Valve Announces New Game

[monkeymagick]

During last nights The International, Valve announced it was producing a new game. Unfortunately, it's not Half-Life 3 or anything we had in mind. The Seattle based company is continuing the trend of developing its own card game entitled Artifact, spin-off on DOTA 2. Details are scarce as the company revealed a really vague teaser with lots of minerals, but not as glorious as these rocks. Brad Muir, a former employee of Double Fine is heading the project and releasing sometime in 2018.

Checkout the teaser.

 

[chenw]

Details are scarce as the company revealed a really vague teaser with lots of minerals

They were clearly short on vespene gas

...
*Hides in a corner*

Space based games are always good in my books though

 

[THRESHIN]

Am I the only one who doesn't like dota? I think I've lost all faith and any interest in valve

 

[maxius]

this is a continuation of the eternal pissing match between valve and blizzard.

 

[vegeta535]

Am I the only one who doesn't like dota? I think I've lost all faith and any interest in valve

Nope you are not alone.

 

[Gasaraki_]

Good luck Valve. Blizzard has a whole library of games and characters that people are interested in to choose from. What does Valve have? Old ass Half-Life game, portal, TF2, DOTA. No one knows any of those characters.

 

[stealthballer123]

No one knows Gordan freeman?
Umm.
Even acting like people don't know the portal bots is kinda dumb.

Blizzard has no characters, it's all generic RPG nonsense.

 

[ecmaster76]

Oh yay. Valve didn't have enough cards in Steam already

 

[Tiburon1186]

Am I the only one who doesn't like dota? I think I've lost all faith and any interest in valve

I feel like I'm the only one who doesn't like card games in general. If I wanted to play cards, I'd play cards... not a video game.

 

[J-Will]

kind of saturated with card games at this point

 

[Dr. Righteous]

What? Nobody up for a game of Gwent?

 

[Gasaraki_]

No one knows Gordan freeman?
Umm.
Even acting like people don't know the portal bots is kinda dumb.

Blizzard has no characters, it's all generic RPG nonsense.

When did Half-Life 2 come out? 2004. Half of the pc gamers now probably have never played Half-Life 2. So you have 2 characters in Half-Life that are popular, some portal robots, TF2 characters with no story behind them, and DOTA, which is what they are focusing on for their characters on the playing cards.

 

[T4rd]

Can they just announce something about HL3?! At least tell us it's dead, or in a perpetual state of stagnant development, or they're waiting on Matrix-style head implants so we can jack directly into VR to play it. A little transparency goes a long way.

I wouldn't be so bad if they hadn't ended Ep. 2 on a massive fucking cliff hanger. At this point I'd be happy with some fan-fiction/made Ep. 3. Maybe after the Black Mesa team gets done with the Xen level after 5 years of working on the last 10% of the game, they can start work on what they think Ep. 3 should be and we'll see it in about 15-20 years.

 

[stealthballer123]

When did Half-Life 2 come out? 2004. Half of the pc gamers now probably have never played Half-Life 2. So you have 2 characters in Half-Life that are popular, some portal robots, TF2 characters with no story behind them, and DOTA, which is what they are focusing on for their characters on the playing cards.

I think pc gamers skew pretty high on the age scale.
I can also say with confidence us old gamers sure as hell played through HL2 with our gamer kids. My little boy was crazy into TF2 for years, as in we all have balloonicorn t shirts. He played with a shit load of other kids too.
I think you underestimate valve's character IP.

 

[Youn]

I can just imagine the meeting where Brad Muir is standing around a bunch of soulless fucks trying to pump them up about a kewl card game by teasing their itty bits with microtransaction fantasies

 

[Evil]

Don't like DOTA, don't like Battle Card Games.

 

[Armenius]

Am I the only one who doesn't like dota? I think I've lost all faith and any interest in valve

No, I also hate the MOBA genre. I used to like card games until this fad exploded. I feel like Blizzard has successfully dulled another generation of possibilities for PC exclusives with Hearthstone, just like the did with WoW.

 

[darrpara]

Great another game I will never bother playing.

