Half Life 2 Deathmatch and Half Life 2 Lost Coast (free)

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It is rather old news. Not sure if it has ever been posted here.
VALVe. My favorite developer. The greatest PC games I have ever played regarding the First Person (and third person if you know how ) realm.
For those with a NVIDIA GPU you can get this:
http://www.steampowered.com/nvidia1/
For owners of ATI GPU's like myself.
http://www.steampowered.com/ati_offer1a/

Of course don't expect to be able to play any mods.
Me? If Steam makes it, I buy it!
One great thing is that you can buy ALL of their games (from their first all the way to Left 4 Dead) for $99.99
Absolutely the best deal around!
http://store.steampowered.com/sub/1134/
If you had a chance to buy $230 worth of games for $100. Would you go for it?

Ask me? I've been playing VALVe games/mods for over two years and the excitement has never dulled. It just gets better and better every month.

Steam don't make games, they are a distributor only

What? Steam is VALVe. Same company. Steam is the name of their distribution method.
They are Steam Games due to being playable via Steam only.

Steam is the digital distribution service that Valve runs, which distributes not only games produced by Valve but games from other game developers.

Why hasn't there been any news on Episode 3 lately? I thought they were going to reveal something about it at the end of 2008, but there's been no news of it on Steam... no trailers, no screenshots, nothing. I'm beginning to wonder if Valve is even working on it, though I don't think they would just "abandon" it.

Valve Time =(

There has been news since around Left 4 Dead.
Half Life 2 Episode 3 will be released in 2010. We should hear the details around the end of this year.

Now if your a developer and or have any kind of experience you would know why it is taking them so long.
I do not want their game until they are content with it.

The reason why it took so long to make Half Life 2 was because they dumped Gold Source and went on with Source.
The source engine has had some major updates if you have noticed. They have been adding all kinds of great functions.
Of course this does come with bugs but that is coding. You will always have bugs in your code. It takes a bit to weed them out.
And when you update your engine it takes a lot of time. Basically you have to remake all your maps.

Ever tried taking a Half Life 2 Engine game and updating it to the Orange Box Engine?
Or at least waiting on the new version of a mod to be released on a higher engine?
It takes a good while. Say half a year to move a game up an engine.
So take the time it takes to make the maps.
Take the time it takes to make the engine.
Take the time it takes to fix those immediate bugs.
Take the time it takes to spend working and how many people to work.

It comes out to a big wait. Around 1 and half years for a game with the quality of an episodic release.
Now 3. They said they were going to make it the longest of the episodic series.
The engine from Ep2 to Ep3 vastly differs. And the maps and such are vastly longer.
That being said it is no wonder why it has taken so long.

Now also I must say that it probably would of been better if instead of releasing an episodic series. Finish the new engine and make all the maps all at once for a Half Life 3 release. And for those who do not know. The episodic series is not Half Life 3.
There will be a Half Life 3, 4, etc. according to Gabe Newell.

I have a feeling that we will be seeing a lot more of the AI Director from Left 4 Dead.
One of the best things I have seen in the direction of AI! It would be ridiculous to not include it in future games!

Good explanation, mmstick. Sounds like you're rather familiar with the game development process. Yeah, I've done a little mod-making myself, so I know that the more features you try to put in, the longer it takes to debug.

Perhaps, but I think Valve chose the "episodic" method so that it wouldn't take so many years in-between sequels.


I think it's funny that one of the main selling points of a zombie game is "AI."

The game does have to be tested. The testers are given debug codes to use if they are needed to test the game. These debug codes are also known as cheats. Developers will never remove them as beta testing would take too long for conventional methods.

I wouldn't mind Ep3 being longer than HL2, ep1, ep2. I just like to play and play. Not reach the end and - oh, that's it... The end of ep3 should be more apparent, but considering there will be a Half Life 3 in the works, I am ever curious to see how this version of Half Life part 4 pans out (Half Life 2, the main game being part1)

Yes the AI Director is a pretty good thing to have.
It spawns enemies and such in numerous places. You never know where they will spawn, how many, or when.

Now the AI Director is currently in it's infant stage as Mike Booth had stated. He is working on improving it to include not just the enemies and such. But the atmosphere, weather, environment. It chooses what to play when. What dialogue to choose. Left 4 Dead has been a great success.

I like using the console for the 1,000 zombies.

Yeah there is no way to actually get through doing that. Rather chaotic.

The thing I like about VALVe is that they give use their Software Development Kit for the games that we own and let us make our own maps and games off of it.

Take a look at Insurgency: Modern Infantry Combat.
Brilliant FPS. Highly realistic.

CoD 4? No this game blows that one out of the dust.
Counter Strike? Even more realistic than that.

I do see the potential for Resistance and Liberation to appear up there with the Official Steamworks Mods. The gameplay and everything is much like Insurgency, but better. This one is set in WWII instead of the modern wars of today.

I don't see how anyone could play a console though...
There is no modding community for it. (Unless your talking about older games that have been illegally modded and played over an emulator)

Your right! They are mindless zombies.
With a very intelligent Artificial Intelligence!

Although it is not actually the zombies. Just the Director..
The Director reminds me of God. lol

HL / HL2 (CS's) all rocked.

But L4D was just the same game with zombies.. Am i the only one that yawned at this?

Mike Booth stated that the idea came from when they were testing the bots for counter strike.
Get a bunch of bots with knives teamed up against 4 people.
L4D is that concept only with a story and better graphics.
I find the AI Director interesting.