Valve cofounder Gabe Newell suggests studio has gone through numerous "twists and turns" to bring unannounced game to market; remaining silent on project is optimal for gamers.
Valve has yet to confirm it is working on Half-Life 3, but company boss Gabe Newell appears to have provided an update on the project. Speaking to Seven Day Cooldown in a podcast interview, Newell said unexpected development issues have kept the studio from opening up on the game.
After asking for a status update for a game all Valve fans have been clamoring for, the interviewer queried Newell, "When can we expect the release of Ricochet 2?"
Newell laughed at this, and spoke of Ricochet 2, a title not likely in development, and more believably a code name for Half-Life 3.
"In terms of Ricochet 2, we always have this problem that when we talk about things too far in advance," Newell said, "we end up changing our minds as we're going through and developing stuff, so as we're thinking through the giant story arc which is Ricochet 2, you might get to a point where you're saying something is surprising us in a positive way and something is surprising us in a negative way, and, you know, we'd like to be super transparent about the future of Ricochet 2."
Newell added that Valve's silence on Half-Life is actually in the best interest of gamers.
"The problem is, we think that the twists and turns that we're going through would probably drive people more crazy than just being silent about it, until we can be very crisp about what's happening next," he said.
Laughing at the continued referencing of Ricochet 2, Newell said, "Nope. Everybody who's been working on Ricochet 2 continues to work on Ricochet 2."
Valve developed the original Ricochet, which was released in 2000. It is a futuristic action game presently available for $5 on Steam.
The most recent Half-Life game was 2007's Half-Life 2: Episode Two. That game advances the story of previous entries Half-Life 2 and Half-Life 2: Episode One. A third episode was planned, but has not seen the light of day.
Eddie Makuch (Mack-ooh) is a News Editor at GameSpot. He works out of the company's Boston office in Somerville, Mass., and loves extra chunky peanut butter.
@SpyLiam lol so true, then they just start doing 2.1, 2.2, 2.4 (no 2.3...jk) but i do have to say ive been playing the half life series since i was about 12, and kept up with it throughout the years. Half Life 3 is not something im holding my breath for, but it does sneak into a dream or two every now and then
ive given up on half life 3... and if valve beleive the wait will mean larger sales when it does get released they are in for a shock ..... 7 years since hl2 is ages in pc game terms so what are they doing
most game developers are working on the next installment while the previous game is released ... for example crysis 3 was in development for 12 months when crysis 2 was released.. so why is half life 3 taking so long ?
even if the source engine has been revamped this is no excuse.. the cryengine has seen 3 versions since its release with the first being released around the same time as hl2....
dont get me wrong i love valve and steam.. however come on guys ... lets have some news... release a demo on steam ... do something ... the wait is killing me !
3 Like Buddy. I think it's better for Valve to take their time with HL3/Ricochet2:D than we getting a game worse than the other two. See it this way. All Crysis games since first Crysis in 2007 have been sucky compared to original Crysis 1. Now on the other hand. HL1 was great but HL2 was better and if you want to keep it that way, (i sure as hell want to) i suggest not being mad about not having the game yet. Rather have it fully polished and good then short, bad and buggy, right?
This is a bad move by Gaben. In real life kids grow up and will not care about a game series they played when they were a teen. Immagine a teen that is say 17 playing Half Life 2 and he also plays the episode games. But he will already be 25 to this day and he would have a wife most likely and wouldn't really care about Gabens series. Of course there are hardcore gamers that will game into their old age. But they are a minority.Point is that most of half lifes fans are getting older and I can bet a lot of them just forgot about Half Life. Maybe Gaben will try to make Half Life for the new gen and not carry on the old story or something.I wouldn't be surprised if valve made HL3 a console port and the PC gamers were screwed. But in all honesty I used to hold the half life series at basically my number 1. But it has been too long and I have found better games and couldn't really care anymore if valve released HL3 in 2+ years from now. And to all those people thinking that this will be like DNF you are right. There is no way that valve could develop a game this long and not have to redo the graphics all over again a couple of times. Since in 2 years we will have new consoles and there will be games that beat Crysis modded by then.
wtf is wrong with valve,hl3 will sold like hell even now they don't give a damn about loyal fans who are seriously going fucking berserk over hl3?give us hl3 before it's too late......