 

[Disco_Stu_04]

Discusison

Is that French?

 

[cptnjarhead]

Maybe its just me... but it seems like Valve hates the fans of the very game that put them on the map. Like Ridley Scott and the fans of the Alien franchise... I enjoyed the recent game more than the two last Alien films... because the game not only tied into the story, but kept the look and atmosphere of the original movie. So many back stories could be tied together, questions answered, but why give the fans what they want? If you're that board of the franchise, sell it to someone who wants to keep it alive.

 

[Mugato]

Am I the only one who doesn't like dota? I think I've lost all faith and any interest in valve

I tried it, couldn't stand it, almost feels like a minecraft sort of thing to me (as in, I don't understand it with this generation) And Wtff was this "teaser"?! A couple of runes floating around? That tells me exactly jack fin shit about the game. Instantly on my do not care list.

 

[NickJames]

Maybe its just me... but it seems like Valve hates the fans of the very game that put them on the map. Like Ridley Scott and the fans of the Alien franchise... I enjoyed the recent game more than the two last Alien films... because the game not only tied into the story, but kept the look and atmosphere of the original movie. So many back stories could be tied together, questions answered, but why give the fans what they want? If you're that board of the franchise, sell it to someone who wants to keep it alive.

They're just after what makes them the most amount of overtime revenue. Yeah sure they can release Half-life 3, please about 2 million fans and possibly make a nice chunk of money. But that's a drop in the bucket compared to the long term revenue of esports, marketplace transactions and cosmetics. A DOTA card game is just another attempt at cashing in on a huge revenue stream by making cards sellable on the marketplace netting them those transaction costs and charging for packs of low odds bullshit. Valve is no longer everyone's player friendly developer, they are a corporate money maker.

 

[Ur_Mom]

They're just after what makes them the most amount of overtime revenue. Yeah sure they can release Half-life 3, please about 2 million fans and possibly make a nice chunk of money. But that's a drop in the bucket compared to the long term revenue of esports, marketplace transactions and cosmetics. A DOTA card game is just another attempt at cashing in on a huge revenue stream by making cards sellable on the marketplace netting them those transaction costs and charging for packs of low odds bullshit. Valve is no longer everyone's player friendly developer, they are a corporate money maker.

I'm not sure on HL3 pleasing fans. Right now, it's at a post-Godlike hype status. Would any game that was released live up to the hype? I doubt it. It would have to turn the buckets up to 11. If it was perfect (which Valve has the folks that can do it), it'd make bank. I just don't know if they'd have the passion to do it right. I think decisions would be made for a higher ROI rather than a better game. Like you said - they aren't the player friendly developer anymore. :/

 

[Armenius]

I'm not sure on HL3 pleasing fans. Right now, it's at a post-Godlike hype status. Would any game that was released live up to the hype? I doubt it. It would have to turn the buckets up to 11. If it was perfect (which Valve has the folks that can do it), it'd make bank. I just don't know if they'd have the passion to do it right. I think decisions would be made for a higher ROI rather than a better game. Like you said - they aren't the player friendly developer anymore. :/

I wouldn't care. I just want to see a conclusion to Gordon's story.

 

[Deleted member 83233]

id pulled off Doom 2016, but then, they're still an actual game company. Valve is not the company they were then. I doubt they have enough game-related focus left to make ANY game that wasn't borrowed from a mod-team somewhere and then enveloped.

Actually, that's how they should build HL2.3 or 3 really. Just pull in a worthy mod team, bolster their resources, give them a small team of extra devs and artists, and allow THEM to build the final HL game.

On the actual topic of this thread... No thanks! Fucking fake card games... Ugh...

 

[monkeymagick]

Is that French?

Si, senor.

 

[scojer]

 

[NickJames]

I wouldn't care. I just want to see a conclusion to Gordon's story.

Sadly most of the original HL story team is gone. I really hope Gabe kept a script to the finale in case he ever gets the itch to finally finish it but I just don't see it happening under his leadership anytime soon.

 

[Nytegard]

Valve is just going the way of the games industry. Easy to develop, F2P, Pay To Win, gambling games.

