and I genuinely can't believe that I skipped over this for so long. Anyway, thanks for the content, and this vid in particular.
"The first contact was bound to happen. The galaxy, let alone the universe was simply too big for just a singular species to develop intelligence in. Any delay in contact only meant a heightening of the eventual culture shock. In humanity's case, this "culture shock" meant the complete extinction of mankind as it had come to be known." -The Author, All Tomorrows
I've always been scared of the combine empire. They are not a mob guided by a Queen/King, they are not monsters with earthly magic powers, they are just... so alien, so ... human like philosophy... The simple act of "combining" every conquered world to their liking, learning, exploiting is something you could see in human like strayegy in fiction... scares me
Compared to the other Combine lore videos trying to explain them, this is probably the most well put together and informative without any over the top personal bias. Great job on putting this video together.
You never fail to put out good videos. You put in such effort and your love for Half Life doesn't seem to ever die. Hope Half Life 3 comes out soon, and when it does, I can't wait to see what you'll make from it. Keep up the amazing work, Skyrionn!
So... The combine desired localised teleportation? insane that all they had to do was keep fighting and invading the home of that Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System in order to get it. (Though I think we can all agree anyone sent into that facility would be absolutely massacred via turrets, goo, neurotoxin, and mashy spike plates.)
''I'm the only one standing between us and THEM" -GLaDOS I think aperture was hidden by her so the combine won't find it I dunno how she'd hide an entire facility but whatevs
@@denifnaf5874 To be honest hiding a facility within what originated as a salt mine isn't too bad. Plus I don't think she even needed to hide it as the entire combine forces would most likely barely be able to break in at all due to the sheer amount of insane defences and weaponry within that facility.
The one captivating thing about the Combine, for me, is that they don't seem "evil". They don't seem to go out of their way to actually cause someone pain for the sake of causing pain. I think whoever runs the Combine, the species that started the entire empire in the first place, lack the concept of empathy and remorse, but have limitless ambition. I think that what they do to the species, while objectively cruel, vicious, vile and evil to us, is nothing that they would consider bad. They seek to expand and the only thing they care for besides that expansion, is its efficiency. And efficiency is worth anything when you don't hold emotions to the cost at which it comes. So while we think turning people into Stalkers for example is an unforgivable cruelty, to them it's probably just recycling a subject that was impacting efficiency in a negative way. Turning something "broken" into something that has its purpose. A cold and calculated methodology that is made by species that are incapable of holding a moral compass and therefore, use ANY methods that are fit to fullful their ends and they aren't exactly evil for it, because they seem to be incapable to empathize. They lack the same brain structure we do, they aren't like us. They might even think it's doing us a favor. If we rebel, we were inefficient and becoming a Stalker is them giving us an option which we wouldn't be able to have without them and in turn, be "efficient" and play our part.
There's a certain Lovecraftian cosmic-horror aspect to the Combine that goes understated - we hear hints that the Combine have conquered worlds and dimensions so far beyond human understanding, that we are basically nothing to them. It's like if a single village of a couple hundred people in the Australian outback rebelled against the British Empire at its height of power in the early 20th century. Their power is so unfathomably vast they could eradicate us all within minutes if they wanted to. Yet, we still resist, we still choose to fight this control. I think that's the real "lesson" of _Half-Life_ - that the human spirit is utterly indomitable. But there's a layer of control above even the Combine - the Employers - guiding and nudging events unseen. It's like the Ghoul says in _Fallout_ - "there's always someone behind the wheel".
Also ties in well to the scientific meaning of Half-Life - no matter how often you measure it, there will always be some material left, just like the indomitable human spirit :)
The Combine was aware of Earth for some time before their invasion, they just weren't quite able to reach Earth with their portal technology. The Black Mesa Incident, however changed that; enabling the Combine to either pass through Xen to reach Earth or the resonance cascade and/or portal storms as a result created the dimensional conditions necessary for Earth's dimension to accommodate a Combine port directly to their overworld.
Your videos are always so underrated, you put so much effort into making these amazing lore videos and I love them. I can't wait so see what you're gonna do next :)
It would cool if we get a idea of what the original species of the combine is. like a vague description of a low raking average Joe combine but describe like a lovecraftian style that would make the advisors look like pathetic maggots.
