Marc Laidlaw reveals Half-Life 2 Episode 3's story synopsis

And here we are. I spoke of my return to this shore. It has been a circuitous path to lands I once knew, and surprising to see how much the terrain has changed. Enough time has passed that few remember me, or what I was saying when last I spoke, or what precisely we hoped to accomplish. At this point, the resistance will have failed or succeeded, no thanks to me. Old friends have been silenced, or fallen by the wayside. I no longer know or recognize most members of the research team, though I believe the spirit of rebellion still persists. I expect you know better than I the appropriate course of action, and I leave you to it. Except no further correspondence from me regarding these matters; this is my final epistle.
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Now I'm sad.
 
10 years of ghosting by Valve finally over. I feel relieved, but not satisfied. Thanks, Marc and fuck you Valve for the torture you put me through.
 
Here's hoping that some screenshots or assets make their way to the web.
The original concept art that was "leaked" seemed to follow pretty closely with the post Laidlaw had released. I just want to see what could have been.

Also no Gman closure wtf
 
I have a hard time getting upset about this because I gave up on Half-Life 2 Episode 3 ever happening at least three years ago. It seemed clear that there just wasn't enough momentum in the company to get that project made at that point. That sucks (Episode 2's ending was excellent as a cliffhanger, but not as a conclusion), but it is what it is. The outline Laidlaw presents here sounds like it would have been a great close to the saga of City 17.

Valve absolutely could have messaged things better, but they've always sucked at transparency.
 
ItsTheNew said:
For a couple of years maybe not a lifetime
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It's a little more complex than that. NDA terms can vary wildly, and not all of them automatically expire (terminate) either. Companies can also put in extra clauses, like adding extra years to specific pieces of information. It all depends on what you signed.
 
For some inexplicable reason, this confirmation of what I already effectively knew for a very long time has upset me a LOT more than I thought it would :(
 
1 thing killed Half-Life 3 and we're part of the problem.

STEAM.

That it became so big and successful(I'm sure far past what Valve had thought) lead Gabe to realize he really didn't have to do anything with his company at that point and just sat back and watched the dollar amounts grow.

Then throw Gabe's "non-management" style of running Valve into the mix where nobody really answered to anyone, it sealed Half Life's fate very quickly. I mean, what did Valve employees really do all those years besides help do some stuff with Steam and such?

Our only and I mean ONLY chance at visiting the world(s) of Half-Life again would be for Valve to sell the I.P. to a capable developer(many AAA studios would surely jump at the chance).

I'm currently thinking of this like a George Lucas situation where George realized he wasn't going to make anymore Star Wars movies and realized by selling the franchise he could a) obviously make a ton of money b) give the fans Star Wars again by selling it to Disney who promptly announced new movies.
 
It is honestly pretty shitty.

I think I wouldn't understand the outrage as much if it were a franchise that weren't being revisited. But it's not. A sequel or another episode was on the cards. It falling by the wayside is really unfair.

Hey Valve, I'm talking to you. It's kinda shitty. You have the money, do the right thing.
 
Old Gimlet Eyes said:
Fall from grace? They have millions of fans worldwide and make billions of dollars.... Just cause some HL fans are salty doesn't mean they don't have exponentially more happy DOTA fans.
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Yeah but DOTA is not a good game. I don't care how many players it has, the game mechanics are a fucking mess.

So, to recap, Valve used to make good games, now they have Steam and a hugely popular shitty game. Hence, the fall from grace.
 
Surfinn said:
Right, but like I said, there's no fucking chance Laidlaw didn't work on a story or complex ideas over the course of ten years. Dude was tweeting about story elements over the course of that time, and that was just public stuff that he felt comfortable enough to share.

I find it pretty much impossible that this outline is all he ever worked on, whether it was writing for EP3 or whatever may have come after that.

The endings of HL1 and HL2 were both fantastic and satisfying, yet mysterious and left you wanting more.

The ending in this outline feels like a retread.
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Dude, this is the ending to Half Life 2.
 
This sounds like an ending for Half-life 2: Episode 3 rather than just Half-life 3. Not just because they used what is basically the word Episode, but if this were a game, it would be significantly shorter than Half-life and Half-life 2, like the two episodes were.

Other than that, I don't see why a fan can't create a game from this. The Source Engine is still fully available and if someone can create a new game completely from scratch of Skyrim, I don't see why they can't do this.
 
fetus8 said:
This mentality is akin to Stockholm Syndrome.

We know Valve is not making another Half Life game, why do we NEED confirmation? This synposis is confirmation that another game isn't coming. It's time to accept our losses and move on.
lol I don't want HL to be dead either
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Yes it's akin to Stockholm syndrome

Asking a company who.. promised an ending to their game, then went silent, then alluded to it being in active development several times, trolled their fanbase with purposely misleading hints and suggestions over years, then lost key developers and writers, then went silent again.. To own up to the responsibility they have to clearly communicate with their customers what to expect for the future of he HL franchise.

