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HL3 Development Rumours - Follow Up (TheKnow + Laidlaw)

N

Nzyme32

Member
So The Know started a dialogue with Marc Laidlaw regarding HL3's development and the rumours / source The Know describe.

Here is the full transcript of the emails they have had discussing it (Read from bottom to top) : http://i.imgur.com/BWrxXuu.png

BWrxXuu.png
Click to expand...

I would suggest people actually read through that and come to your own conclusions rather than watching the video alone, which happily goes for legitimising their own source claiming that they are "both right from different perspectives" and not really discussing the full conversation or Marc Laidlaw's points, which are pretty interesting points of view compared to gaming culture in general.

Regardless here is the know's follow up: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b67WZpn04SY&feature=share
 
I

iMax

Member
A lot of this could be avoided if they just said "it's cancelled" or "it's in development". They lose nothing either way. Keeping fans in this ridiculous state of limbo achieves nothing but the mounting of disrespect for the Valve brand.

Remember, we're talking about a game that's been announced. This isn't some mystery project.
 
T

twobear

sputum-flecked apoplexy
as I said in the other thread, it's not surprising to anyone who's taken an interest in hl3's development that it's on the backburner right now.
 
W

wanderingprostheyltite

Member
iMax said:
A lot of this could be avoided if they just said "it's cancelled" or "it's in development". They lose nothing either way. Keeping fans in this ridiculous state of limbo achieves nothing but the mounting of disrespect for the Valve brand.

Remember, we're talking about a game that's been announced. This isn't some mystery project.
Click to expand...

When was it announced? I know EP3 was discussed as being worked on but not a full title.

To your first point I think they enjoy sticking to the shroud of secrecy, almost a pride thing to not say anything.
 
N

Nzyme32

Member
iMax said:
A lot of this could be avoided if they just said "it's cancelled" or "it's in development". They lose nothing either way. Keeping fans in this ridiculous state of limbo achieves nothing but the mounting of disrespect for the Valve brand.
Click to expand...

I kind of side with Marc Laidlaw, since (at least compared to when HL2 EP2 had just come out), I really don't care what is happening since I assume anything they do eventually release will be what they want creatively and as a game. Meanwhile I really don't buy the argument that the project's development is being stopped is based around fear. A bunch of the stuff Valve are doing is being panned or severely pissed off the community, yet they keep going (with exception of paid mods - although they still are keeping the idea in mind, which is also dicey). Pretty much not convinced of the management argument either since they still talk about it for recent projects including their VR stuff.

Despite all that, it would not surprise me at all the HL3 or any HL project for that matter is simply put to a side for a whole manner of other reasons or simply because there are other projects people have chosen to work on - which I suspect is pretty likely. As for HL3 being cancelled, I doubt that one, but also couldn't give a shit whenever it comes out. As long as it is something as special as 1 and 2, they can take several decades if they want.
 
I

injurai

Banned
godelsmetric said:
as I said in the other thread, it's not surprising to anyone who's taken an interest in hl3's development that it's on the backburner right now.
Click to expand...

I'm not even slightly worried about it being on the backburner to be honest. They have limited bandwidth, and they have taken on a number of projects, like VR, Vulkan collaboration, SteamOS, Steam Controller. Never mind having to support their major pillers, Steam, Dota 2, TF2, CS:GO.

They have been overhauling both Source and their creation tools over the past years. We know their primary indev project is Left 4 Dead 3. I expect HL3 to be on the backburner until that game comes out to be honest. The word a while ago is that they have small teams break away and experiment with various verticle slices to resolve interesting and new gameplay set pieces for hl3, or other potential experimental projects. This goes back was far as 2009 and lasts at least up through time of Portal 2. We know Valve has invested a considerable amount of effort in try to push the first person interactive narrative in attempting to develop story telling around sign language and delivery of story effectively to deaf gamers.

It just doesn't make sense that HL3 is actually dead. It's quite obvious Valve is in a stage of setting themselves up for the future trends of gaming with both VR and turning steam into a comporable platform as the traditional consoles. They have to see that through with their limited bandwidth.
 
