Every gamer has an origin story, and mine is Half-Life. It was the first game I ever properly played, and somewhere I have still got the t-shirt to prove it. Faded to within an inch of its life now, but I am not letting it go.
Looking back, it is wild how much it got right in 1998. No cutscenes yanking control out of your hands, just Gordon Freeman, a crowbar and a research facility going catastrophically wrong around you in real time. That slow tram ride into Black Mesa before everything breaks is still one of the great openings in games. And the headcrabs still live rent-free in my nightmares.
Hundreds of games later, it is still the one that started it all. Funny how a crowbar and a hazard suit can set the course for a lifelong habit.