Q4 actually looks rather nice in motion, I think (based on the Gamespot video review, anyways). It really isn't impressive in shots, but I don't think it is nearly as ugly as people are suggesting.
I actually think it looks better than FEAR in a number of ways (which has some seriously blocky level designs, it seems). FEAR relies almost entirely on textures and texture effects to achieve its visuals, and I don't really support that approach...
Technically, I guess it is behind, but Half-Life 2 looks a whole lot better than either of these games.