Marc Laidlaw has left Valve

dex3108

Member
How would money help?

VALVe are swimming in money.

You can´t kickstart ambition or desire to make a game.

Who cares about Valve. If there is KS campaign for HL3 what could Valve do? If they block it they will piss people who want closure. As you said they don;t care about money ether. Only thing they could do i block KS and formally announce that they are working on HL3 or let KS continue. In both cases it is win for users. :D

When there is no nice way to make them talk there are other ways.
 

KC Denton

Member
Imagine if Porsche started producing cheap, economy-oriented cars. Now imagine if they became successful at it, then refused to talk about the 911 for nearly a decade. Sure they'd technically still be a car company, but their original fanbase is going to feel a little betrayed.

That's how a lot of Half-life fans feel about Valve.
A more comparable imaginary scenario is if after the cliffhanger ending of Halo 2, Bungie went on to make Destiny and never mentioned Halo after that.
 
Who cares about Valve. If there is KS campaign for HL3 what could Valve do? If they block it they will piss people who want closure. As you said they don;t care about money ether. Only thing they could do i block KS and formally announce that they are working on HL3 or let KS continue. In both cases it is win for users. :D

When there is no nice way to make them talk there are other ways.

pachah1.png
 

Zia

Member
Gutted.

While Dota 2 has received really great support as a Source 2 title, TF2 is mainly crowd sourced and while CS:GO has seen a pretty big fundamental update content updates are nonexistent and it's still stuff a few people with a lot of data can handle. Steam Controllers are out the door, the holiday sale was very quiet, the Vive looks like it's retail-ready. I've been assuming a good portion of Valve is working on something new and I'd really, really like to know what that is now.
 

Jb

Member
A more comparable imaginary scenario is if after the cliffhanger ending of Halo 2, Bungie went on to make Destiny and never mentioned Halo after that.

That's the thing that people saying "they never promised an Half Life 3" seem to forget. Episode 2 ended on a big cliffhanger that made the whole HL2 narrative arc feel unfinished. That they don't know how to modernize HL for the modern era is understandable, but a conclusion to that arc in some way shape or form would have made sense.
 
He meant HL2 when he said 12 years

But that doesn't make sense. He says 12 years of silence. So Episode 1 and 2 didn't exist?

Gutted.

While Dota 2 has received really great support as a Source 2 title, TF2 is mainly crowd sourced and while CS:GO has seen a pretty big fundamental update content updates are nonexistent and it's still stuff a few people with a lot of data can handle. Steam Controllers are out the door, the holiday sale was very quiet, the Vive looks like it's retail-ready. I've been assuming a good portion of Valve is working on something new and I'd really, really like to know what that is now.

Wouldn't surprise me if the biggest group within Valve is the VR group now. Which obviously doesn't necessarily translate to shipping a new game soon.
 

TheSeks

Blinded by the luminous glory that is David Bowie's physical manifestation.
There might be some consequences to that, though.

Like smelling the ashes, Mr. Samarecarm?

TheRedSnifit said:
The reality is that Steam works well enough that few people see reason to seek out alternatives.

No, the reality is: A lot of titles are Steam and Steam only and that's why people flock to it. You can't get Street Fighter 4 on GoG. You can't get SF4 on Origin. Uplay... etc. There's other "Steam Only" titles published that either take a while to come around on other services or never do.
 

gdt

Member
Something I find very odd about Valve is that they have 1 original series that was created entirely inside their walls: Half Life.

Every other game they have released was either originally a mod, or started development/was conceived of outside of Valve.

Yeah so right on schedule
 

water_wendi

Water is not wet!
No, the reality is: A lot of titles are Steam and Steam only and that's why people flock to it. You can't get Street Fighter 4 on GoG. You can't get SF4 on Origin. Uplay... etc. There's other "Steam Only" titles published that either take a while to come around on other services or never do.

And the other part of the equation is that once in you are locked in forever. You cant take your games out, PC gaming has no generational reset like consoles, and most people arent going to toss out their gaming library. Steam can only increase due to its very nature.
 

dex3108

Member
Something I find very odd about Valve is that they have 1 original series that was created entirely inside their walls: Half Life.

Every other game they have released was either originally a mod, or started development/was conceived of outside of Valve.

Hmm can we count Portal too? It was student project before they went to Valve and it is not entirely same as project that students did before going to Valve :D Core concept was similar but they improved it and whole thing evolved under Valve.
 

Cleve

Member
I don't think there's a value in releasing half life 3 at this point. Expectations are just too high among a fan base that will never be happy.