I think the qz combine deserve more of an explanation like the "unseen lore" since there is no official explanation on specific things. Lemme explain So we know that the combine units deployed in the qz come in the 4 variations, but in the files of there voicelines, its shown that they would use tactics that would emotionally manipulate unfortunate victims, in a scene of HLA it can be heard that the combine grunts are calling out for Alyx pretending to be some sort of friendly, whats interesting for that is that ALL units have voicelines for that specific task as well, which are gone unused. Going further with the idea of unused voicelines there are the unusued charger voicelines, lines of switching weapons and charging towards the player hence the name, there was a cut feature that would include the charger running at the player while wielding a stunstick to strike the player. There is still more lore that can be speculated around the grunts from hla as well, from one single death voiceline that cant be heard in game but only seen in the captions, one line the grunt cant say when killed by the player is "im sorry", this fact alongside the other voicelines the grunt has showcases that he is the least augmented like the captain, suppressor, and charger, but enough to complete decent tasks within the quarantine zone. More hidden lore that can be found is about the workers, theres so much we can speculate from just the scenery and destruction when playing through, you can find dozens of dead grunts and works alongside each other showcasing that covering up the qz is not an easy task, and in some parts you can see them using some sort of device to spray against the xen fauna covering the walls, those tanks that are filled up are seen in the antlion section of the game where its showing antlions being extracted from there sacks right into those said tanks. Whats interesting about the antlions is that they are all slow and heavy, a lot more bulky than the hl2 variations, this can be supported by the nests that they build which are on the surface of the qz, which means whatever the combine extract from the antlions, they turn that mix into fluids used by the workers to wipe out the xen flora and fauna. Straying away from all that, the big question is why we dont see any of these soldiers outside the qz and in hl2, well I think tge answer to that is they were deployed somewhere else, by the time hl2 came around, city 17 was probably finished and the only thing they needed was less troops to worry about which is why they only use cps and standard transhuman soldiers, which by that time the city grunts were not needed and the qz units were probably deployed else where in other quarantine zones, I dont believe one bit that the suppressor and wallhammer would evolve into the hl2 soldiers, especially from how effective they are shown in hla. Now is all that I explained canon? It can be, valve themselves have conflicted with there own lore, but the way I explained things can definitely explain how city 17 and everything would be different the time hl2 comes around, best possibility to make everything in hla canon to exist in hl2 somewhere else in the world.
Another note, cmdrrileysv4000 shows a lot of cut content from hla which could definitely add some more lore to what the combine could've added or already added by just arent seen
Honestly, I genuinely wish the Combine officially became one of the top 10 strongest factions in science fiction. I might sound a bit selfish, but at least I'm expressing my honesty and passion for my favourite antagonist faction of all time. I think Wallace Breen's quote about indescribable wonders whether carbon stars with sentient fungi and gas giants that are inhabited by vast meteorological intelligence effectively convey the vast scale of the Combine, as these wonders mentioned by Wallace Breen are likely just glimpses and used as examples to highlight the futility of the resistance against the unstoppable force like them, as these mentioned wonders suggest there are countless worlds across the multiple dimensions filled with both imaginable and even unimaginable species and resources that the Combine has conquered and assimilated into their arsenal. Perhaps there are more powerful entities just as powerful as the race, like Nihilanth, if not more so. Also, I loved your video! I rarely comment on UA-cam videos because I'm an introvert, so I consider this comment one of my brave actions. :) Edit: I felt unsatisfied with my previous response, so I edited my comment to remove my previous theory.
Philosophy aside, the combine is just a huge multidimensional technological entity trying to survive. Imagine humanity in the eyes of simple creatures, we are super powerful and will destroy entire ecosystems for our own gain.
The combine are cruel but there nothing compared to the qu from all tommorows who biologically made humanity into whatever they wanted such as living plants and forced them to stay on the worlds to suffer
@@Judgemenlt I feel like intentions are important. I also feel like "good and evil" is a concept that can be easily twisted, the combine probably don’t even understand the human concept of right and wrong and evil and good. On the other hand I feel the Qu were fully aware of their actions.
@@denifnaf5874 I think the disfigured monstrosities known as "humans" probably lost most of their sex drive, it was probably only done for the sake of procreation
They could very easily be compared in one sense to the Borg of Star Trek lore. It's essentially a conquest and assimilation of all inhabited worlds. A story about the Combine's encounter with the Nihilanth's species would be an interesting exploration.
I love the Combine so much, I even adopted one of the code names a generic unit can get, Sweeper Zero. Combine is extremely interesting for me, what they do, how they operate. Tactics, lore, mechanics. I love these fellas. ❤
Thanks for these videos. I always love deep dives into half life lore. Something I always wondered was the original games design of the nihilinth with it having scars and mechanical components grafted to it suggests this story was allready thoroughly planned out. Also any chance of getting an ichtyosaur deep dive ? They scare the living shit out of me but it's driven to a point of almost obsession
I have a theory that the combine conquest was initially peacefull for the first couple worlds or even the first few universes When other races where still almost as advenced as the combine Way before a civilazation would be an ant in comparison Those days where long gone by the time they discovered the Nihilanths species hovewer...
