If you liked Half Life 2 then Episode 2 will probably make you very happy.  Personally I found Episode 2 to be another example of a poorly paced game with a few good boss type battles that will keep you from moving on to your next game.  Technically the game looks good and has some interesting environments but most of the game you are running down narrow corridors shooting dump AI.

This time around you have more puzzles, more driving and more running down tight hallways.  The driving level is fairly short this time but a confrontation at the end of the game really makes you fully understand why vehicle controls suck in Half Life 2.  I'm guessing that the driving portion must be better on the PC but on the 360 controller using one analog stick to control speed and direction is really horrible.  One only has to look at how driving the Worthog in Halo for how to control a vehicle in a console FPS.  The driving portion almost ruins the final battle but it's just too good to screwup. 

You can tell that Episode 2 was not developed inside of a vacuum.  The early levels in Episode 2 are typical FPS game play where you are in an abandoned mine.  You first off baddies that look like they came straight out of Starship Troopers.  This level is capped by a nice battle where you hold back the Antlion attack at a five tunnel intersection to protect Alyx.  Eventually you get to the car level which is thankfully short (must of hard the complaints).  There is one  good ground confrontation that introduces you to the Hunters, a smarter and tougher enemy foe.   These guys actually dodge your bullets.  The addition of these guys to the game is a good move since they are tough to kill and add to the complexity of the game.  The final battle of the game is a full scale attach that feels a bit more like Halo 3 then the rest of the game.  You are out in the open attacking several Striders (think very, very tall alien robot)  where you drive out to fight them.  The Hunters are a pain in the but in this fight but running them over is very effective.

I'm not really hooked anymore on the story since it really isn't that interesting.  There are several unanswered and some new ones have been raised at the end of the game.  I'm very detached from the story right now.   Half Life 2 is the perfect example of a game I would not have kept playing if it weren't for achievements.  Sure there are some really good encounters and the puzzles are a bit refreshing but still the pace of the game is too slow.  Often I wanted to just take the disk out and sell it to Gamestop for Call of Duty 4 or maybe Assassin's Creed. Well now that I've competed Episode 2 I can do just that.