Spoilers Alert: Half-Life: Alyx Ending , too sentimental?

I don't know about you but manipulating a past dramatic event in the series just to please some fans makes it cheesy for me. Plus the fact that time travel brings only contradictions and inconsistencies to the scenario of a game. I know Half-Life falls into the sci-fi genre but I was happy that until recently they had stayed clear of such concept as time travel. Can we be affected by a dramatic event in the series anymore? Besides, it should have been a much more difficult and costly endeavor to travel in time and for a much bigger purpose; for example, preventing the Resonance Cascade maybe? Not for G-man to do whatever he wants in the universe like it's a piece of cake. He is practically a GOD now. I used to think of Advisors as formidable foes but now it seems to me that they are only a part of scheme, G-man's scheme.
I believe after writer Marc Laidlaw left the studio, they would never be the same.

It was done Episode 1, the Vortigaunts change the ending to Halflife 2 by preventing Gman changing the timeline, which he alludes to in Alyx, vaguely aware of the future. They also power his prison which again links to the opening of Episode 1.

Time as we know it doesn't apply to the Gman, him pre-conceiving events ahead of time was established from the very opening cutscene of Halflife 2 and then later in Episode 2 it's established it was him to created the events of Black Mesa, as well as saving Alyx Vance.

The entire level leading up to him is a distortion of space/time, the only way they could capture Gman was by containing him in a bubble, which meant, the entire building with a prison built around it.

If he can be captured, then he isn't infallible, if anything in Alyx this is the most vulnerable the character has been, he also serves someone in a higher echelon limiting his ability.

This style of story-telling, giving the player some information but withholding the bigger picture has always been standard fare since the series' origin.

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The final sequence with Gordon was basically for the fans, and it delivered.

@uninspiredcup: Still, I'm not convinced. What we saw was definitely a retcon trick from Valve. Retcon is expected in cheap comic book series written for teenagers not a highbrow series like Half-Life.

Time travel elements generally inherently retcon, and it was nothing new in Alyx. So, not really sure what to say here, get the impression you made your decision and nowt gonna change that.

Alyx arguably links Halflife + Halflife 2 better than Halflife 2 ever did and raises Episode 1's weak narrative to something more relevant than a dungeon crawler.

It also has the added reality outside the game of people sitting on their hands for 15 years on a cliffhanger ending with a sequel never to be, which it was addressing, not negating.