I don’t think the “Original” Combine race still exists. I’m willing to bet that they are long dead but their empire is so vast that most of their slave races have no idea.
Good one. Always enjoy a new Half Life lore video from you. Although I have a feeling you'll get through all possible lore someday soon... :D Shame they never made a HL3. Or episode 3. Shame for us anyway. Though I do understand why they didn't want to continue back then. I hope they will, eventually.
This youtube channel 's work covering Half Life content can be summarized with the following statement: "The Breen Grub / Epistle 3 was written by Mark Laidlaw. While Mr. Laidlaw no longer works at Valve, and therefore this source can not be considered cannon, let's see what he had to say anyway." That phrase, or some variation therein, has been in EVERY VIDEO.
One would hope we might see some of the adapted creatures rebel in future material, like Overwatch that get memories back and regret or stuff like Gunships acting almost like giant pets to ressistance members who care for them and nurse them back to health. As to our Base location it's in Nunya, just outside of Business.
Something I think about from time to time since I like listening to sci-fi e books and a fan of the half-life series is what if two hyperaggressive civilizations such as the Combine and the Qu of the novel All Tomorrows would interact or conquer one another.
Sometimes i wonder if the combine exists in our universe, since lets say that the multiverse theory is true, then one day the Combine will come to earth, which is a scary thought
Ngl i very much feel like epistle 3 undersells the combines might by quite a bit. The combine are a multiversal empire, not only do they have the ability to drain specific worlds they teleport to but they can expand and drain outwards every other world too. As long as they can put citadel components and dark fusion reactors through the initial portal they can endlessly strip more and more worlds and teleport the material back home. The combine could easily be able to build dyson spheres, heck id argue dyson spheres arent as impressive of a concept as when half life was originally worked on, numerous series have done them with a smaller scale than a multiverse. As a fan of Halo and 40k theyre everywhere for them and those are single universes. I feel like the combine overworld, alyph, would be something much, much greater, a proper universal construct. When you're draining from countless universes you can build unimaginable things. But that also means you are spread infinitely thin. So we ask how the rebels managed to push back the combine forces, make them desperate? Well because 'the combine' cant be bothered with one world of infinite, the combine forces we see would essentially be bottom of the totem paper pushers, to us annihilation, to the combine? Peons. That said under such circumstances i can only see the combines expansion and empire as a means to survive entrophy. Cannibalizing other universes to make sure their own doesnt collapse into nothingness.
it's insane that all the effort everyone puts in to be free of the combine in all 3 games, its only a small occupational force they were fighting. mere planet prison guards.
Fun fact the combine over watch soldiers used to be humanoid aliens that were in those suits. That was the original idea that they were going to go for but then they just made him human augments. For my own sake I like to say that some of them are human augments and I like to say that the soldiers that we see in the game are not human they're kind of like humanoids from other planets and dimensions that are just humanoid soldiers being used as a battle platform. I don't know it just makes it sound cooler to me when you think of it like that. It truly makes them alien like they're some kind of political military enforcer on a planet.
You're doing a fantastic job! Just a quick off-topic question: I have a SafePal wallet with USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (alarm fetch churn bridge exercise tape speak race clerk couch crater letter). What's the best way to send them to Binance?
Personally I would have waited for April 1st, and would have pranked everyone by having the same thumbnail and title but then having the video being about the song Combine Harvester by The Wurzels.
My guess is that The Combine have a grasp on the concept of memory transfer and don't fully understand the idea of cut and paste versus copy and paste. As such, they go from planet to planet to "refine" a species. Taking the ones that are useful and copying their minds to their repository, while the rest get their memories wiped as soldiers are needed or are just left to die out. That's a concept that I wish was explored, a soldier quota, when The Combine lost soldiers, they harvested random citizens to be transformed. So, you' be responsible for the transformation of countless people through fighting them.
The Epistle 3, even if it is not cannon, can take so many turns. Instead of a pointless Kamikaze attack, they could use the ship to travel through space and time to give humanity the technology to prepare for the invasion. Later they could recruit the Nihilanth specie and other species enslaved by the Combine to fight back. This in turn would ironically turn Humanity into the new Combine, starting a civil war between those who wants the power and become conquerors, and those who reject it and know the dire consequences of that. This would only create a new resistance that would fight back, in some sort of cyclic story.
With fictional settings like this I often find myself wondering what I would do if I was there. As much as I'd love to think I would resist, I don't think I would have the emotional fortitude for it. I'd probably end up in "an eternity's repose". It brings peaceful thoughts, does it not?
The Combine are a cosmic horror. Beating them is not a matter of destroying them them, but banish them. Human can never hope to truly "defeat" the Combine, as the Overwatch is not even the true Combine army, its just an local occupation force made of mostly human (well "human") troops.