I hope the guy enjoys retirement, and valve continues to pursue making projects they're passionate about getting in to fans hands.

Is there any alternative? It's pretty much a monopoly.

There are alternatives, the sad thing is each time I see a new one appear there's way more posts of "ANOTHER CLIENT? FUCK THAT" even when they're really not that bad, and alternatives are a good thing.
 
Something I find very odd about Valve is that they have 1 original series that was created entirely inside their walls: Half Life.

Every other game they have released was either originally a mod, or started development/was conceived of outside of Valve.

Valve only made one game
 

Wallach

Member
Who cares about Valve. If there is KS campaign for HL3 what could Valve do? If they block it they will piss people who want closure. As you said they don;t care about money ether. Only thing they could do i block KS and formally announce that they are working on HL3 or let KS continue. In both cases it is win for users. :D

When there is no nice way to make them talk there are other ways.

That's not how this works. That's not how any of this works.
 

injurai

Banned
Laidlaw consulting on Half-Life 3 in three years confirmed! Half-life releasing in 2023 confirmed!

Oh it's a good day.
 

kavanf1

Member
There's only one person who can save us now...we need Devin Tripp to write Half Life 3.

Help us Devi One Kinobi, you're our only hope.
 
I really doubt they'd create Source 2 for the sole purpose of custom games for Dota 2. Source 2 has to have been planned for something else, with the Dota 2 port being a trial run of the engine (similar to Half Life: Source being a test of the Source engine).

Valve making multiplayer games is actually what they do and always have done. The majority of their games have been multiplayer, even right in the beginning. Team Fortress is even older than Half Life, made by some of the first employees of Valve (before they worked at Valve, or even before Valve was a thing).

Something I find very odd about Valve is that they have 1 original series that was created entirely inside their walls: Half Life.

Every other game they have released was either originally a mod, or started development/was conceived of outside of Valve.
Portal as well.

The mod it's based off of is nothing like Portal at all, and is like saying Pikmin is a Mario game because it was born from a Mario tech demo.

Imagine if Porsche started producing cheap, economy-oriented cars. Now imagine they become successful at it, and refuse to talk about the 911 for nearly a decade. Sure they'd technically still be a car company, but their original fanbase is going to feel a little betrayed.

That's how a lot of Half-life fans feel about Valve.
Valve has been making multiplayer focused games since the company was founded, them continuing to make them isn't some new trend.

The majority of the early staff at Valve were from multiplayer mods of Quake. Counter Strike and Team Fortress were some of Valve's first major games, and even Half Life had a popular multiplayer component to it.
 

jem0208

Member
Hmm can we count Portal too? It was student project before they went to Valve and it is not entirely same as project that students did before going to Valve :D Core concept was similar but they improved it and whole thing evolved under Valve.

Aspects like the the story were definitely created inside of Valve. But IIRC after completing Narbacular Drop the devs had already started working on the puzzles, portals and physics behind the game before being hired at Valve.

The point stands though that Valve hired these devs because they had a cool game concept and helped them build on it; the game was conceived of outside of Valve.


Note: I don't think this is a bad thing, it's great that Valve were able to hire these guys and help them realize their concept. I just think it's odd that Valve hasn't actually created an original game series since Half Life.

Edit: Even with Portal the story is based inside of the Half Life universe, although I believe this is because they had a limited dev team and it would save them money being able to reuse assets.
 

injurai

Banned
I want to believe he wrapped up work on HL3, and now the rest of the team is moving into full production. I really want to believe he is just being coy.
 

Crackbone

Member
They've been heading down this road for awhile now and this just confirms what we already knew.

Theyre a digital distribution platform first and anything software related will likely be heavily multiplayer and monetized experiences.

I don't necessarily think there's anything wrong with that as it's a proven revenue stream and obviously lots of folks are jumping on board but personally it's not my cup of tea and that makes me sad.
 
Valve made one of the best (actually the best) game of all time in Dota 2 and people are still saying they don't make games. If they never made another L4D, Portal or HL I wouldn't be too bothered.

They didn't even make Dota smh.

Valve defenders are the actual worst.
 

CHC

Member
That sucks, he's actually one of the few people from Valve whose name I knew, outside of Gabe Newell himself. Viktor Antonov, who did a lot of the art for Half Life 2, actually left years ago to work on Dishonored. I can only guess the reasons were similar.

I'll be shocked if Half Life 3 ever comes to fruition. Makes me a little mad... usually I don't demand or feel entitled to sequels but when a story literally just ends abruptly like Episode 2, then yeah, it's hard not to be a little salty.
 