R

Rezae

Member
At this point I care about HL3 about as much as I cared for TLG. I stopped caring, it was finally shown, brought back from the dead, I let the hype suck me right back in, but now that the shock has worn off, I still don't know if I really care.
 
B

Bubba_Sparks

Member
I haven't followed Valve's internal politics closely, nor have I followed the sega of Half-Life 2 Episode 3/Half-Life 3. I will say this, as of October of this year it will have been eight (EIGHT!!!) years since the release of Half-Life 2 Episode 2! In that time, Naughty Dog managed to develop every single Uncharted game and The Last of Us while Ubisoft Montreal has developed every single Assassins Creed game! Outside of those two, every Mass Effect game has been developed, along with the entire BioShock series of games, oh and not to forget Call of Duty! Just think about that for a second, basically every major franchise that has come define modern AAA gaming has been developed in the time between Half-Life 2 Episode 2 and today! So while I don't know much about what's going on at Valve, I can definitely say that they are not committed to developing Half-Life at this point as there is no reason for the development of Half-Life 3 to have taken that long.
 
D

de1irium

Member
iMax said:
A lot of this could be avoided if they just said "it's cancelled" or "it's in development".
Click to expand...

Or even just "we would really like to release another Half Life chapter at an indeterminate future date, but we're just not there yet."

I totally understand Mark's side of things ... the creative process is more creative than it is process, but if you don't have both working in unison you don't wind up with an actual product.

That said, I find it hard to believe that they took the game as far as HL2:EP2 and don't have concrete enough plot, story or gameplay to wrap the story arc in an reasonably interesting way.

But who knows ... like others have said, it's hard to care anymore. HL may as well just go out as one of the greatest unfinished stories in gaming.
 
C

corn_fest

Member
Man, Laidlaw has the patience of a saint.

"As we've said, we'll talk when we're ready."
"Thanks but..! Half-Life belongs to the gamers now! They deserve an update! Anything!"
"No, really, we can't, as I've explained..."
"Wanna appear on our podcast and talk about HL3, thereby indirectly confirming it? huehue"
 
C

CHC

Member
So many words to say nothing at all. First rumors that its cancelled, then all this double talk from Valve to say that the rumors aren't true.... But that there is nothing new to announce.

I mean get your shit together Valve, literally any statement one way or another. And as for the whole "they don't owe us anything" argument that people love to bring out: not necessarily but this level of weird cagey non-statements just doesn't reflect well on their image either way. After all this time there should be some kind of decisive direction for the games development.
 
D

Doctor Ironic

Member
injurai said:
We know their primary indev project is Left 4 Dead 3.
Click to expand...

No we don't. People saw a L4D2 map remade in Source 2 as a tech demo and a project list that included L4D3 among seven variations of HL3 and also gags such as "boners lol" and jumped to conclusions because this is the internet.
 
T

trh

Nifty AND saffron-colored!
I would be really surprised if the Vive release isn't accompanied by a game announcement from Valve within ~6 months. I can imagine that VR is going to serve the role that physics did in HL2 for HL3.

Edit: they talk about Valve not wanting to release HL3 in case it would make people upset because it can't possibly live up to the hype, but I think the best way to upset people is to never release it at all, aka what they've been doing. 'Not wanting to upset people' does not seem like their motive.
 
H

Haines

Banned
I simply dont care about half life 3 unless the announce it.

And these rumours are just plain silly and not even entertaining.
 
N

Nzyme32

Member
Doctor Ironic said:
No we don't. People saw a L4D2 map remade in Source 2 as a tech demo and a project list that included L4D3 among seven variations of HL3 and also gags such as "boners lol" and jumped to conclusions because this is the internet.
Click to expand...

Well it was pointed out by a certain someone here on GAF that they were doing some play-testing for it fairly recently.
 
S

Syf

Banned
It's the same sort of baseless rumors we've seen plenty of times over the years since episode 2. Better to just leave it in the back of your mind unless they do give us something concrete.
 
