Game Theory: Gaming's Biggest Mystery SOLVED! | Half Life G MAN Theory

(whoosh) (MattPat's creepy voice) Rise and shine, loyal theorists. Get up and. . . shine. It's not that I mean to imply that you've been sleeping at work, watching your videos about fidget spinners and Jake Paul. Well, let's say your time has come. . . Again, to wake up, theorists. Wake up and smell the ashes. (MattPat's usual cheerful voice) Hello, Internet! Welcome to Game Theory, the show where I inadvertently piss off fandoms of

game

s I'm genuinely a fan of, slowly alienating myself as a

game

r from franchise after franchise, all except Mario games for some reason. Apparently I can say whatever I want about him!

Anyway, the one sector of the Internet I hope I don't anger today is the "Half-Life" community as I try to solve what may be one of the oldest mysteries in all of

gaming

: Who is G-Man? "I apologize for what must seem like an arbitrary imposition. I trust it will all make sense to you over the course of... well, I'm not really at liberty to say." But I'm G-Man! It's about fifteen minutes, about fifteen minutes (and twelve seconds). Now, since people born on the day the original "Half-Life" came out turned eighteen last year, chances are many of you have only been exposed to this masterpiece of a franchise through "Half" memes. -Life 3 Confirmed".

Let me quickly bring you up to speed on the series and why this guy is so endlessly fascinating and has kept gamers scratching their heads for decades. "Half-Life" puts you in the shoes of Gordon Freeman, an MIT graduate with THE most absurd doctoral thesis title imaginable. (he takes a deep breath) Yes! First time! One and done, baby! Yeah, for a guy who doesn't talk throughout the entire series, he talks a lot. Anyway, Gordon starts a new job at the Black Mesa research facility and experiences THE worst first day of his

life

when the team accidentally opens a door letting in hordes of murderous aliens.

Looks like someone has a bad case of Mondays! You, as Gordon, have to go to the alien dimension, known as Xen, to close whatever is keeping these portals open. After fighting your way through hundreds of enemies and killing a LITERAL testicular monster, you finally come face to face with the big bad: Xen's leader, the Nihilanth, a giant, three-armed, floating fetus monster that he holds open the portal. . You do what you were trained to do in graduate school when you first encounter intelligent alien

life

: SHOOT UNTIL I'M DEAD! As the battle ends, you pass out, but when you come to, you're face to face with this guy.

We never hear his name spoken aloud, but clever players found that he is referred to as "the G-Man" in the game's code, a name Valve later confirmed. He explains that he and his mysterious employers now have control of Xen and congratulates you for everything you've done. "The border world, Xen, is under our control for the moment, thanks to you. That was a pretty nasty job you did there. I'm impressed." The game ends when he offers you a new job, working for him and his employers. He accepts the offer and he will put you in stasis until he needs you again. "That's why I'm here, Mr.

Freeman. I have recommended his services to my... employers (takes a deep breath) and they have authorized me to offer him a job." If you refuse, he will teleport you to a room full of Xen aliens for you to beat them to death, but this is the craziest thing... although this is the first time he talks to you in the game, if you've been paying attention. , he has been silently watching you from corners the entire time, from places out of your reach, and it was HERE where the

mystery

of the G-Man was born. Players had years, YEARS, to contemplate who this character was, and with "Half-Life 2" featuring him playing an even bigger role, the questions began to pile up.

Who are his employers? How can you explain his strange voice and his strange powers? Why is his character model so much uglier than everyone else's? And today, after analyzing all the evidence, ALL the expansion packs, ALL the hidden history, the conclusion I have reached will blow your mind. Are you ready for this? After decades of waiting, I found out that G-Man is Sans! Wait wait wait! Don't hit the "Dislike" button! Obviously, I'm just joking, obviously. The reason I bring it up, besides making fun of that

theory

, is that it's worth noting that G-Man possesses similar powers to Sans.

