When Valve was teasing three major announcements earlier this month, countless gamers around the world held their breath and crossed their fingers in anticipation of those three magic words to come tumbling from Gabe Newll's mouth - Half Life 3. Ultimately, that never came to pass, as Valve and Newell had set their sights on conquering the living room audience, as opposed to merely entertaining them.
Despite the revolutionary impact that could result from Valve finally charging headlong into the console war with its SteamBox, it was difficult not to be disappointed that we were still no closer to Half-Life 3 then we were five years ago. This was the case for not only gamers, but developers as well, like Gearbox President Randy Pitchford.
The man behind the revered Borderlands series spoke with GI.biz about his disappointment regarding the company's decision to focus on hardware over games.
"I want to see Half-Life 3 or other exciting and big and original offerings from these guys who are amongst the best in the world at crafting interactive entertainment and are resourced better than anyone. As long as Steam and Valve are one entity, I am always going to feel uneasy that attention and resources towards the platform is distracting attention and resources away from the entertainment they could (should?) be creating."
No matter how you feel about Gearbox and Pitchford over the Aliens: Colonial Marines travesty, it's hard to disagree with him on this point. The future of the Half-Life franchise has almost been relegated to an Internet gag at this point, with various message boards and forum threads adorned with lines like, "Newell eats bad chicken burrito, lets loose 3 minute fart. Half-Life 3 confirmed."
We'd all like to see Mr. Freeman's adventure continue, but with the company showing its new direction, it's hard to see that ever coming to pass.
"I guess I am just a greedy gamer who wants to be blown away playing more of the best, new video games in the world, so I selfishly want to know that the incredible talent at Valve is spending 100 percent of their mindshare building new video games!"
Indeed Mr. Pitchford, indeed...
