Valve responds to Half-Life 3 grumbles Valve has responded to demand for Half-Life 3 information, claiming to have its games more "baked" before any announcements are made. Head honcho Gabe Newell admitted Valve is aware of how much it annoys fans with the turnaround time of some games, Penny-Arcade reports. "It's pretty frustrating to us when we put them into …
My theory is they are waiting out when a certain programmer leaves so they can be all willy nilly with the code and sell it to the highest bidder. So now inter office politics are taking place and people who go against the programming team and stick up the ideologies of the consumer will often get fired. But I am sure the whole dept is fat and needs 6 more months of a health spa before they get back to writing code. Management needs to abduct them into a jail cell type of frat house to get the stuff out the door sooner.
The longer people wait, the more they expect. Even fantastic titles like GT5 can be destroyed by expectations. Look at the reviews for that in particular, not a single one focuses on the physics, the graphics or really anything else about the game, usually just gripes about how long it took to arrive (conveniently forgetting of course, that all previous full Gran Turismo titles arrived mid-gen).
I have decided that Valve is doing the following...
-Developing a next gen game engine, "Source^2", with the XB720 and PS4 in mind.
-Developing Half Life 2: Episode 3 based on the new engine.
-Developing Half Life 3 based on the new engine.
-Porting all of Half Life, Opposing Force, Blue Shift, Half Life 2, HL2: Episode 1 and HL2: Episode 2 over to the new engine with relevant updates.
-Releasing the entire updated collection as a super pack game release, like Orange Box, but only Half Life... perhaps called "The Combined Box" ;)
Therefore, I am willing to wait patiently until all my dreams are answered!
Not another port of Half Life, modders such as Sven Co-op always have to deal with "Why doesn't Sven Co-op work on Half Life: Source". This is simple because it was designed for GoldSource not Source, but anyone who doesn't understand and can't be bothered to RTFM its just a newer version of the original Half Life to them.
Anyone bitching about how long a video game can take, and bringing up bad Duke Nukem Forever analogies should look to Blizzard. Blizzard always slip, always take far too long on getting a game out, and the fans lap it up. At the end of the day, if the game is good enough, people will buy it. Problems arise when a game is overhyped and fails to live up to standards.
Even though waiting for the next installment of starcraft 2, and diablo 3 is driving me out of my mind, I understand the general silence from Blizzard (and from Valve as well over HL3). It means the hype is controlled to an extend where it is hard to be overhyped. It also means you aren't releasing to deadline and slipping quality in order to do so. The reality is that for a game to become a huge best seller it has to be very very good. Gameplay, graphics, story, the lot. Even something as apparently simple as Angry Birds had addictive gameplay, the graphics were very appealing, and the humourous concept gave the story.
Oh so very true. I remember all the talk about StarCraft 2 being canned because of WoW being more profitable. Yet we remained loyal, waiting for Blizzard to churn it out. Before DNF, Diablo 2 had a long dev cycle, so long that some people were betting on which would come out: Linux Kernel 2.4.x or Diablo 2.
It's annoying, but it's good when it finally comes out. Unlike DNF.
There is a big difference between not publishing a deadline and not having one at all.
I gave up waiting for DNF back around 2002/3 when they started saying "it would be ready when it's done". As a software developer myself I know that without a deadline you can always improve, tweak, adjust, enhance,.... and simply meddle with software forever. Which is apparently what happened with DNF; resulting in 1997 style game play with a modern engine, resulting in a game as tedious DOOM 3.
Having a hard deadline makes the developers focus and stops them constantly trying out new and often irrelevant mods. Of course having a deadline does not mean you meet it, but it does at least put a stop to anything other than bug fixing and testing prior to a release.
"Which is apparently what happened with DNF; resulting in 1997 style game play with a modern engine, resulting in a game as tedious DOOM 3."
Nope, I actually found it dull because it *wasn't* 1997-style gameplay. It was more Halo-style gameplay, with linear levels, a lame 2 gun carrying limit (Halo's inheritance) surrounded by a nice-looking but nigh explorable world.
I actually found Doom 3 fun, though that one was similar to Half-Life...
The preview videos for HL2 with the part of killing those super tall walking stick robots.
That video was so super cool!
But then when it came time to kill one it felt lacking and sped along no time to relish in the kill.
Then after killing the tall freak 3-4 legged robot the second one I think just walks away unable to kill it. GRRR!!!!!!! Some things were obvious to do and others made you stop for 45 minutes or an hour to look around to find what you missed but then you save game and come back after a few days to relax your carpel tunnel syndrome hands then totally forget what you were doing so you start 2 levels back or so to get back in the groove of things. Not enough sniper shooting.and not enough ramps to do tricks and such. But overall I did love HL2. I am tempted to reisntall it and forget WOW for a while.
An Answer! :O
I only recently got the Half Life series off steam and to hit that nail biting cliff hanger with no mention of a sequel gave me 2 and a bit strokes. I, like many people, am really pissed off that its taken this long to say yes or no on the whole thing, but the last 6 installments in the series were so good, I am willing to forget my anger if this one will uphold the awesomeness of the series.
Besides, another year can't hurt, right?
P.S OMG Valve CAN count to 3!!!
I'm sorry, but what rock that crushed your sense of joy and laughter have you been living under? Half-Life is STILL one of the best FPS you can get. Sure the graphics look a bit dated, but not by much, but the physics engine, story and puzzles are infinitely better than anything you can get today. Call of Duty and Battlefield have declared "I'm better!' "no Im better" war, and consequently, snuffed out all 'real' competition. On rare occasion a beacon of individuality appears and disappears.
Half-Life is and always will be an awesome game! just look at GMod, Portal, Left4Dead and Team Fortress 2, they are all perfect examples of games that probably never would've existed without Half-Life and its engine. and they are all completely different games that all have attracted completely different crowds of gamers.
So Half-Life is dead huh?
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