Both the Giant Bombcast and the Giant Beastcast last week spent a little bit of time talking about the recent Half-Life 2 episode 3 synopsis that Marc Laidlaw posted on his site and the both then made the point that Valve really has painted itself into a corner with the Half-Life franchise, because Half-Life 1 & 2 have set expectations are so high that any new main entry into the franchise has to redefine the FPS genre in order for it to not be a disappointment to the fans.

I found the idea of needing to make a game that redefines the FPS genre a interesting thought experiment. So I thought I'd post the question here.

If you were given free reign to lead the development of Half-Life 3, what would you do to make the game as genre redefining as the the first two?

I would have made it Half Life episode 3 all those years ago. It would've been just like the previous episodes, but just a narrative conclusion to the series. This way no one would anticipate it for years and get their hopes up for something amazing.