We wish to help The Resistance. Where is your base located and how many of you are there?
I wanna help out with the Lambda Resistance, because I've been thinking about a custom Half Life 2 mod about a young autistic 20 year old man who's working with the resistance group to remove the combine from planet earth! But I still haven't figured out on how the story plot should start out but I'm still working on it so no worries.
In engineers voice yaaayy you can't fool me with those basic tricks combine
Well... it was Ravenholm, but-
Mine was ravenholm, but you know how that ended
classified
48 MINUTE HALF LIFE LORE VIDEO LETS FUCKING GOOOOOOOOOO
edit : he even put in subtitles, what a chad
LETS GOOO
Always with the subtitles. They're so easy to do. Thanks for being here
@@Skyrionn not created by your haNd but tooIs?
@@sheeringobjectI mean all he'd have to do is copy-paste his script into the caption generator and add timestamps
@@misterhydra7285 thats handy
It's disturbing how creative the Combine is in destroying all it touches during its conquest.
And worse, we, humans, (probably) help them get to Xen.
Given enough time and advancements, humanity would prob become worse then the combine lmao, just imagine if u found another planet with the resources of earth on + humanity would most likely use it to itd fullest for ours
@@deathmaster38interesting theory, the combine could be a remnant of the human race that expanded so hard that it lost all touch with itself if that makes sense
@@jackdaniels5071And somewhere out there, that ancient human civilization built giant rings in space…
@@Devdev009 Oh ! s*t
Don't drink the water, they put something in it to make forget. I don't even remember how I got here.
You got here by train.
"...They're always departing but they never arrive... and the ones that do arrive... they never leave... you never see them go they're always full... no one ever gets on but they're always... they're always departing but they never arrive..."
Same guy but in the Half Mind mod:
“GET THE HELL OUTTA HERE!:
The water even made you forget to use the word you in that sentence
This is a joke btw
Sometimes i dream about cheese
The ultimate irony of the Combine's subjugation of Earth is that humans would have become an entity much like the Combine given enough time to evolve and expand unchecked.
I hate that you are right, we think of combine enslavement of humans to be this big scary event. When in fact it is just a larger scale holocaust, we pretend like we didn’t already do exactly what the combine did to us, but we did it to each other. That’s why I love the combine, the scariness in them, is the same horrors we can find if you simply look within
@@jpassa9093humans will cooporate when aliens invade mfs when ota soldier:😮
Literally, the combine could just be a "future of humanity" if we advance far enough
@@jpassa9093Not just the Holocaust. Look at how we treat other species. It's disgusting and it's all because humans were brain washed by industries into thinking it was okay. Humans treat animals horribly in the agricultural and fishing industries
They just had to hit us first before we reach the 41st millennium
It must be such a pain in the ass to get all of this b-roll footage captured, and in such a cinematic quality too.
Just know that your efforts are seen and appreciated a lot, even when algorithm doesn’t do you justice you’ve most definitely earned.
It was a long one to put together but absolutely worth it. While it's nice to see content doing well in the algo sometimes, this does come mostly from a love of the series. I think this one is doing better than normal though
Ahhh, hell yes. I was waiting for something like this.
The Combine are some of my favorite villains in any medium at this point. The idea of fusing biology and technology in the way that they have has really expanded and/or awakened something in my mind creatively, and I'm kind of obsessed with the idea of such an entity now.
I'm relatively new to the series and I genuinely can't believe that I skipped over this for so long.
Anyway, thanks for the content, and this vid in particular.
They're brilliant. They're very high on my list of villains too. The Strogg are very close to them too.
damn that was good, you've become the top source of Hale Life lore bar none.
"The first contact was bound to happen. The galaxy, let alone the universe was simply too big for just a singular species to develop intelligence in. Any delay in contact only meant a heightening of the eventual culture shock. In humanity's case, this "culture shock" meant the complete extinction of mankind as it had come to be known."
-The Author, All Tomorrows
All Tomorrows. One of the best pieces of fiction out there.
Fucking mortifying, though (which makes it better)
I've always been scared of the combine empire. They are not a mob guided by a Queen/King, they are not monsters with earthly magic powers, they are just... so alien, so ... human like philosophy...
The simple act of "combining" every conquered world to their liking, learning, exploiting is something you could see in human like strayegy in fiction... scares me
i need you to know how much i appreciate these videos still, don’t stop putting in effort
One more month left for the 20th anniversary of HL2 release.
The recently taken Nova Prospekt prison. About 42 fighters, 23 civilians, 8 scientists, and 1 badass dog. This is the last of us.
47:26 Your end phrase was a masterpiece, I smiled
Compared to the other Combine lore videos trying to explain them, this is probably the most well put together and informative without any over the top personal bias. Great job on putting this video together.
