So no Half Life 3?

Eh. As far as I'm concerned, a Combine snuck up behind Gordon and shot him at the end of Episode 2, thus ending the story. I long since stopped caring about what becomes of the characters. Sure, I'd like Half Life 3, if only to watch the internet explode with excitement. But I'd be just as happy with Valve coming out and saying "No, we have no plans for Half Life 3 at this time".

Hell, just have somebody film Gabe Newell putting on a Gordon costume and running around his office with a crowbar for a bit. Boom, there's Half Life 3. Throw in an exclusive Dota courier and a TF2 hat for good measure.

I am not waiting for Half Life 3, like I am waiting for the new football season for example, but I am looking forward to it. I have a feeling it will come out some day and that it will be the best game ever made.

i dunno man- i suggest you look into their VR work. for one, consider watching will and norm's impressions of the thing- considering how much time those two have spend with other VR prototypes, it's hard not to be excited for valve's work. and from what i understand, their lighthouse tracking technology is completely novel.

also- how many people have actually listened to the source material? it's patently clear that valve's own impression of what valve is- couldn't be further from "the game developer that made half-life." their identity is changing, and the problems they're finding intellectually stimulating are not narrative conclusions to traditional games. that might be a bummer for some- but i'd rather them work on things they are deeply invested in than put out a halfhearted sequel due to some misconstrued sense of obligation to a fanbase.

and the idea that it'd be preferable for them to farm it out to some other dev is ridiculous, at least to me. who would you give it to? and is the narrative of half-life really so compelling that it demands a conclusion? sometimes the best work goes unfinished- and serialized work is often bungled in the final moments.

Kind off. Except Nintendo still releases games and attempts things. Also as a publisher they still find various games/new ip's. Granted Nintendo actually has a console platform to support. But still. I can forgive Bethesda (the developer not the publisher) for not releasing many other games besides Elder Scrolls/Fallout because when those main entries come every 5 years they usually worth playing.

But since launching Steam Valve has really cut down the number of games they release, and as PC gaming has gained more and more hype, and indie games have gained so much push Valve has basically just said "screw making games." All they do now is explore weird ideas. On one hand that is really cool, we get fresh things. But I'd like to see them take that approach and actually make games with weird ideas. They would be one of the only devs with the budget to make AAA games that are different. I feel like they are leaving people out to dry a bit at times. Especially considering how many talented devs they have on staff.

The only part of Half-Life that I liked was the Gravity Gun and Valve's already done more interesting things with a puzzle-solving gun in Portal. And for my money, Portal's also got a better story.

Did you guys forget? We already know how Half-Life ends.

I think this may be it, so if you haven't checked, check it out I suppose.

You should watch it on YouTube if you like timestamps.

Valve should focus on Shenmue 3 first! It's been way too long since they've released a Shenmue game. What's the deal?

Psst Half Life 3 is never coming out. Spoilers.

Like I said, it's fine to be angry or upset or whatever. I really liked those games, and closure would be cool, but some people in this thread have been using words like "owe" and "debt" and "obligation," which is just gross self-entitlement.

This,

I guess I don't care anymore. Other games have done it better since

With the announcement of a new engine, the next logical step is a game announcement on the tech.

I always said to friends if Half-life 3 is going to come, it would be on the new Source engine. The game design of HL2 at this point is so dated, i'm not sure Valve could please everyone. If Gordon somehow got his hands on a portal gun or tech, that would be enough. The combat potential of portals and the gravity gun can only be great.

I'm not personally bothered, but it is from here on that I would finally expect some solid news. I'm not sure if this quote counts, but their inability to just say 'no' is either down to sillyness or because they would just be lying if they did.

I won't lie, I really want a half life 3. But the thing is that I'm not really bothered if they don't come out with it, my beef is that they are so BLATANTLY EMPTY with the answers that they give us of whether or not its coming out. JUST GIVE US AN ANSWER ALREADY. TELL US YES. TELL US NO. Don't keep dangling this "we are not sure but maybe but no promises" type of answers above our heads. Some gamers really want a real conclusion to the Half-life story and really enjoyed the game play of it. I personally liked the part where you defend yourself against Antlions in EP2.

If Valve is a company that doesn't want to make games anymore then they should say so, though it would be really sad if they did. I really hope they do keep making games and stray away from hardware because most of their games are pure fucking gold IMO. The hardware they are working on is honestly nothing that innovative. VR is already being done by Oculus so really its a race to see who does it better. Nobody really understands what Steam Machienes are and if they are really worth the price they want them for, and the controller, though intriguing, I feel is being over hyped. All they did was replace a Joystick with a track pad and add some buttons on the bottom (I think).