2 Like By the time HL3 (or whatever it will be called) is released, Alyx and Gordon will be middle-aged, and the main character will be their son, Gordon Vance-Freeman, Jr.
5 Like If Half life 3 is released ,valve will become the greatest game developers of all time....and the half life series will become the greatest series of all time..........For those who are telling that half life 2 is not the greatest game ever ,those people should be ashamed to call themselves atleast amateur gamers.........
@TheOnlyConan I guess, but totally different genres, like me saying "Peggle is good, but GTA IV is better". No comparison.
2 Like Half-Life 2 is not the greatest game ever. Half-Life 1 is number one in my list and I've been waiting for long, long time for "black mesa source" to complete their mod. Which is basically HL1 with the HL2 engine. Anyways when a HL3 gets out I would love to see some next gen graphics that's even better than CryEngine 3 and of course Earth liberated from the Combine. Oh yeah, I've heard rumors that Valve wants to make a movie... they might wanna take a look at that guy who made "What's in the box"
2 Like Before Half-Life 2, there weren't really many stand-out singleplayer games out there. After GTAIII came out, games after that changed their shift to a more open-world gameplay. HL2 and EP1 were strictly linear but EP2 shifted to a more open-world gameplay. After the release of CoD4, it seems that a lot of games also shifted in their direction. Features of CoD4 includes customizable weapons, linear gameplay, strategic enemy spawning (HL2 has usually a fixed amount of enemies, excluding antlions; CoD has an indefinite amount of enemies and will keep spawning until you reach a certain part of the level, keeping you on your toes while you progress the level), scripted interactive cutscenes, flashy loading screens, die-hard character, and a game changing multiplayer. The HL series by design, is linear and very scripted and they have adopted some things from CoD to their other games (Remember the boss battle final scene? Scripted interactive cutscenes on your die hard character who was directly hit by the booby trap and she managed to stand up unscratched even after experiencing things no normal human would survive. No matter how fans deny it, this scene was inspired by CoD.
It's like Valve is experiencing a development hell after CoD4 was released. They wanted to make HL3 stand out from all the other FPS games out there. But the competition is getting a lot better and Valve is doing a lot of catch up just to be at par with those games. If Valve releases HL:EP3 with their pre-CoD4 script, a lot of people would be complaining as much as what happened to Mass Effect 3.
EA Bioware is the exact opposite of Valve. They always rush their games. A lot of scenes from the game is memorable, but due to the pressure of EA to release the game 'as planned', their last game's ending was rushed and had to be amended with an Extended Cut. Same might happen to Valve if they released their game with the early script and will lose more of their fans as they don't have a fanbase that's larger than the big-name game companies such as EA, Ubisoft, and Activision.
1 Like @triadwarfare Bahahahaha, you sir, are so, so wrong on many levels. Go back to your console.
Think about it for a second, it took 9 YEARS to make TF2 and 10 to make Half-Life 2.....it might be a while, just saying.
1 Like @Zehoan You are wrong.
HL1 was released in 1998. HL2 released in 2004. 6 years, not 10. Then it took 2 years for EP1, and 1 year for EP2...and 5+ years for EP3/HL3 which is completely out of the year comparison for each episode...
4 Like Half Life is the only game I'd never want to rush... I'm not really going to think about "it should have been released by now, etc etc". I completely trust what they are doing and if they consider they need time for it then time shall be given... Because I'm 100% sure that when it comes out it's going to be - I don't even have words for it...
Four-year-old images from Valve's apparently abandoned episodic first-person shooter series surface, depict apparent return to Xen.
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