You never fail to put out good videos. You put in such effort and your love for Half Life doesn't seem to ever die. Hope Half Life 3 comes out soon, and when it does, I can't wait to see what you'll make from it. Keep up the amazing work, Skyrionn!
Half-Life 3 could be in the works. We hope anyway. Thanks for being here every week
So... The combine desired localised teleportation?
insane that all they had to do was keep fighting and invading the home of that Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System in order to get it.
(Though I think we can all agree anyone sent into that facility would be absolutely massacred via turrets, goo, neurotoxin, and mashy spike plates.)
Oh I would have loved to see them go up against GLaDOS
''I'm the only one standing between us and THEM"
-GLaDOS
I think aperture was hidden by her so the combine won't find it
I dunno how she'd hide an entire facility but whatevs
@@denifnaf5874 To be honest hiding a facility within what originated as a salt mine isn't too bad. Plus I don't think she even needed to hide it as the entire combine forces would most likely barely be able to break in at all due to the sheer amount of insane defences and weaponry within that facility.
The one captivating thing about the Combine, for me, is that they don't seem "evil".
They don't seem to go out of their way to actually cause someone pain for the sake of causing pain.
I think whoever runs the Combine, the species that started the entire empire in the first place, lack the concept of empathy and remorse, but have limitless ambition.
I think that what they do to the species, while objectively cruel, vicious, vile and evil to us, is nothing that they would consider bad. They seek to expand and the only thing they care for besides that expansion, is its efficiency. And efficiency is worth anything when you don't hold emotions to the cost at which it comes. So while we think turning people into Stalkers for example is an unforgivable cruelty, to them it's probably just recycling a subject that was impacting efficiency in a negative way. Turning something "broken" into something that has its purpose.
A cold and calculated methodology that is made by species that are incapable of holding a moral compass and therefore, use ANY methods that are fit to fullful their ends and they aren't exactly evil for it, because they seem to be incapable to empathize. They lack the same brain structure we do, they aren't like us. They might even think it's doing us a favor. If we rebel, we were inefficient and becoming a Stalker is them giving us an option which we wouldn't be able to have without them and in turn, be "efficient" and play our part.
There's a certain Lovecraftian cosmic-horror aspect to the Combine that goes understated - we hear hints that the Combine have conquered worlds and dimensions so far beyond human understanding, that we are basically nothing to them. It's like if a single village of a couple hundred people in the Australian outback rebelled against the British Empire at its height of power in the early 20th century. Their power is so unfathomably vast they could eradicate us all within minutes if they wanted to. Yet, we still resist, we still choose to fight this control. I think that's the real "lesson" of _Half-Life_ - that the human spirit is utterly indomitable.
But there's a layer of control above even the Combine - the Employers - guiding and nudging events unseen. It's like the Ghoul says in _Fallout_ - "there's always someone behind the wheel".
Also ties in well to the scientific meaning of Half-Life - no matter how often you measure it, there will always be some material left, just like the indomitable human spirit :)
so the G-man is an escaped Shu’ulathoi that had chosen his own form and is twisting fate to see the downfall of the Combine in the future?
This has always been a popular theory and if U go back and listen to the nihilinths voice lines from the first game it kind of reinforces it
The Combine was aware of Earth for some time before their invasion, they just weren't quite able to reach Earth with their portal technology. The Black Mesa Incident, however changed that; enabling the Combine to either pass through Xen to reach Earth or the resonance cascade and/or portal storms as a result created the dimensional conditions necessary for Earth's dimension to accommodate a Combine port directly to their overworld.
Havent even watched it and I know I am going to love it already. Love your content.
Your videos are always so underrated, you put so much effort into making these amazing lore videos and I love them. I can't wait so see what you're gonna do next :)
given enought time aperture could have fought the combine to a stalemate
100%
It would cool if we get a idea of what the original species of the combine is. like a vague description of a low raking average Joe combine but describe like a lovecraftian style that would make the advisors look like pathetic maggots.
I think the qz combine deserve more of an explanation like the "unseen lore" since there is no official explanation on specific things.
Lemme explain
So we know that the combine units deployed in the qz come in the 4 variations, but in the files of there voicelines, its shown that they would use tactics that would emotionally manipulate unfortunate victims, in a scene of HLA it can be heard that the combine grunts are calling out for Alyx pretending to be some sort of friendly, whats interesting for that is that ALL units have voicelines for that specific task as well, which are gone unused.
Going further with the idea of unused voicelines there are the unusued charger voicelines, lines of switching weapons and charging towards the player hence the name, there was a cut feature that would include the charger running at the player while wielding a stunstick to strike the player.
