The story is utter crap
I agree with that, actually.
You are plonked down into the city with no idea whatsoever about what you're supposed to be doing. So you wander at random until you meet up with some dudes, who tell you to go and meet up with them again somewhere else. When you get there, the main dude gets captured, so you set out with his daughter to rescue him from an evil base. When you do so, the girl gets captured for a change, so you set out to rescue
her from an evil base. You find her in the main baddie's evil base and then you make a nuke explode in her face. The end.
That's not a story, that's just random shit happening. You have no goal or objective other than the vague "stick it to the Combine". Initially it looks pretty good, even though they ask you to take a ridiculous and unnecessary detour on foot. But they say that once you get to Black Mesa East they're going to forumulate a plan of action etc etc. But things go pear shaped pretty much the moment you get there and from that point on you spend literally the entire rest of the game rescuing people (and you utterly fail at that, I should add, since all three of you end up in Breens clutches in the end, and it's only due to his incompetence, not your efforts, that you get free again).
The HL series is often lauded for its storytelling. Yes, the seamless
presentation of the story with no cutscenes and no point where you lose control of the character is impressive. But the
story itself that is presented is crap.