Yesterday, Valve shared a documentary for the 20th anniversary of Half-Life 2. And, in that documentary, we got to see some prototype gameplay footage from Half-Life 2: Episode Three. Not only that, but Gabe Newell shared his thoughts about why Half Life 2: Episode Three never came out.
Let’s start with the gameplay footage. This footage shows a new weapon that would allow players to create ice bridges to scale walls. This weapon would also allow you to freeze enemies. Plus, the video shows a new enemy that players would fight.
As for why HL2: Episode Three never came out, Gabe Newell had this to say.
“We could have shipped it, it wouldn’t be that hard. The failure was, my personal failure was being stumped. I couldn’t figure out why doing Episode Three was pushing anything forward. If it weren’t for the episodes there’d be no such thing as DOTA. And I know that sounds really weird, but it was the things we learned when developing the episodes that led to Team Fortress 2.”
Gabe concluded that Half-Life represents a tool Valve has and promises it has made to its customers to capitalize on innovation and opportunities to build game experiences that haven’t been involved previously.
The problem with this logic is that a lot of players want to know what happened next to Gordon, Alyx and the G-Man. They want closure to the story. And that’s what Gabe fails to understand.
That’s my main issue with a lot of game series lately. A lot of them do not feel like complete games. They don’t have proper endings. They either feel like fillers or “small episodes” (story-wise), or they end at a cliffhanger. And when they don’t get a sequel, it makes you feel like a fool for playing and supporting them. A perfect example of this is Deus Ex: Mankind Divided.
Anyway, there are some rumors that Valve may be working on a new Half-Life. However, as with more HL3 rumors, I suggest taking them with a grain of salt.
Finally, the team behind the Half-Life 3 fan game, Project Borealis, has released a demo for it. So, if you haven’t played it, I suggest doing so. It’s not much but hey, it’s at least something.
Enjoy!
Check out never before seen footage of Half-Life 2 Episode 3!
Looks like you would be able to make ice bridges to scale walls and more! pic.twitter.com/RuaI7476jG
— Half-Life Alyx NoVR (@HL_Alyx_NoVR) November 15, 2024
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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Gaymers don't deserve Half Life 3. Let the memories die with the older generation. The newer generation just cares about peanus and rap music.
nope that wasn't it, they didn't want to become the victim of another Crysis 2 or F.E.A.R 2
Wrong, but I can't expect you to be right.
I can relate that pretty well. Both of those games with their follow-up sequels were massive let downs. I was especially frustrated with C2 & Crytek basically died with that immature release.
Crysis 2 wasn't a massive dissapointment. Then again, you'd have to have been alive at the time with a working brain to understand the nuance and grey area that entire release inhabitated. It being a better seller than Crysis 1 by a country mile must have slipped your empty mind.
It was an absolute disappointment. It was made to sell better than Crysis 1 because Crytek targeted those lame plastic boxes instead of PC. Telling C2 not a disappointment after enjoying C1 is like admitting myself into a mental sanatorium and claiming I am alright.
You’re an extremely low IQ guy/girl/thing. Crysis 2 was superior to Crysis 1 in both gameplay and story. Crytek would be out of business right now if they didn’t move to console. Then again, not like you’d have the brain power to understand the nuances of life.
A linear and pretty beach and a poor to abysmal final hours of the game in the ice makes everything you have to say null and void. I was alive back then to experience everything, but best of all I’ll always be smarter than you so I enjoy everything more!
Crytek almost died because they were going all in live service games, eg making MOBA. It's utter luck that with all of the shxt they were throwing at the wall that Hunt: The Showdown stuck.
consoles are the problem in both cases.
seeing how cool that blob creature looked and moved along with the ice gun, really hammers home how STAGNATE modern gaming has become. also how wasted Valves potential is(infinite funds+status with NO drive). They could have put 10% towards experimental SP content but instead they chase F2P $$$. Shame.
play echo point nova if you want cool stuff.
Made by Severed steel devs…..nice, wishlisted and next Sale, it shall be mine… (PS john should start a DSOG gaming group where us uber based gamers kill eachother and talk current year)
There is no such thing as infinite funds. You're a child who has no clue about business.
I think valve is literally the 1 exception, as long as… games are made… valve is flush. kid. called 30% off each purchase.
🎯
The new documentary in the Ep 3 section really fleshed out what they had in the 6 months of work that went into it before going helping with L4D, and it was quite interesting! But oh well, they were burned out of HL after about 8 years between all entries. They should have done it after some rest still.
Translation of what GAYBE actually meant: we somehow managed to make 2 games that were bode well with people and we made some money so we resorted to be middle men and selling other people games rather than developing our owns again that potentially could backfire and distort our image of being a mysterious cult and the pillar of PC master race to another one trick dog dev.
TLDR: We Lack BALLS and we are greedy fatsos
If that's what you got from what he said, just think of it as being one of the many reasons you're poor and live with your parents.
thats it? Thats all they got after all those years? wtf are they doing scratching their balls all day?
I really think they were scratching balls all days with some raw thick vaselines.
Hello, I'm Gabe Newell, I cancelled Half-Life because I get money with Steam selling other people games.
If you were really Gabe Newell you'd be smarter and richer.
Lol. You're f*kin wild. Stay glued, this is super good for your brain.
best example why socialism doesnt work, here is another one, how much money has star citizen gotten and its ten years and still no game.
What Gabe says is a two headed snake. If you look at HL: Alyx, then you will be persuaded to believe him. If you look at HL2, you will call him a greedy liar. Half Life really needs a magnificent come back to raise the bar once again. Current gen gaymes are mostly just trash.
Mmm… I think he has a point, ALSO backed by other devs saying in the documentary that they were kinda out of ideas on what to do with the mechanics because they had done it all, and even Arkane was having trouble coming up with unexplored and interesting gameplay. Plus being burnt of 8 years of HL… I lean towards getting that feeling.
fr, i dont know what rock he's been living under, but there is definitely plenty of space to innovate. Path tracing, making physics great again, realistic character animations, AI, etc.
Such a vague answer by Gabe, just say it clearly steam happened and ur company is earning a lot of money just by taking cut on sales and u don't feel the need to develop new games. Counter strike and steam sales cut is ur cash cow now.
bingo
why socialism is bad for society in a nutshell. Remember they take 30% from every game sold.
He gave you an answer you didn't want to hear so you substituted it with your own warped version of deranged events. Typical Gen Z
That Cliffhanger in episode 2 is still the most brutal way to end a game with no sequel for the next 17+ years.
That's the truth and I can't see how Gaben could possibly be stumped about why there needed to be a HL2 Ep3. You just don't end an episode like Ep2 the way Valve did unless you were trying to build a strong desire to play the next episode.
Half-Life: Alyx was the true sequel.