There is still more lore that can be speculated around the grunts from hla as well, from one single death voiceline that cant be heard in game but only seen in the captions, one line the grunt cant say when killed by the player is "im sorry", this fact alongside the other voicelines the grunt has showcases that he is the least augmented like the captain, suppressor, and charger, but enough to complete decent tasks within the quarantine zone.
More hidden lore that can be found is about the workers, theres so much we can speculate from just the scenery and destruction when playing through, you can find dozens of dead grunts and works alongside each other showcasing that covering up the qz is not an easy task, and in some parts you can see them using some sort of device to spray against the xen fauna covering the walls, those tanks that are filled up are seen in the antlion section of the game where its showing antlions being extracted from there sacks right into those said tanks.
Whats interesting about the antlions is that they are all slow and heavy, a lot more bulky than the hl2 variations, this can be supported by the nests that they build which are on the surface of the qz, which means whatever the combine extract from the antlions, they turn that mix into fluids used by the workers to wipe out the xen flora and fauna.
Straying away from all that, the big question is why we dont see any of these soldiers outside the qz and in hl2, well I think tge answer to that is they were deployed somewhere else, by the time hl2 came around, city 17 was probably finished and the only thing they needed was less troops to worry about which is why they only use cps and standard transhuman soldiers, which by that time the city grunts were not needed and the qz units were probably deployed else where in other quarantine zones, I dont believe one bit that the suppressor and wallhammer would evolve into the hl2 soldiers, especially from how effective they are shown in hla.
Now is all that I explained canon? It can be, valve themselves have conflicted with there own lore, but the way I explained things can definitely explain how city 17 and everything would be different the time hl2 comes around, best possibility to make everything in hla canon to exist in hl2 somewhere else in the world.
Another note, cmdrrileysv4000 shows a lot of cut content from hla which could definitely add some more lore to what the combine could've added or already added by just arent seen
Honestly, I genuinely wish the Combine officially became one of the top 10 strongest factions in science fiction. I might sound a bit selfish, but at least I'm expressing my honesty and passion for my favourite antagonist faction of all time.
I think Wallace Breen's quote about indescribable wonders whether carbon stars with sentient fungi and gas giants that are inhabited by vast meteorological intelligence effectively convey the vast scale of the Combine, as these wonders mentioned by Wallace Breen are likely just glimpses and used as examples to highlight the futility of the resistance against the unstoppable force like them, as these mentioned wonders suggest there are countless worlds across the multiple dimensions filled with both imaginable and even unimaginable species and resources that the Combine has conquered and assimilated into their arsenal. Perhaps there are more powerful entities just as powerful as the race, like Nihilanth, if not more so.
Also, I loved your video! I rarely comment on UA-cam videos because I'm an introvert, so I consider this comment one of my brave actions. :)
Edit: I felt unsatisfied with my previous response, so I edited my comment to remove my previous theory.
Ngl falling asleep to this - rewatching / relistening to sleep to again
Philosophy aside, the combine is just a huge multidimensional technological entity trying to survive. Imagine humanity in the eyes of simple creatures, we are super powerful and will destroy entire ecosystems for our own gain.
Trying to survive and being in a constant war campaign are not the same.
@@Pariahmary Is survival not a war in and of itself?
@@Grottogoob bro they're on a fetish quest for technology
@@Pariahmary No argument there, well put!
He sure knows how to yapp for hours to make content in a good way.
That's crazy.. It's reminds me of one leader of Earth who keeps yapping on the screen all day 🤯
Breen was spreading the values of our benefactors. We needed to here those valuable insights
Yessss another Half Life video!! What a great thing to wake up to.
The combine are cruel but there nothing compared to the qu from all tommorows who biologically made humanity into whatever they wanted such as living plants and forced them to stay on the worlds to suffer
I remember hearing some of the stories and illustrations, some super bone chilling (hopefully) fictional futures.
at least the combine’s augmentations were somewhat practical, but the qu were being evil just for the sake of being evil
@@Judgemenlt I feel like intentions are important. I also feel like "good and evil" is a concept that can be easily twisted, the combine probably don’t even understand the human concept of right and wrong and evil and good. On the other hand I feel the Qu were fully aware of their actions.
At least the qu didn't ban sex
@@denifnaf5874 I think the disfigured monstrosities known as "humans" probably lost most of their sex drive, it was probably only done for the sake of procreation
They could very easily be compared in one sense to the Borg of Star Trek lore. It's essentially a conquest and assimilation of all inhabited worlds. A story about the Combine's encounter with the Nihilanth's species would be an interesting exploration.
I really like this new editing style! Nice work as always Skyrionn
Fun fact: in the newspaper of both HL2 and HL:A the Combine used large ships and orbital bombardment against humanity in the 7 hour war.
