Sneaking suspicion of Valve, incoming Steam sale & HL3

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mtbush

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Anyone else get the feeling that Valve is going to make a big announcement in regards to HL3 with the Steam Summer Seal starting tomorrow?
It just seems really strange that they choose to highlight HL2 right before the festivities kick off...

Maybe I'm reaching or it's just wishful thinking, but I think something really big is going to be happen during the course of the next week, probably starting off with an ARG of some sort.

Discuss ;)
 
i hear more HL3 predictions then i hear daft punk at coachella rumors.
 
DNF and Chinese Democracy eventually came out...and sucked. HL3 will exist someday.
 
eh...

Valve stopped making games. They're making lots of money selling other games.
 
J Macker said:
eh...

Valve stopped making games. They're making lots of money selling other games.
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I think this holds water. Valve is lost. Sure, they are releasing 1 game a year but none of them look to be something that would require a large team. So where does that leave us? Some people working on Steampipe conversion, some people working on Source 2, some people working on Steambox, and some people working on Linux stuff. Where is the big project?
 
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limitedaccess said:
They are actually on a 1 game a year pace since 2006.
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You caught me in the middle of an edit, I was pointing that out as well. But like I said, where is the big project? The games they have been releasing seem like small team stuff.
 
DOTA 2 might not seem like a big project, especially in terms of developing the core game itself, but with how they are positioning it I think it is a rather big project especially if you consider the ancillary support involved. I guess you can argue CSGO as a small but CS is a rather important product for a large segment of their users. I'd say Portal 2 and L4D should be considered typical big projects.

The other big project would be the Steam box and Linux initiatives. This of course to the end Windows PC user has no meaning but from their perspective would be rather important. They might have game projects tied into these two initiatives as well since they want to use those to help promote these.

Somewhat related to this is they are slowing (or really already have) creating their own platform essentially via Steam. Now from a gaming perspective for the end user this isn't very interesting but from their business side they would have essentially managed to create their own ecosystem with comparatively minimal investment (compare that to Sony and MS with their consoles). So in terms of how they have managed to do this while coming off positively in terms of PR is rather amazing in that sense, albeit not in a game development sense.

In terms of Half-Life 3 I think one of the major hold ups actually is regarding how they will make it more online. You can tell with Valve's direction they want games to be online and connected (including interviews alluding to such), at the same time there are obvious pitfall (just from a PR stand point) of doing this which requires some careful navigation. I don't think they want to release a purely SP game at this point.

Edit: Just to add, Valve also has the issue of having to protect its brand due to how it has positioned itself. They have high brand equity at this point which is why they may be more reluctant to release and commit on new games.
 
mtbush said:
Anyone else get the feeling that Valve is going to make a big announcement in regards to HL3 with the Steam Summer Seal starting tomorrow?
It just seems really strange that they choose to highlight HL2 right before the festivities kick off...

Maybe I'm reaching or it's just wishful thinking, but I think something really big is going to be happen during the course of the next week, probably starting off with an ARG of some sort.

Discuss ;)
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I talked about this in the other steam thread :p
 
limitedaccess said:
They are actually on a 1 game a year pace since 2006.
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Most of those games are mediocre at best and not new IP's. L4D is the only thing new they have done for along time. And they did that in 2008.

Portal and L4D are the only things that have come from Valve that are creative and unique. And the funny thing is.. They bought the Idea :/

Valve really needs to step up there game for next gen.. esp for HL3. If they release another generic HL shooter. It will be a huge disappointment. I would like some actual story in HL3 too.
 
King Icewind said:
I hope itll get released just so we can stop having threads like this about it.

:p
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Naw we'll just get complains about either how awful it is for the time we had to wait. Another possibility is we will get spammed with threads about how amazing and awesome it is =o Can't win!
 
Honestly if they were to release hl3 tomorrow I wouldn't care. its bee so long I gave up on HL ages ago. so valve wont be getting my money any time soon.
 
shifty68 said:
Honestly if they were to release hl3 tomorrow I wouldn't care. its bee so long I gave up on HL ages ago. so valve wont be getting my money any time soon.
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Awww, come on now. I take nothing any game maker does personally. If they make a good game I'll buy it. I have no agenda or moral obligations when it comes to that sort of thing. I just like good games. Screw politics. ;)
 
shifty68 said:
Honestly if they were to release hl3 tomorrow I wouldn't care. its bee so long I gave up on HL ages ago. so valve wont be getting my money any time soon.
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Sucks to be you, that's like saying I stopped listening to Tool because their album releases are 5-7 years apart.

