Now that's a quote I want to see on a movie poster: "Kind of molesty in parts, but interesting..." -Vector
My HL2 rage has mostly subsided, I've finished Ep. 1, and I've gotten well-underway in Ep. 2. and I'm enjoying myself for the most part. I'm glad to see that the devs have seen the error of their ways and have made the flashlight MUCH more friendly, rather than being on a 30 second timer and then needing to wait 15 seconds to recharge AND stealing from your running energy while it's at it, it's been divorced from the auxiliary energy into it's own separate energy bar that lasts for a 2 or so minutes and recharges in a few seconds flat, which is way better.
AND while I want to say "Close, but no cigar Valve. That's a pointless mechanic and shouldn't even be a concern for the player, just give them a fucking infinite flashlight already and be done with it." it doesn't cause enough hiccups in gameplay to be detrimental to enjoyment, and it's KINDA SORTA like the blink meter in SCP: Containment Breach in creating atmosphere, something I enjoyed about that game.
Also, it's feeling increasingly like Gordon is no longer made of wet paper, and can actually take a few hits, but that may just be me getting better at the game after my long long respite.
What I'm happy with is that I get to another Survival Gauntlet section of the game, and it has awesome music and best of all, turrets! I love using turrets so much, I don't know how much I love just cradling it in the clasp of my gravity gun like it's a baby that shoots bullets out of it's mouth instead of crying. What I'm not happy with is that the game decides to make them explode on me for the obvious purpose of preventing me from carrying one through the rest of the game. Goddamnit game, just let me do what I want instead of going out of your way to ruin my fun, now I have to carry this gnome around with me some more.