He appears to have the ability to teleport as he can disappear without warning. You will often also see him move in one direction, but then he will appear in front of you in some way. He has telekinetic powers and we even see at the end of "Half-Life 2" that he can stop time. "Is it time, Dr. Freeman? Is it really that time again?" He appears and disappears for miles in seconds, and between the first game and the second he places Gordon Freeman in stasis outside of time. G-Man plays with the laws of space and time like a fiddle, and this is important as it gives us our first clue as to who this guy really is. "Half-Life 2" begins twenty years after the events of "Half-Life 1" with a creepy monologue from G-Man to Gordon implying that it's time for him to get his job back.

In the twenty years since you were placed in stasis, another alien civilization has invaded Earth, this time known as the Combine. The Combine is tough! According to the game's lore, they turned Earth's entire military into dust (boom!) in just seven hours, and we learn that Nihilanth and his warriors from "Half-Life 1" have been driven from their home. . planet and we were hiding in Xen from these guys. So, considering that G-Man explicitly states that he and his employers are in control of Xen at the end of "Half-Life 1", that must mean that he is then a representative of the Combine.

Good? No! The Combine are amazing and a military force to be reckoned with, but they are bad at one thing: teleportation. Well, teleportation and apparently stopping a science nerd carrying a crowbar, but whatever. A major plot point of "Half-Life 2" is that the Combine, while powerful, cannot teleport within a dimension. (bleep) Sure, they can teleport BETWEEN dimensions, but once they're in local space, they have to move using normal means: trains, cars, planes, and spaceships. But as we've seen, G-Man has no problem with Dr. Who. Additionally, in "Half-Life 2", any NPCs who are allied with the anti-Combine rebellion will not attack the G-Man (ding!), while those who are pro-Combine will (whoosh!).

So G-Man is the enemy of the Combine, right? Well, it's not so clear. In the DLC (sorry, I mean the "Expansion Pack", the DLC didn't exist back then). In the expansion pack, "Half-Life Opposing Force", G-Man is seen rearming a nuclear bomb that eventually destroys Black. Mesa, the same nuclear bomb that your character had just defused, and if that weren't strange enough, it's this explosion that draws the attention ("Metal Gear" alert sound) of the Combine first, who then target Earth for their next invasion. So, G-Man is an enemy of the Combine and it turns out that he is the person who calls them to Earth in the first place.

And this points to another key characteristic of this character: his role as chess master. The G-Man is all about making small moves that have disastrous long-term effects. In "Half-Life 2: Episode 2" we learn that he gave the crystal to Black Mesa, causing all the events of the first game to happen. He launches a nuclear bomb at the exact moment that triggers a hostile alien invasion. Instead of awakening Gordon Freeman when the Combine first attacks, he waits twenty years for the precise moment when Gordon's return would perfectly galvanize humanity to create a successful armed uprising that ultimately destroys the local Combine presence.

So all told, to find G-Man, we need to find something that can teleport, manipulate time, possesses deep knowledge of how future events fit together, and is an enemy of the Combine. And when you look at all of these traits, they describe them perfectly. . . a Nihilanth, a creature of the same species as the final boss of the first game. Yeah! My

theory

is that G-Man, one of the most mysterious characters in video game history, is a creature related to the space fetus from the first game. Let's go through the list. As we covered previously, all of Xen's creatures in "Half-Life" were fleeing the Combine in fear after that species took over his home planet.

So everyone is motivated by revenge, and since they can't defeat the Combine on their own, setting up an elaborate plan in which human resistance fighters take down the Combine is a good alternative strategy. Like G-Man, Nihilanth is shown to also have the power to create and manipulate local teleportation portals, as we see during the final battle against him. We also know that all Xen creatures can manipulate time and space. The Vortigaunts, a peaceful alien species enslaved by the Nihilanth in "Half-Life 1," are shown to have the same powers as the Nihilanth species, only weaker versions of those powers: teleporting, manipulating space, and even existing outside of time. .

