If it makes you feel any better, not only have I not played HL1 or HL2 (which I own via Orange Box), but I only just started playing Quest for Glory 4, which I've owned since it came out.

This means that you played the game almost 4 year after it was released. What you need to understand is that when HL2 was released the gameplay was nothing but dull, and the engine innovations (graphics and physics) were top notch.
The fact that it's even in the discussion with games like Bioshock, ME2, and Uncharted which all were released in the last couple of years speaks volumes to how good HL2 really is.
The HL games, especially 2, are about the experience. Most plots are old and hackneyed by now. HL2 was the first game which felt on par, in terms of pacing, action, pathos, production value etc, to a really good movie. That's why it is was, and still is, one of the standout achievements in gaming IMO - it transcends the standard video game formula, and makes a great argument for games as art. And it was the first one to do it.

I'm with aliasalpha. I think the HL2 games are good, but still overrated. Reading all these comments makes me wonder if I missed all kinds of incredible stuff in the games while I played, because I don't remember anything really blowing me away

That's another one I've gotta play through. Plus Brood War of course. Then of Warcraft III and Frozen Throne. Also I've yet to play Lord of Destruction, and Diablo II needs to get the everliving crap replayed out of it.

I took that into coonsideration, I can remember what things were like at the time and how blown away I was by other games of the era, one of the main reasons I never got it in the first place was because of how underwhelmed I was by it. I liked the shiny effects and all but based on seeing the gameplay I wasn't impressed

This reminded me of the xkcd comic:
http://xkcd.com/606/

I still spend about three nights a year, every year going back to HL2 and completing it. Don't really know why, guess its got some kind of mind control going on over the music. of course it could also be seeing soldiers flipping off the cliff when you send explosives their way as well too

Heh... :) Add Diablo to the list here too.

That's funny, that's the exact same place I "fell off" Ep2 as well. Still haven't bothered to go back and complete it.

Well, i've never finished ELITE... so i'm like late as f.. ;P
Anyway i have one of my "i'm late" stints [is that the correct word?] years ago. I had this awesome game called Space Quest 1, the SCI version. I've already finished SQ2&3, and i wanted to finish this one too.
For years i couldn't play it, because it required a VGA card, and adding Hercules drivers from different Sierra games didn't work well [it hanged after 1 screen]. Anyway, i finally got myself that VGA card with a new shiny 80286AT, and started playing the game, soon to find that it has a nasty copy protection requiring a manual [i only had the original 1.2MB 5'25" disks, and i still do!]. So i replayed the part from the beginning up to the moment where Roger blasts off in a stolen/bought ship from Kerona a zillion times. A ZILLION TIMES. And then i found this little magnet thing, which was not covered in the only available solution in Poland [in the Secret Service issue #03 magazine], and found out You can cheat Your way out of the slot machine on Kerona. I was proud as hell, i found something that the "gods at SS" did not. So i wrote them a postcard for the "Tips & Tricks" section. The problem was, it was already...
...march 1996.
From more modern stuff, i can shamelessly admit, i've never finished Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, or any other [A]D&D RPG for that matter.
And, the crown jewel of shame.:
I've never finished Fallout 2 [farthest i went was New Renp], or any Ultima game, or Jagged Alliance 2 [i've conquered every city, and did all quests, and stopped at the gates of Meduna - the capital, the save is still on my disk, but i think, as usual i'll start all over again]. Actually, that's the problem i have with those games, i start them, abandon in the middle, and start from the beginning again after a year.
How's that for late?:D

I've never played Half-Life so I'm even farther behind.
It's on my games-to-play list though. :P

I think it's all about feel. Like with Deus ex or Bloodlines. You feel it or don't. And that is all the difference.

And this is why I was so impressed. I think the most modern game I played before Half-Life 2 was, wait for it... Doom 3. I kept myself behind by not having a top notch machine, money or any real want to play these new pieces of ass that are coming out every Saturday tea time.
And to add to that, I only finished Doom 3 in January of this year.
I just don't play modern stuff, it all seems bland and uninteresting to me. I need story and Half-Live delivered that through movie-like techniques; all through your own eyes...

There's plenty of modern stuff with a story if you take the time to dig through the mountains of turds for the 2-3 diamonds released every year. It's been the same way since the start of the gaming industry, granted in the 80s & 90s there were more good games but there were a proportionately larger amount of shit games, in effect you were digging through mountains twice as high with the hope of finding 4-6 diamonds (but these ones made a tinny PLING noise when you picked them up, it WAS the 80s...)

I haven't actually finished HL1 or 2. I keep meaning to but the first parts of both games are the most boring shit I have ever played, so I gave up. I'll probably trudge through the games this summer though.