O

Obliterator

Member
Its dead and isn't happening imo. I don't think anyone at Valve is even working on it. They want to just build F2P stuff now or cheaper games. I think L4D3 will be micro transaction based but we'll see.

At this point I think fans should just let it go, Valve does not care
 
S

Stopdoor

Member
corn_fest said:
Man, Laidlaw has the patience of a saint.

"As we've said, we'll talk when we're ready."
"Thanks but..! Half-Life belongs to the gamers now! They deserve an update! Anything!"
"No, really, we can't, as I've explained..."
"Wanna appear on our podcast and talk about HL3, thereby indirectly confirming it? huehue"
Click to expand...

Yeah, man, pretty much how I read it.

Also don't see why people think it's such an easy thing for Valve to give a "it's canceled/not canceled!" statement - considering the intense debates about pre-release footage compared to final release gameplay that occur on this forum, people will take any statement or work in progress for video games as a promise, an unbreakable vow.
 
M

MidnightPass

Banned
does anyone think there just waiting for some revolutionary mechanic or revolutionary gameplay before they start to really work on HL 3?
 
B

Bluth54

Member
Bubba_Sparks said:
I haven't followed Valve's internal politics closely, nor have I followed the sega of Half-Life 2 Episode 3/Half-Life 3. I will say this, as of October of this year it will have been eight (EIGHT!!!) years since the release of Half-Life 2 Episode 2! In that time, Naughty Dog managed to develop every single Uncharted game and The Last of Us while Ubisoft Montreal has developed every single Assassins Creed game! Outside of those two, every Mass Effect game has been developed, along with the entire BioShock series of games, oh and not to forget Call of Duty! Just think about that for a second, basically every major franchise that has come define modern AAA gaming has been developed in the time between Half-Life 2 Episode 2 and today! So while I don't know much about what's going on at Valve, I can definitely say that they are not committed to developing Half-Life at this point as there is no reason for the development of Half-Life 3 to have taken that long.
Click to expand...

Valve is a much smaller company then most of those developers you've listed (there are probably far more people working on each individual Call of Duty and Assassin's Creed game then all Valve employees combined, at most Valve seems to have around 300 employees) plus they have developed multiple games since the released of Half Life 2 Episode 2, they've put out L4D2, Portal 2 and Dota2 along with doing large number of content updates for Team Fortress 2 (which has had the equivalent of several games worth of content added to it since it came out in 2007), CSGO and DOTA2. They probably also provided some development assistance with the studios that worked on L4D and CSGO.

Not only that they've made huge improvements to Steam, they are working on VR and Steam hardware, and Source engine 2.
 
Tainted

Tainted

Member
If HL3 ever comes out, I fear how it will look based on how FPS's have evolved over the last 10 years or so. I dont want a cover based health regen system in my Half Life
 
O

OEM

Member
MidnightPass said:
does anyone think there just waiting for some revolutionary mechanic or revolutionary gameplay before they start to really work on HL 3?
Click to expand...

Please no, this just sounds like a gimmicky. All we want is incredible level design, atmosphere and story. This is Half Life. I dont even care if it plays like the previous game. Infact I prefer its like the previous entry.
 
D

Dreamwriter

Member
The thing to remember about Valve is, the company overall doesn't make decisions. The teams in the company make their own decisions. So the company wouldn't make the decision to cancel or proceed in Half Life 3's development, and any announcements before the game was far enough along to guarantee its release would be premature. If enough people working there decided they wanted to work on the game, then they could choose to do so, and try to recruit other people to help with it. If too few people were interested in working on it, then it just wouldn't get made. That's how Valve works, for the most part.
 
N

Nzyme32

Member
corn_fest said:
Man, Laidlaw has the patience of a saint.

"As we've said, we'll talk when we're ready."
"Thanks but..! Half-Life belongs to the gamers now! They deserve an update! Anything!"
"No, really, we can't, as I've explained..."
"Wanna appear on our podcast and talk about HL3, thereby indirectly confirming it? huehue"
Click to expand...

