i was worried this was gonna feel too derivative when i heard half life sound effects at the start but honestly? i'm pleasantly surprised
the combat manages to be both stressful and still fun, the experience of desperately running around trying to reload your shells and forgetting to cock the shotgun when you're about to shoot was great, and i enjoyed having to time your hits with the melee weapon while still trying to dodge out of the way and maneuver through the cramped space using only your memory, it's a good combination of pre-planning and thinking on the fly
the enemies that charge at you but slow down if you shoot them are well designed, they absolutely destroy you if you panic but they're not that bad if you just calm down and aim (which i think makes a lot of sense for this type of game)
the boss feels like you're trying to balance keeping your distance while navigating the environment, making sure you have enough ammo, and actually doing enough damage to the boss (this is a good thing, i enjoyed it) - i ended up landing on the strategy of killing the crawler asap and then trying to avoid the leg guys, which was very fun
my main gripe with this game is still the sound effects (and, honestly, the memes at the start, though they could still contribute to a more lighthearted tone if that's what you're going for) - the game ends up feeling insecure about its own premise with the references to half life and i feel like it can stand on its own
it could also use a story, but honestly, combined with the memes, "you get home and there's a bunch of weird zombies you gotta kill" ends up somehow working as a good backdrop for the gameplay. i'm not sure how that would scale to a longer 3-4 hour game, which i think would be the ideal playtime for this personally (assuming you add more bosses and expand on the combat in the next sections, maybe with more weapons that have neat reloading mechanics, like a single shot bolt action hunting rifle or something)
i'd be very interested in playing through a full game that had a few hours of content if you decide to keep working on this, it's really fun