I'm pretty sure they're aware now that Half Life 3 is an impossibility. There is ZERO chance that it can be successful in a way that it's been built up to be. Why bother making a game that would only hurt your overall reputation?

 

[Dunnlang]

Valve is just going the way of the games industry. Easy to develop, F2P, Pay To Win, gambling games.

I'm pretty sure they're aware now that Half Life 3 is an impossibility. There is ZERO chance that it can be successful in a way that it's been built up to be. Why bother making a game that would only hurt your overall reputation?

I suspect their plan was always to make HL3 for a new VR platform. The best way to make an impactful splash is to wow people with something they have not seen before. Unfortunately, I don't think VR gaming has matured, or developed, as expected. It will take too long for hardware and software to converge and saturate the market. By the time Valve could make enough sales for HL3, VR would not be new, special and amazing.

There was a time a few years ago that everyone thought headsets would be affordable and we'd just be fine with FPS games that flip the "VR On" switch. That time has passed as we learned the hardware and software requirements to make a comfortable gaming experience are much higher.

 

[cvinh]

Considering how successful Hearthstone is, I'm not surprised they want to get into that market. People paying hundreds if not thousands of dollars for virtual items.

 

[Deleted member 83233]

Considering how successful Hearthstone is, I'm not surprised they want to get into that market. People paying hundreds if not thousands of dollars for virtual items.

While not surprising at all, (maybe even intelligent on their part from a business point of view) it's no less lame.

 

[Design1stcode2nd]

I played the hell out of HL2 and Team Fortress but since then nothing has really appealed to me. Played a bit of Portal 2 but never got very far. I've enjoyed all the Blizzard games I've played since Lost Vikings.

Blizzard doesn't have characters...really? Illidan, Kerrigan, Thrall, Diablo...

 

[Deleted member 83233]

"...why is that Gabe?"

"It's not that I'm lazy Bob... it's that I just don't care!"

"Don't... care?"

"You know what else Bob? My company has NO bosses... NO BOSSES!!!"
"So any time we want to make a game, nobody will agree on one!"

"Now what if... and believe me, this is COMPLETELY hypothetical... we made YOU the boss, with no less than the entire company... right underneath you. Would that help?"

"It might Bob... hey listen, I have to go now, but good luck with your firings..."

 

[Krenum]

Yay.....Another card game. Valve, you suck.

 

[rudy]

They're just after what makes them the most amount of overtime revenue. Yeah sure they can release Half-life 3, please about 2 million fans and possibly make a nice chunk of money. But that's a drop in the bucket compared to the long term revenue of esports, marketplace transactions and cosmetics. A DOTA card game is just another attempt at cashing in on a huge revenue stream by making cards sellable on the marketplace netting them those transaction costs and charging for packs of low odds bullshit. Valve is no longer everyone's player friendly developer, they are a corporate money maker.

That all makes sense fine, but the problem is valve is plenty big enough to have multiple development teams. They have no need to put all their eggs in one or 2 baskets. Second I personally have a larger theory on the demise of deathmatch games that I think is going to start swinging back around. Mainly in the days of CRTs and old school players fast paced DM games were easier to digest for a handful of reasons, mainly your average gamer was more knowledgable about computing so they could dig into config files, alter video settings, make scripts etc.. And CRTs just made it easier to play because their technology actually allowed you to see and respond at high frame rates. But when all the millions of young AOL noobs came on the scene getting pounded by veterans in those games was too much so they went to simple realistic games and made counterstrike the juggernaut it is. However something is happening we are seeing renewed interest in faster paced games with more variety in weapons and skills. This is evident by the popularity of over watch. I think this boils down to several factors. First LCDs after the advent of lightboost are now viable fast paced FPS monitors. We now have them pushing 240hz and have technologies like adaptive sync, gsync, strobing, lightboost etc.... So this means spinning yourself quickly to take a shot isn't the hell it was on 60hz lcds with massive ghosting. Second 3 generations of realistic shooter noobs have now grown up and I think a lot of them are itching for something more demanding, leanring to move forward and backwards, and aim is now a forgone skill that they all have. Third, the old days of getting good at a game requiring you to know a good player and have them train you are gone. People can make tons of money showing you how to play on services like youtube and twitch. All this comes together to say ya, we could see another resurgence of quake, unreal, or some other fast paced game like hmmm what was the fastest most dynamic game I ever played oh yeah, valves own HLDM...... So to me its about time valve start really looking at bringing out hl3 with a multiplayer component.

