I got a bit further in HL2:Ep2 today, and it’s been nothing but antlions, antlions, and more antlions. Including a new variant, the acid antlion, and they’ve actually got a decent AI. They’ll try to stick to their strong long-range attack, hide behind obstacles when not firing, and try to sneak up on you if you retreat.

In the middle there was a defend-this-spot battle involving turrets, and it was simultaneously less and more frantic than a similar battle in the original HL2 (at Nova Prospekt). You only have two turrets to take care of this time, they don’t fall down so easily, and you’ve got backup from a couple other NPCs, but things get tense at the end when it’s difficult to avoid being overrun.

I also had a vortigaunt for a companion instead of Alyx for a while, and their shock attack is pretty powerful. After a while all the third-person pseudo-praise you get from him gets a bit discomfiting. “Ah, this seems like a situation for which the Freeman is uniquely suited!” “Um, yeah, thanks…again…”

I hope I’m done with antlions for the rest of the episode, as I’m kind of sick of them now and I’ve completed the web cache achievement and almost got the squish-all-grubs achievement (328 of 333). I’m getting close to that kills-with-thrown-objects achievement, too (26 of 30), which was tough to try for up to this point since there isn’t much to throw around with the grav gun inside the antlion nest.