Quality > Quantity
 
My first thought when I saw Half Life 2 on Midweek Madness sale was that Valve simply had to put something there to fill Midweek Madness before Summer Sales begin tomorrow. With the impending sales, most publishers probably waited for that and Valve had to put something for Midweek.

Just a wild guess anyway. :p
 
there has been a lot of Half Life 2/Deathmatch updates over the last few weeks which was a bit weird...Valve releasing a Chinese update by 'mistake' was also strange...Valve doesn't do anything by mistake...some sort of strange viral marketing campaign?...either way I'm not anticipating HL3 but will buy it on Day 1 when they do release it...same with the people who bitch about George R.R. Martin not releasing the books in his crazy popular Ice and Fire series (Game of Thrones) more often...they will all buy it whenever he releases the next installment

I also don't see Valve announcing a game this big during the first day of their Summer Sale...they will only announce this at a big gaming convention or developer conference
 
Thought it was a Korean 'mistake', not Chinese.
Anyways, I highly doubt they are going to release anything... I think Hornet has the right idea, they had nothing else to put on sale the day before the start of the Summer Sale.

I doubt they'll secretly release HL3, they'd miss out on too many preorders and pre-release hype that will ramp up sales.
 
limitedaccess said:
Edit: Just to add, Valve also has the issue of having to protect its brand due to how it has positioned itself. They have high brand equity at this point which is why they may be more reluctant to release and commit on new games.
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Good post. I wonder if they had hl3 ready to release a few years ago but it wasn't good enough, than they decided to wait for next gen console and give there linux efforts some heavyweight power. I have yet to try the linux steam but I may be tempted to play with it if it works with something other than 8 year old valve games. Actually I think I'll try to play with it this weekend.
 
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The steam sale should be hitting today at some point, someone on another site pointed out that:
-Several of their normal flash sales are ended 6 hours early
-There are no new releases for the next 72+ hours (which has been the norm for all summer sales)
-Plus a bunch of other sites are confirming it

As far as any bigger announcements, I dunno, but sale should hit today. At this point, I'm expecting it to be pretty disappointing. The only thing i'm intending on buying is Kerbal, if it drops to $5-7.
 
lilbabycat said:
The steam sale should be hitting today at some point, someone on another site pointed out that:
-Several of their normal flash sales are ended 6 hours early
-There are no new releases for the next 72+ hours (which has been the norm for all summer sales)
-Plus a bunch of other sites are confirming it

As far as any bigger announcements, I dunno, but sale should hit today. At this point, I'm expecting it to be pretty disappointing. The only thing i'm intending on buying is Kerbal, if it drops to $5-7.
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Sleuthing badge for you sir. How big is your steam collection? Mine is huge and as such I don't have much I'm really looking to pick up. But than again I will just buy shit if it's a stupid price.
 
mtbush said:
Sucks to be you, that's like saying I stopped listening to Tool because their album releases are 5-7 years apart.

Quality > Quantity
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Ya but hl2 sucked when compared to hl1.

and by that reasoning duke nukem forever should have been the best game ever.

i am not mad a valve i just don't care any more my gaming interests have changed.
 
mtbush said:
Sucks to be you, that's like saying I stopped listening to Tool because their album releases are 5-7 years apart.

Quality > Quantity
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I definitely need a new Tool album in my life. Curse Maynards artistic integrity! ;)
 
dsystem said:
I definitely need a new Tool album in my life. Curse Maynards artistic integrity! ;)
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They are working on it.

Hmm....

Tool...Mentioned in a Half Life thread
+ A Crowbar is considered a tool
=
HALF LIFE 3 CONFIRMED!:eek::eek::eek:
 
There is no way they could keep HL3 work under wraps. If they were working on it, it would be widely known. Especially with them having laid off some people awhile ago... you know somebody would spill the beans (anonymously of course).

The other problem is that nothing gets done at Valve unless people want to work on it. If nobody wants to work on HL3..........
 
jwcalla said:
There is no way they could keep HL3 work under wraps. If they were working on it, it would be widely known. Especially with them having laid off some people awhile ago... you know somebody would spill the beans (anonymously of course).

The other problem is that nothing gets done at Valve unless people want to work on it. If nobody wants to work on HL3..........
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Projects at Valve are deeply compartmentalized. The beans are pretty safe.
 
jwcalla said:
There is no way they could keep HL3 work under wraps. If they were working on it, it would be widely known. Especially with them having laid off some people awhile ago... you know somebody would spill the beans (anonymously of course).
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Yeah, except that they worked on HL2 without anyone knowing for what, four years? Nobody knew about Portal 2 until the ARG. TF2 was being reworked for 7 years without a peep. If there is one thing Valve is good at, it's keeping projects under wraps.
 
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