 

[Deleted member 83233]

That all makes sense fine, but the problem is valve is plenty big enough to have multiple development teams. They have no need to put all their eggs in one or 2 baskets. Second I personally have a larger theory on the demise of deathmatch games that I think is going to start swinging back around. Mainly in the days of CRTs and old school players fast paced DM games were easier to digest for a handful of reasons, mainly your average gamer was more knowledgable about computing so they could dig into config files, alter video settings, make scripts etc.. And CRTs just made it easier to play because their technology actually allowed you to see and respond at high frame rates. But when all the millions of young AOL noobs came on the scene getting pounded by veterans in those games was too much so they went to simple realistic games and made counterstrike the juggernaut it is. However something is happening we are seeing renewed interest in faster paced games with more variety in weapons and skills. This is evident by the popularity of over watch. I think this boils down to several factors. First LCDs after the advent of lightboost are now viable fast paced FPS monitors. We now have them pushing 240hz and have technologies like adaptive sync, gsync, strobing, lightboost etc.... So this means spinning yourself quickly to take a shot isn't the hell it was on 60hz lcds with massive ghosting. Second 3 generations of realistic shooter noobs have now grown up and I think a lot of them are itching for something more demanding, leanring to move forward and backwards, and aim is now a forgone skill that they all have. Third, the old days of getting good at a game requiring you to know a good player and have them train you are gone. People can make tons of money showing you how to play on services like youtube and twitch. All this comes together to say ya, we could see another resurgence of quake, unreal, or some other fast paced game like hmmm what was the fastest most dynamic game I ever played oh yeah, valves own HLDM...... So to me its about time valve start really looking at bringing out hl3 with a multiplayer component.

It will be interesting to see how well Quake Champions does when it's fully released. It's not 100% pure (I know there are people that will complain about this or that, like the skills added...) but it seems pretty close, and really I can't fault them for adding a few minor modern-day conventions to attract more players. How good or popular it is remains to be seen, but it will be a good litmus I think for seeing if a resurgence (like the one you're predicting) is possible. I have a feeling that it is possible. While the MP component of Doom 2016 wasn't very popular, id definitely brought back fast-action, skill based, SP shooting. The MP side could be "that" close to doing the same. Just have to wait a bit more to find out.

The unfortunate thing that I think is hampering some of that is the attitude a lot of these companies have toward dedicated servers. All of US want them, none of THEM want to give them to us. You're right though, I've been seeing more faster paced games surfacing lately, and some of them are getting some fairly positive responses.

No idea if that will have any impact on Valve or not really. I've kinda given up on more HL, but I'd even be happy with more L4D at this point.

 

[dethklokworkorange]

"...why is that Gabe?"

"It's not that I'm lazy Bob... it's that I just don't care!"

"Don't... care?"

"You know what else Bob? My company has NO bosses... NO BOSSES!!!"
"So any time we want to make a game, nobody will agree on one!"

"Now what if... and believe me, this is COMPLETELY hypothetical... we made YOU the boss, with no less than the entire company... right underneath you. Would that help?"

"It might Bob... hey listen, I have to go now, but good luck with your firings..."

Perfect. How about a Pieces of Flair card game? HL3 stapler?

 

[THRESHIN]

No, I also hate the MOBA genre. I used to like card games until this fad exploded. I feel like Blizzard has successfully dulled another generation of possibilities for PC exclusives with Hearthstone, just like the did with WoW.

Yeah I don't get it. I don't mind playing one of the magic card games on the very rare occasion but that's only for my own personal nostalgia. I used to be into the game a bit when it was still new.

 

[Noghri2]

This made me laugh today at work when I saw it.