Ok, rant over.

hate to break it to ya chief, but that's akin to asking for a release date. the reason they're non-committal is clearly they're interested in returning to the IP- just not anytime soon. you're never going to get that kind of closure- they'll get to it when they feel like it. and right now they don't feel like it.

again, i'd suggest listening to the podcast. it really fleshes out the reasoning for why valve is the way it is today.

They're actually working on Half-Life 5 right now. HL3 and 4 are complete and in the Steam architecture, but people haven't bought enough Steam games yet to unlock them.

Well, you know what you have to do.

That statement is as vague as they come, so who knows what actually will happen? At this point I'd be fine with HL3 never coming out, even though I'd prefer if it did come out (at least if it managed to bring a suitable conclusion to the story).

I'm a big fan of Half-Life, I would love to play HL3, but at this point I hope they never do another HL game, or if they do I hope it sucks just to kill of the hope for any more HL.

Not because I wouldn't want the game, but because you can't trust Valve. HL3 would just be another awesome game that left you wanting more from a company who doesn't deliver more. Amazon might as well own the IP. Valve is just a retailer now, with far more interest in bean-counting than games. HL's value to them is free publicity, the legacy of HL serves them better than trying to live up to the legacy.

@fisk0: Half Life was not a mod of Quake, it used the same engine modified.

Counter-Strike and TF2 were mods created from their own games that they capitalized on. If you think about, it they have not had an original idea since Portal. Dota 2 is based off a mod from another company's game and their VR stuff is basically another Oculus.

If they don't want to make any more Half-Life games or any other original IP's again than fine. But it's a huge bummer that they keep talented designers and writers on staff for nothing instead of letting them work their creative muscles.

People acting surprised that there's still interest in Half Life 3 is more annoying than people always asking about Half Life 3.

Also this is a bit of depressing news. I just wonder what Valve is doing with all that time and money. If it's just VR, I'll be really bummed out.

Just because the Half-Life series may not carry on in game form does not mean it doesn't exist in my fan fiction.

Anything they make will be a disappointment anyway. If it was just a game that came out soon after teh other that woudl be one thing...but now there has been this build up of expectations that are beyond a game.

@monkeyking1969: This excuse feels very lazy to me. People are excited about it so why bother? A few people being disappointed shouldn't scare off a company like Valve from completing a story.

If they can't microtransact it like DOTA they aren't interested in it anymore. They want obsessive audiences they can bleed dry over years, not fans who will play the game once and really like it.

I'm pretty sure they're working on Left For Dead 3. It's a nice arcade-y thing to stretch the Source Engine 2's legs with before making less casual stuff.

I won't believe it when I don't see it.

I'm on two minds on this, on one hand I really want more games from the brilliant minds that brought us Portal 1 and 2. On the other hand If those brilliant minds really wanted to make more games they could just get up and leave, so they must be staying with Valve for a reason. I respect Valve for not flooding the market with the same money making cash cow every year. But something smaller once in a while, in the spirit of the first Portal would at least show us that there is something going on besides Steam, Dota, TF2 and Counter Strike.

@mx said:

lol, that's exactly what's been happening, though. The exodus of talent over the last few years is quite staggering when you look at it.

I personally can't imagine what it must be like to be a creator at Valve. Having your passion project hinge on the whim of whether or not other people feel like working must be a total nightmare.

Yeah, I was hoping something to push game devs to start really considering Linux for steam boxes. Wait and see maybe something winter..... sigh.

39:49- that's the timestamp, and it tells you all you need to know.

Bingo. All reports of Valve seem to be a free form place where people can do a bit of what they want. If they want to experiment on stuff they can. However the lack of deadlines, and structured formed teams means that very little actually gets done. To me this is a perfect case of a world where one extreme isn't the answer to the other extreme. Does it suck that publishers like Activision grind their developers to the bone and push out sequel after sequel with low development time? Yep, but the answer isn't to remove everything that they do. You need a middle ground. Indy devs struggle with this but the need for income as they are usually rather poor forces them to actually release a product. A lot of the times their passion projects end up being great too, and while like any creator of course they would of wanted more time on it, they still can move on to other passion projects.

Again, Valve seems like the most pretentious company right now. The "fuck you we are rich and we are doing whatever we want" except for of course have any sort of structure, teams, or any sort of actual game announced or in development. If some of Valves future ideas like the Steam Box, their VR or whatever else crazy they may be tinkering with doesn't hit, one of these days Valve is going to look in the mirror and wonder what they did with all their good faith. Just because Steam is good (most of the time, it still has so much wrong with it) doesn't mean they get a free pass. We want games Valve. It's time to deliver. It isn't just about Half Life 3 anymore either.