I find it interesting that he mentions Valve's employee count "pushing 400". The Valve Employee Handbook that leaked earlier in the year (~March [Edit: And itself is dated 2012]) has the number at less than 300. This implies that in the space of (well) less than a year the company has hired around 100 people.
Is Valve's unique structure preventing them from making pure single-player games?
- Thread starter abasm
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I find it interesting that he mentions Valve's employee count "pushing 400". The Valve Employee Handbook that leaked earlier in the year (~March [Edit: And itself is dated 2012]) has the number at less than 300. This implies that in the space of (well) less than a year the company has hired around 100 people.
you have to think that all the focus on mp and community created content is leading them to an MMO. I'm sure HL3 will still be a standalone masterpiece, but after that we won't see much in the way of valve created singleplayer content.
And i'm not talking mmo like wow or something, with massive amounts of pre generated content. It would be something heavily focused on player created content.
And i'm not talking mmo like wow or something, with massive amounts of pre generated content. It would be something heavily focused on player created content.
Similarly, ever since Dota 2 was unveiled, I've wished for a Valve-developed lootwhore ARPG game in the vein of Diablo. Clearly, Source is perfect for it, and any additional Valve-developed "acts" would be free!
actually when you do think of it, their multiplayer is primarily story driven Co-Ops:
TF2
Portal 2
L4D 1+2
and the other games are built mainly on teams Vs. Teams:
TF2
CS
DOTA
what i like most in their games is that they make you join forces with others, and not like other games, which are mainly self centered multiplayer games (kill streaks as an example)
TF2
Portal 2
L4D 1+2
and the other games are built mainly on teams Vs. Teams:
TF2
CS
DOTA
what i like most in their games is that they make you join forces with others, and not like other games, which are mainly self centered multiplayer games (kill streaks as an example)
crimsonheadGCN
Banned
You described what the idea of Prospero eventually morphed into: http://half-life.wikia.com/wiki/Prospero
With Team Fortress 2 largely done and the team having less than 10 people, maybe they decided to start work on it again?
Prospero Redux could explain the LMNO-esque sci-fi art people have seen peppered about Valve's hallways the past couple of years.
They are going to have quests for DOTA 2 whether they are just glorified tutorials or much more we would have to wait and see. The work they have put into DOTA 2 they could quite easily make coop mini campaigns.
Don't forget that Half-Life 2 had multiplayer, in the form of Half-Life 2: Deathmatch (and Half-Life 1 had built in multiplayer). Wouldn't be surprised to see something similar happen with Half-Life 3. HL2: Deathmatch technically serves as the multiplayer for the episodes too, as they are both part of Half-Life 2.
Also, all the games you've mentioned have very different styles of multiplayer: TF2 is large scale and heavily objective based; CS is designed more around smaller teams and gunfights with optional objectives; Left 4 Dead is 4 player co-op, and 8 player versus, with survival focused gameplay; Portal 2 is a puzzle co-op game; Dota 2 is a 5v5 RTS essentially. In fact, the only two of their games which are remotely similar are Left 4 Dead and Alien Swarm, and the latter is played top-down.
I don't think their structure is preventing them from making single-player games, I just think it's harder to make single-player games in general nowadays - you have to create a lot more content and story to satisfy customers than you do in multiplayer because single-player games are generally designed to be played once.
Also, all the games you've mentioned have very different styles of multiplayer: TF2 is large scale and heavily objective based; CS is designed more around smaller teams and gunfights with optional objectives; Left 4 Dead is 4 player co-op, and 8 player versus, with survival focused gameplay; Portal 2 is a puzzle co-op game; Dota 2 is a 5v5 RTS essentially. In fact, the only two of their games which are remotely similar are Left 4 Dead and Alien Swarm, and the latter is played top-down.
I don't think their structure is preventing them from making single-player games, I just think it's harder to make single-player games in general nowadays - you have to create a lot more content and story to satisfy customers than you do in multiplayer because single-player games are generally designed to be played once.
I wrote a blog post on this a while back, and I'd like to post it here, but I'm not sure if linking one's own blog is allowed or not. The short version is that yes, that's why Valve isn't very good at single-player games. A single-player game pretty much straight-up needs an author or a small group of people working together. The larger your team gets, the more unwieldy, and it becomes very challenging to make a game where everyone has to be working towards one goal. The reason it took them so long to release Half-Life 2 and their subsequent episodes is because of just how unwieldy all this stuff is.