The fear argument is pretty amusing. Laidlaw's response to the fear argument is partly read out, but then twisted to fit their narrative and source, all while they try to decipher "what could he possibly mean?!", even though he is pretty blunt about his opinion
 
Z

Zaptruder

Banned
Bloody hell Valve. Should've just pumped out Ep 3 when it was still relevant. At least we could've let this shit go.

Instead they gave us the biggest blue balls ever, and some of us are still complaining about it.
 
F

Funkyhamster

Member
Stopdoor said:
Yeah, man, pretty much how I read it.

Also don't see why people think it's such an easy thing for Valve to give a "it's canceled/not canceled!" statement - considering the intense debates about pre-release footage compared to final release gameplay that occur on this forum, people will take any statement or work in progress for video games as a promise, an unbreakable vow.
Click to expand...

This is a good point, and it makes me think that Valve at least hopes to release HL3 in the future. After all, if it's totally dead, there's no reason not to come out and say that it's canceled. But if they do want to make it at some point, they have a lot to lose by confirming that it's still in the works if they don't have a concrete release timeframe right now.
 
O

Obliterator

Member
Dreamwriter said:
The thing to remember about Valve is, the company overall doesn't make decisions. The teams in the company make their own decisions. So the company wouldn't make the decision to cancel or proceed in Half Life 3's development, and any announcements before the game was far enough along to guarantee its release would be premature. If enough people working there decided they wanted to work on the game, then they could choose to do so, and try to recruit other people to help with it. If too few people were interested in working on it, then it just wouldn't get made. That's how Valve works, for the most part.
Click to expand...

Sounds like a pretty terrible way to run a business honestly, but overall Valve is doing solid so what do I know
 
G

gdt

Member
All this crying about this is lame at this point.

I love Half Life, hell I just replayed Half Life 2 and Eps not too long Anahi but I'll be okay if they don't make another. I won't take it as a personal insult to my fandom.

I just think about other shit.

The day they announce and show off Half Life 3 will be dope as fuck tho.
 
M

mysocksarepink

Banned
I don't see this coming anytime soon. We're likely years away from an announcement

But when it is announced, holy fuck. The internet (and i) will likely be engulfed in flames
 
G

gdt

Member
The other thread was driving me nuts too.

I.e. the supposition that it's a proven fact that Valve's structure doesn't work.

Umm by what metric? Anything measurable seems to say the opposite. Seemingly, it's been amazingly successful for Valve and the people working there.

Certainly isn't for everyone though.
 
M

MasterOfPastures

Banned
One of the better nicknames I have heard of Valve fits them perfectly:

Valvehalla: The place for the gods of the industry to feast and do whatever they want, limited by their own initiative and the larger indirect pull of the company. Crazy benefits, crazy pay, etc.
But if you are not self-driven, disciplined or multifaceted with many talents, the pressure from the internal competition alone can burn you out.
 
G

gabbo

Member
Bubba_Sparks said:
I haven't followed Valve's internal politics closely, nor have I followed the sega of Half-Life 2 Episode 3/Half-Life 3. I will say this, as of October of this year it will have been eight (EIGHT!!!) years since the release of Half-Life 2 Episode 2! In that time, Naughty Dog managed to develop every single Uncharted game and The Last of Us while Ubisoft Montreal has developed every single Assassins Creed game! Outside of those two, every Mass Effect game has been developed, along with the entire BioShock series of games, oh and not to forget Call of Duty! Just think about that for a second, basically every major franchise that has come define modern AAA gaming has been developed in the time between Half-Life 2 Episode 2 and today! So while I don't know much about what's going on at Valve, I can definitely say that they are not committed to developing Half-Life at this point as there is no reason for the development of Half-Life 3 to have taken that long.
Click to expand...

Is there a version of the old DNF website for HL3/Ep3, because this paragraph is basically it.
As for Hl3/Ep3 itself. Yes I want it, but I have plenty of other games to play until then
 
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