God i love this long half life lore videos, subbed.
I love this channel
Thanks for being here
25:40 Awesome, thanks for this lore, didn't know that. We do have a place in the union :)
The entire video no annoying "where" but in the end 2 times :D Still a good vid, nice job dude :)
Ohhhh yeah, I’m about to sleep so good to this. Thanks man
I love the Combine so much, I even adopted one of the code names a generic unit can get, Sweeper Zero.
Combine is extremely interesting for me, what they do, how they operate. Tactics, lore, mechanics. I love these fellas. ❤
Thanks for these videos. I always love deep dives into half life lore. Something I always wondered was the original games design of the nihilinth with it having scars and mechanical components grafted to it suggests this story was allready thoroughly planned out.
Also any chance of getting an ichtyosaur deep dive ? They scare the living shit out of me but it's driven to a point of almost obsession
"THEY come from anywhere and everywhere"
-BreenGrub
THEY rule all
Half Life really is a goldmine for a fucking horror anthology, Valve COME OOOOOOOON
Criminally underrated channel
You've become one of my favorite content creators
Skryionn, you absolutely need to do STALKER and Metro, they are both rich with lore, and they are all cool
I have a theory that the combine conquest was initially peacefull for the first couple worlds or even the first few universes
When other races where still almost as advenced as the combine
Way before a civilazation would be an ant in comparison
Those days where long gone by the time they discovered the Nihilanths species hovewer...
Also i think the advisors aren't even at the top
That's how op the universal union is
Interesting theory - anything could have happened in those early years
I don’t think the “Original” Combine race still exists. I’m willing to bet that they are long dead but their empire is so vast that most of their slave races have no idea.
Love your content man, you are amazing as hell, thanks for you and your job man. Wish you all the best.✨
Thanks for watching the videos. I appreciate you! I love putting this stuff together because I love the series
Ok, this is my favorite one so far. The videos about The Combine Lore are the best of this channel IMO.
Glad you like them! Could be more to come
Ur content is so awesome. I like ur story telling and editing!
Thanks for watching it. I love this community.
Good one. Always enjoy a new Half Life lore video from you.
Although I have a feeling you'll get through all possible lore someday soon... :D
Shame they never made a HL3. Or episode 3. Shame for us anyway.
Though I do understand why they didn't want to continue back then. I hope they will, eventually.
Love your lore videos. Thank you for another!
This youtube channel 's work covering Half Life content can be summarized with the following statement:
"The Breen Grub / Epistle 3 was written by Mark Laidlaw. While Mr. Laidlaw no longer works at Valve, and therefore this source can not be considered cannon, let's see what he had to say anyway."
That phrase, or some variation therein, has been in EVERY VIDEO.
Interesting point but my last video didn't mention Breengrub or Epistle 3....
Watched every minute, twice. Keep it up.
Love this video already
Awesome vid! Such great storytelling & analysis… On a related note, does anyone else be gettin’ WEF vibes too?
One would hope we might see some of the adapted creatures rebel in future material, like Overwatch that get memories back and regret or stuff like Gunships acting almost like giant pets to ressistance members who care for them and nurse them back to health.
As to our Base location it's in Nunya, just outside of Business.
Wonderful video, as are all your videos!! Glory to Skyrionn!!!
in the combines alien mind, they could maybe think they are doing us and all the other species they assimilated a good deed
They're helping us in the long run. Praise our benefactors
HL lore from you is an insta like
Love to see it
Bro was like: you know what. No more single video ima make a movie of LOOOOOOOORRRRRRRREEEEEE and the combine
Something I think about from time to time since I like listening to sci-fi e books and a fan of the half-life series is what if two hyperaggressive civilizations such as the Combine and the Qu of the novel All Tomorrows would interact or conquer one another.
The moment the Combine try and go against aperture/GLaD0s will be something nuts.
Always making fire videos!
Sometimes i wonder if the combine exists in our universe, since lets say that the multiverse theory is true, then one day the Combine will come to earth, which is a scary thought
A scary thought
Great video, as always!
“The combine could not penetrate the Shu’ulathoi physically” - Skyrionn 7/10/24
Or 10/7/24 for you Americans.
freakgrub
Ngl i very much feel like epistle 3 undersells the combines might by quite a bit. The combine are a multiversal empire, not only do they have the ability to drain specific worlds they teleport to but they can expand and drain outwards every other world too. As long as they can put citadel components and dark fusion reactors through the initial portal they can endlessly strip more and more worlds and teleport the material back home.
The combine could easily be able to build dyson spheres, heck id argue dyson spheres arent as impressive of a concept as when half life was originally worked on, numerous series have done them with a smaller scale than a multiverse. As a fan of Halo and 40k theyre everywhere for them and those are single universes.