Totally pointless for them to provide that closure now that a fanfic styled plot outline has been released on a blog
 
So weird to see Half-Life wrap up like this. Kind of sad; I wonder how people who are still at Valve feel about it. They're not all fabulously wealthy, are they? Surely some of them would like to actually make video games again.
 
I would love for someone to finally blow the lid off of this whole thing and give us the details of what happened to Half-Life. A documentary on this subject would be fascinating.

Gabe, you suck!
 
Crono27 said:
Let them just vent. At the end of the day, the salty ones will always be the loudest.
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Yup. Let them get it all out.
calavera_jo said:
Yeah but DOTA is not a good game. I don't care how many players it has, the game mechanics are a fucking mess.

So, to recap, Valve used to make good games, now they have Steam and a hugely popular shitty game. Hence, the fall from grace.
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I'll just let you vent brosef.
 
I'm really at a loss why Valve haven't publicly confirmed, yes, HL3 is dead. They've strung fans on for YEARS. It's so... I don't know.

I can't believe what's happening.
 
oh man, a decade of waiting for a few paragraphs of text. yikes..

glad i wasnt really anticipating the game that badly, as i've convinced myself HL2 was actually pretty boring. those terrible vehicle sections, ugh! im glad i dont have to do it again in a new game, phew.
 
Mellahan said:
I'm really at a loss why Valve haven't publicly confirmed, yes, HL3 is dead. They've strung fans on for YEARS. It's so... I don't know.

I can't believe what's happening.
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I genuinely believe the upper management at Valve doesn't give a single shit about its fans. They make Nintendo look transparent.
 
Mellahan said:
I'm really at a loss why Valve haven't publicly confirmed, yes, HL3 is dead. They've strung fans on for YEARS. It's so... I don't know.

I can't believe what's happening.
Click to expand...

There's less risk to just stay quiet about it.

It's a shitty thing to do.
 
Prototype Viktor said:
if you raise 50 million
i.e. 160~ million for Valve
for the next TI they will release it via hats
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Holy FUCK man. You cracked the code.

The game code for Half Life 3 is stored in the hat data. It was right under our noses, no, on top of our heads, all along!

But yeah Valve never should have teased HL3 for as long as they did, it's no wonder some people are rightly pissed at 'em. I don't blame them at all. Teasing it, knowing how crazy some fans get over the teasing, while knowing you're not even working on it, is straight up a dick move.
 
Mellahan said:
I'm really at a loss why Valve haven't publicly confirmed, yes, HL3 is dead. They've strung fans on for YEARS. It's so... I don't know.

I can't believe what's happening.
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Maybe because they want to do more games in the half-life universe?

This is a written synopsis ending to episode 3, not an ending to the entire franchise.
 
Interesting story synopsis. A lot of abstract shit going on that would be hard to represent in a game. Like going crazy and losing the ability to focus because of space time jumps...

As cool as a story ending it sounds like it would have been difficult to structure as a game? So it starts with you flying a plane and crash in a FPS cutscene. Then walk a short while on a glacier until you get to a combine base. Fight through that to the ship, you start up the ship something and then shit gets weirder, the end. Sort of one note compared to HL1 and HL2, but then I guess this was supposed to come out ten years ago...

It also sounds like the ship was sent back in time to the 7 hour war and blew up the mother base in outer Space? So time is changed and humans won war I guess but somehow there is still a resistance for Gordon to tell his story to.

Anyway, I look forward to the terribly animated and amusingly narrated YouTube recreation of this end to the Half-life saga.
 
Mellahan said:
I'm really at a loss why Valve haven't publicly confirmed, yes, HL3 is dead. They've strung fans on for YEARS. It's so... I don't know.

I can't believe what's happening.
Click to expand...

This is a company that literally hires psychologists so they can find the best ways to make money from people.


They probably run the numbers about announcing its dead and seen its not worth it.
 
tkscz said:
This sounds like an ending for Half-life 2: Episode 3 rather than just Half-life 3. Not just because they used what is basically the word Episode, but if this were a game, it would be significantly shorter than Half-life and Half-life 2, like the two episodes were.
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Because HL3 pretty much never existed, this is as far as they got with the story (Marc's version of the story at least)
 
I kind of like the idea that the Combine are unbeatable. It's a shame the saga has to end this way, I was always fine with it never happening, but there was no need to string the fans along for years after they knew for certain internally that they weren't going to bother.
 
Surfinn said:
Right, but like I said, there's no fucking chance Laidlaw didn't work on a story or complex ideas over the course of ten years. Dude was tweeting about story elements over the course of that time, and that was just public stuff that he felt comfortable enough to share.

I find it pretty much impossible that this outline is all he ever worked on, whether it was writing for EP3 or whatever may have come after that.
Click to expand...