Ideally, you should have a small group of people working on the game (like Portal), or you should have a small group of people leading its development.
Except that Left 4 Dead was Turtle Rock's invention, and Valve bought Turtle Rock part way through Left 4 Dead's development. L4D isn't really a Valve game--and that might be why it's significantly better than its purely Valve-developed sequel, Left 4 Dead 2.
Ideally, you should have a small group of people working on the game (like Portal), or you should have a small group of people leading its development.
Except that Left 4 Dead was Turtle Rock's invention, and Valve bought Turtle Rock part way through Left 4 Dead's development. L4D isn't really a Valve game--and that might be why it's significantly better than its purely Valve-developed sequel, Left 4 Dead 2.
God not this shit again. lol
I think Gabe's warning about "isolated" single player experiences isn't necessarily about SP games being hard or inefficient to make with the cabal system, but that community involvement would be an integral part of future games from them.
There was a Penny Arcade blog post a while back where Jerry waxed poetic about the glory days of Doom 2 and Duke Nukem 3D where there was a vibrant, active community devoted to creating level packs, many of them quite good. You could go online and download dozens of the community's finest creations and enjoy them all in one sitting, and there were new ones being made all the time, some of them quite ambitious. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if Valve introduced a new, easy to use level editor for their next SP game in an attempt to bring that experience back.
There was a Penny Arcade blog post a while back where Jerry waxed poetic about the glory days of Doom 2 and Duke Nukem 3D where there was a vibrant, active community devoted to creating level packs, many of them quite good. You could go online and download dozens of the community's finest creations and enjoy them all in one sitting, and there were new ones being made all the time, some of them quite ambitious. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if Valve introduced a new, easy to use level editor for their next SP game in an attempt to bring that experience back.
SniperHunter
Banned
Valve is slipping...I don't care about any of their upcoming projects. Source film maker, Steam appz, DOTA2, more TF2 content....meh
I wish they would reveal Source 2.0, Half life 3 and Half Life 2 remake running on DX11
I wish they would reveal Source 2.0, Half life 3 and Half Life 2 remake running on DX11
bruce willis?
That is your problem, not Valve's. More Half-life is definitely coming, but all the stuff you don't care about has proved tremendously successful for them, and is well loved by new and old fans alike.
On top of that, HL3 won't happen 'til they can be sure it'll blow peoples' minds like HL2 did. The projects they've been working on since the Orange Box have laid the foundation for all sorts of crazy new tech to increase its wow factor even more.
I think Portal 2's SLE (Simplified Level Editor) is Valve's way of testing the waters. Obviously it's a much easier case for a puzzle game such as Portal 2, but I'm sure Valve could make a similar tool for the likes of Half-Life. And of course we know that even internally there's a dislike for Hammer, so I assume its Source 2 variant will be easier to use.
Portal 2's SLE and Source Filmmaker are opening the door to the community making full fledged mods/addons with relative ease. Couple that with Steam Workshop and the community can actually make money from it as well.
Ideally, they'd give map pack makers the option to either sell their creations or set them up as donationware like the community TF2 maps.
I'd argue that DoD and CS are pretty fundamentally similar, which is why we haven't seen them really make anything of DoD, and, until they figure out a way to reimagine it TF2-style, we probably won't.
SniperHunter
Banned
All right this is a good point, but as a hardcore Half Life fan, who thinks HL2 is the best single player shooter ever! I am sick and tired of waiting! And reading about all these other projects pisses me off....
I think replaying Half Life 2 and the two episodes will calm me down, I need to get to that ASAP.
Uh, how about the fact that CS:GO is a flat-fee multiplayer game with no cosmetics? Valve wouldn't release it that way if they really wanted to put TF2's business model as their absolute top priority? I think the bigger problem is that there's next to no interest in DoD right now to warrant another installment. That could change, but I wouldn't blame Valve for it being a fairly niche game.
Half Life is my least favourite Valve franchise, by a huge margin.
I wasn't referring to TF2's business model. I meant that it would need to be fundamentally shifted, or as JaseC said, it would have to take advantage of some technological leap to warrant a sequel.