The best strategy is crouching behind a rock until the helicopter stops shooting for a second or two, fire a rocket, then duck again.

The cover looks bad (low poly rocks) and plays equally badly.

This is particularly annoying because the skybox in that section of the game is so large: If you miss the helicopter (or didn’t miss but the helicopter decided to push the missile away for no reason), it takes AGES for the rocket to reach the level bounds and despawn, leaving you unable to defend yourself until it finally has.

The rocket launcher’s laser targeting is very sluggish (Half-Life 2’s rocket launcher is way more responsive).

the helicopter’s collisions are TERRIBLE (sometimes rockets just “bounce off” somehow).

I actually really like the RPG, and I feel like it gets a bad rep because it’s introduction (the cliffside helicopter fight) is awful and (in my opinion) possibly the worst part in the game for the following reasons: For instance, it allows you to shoot a rocket and instantly switch to a different weapon before the rocket has reached the target. And yes, there are reasons to use the rocket launcher without laser.

Half life 2 rocket launcher