In "Half-Life 2", there is an incredibly well-hidden cave that houses what is known as the Singing Vortigaunt. This guy is like Exposition-Dump Central, but one interesting thing he says is this: the word "adjacent" means "existing at the same time." So this proves that the of time for twenty years. It's also worth noting that when the Vortigaunts unite his powers, they can stop G-Man's plans, preventing him from contacting you and teleporting you away from his command at the beginning. "Half-Life 2: Episode 1." "We'll see". . . "This is an essential detail because the Vortigaunts have been enslaved by Nihilanths in the past, so of course they would oppose any plan G-Man has.

But perhaps most important of all, as I said before. When you refuse to work with him at the end of "Half-Life 1", G-Man teleports you to a room full of aliens you spent killing during the game, which is the exact same thing Nihilanth does to you during the final battle against him. him. Now, I'm sure some of you must be confused. How can I say that this thing, the thing you kill at the end of the first game, is literally the same as seeing this creature die? It's actually easy. Canonically there is more than one Nihilanth. Although the game acknowledges that this Nihilanth, the final boss of "Half-Life 1", this species has been hunted to near extinction. the story of "Half-Life", there have been others.

When asked if the Vortigaunts or Nihilanth had ever been captured by the Combine before "Half-Life 2", Marc replied that: So we know that precursors to the Nihilanth species exist. But it gets deeper. Listen to this. (distorted noise) Did you hear it? "Another one is coming. Another one is coming." That's the Nihilanth speaking telepathically to Gordon in the first game. Here, listen to it again. The Nihilanth, while telepathically communicating with you in "Half-Life 1", openly says that there is another one out there. "Another one is coming." But keep going. Another of his lines is: This is a clear allusion to the G-Man, but why is it significant?

From the species name of this creature, "Nihilanth". Everything we need to know is hidden in the name. "Nihil", from the Latin literally meaning "none" or "nothing", and "anth", from the Greek "anthropo" meaning "man". His name, "Nihilanth", nihil-anth, literally means "no man". In one fell swoop, we are told outright that G-Man is not a man. He is nihil-anth. Oh yeah! And here's the trick, such a minute detail but it brings all this together. Check out this, “Nihilanth,” featuring vocals from Michael Shapiro. "G-Man", voiced by Michael Shapiro. G-Man is actually voiced by the same actor as Nihilanth's boss.

There is nothing clearer than that. By the way, I've been joking about this this entire episode, but Nihilanth looks like a human fetus. Is it too much to assume that a version of him or a precursor species could disguise himself as a droopy-faced human? Also, notice that Xen aliens tend to have this weird third vestigial arm right in the middle of their chests, the same place where G-Man constantly plays with his tie. Tie or disguised arm? Okay, let it go, Matt. You're starting to dip into Sans-is-Nes territory again. I should have stopped at the voice actor part.

Suffice to say, "Half-Life 3" may never be confirmed. It's a meme that I sadly suspect will never come true, as Valve is too busy printing money with Steam and hat-based microtransactions. This one is literally valued at $12000. Just say'. So, without any major revelations or additional clues in thehorizon, I think this might be the closest we get to a final answer. And if you're a member of the "Half-Life" community and this theory bothered you, remember that at least I care about trying to resolve this part of the story, unlike the people who created the game who will keep you hanging. for eternity, or have no answer at all.

I mean, take it again Marc Laidlaw, the head writer I mentioned earlier, who has gone on record saying that he himself "doesn't believe in canon." So keep that in mind. And with that, I think it's time. "Is it really that time again? It seems like you just arrived." Yes, G-Man, it's time... it's time to remind everyone that it's all just a theory, a game theory! Thanks for watching. "(gasps) Instead of offering you the illusion of free choice, I will take the liberty of choosing for you." Subscribe. Listen to the G-Man. He'd smash that subscribe button for you if it weren't for his tiny, strange, vestigial baby arms. do it, he hits the subscribe button in the next five seconds and then comment below what other classic game franchise you want me to cover.

I'm getting off." (steps)