I feel like the combine overworld, alyph, would be something much, much greater, a proper universal construct. When you're draining from countless universes you can build unimaginable things. But that also means you are spread infinitely thin. So we ask how the rebels managed to push back the combine forces, make them desperate? Well because 'the combine' cant be bothered with one world of infinite, the combine forces we see would essentially be bottom of the totem paper pushers, to us annihilation, to the combine? Peons.
That said under such circumstances i can only see the combines expansion and empire as a means to survive entrophy. Cannibalizing other universes to make sure their own doesnt collapse into nothingness.
IM ABOUT TO SLEEP AND SAW THIS UPLOADED FEW HOURS AGO LETS GOOOO
Sweet dreams of The Combine
why do you make 10/10 content
Thank you for making these videos
Thanks for watching them
Love this guy
Love you too
Hey Skrionn just dropped another Banger !
Thanks for watching and being here!
Amazing Video! Please do more!
it's insane that all the effort everyone puts in to be free of the combine in all 3 games, its only a small occupational force they were fighting. mere planet prison guards.
I have heard Half Life 2/The Combine described as "A game where the player is playing a First-Person Shooter, and the enemy is playing Stellaris."
Your Video is of so High quality UA-cam in Germany thinks of it as a Documentary every other video on this feed are German Documenteries
The combine can be use as a antagonist for other video game franchises that involve the multiverse
Fun fact the combine over watch soldiers used to be humanoid aliens that were in those suits. That was the original idea that they were going to go for but then they just made him human augments. For my own sake I like to say that some of them are human augments and I like to say that the soldiers that we see in the game are not human they're kind of like humanoids from other planets and dimensions that are just humanoid soldiers being used as a battle platform. I don't know it just makes it sound cooler to me when you think of it like that. It truly makes them alien like they're some kind of political military enforcer on a planet.
You're doing a fantastic job! Just a quick off-topic question: I have a SafePal wallet with USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (alarm fetch churn bridge exercise tape speak race clerk couch crater letter). What's the best way to send them to Binance?
the scariest part about them is that we only saw in Half Life 2, Episode 2 and Alyx, thats all in one country, they have a Multiverse worth os units.
Personally I would have waited for April 1st, and would have pranked everyone by having the same thumbnail and title but then having the video being about the song Combine Harvester by The Wurzels.
The combine was kept out by glados to prevent them from breaking into aperture
GLaDOS could've beaten them easily
lol 7 hours ago is that a 7 hour war reference?
ALSO WOW 48 MINUTES LORE CRAZY
funny you kept saying "our benefactors"
The greatest of all time! Thank you 🙏🏾
Thanks for watching!
I feel like if valve was planning to wrap up Half-Life episode 3 it would involve Gordon time traveling back to black Mesa incident.
My guess is that The Combine have a grasp on the concept of memory transfer and don't fully understand the idea of cut and paste versus copy and paste. As such, they go from planet to planet to "refine" a species. Taking the ones that are useful and copying their minds to their repository, while the rest get their memories wiped as soldiers are needed or are just left to die out. That's a concept that I wish was explored, a soldier quota, when The Combine lost soldiers, they harvested random citizens to be transformed. So, you' be responsible for the transformation of countless people through fighting them.
The Epistle 3, even if it is not cannon, can take so many turns. Instead of a pointless Kamikaze attack, they could use the ship to travel through space and time to give humanity the technology to prepare for the invasion. Later they could recruit the Nihilanth specie and other species enslaved by the Combine to fight back. This in turn would ironically turn Humanity into the new Combine, starting a civil war between those who wants the power and become conquerors, and those who reject it and know the dire consequences of that. This would only create a new resistance that would fight back, in some sort of cyclic story.
glad you covered these daddies.
They needed covering at one point. Combine Daddies giving us new options for the future of our species.
With fictional settings like this I often find myself wondering what I would do if I was there. As much as I'd love to think I would resist, I don't think I would have the emotional fortitude for it. I'd probably end up in "an eternity's repose". It brings peaceful thoughts, does it not?
An obsession with evolution
Do one for the the G-Man and/or his "Employers"
Humanity may call "The Combine" "The Combine" because the soldiers clone themselves, combine themselves.
You bet your ass I’m smoking my morning joint to this
God bless you skyrionn , you are truly a godsend!
The Combine is like the Covenants in Halo
i vote up and hope youtube won't autoplay this video everytime I finished one like that one before
The Combine are a cosmic horror. Beating them is not a matter of destroying them them, but banish them. Human can never hope to truly "defeat" the Combine, as the Overwatch is not even the true Combine army, its just an local occupation force made of mostly human (well "human") troops.