It's reasonable to assume that Marc was probably involved in cancelled projects like Stars of Blood, and that Arkane HL game. I'm sure there's a treatment for HL3 as well.
 
Maybe if you could deny the combine some kills by last hitting your own resistance team members, Half-Life would of made more sense for gamers.
 
rashbeep said:
Because HL3 pretty much never existed, this is as far as they got with the story (Marc's version of the story at least)
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I recall reading somewhere not that long ago that HL3 and Ep 3 were projects that kept getting started but never really gained enough momentum to get anywhere /remember that AAA productions typically involve hundreds of people, and without getting enough momentum they will collapse - that's why games finally releasing after long development cycles are filled with various issues).
After several years of restarts and shutdown, people in the company grew tired of it, making new attempts to start it even more challenging. Eventually it simply died out.

Sadly I can't remember where I read this. I guess it was some anonymous dev talking to Kotaku, or something similar.
 
Can someone split this thread off into a discussion just about the plot. There os some serious long time fan goodness in there that i want to talk about without a thread full of how shot valve is
 
I'm really glad he posted this. I know that I and many others feel that reading this script feels like closing a chapter in our lives; Marc has given us some closure after so many years, and I'm grateful to him for doing so. We'll probably never see another Half-Life game, it sounds like Valve has changed too much by now, but at least we know what might have been.

I think it will be fascinating to see what the community do with this plot, because it's essentially a fairly detailed script of the game - maybe we'll see attempts by fans to recreate it within the Source engine as a full-fledged game?

I do think it's interesting that this seems to have exposed some very serious tensions between Valve and many of their oldest and most dedicated fans and supporters. Many feel real, genuine resement towards Valve for the way they've (mis)handled Half-Life 3 (Or Ep. 3) over the past decade or so, and in particular the way Valve have treated fans of the series and the company.

I think that's part of why Marc Laidlaw has received such an outpouring of love and gratefulness for posting this. Many fans felt completely abandoned by Valve, mistreated and ignored, strung along with vague promises of resolution to a series of games that many had investet so much of their emotions and time into. At this stage, most don't even care whether we get Half-Life 3 as an actual game, they just want to know how it ends so they can put this entire sordid, painful chapter to rest and move on.

Marc gave them that closure with his post. But the simplicity of it perhaps makes it yet more frustrating, because it reminds many people just how easy it would have been for Valve to intervene and never let it get to this stage in the first place. It's exposed an enormous and growing divide between Valve and their fans, who no longer believe Valve give a crap about them.

I think it's easy to handwave away criticism of Valve, as many users are doing, by referring to the fat stacks the company is currently counting up. I honestly don't think I've ever seen anything like this outpouring of genuine emotion, resentment and anger towards a company for the way they've treated this series and their fans. I hope you guys have seen the video which shows the reaction in the stadium when Valve announced 'Artifcate' - I honestly can't remember the last time something like that happened, other than maybe when Sony announced the Vita partnership with AT&T. There is a genuine, visceral sense of anger and frustration here, and I really think Valve need to come out and openly address it and begin the process of fixing that relationship and working to make amends.
 
Going to play all the half life games over again, question about Half life 1. I havent played it since 2002 probably. Should i play the original or the Black Mesa mod, any differences?
 
I discovered and played Half-Life just during the middle of my six years of electrical engineering studies at the university, and I already was a huge fan of FPS (Quake II & Unreal were my favourites). Half-Life made them to look like amateur efforts, so yeah... it became my fav game ever and I followed every new "chapter" in this saga, including Blue Shift and Opposing Force.

This epistle puts me in a melancholic mood, not that much due to the implications (no episode 3 ever) but it kinda closes the circle of something it became part of my life. I pretty much can remember where my life was for each new HL release. So, there are a lot of memories (good ones) attached to these games.

I recognize it's very likely this is the end of HL, but part of me, very deep inside still believes someday HL3 (as an episode or a new "full" game) will appear. Most probably I'm being very naive, I don't care, that's what I believe and I can't explain it, but there's something weird about all this that doesn't seem right.

I'm kinda pissed at Gabe for not being able to behave during all these years in a more honest way and tell us, the fans, what was going on with HL3 development. It's ok to tease and play the "let's be ambiguous" game for a certain period of time, but there is a moment, IMHO, where it's just a dick move. Even if HL3 is released, I still think it is not cool to not say anything during such a long time.

Marc Laidlaw always came across like a super nice dude, but after releasing this epistle, to me he's a million times more awesome than before. Kudos to him for this.

Regards.
 
JK-Money said:
Going to play all the half life games over again, question about Half life 1. I havent played it since 2002 probably. Should i play the original or the Black Mesa mod, any differences?
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Play the original for now. Black Mesa doesn't have the Xen part out yet (supposed to drop in September)
 
So many shitty games
soooo many shitty games

get sequels
games that barely make a profit and no demand get continued



and Valve the rich ass company
Demand is there
Money is there
Third party devs offering to help make it

and nothing
 
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