Just a perspective on what the other Valve writers are seemingly working on

Chet Faliszek is doing PR for the Vive
Jay Pinkerton is doing comics
Erik Wolpaw is doing comics and soon Psychonauts 2
Ted Kosmatka left for Bungie
Steve Jaros was doing Dota the last time he talked about work

of course there's unannounced stuff, which might not see the light of day at all... but the point is they haven't exactly knocked it out of the park in these last years

Welp.
 
They didn't even make Dota smh.

Valve defenders are the actual worst.

Dota 2 was made by Valve. The last 2 years of balance updates to the game have also been done by Valve and added to Dota 2 long before they hit the original mod. I wouldn't be surprised if this is the year the Dota mod is entirely dropped and Dota 2 begins to get exclusive heroes.

Dota 2 is actually a pretty unique product. It's a remake, but it's a remake that cannot directly reference the original game, so everything about the world and characters is 100% Valve.
 
That sucks, he's actually one of the few people from Valve whose name I knew, outside of Gabe Newell himself. Viktor Antonov, who did a lot of the art for Half Life 2, actually left years ago to work on Dishonored. I can only guess the reasons were similar.

"I left precisely when they stopped making epic, triple-As, which was Half-Life 2," Viktor Antonov told Eurogamer. "Since then, they were episodes.

"Valve is a great place, but I'm interested in projects, not in companies. I went to Valve specifically for Half-Life 2. I went and I collaborated with Arkane to do The Crossing and Dishonored. I put the project above everything else.

"Valve has grown into a much bigger company," he went on, "and what I really enjoy about the philosophy of Arkane is that it's a small, core team that does risky creative projects. And when I went to Valve, they were a small company. They've grown now, they're much bigger, and I'm interested in a certain level of creative risk taking and a certain energy that can be compared to jazz, jamming or rock n' roll, where it's small, it's intense and it's about making revolutions in the media."

.


Dota 2 was made by Valve. The last 2 years of balance updates to the game have also been done by Valve and added to Dota 2 long before they hit the original mod. I wouldn't be surprised if this is the year the Dota mod is entirely dropped and Dota 2 begins to get exclusive heroes.

Dota 2 is actually a pretty unique product. It's a remake, but it's a remake that cannot directly reference the original game, so everything about the world and characters is 100% Valve.

Well, only Pit Lord is left and they reach parity. So it's possible, but then again the rate of hero releases has substantially went down these last years.
 

Sibylus

Banned
tumblr_m2et85dFqW1rszru2o1_500.gif


I don't have the heart to post the Half-Death Replay thread. RIP.

In all seriousness, Laidlaw's major story work on Half-Life's continuation was finished years and years ago. His retirement won't be a major factor in either Half-Life 3's death or eventual release.
 
they will never release another dope single player game again

I feel like I've known that for awhile but now it's real

Fucking Valve
 
Just a perspective on what the other Valve writers are seemingly working on

Chet Faliszek is doing PR for the Vive
Jay Pinkerton is doing comics
Erik Wolpaw is doing comics and soon Psychonauts 2
Ted Kosmatka left for Bungie
Steve Jaros was doing Dota the last time he talked about work

of course there's unannounced stuff, which might not see the light of day at all... but the point is they haven't exactly knocked it out of the park in these last years

wait

so the creative director of Saints Row left for Valve and ended up working on Dota
 
I don't think there's a value in releasing half life 3 at this point. Expectations are just too high among a fan base that will never be happy.

I hope the guy enjoys retirement, and valve continues to pursue making projects they're passionate about getting in to fans hands.



There are alternatives, the sad thing is each time I see a new one appear there's way more posts of "ANOTHER CLIENT? FUCK THAT" even when they're really not that bad, and alternatives are a good thing.

That's very true, people were even annoyed at Rise of the Tomb Raider coming to the Windows 10 store, which is client free. The vast majority of PC games are on Steam in addition to the majority of the community which is the primary reason it has so many people online at a time. There are alternatives but it's really just Origin which is forced to be relevant by EA keeping their games exclusive to it, which is good in my opinion.

In my opinion the Windows 10 store is the ideal place to sell PC games, it's just there are hardly any games on the thing.
 
In all seriousness, Laidlaw's major story work on Half-Life's continuation was finished years and years ago. His retirement won't be a major factor in either Half-Life 3's death or eventual release.

My thoughts as well. Whatever is going on with HL3 at valve, I imagine story isn't one of the hurdles keeping it in development hell.
 
So, I guess if the writer is retired, we can assume Half Life 3 is done. Probably just working out the bugs so it can launch alongside Vive.
 
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