Checkpoints! We love them, we have them, we shout at them, we scream for them. Vital or not, checkpoints are here to stay. Moving away from the old days where some of us bums would actually enter a menu and save. I still manually save from time to time, just in case.

One thing I have learned however is that checkpoints piss me off, as well as produce copious amounts of joy! I mean, what if I had happened to not saved after that boss fight? What if this section was really long and I got past 3 quarters of it and died and then had to go back? Indeed, my ass has relied on getting to certain checkpoints for piece of mind. That security that the hard bit is over, lulz.

So what's brought this all on? Well I've gotten frustrated with COD4 single player on vet, trying that last bloody level. After the debocle of the sniper mission and waiting for that damned heli (that took its sweet time) to pick me & my useless comrade up I decided to take a break and play some Half Life 2.

I'll admit it now - I've never really tried to complete a Half Life title. I've wanted to but something shiny would distract me and I'd be off chasing after flowers or some such nonsense. After the complete "success" that is Portal I decided that it's time I took my copy of Orange Box and play through all of the Half Life titles in it. I owe it to Valve and to myself. I started my HL2 game and so far it was going really well, really interesting, beautiful graphics and I really understand why everyone has a nerdgasm when a HL title is released.

To get back to the topic of checkpoints, I've got to this section in HL2. I'm wading around in this river (early in the game) and met some of the underground people's. I get to this tunnel area and saw above some guards. I shoot at them and they go running off somewhere, so I continue to venture through these tunnels and the next area is a small, room with deep water and a gate. I head towards the gate which on closer inspection wont let me through. I look up and I see guards throwing in flammable barrels, oh shi--- it blows up! Ripping a hole, I much needed, in the gate and giving me a bit of a burn leaving me with 5hp left (the bastard).

I think nothing of it and walk out of the tunnel, I hit a barrel near some wooden bridge and get 2 guys out. Take out another on the ground and I found a small medi pack which I used. Walked around and another guy dropped down, killed him, took out a wooden bridge and then made my way towards there. OH SHI-- 2 guards owned me. Each time they get me, so I thought "I know, I'll just go back to my manual save point and not get owned by the before mentioned barrels".

Wait.

My manual save?

Overwritten by an auto one just after I get hit by the barrels...

but..

wha???

You bastards!

I really felt like a Half Life marathon but this has kind of kicked it in the balls. I suppose if I really tried hard I could get past those two guards, but getting rid of the first 2 with only 5 hp and trying not to get hit was a challenge in itself. Why the HELL would the game save there? I mean, they must of know lots of stupid people (like me) would of just walked into that flaming barrel trap! Why auto-save just after? I mean, who the fuck thought that was funny!?!!?

I'm of to whine and cry now.