[gemeaux333]

Marc Laidlaw just said he wanted to finish his scenaristic ark with Episode Three and then leave the scenaristic works of the next games to the new generation... Episode Three never happened but Marc Laidlaw leaved anyway, so it will be hard to properly pursue the actual scenaristic ark without him as he don't want to go back to Half-Life...

[Hendricks266]

I guess Half-Life....

had a half-life.

[MusicallyInspired]

Maybe he'd come back for just one more contractual job....I really can't picture Half-Life without his pen. Maybe that's why HL3 will never happen.

[Jim]

 MusicallyInspired, on 21 July 2017 - 12:28 PM, said:

Maybe he'd come back for just one more contractual job....I really can't picture Half-Life without his pen. Maybe that's why HL3 will never happen.

The sad things is that the fans can create an valve worthy ep3, imagine Minvera's map design, Transmission 120's gameplay, and 1187's custom enemies and weapons all coming together.

[MusicallyInspired]

No. Won't be the same.

[Jim]

Adam foster works for Valve

[necroslut]

The episodes were kinda lackluster to begin with. I'm pretty sure that's why we never got a third.

[MusicallyInspired]

The first episode was. The second episode, absolutely not.

[necroslut]

 MusicallyInspired, on 21 July 2017 - 09:11 PM, said:

The first episode was. The second episode, absolutely not.

Depends on what you mean, and what you expect from a Half-Life title. It wasn't a bad expansion, and it was a definite step up from Episode 1, but it hardly blew us away like HL1 and HL2 did at release.
Which, I suppose, you can't really expect from an expansion.... but it was an expansion released three years after the original game. I for one don't find it strange at all that they abandoned doing the episodes.

[Player Lin]

Whatever the excuse is, even like that(and EP2 is not lackluster at all), Valve should at least finishing the HL2 storyline by complete EP3 I think. Not just leave cliffhangers like that shit in the end of EP2...to make fans got suffered with never completed stories...what the hell wrong with you guys on Valve seriously.

[gemeaux333]

Marc laidlaw said the 3rd episode was meant to have an open ending , and end on a cliffhanger, meaning the result would have been the same as the space between HL1 and HL2... he also said that Half-Life story began before he was hired, and will continue without him !

[MusicallyInspired]

It has been said that episode 3 would end the Half-Life 2 store arc though. So at least things would be tied up. Whatever the cliffhanger would have been in ep3 it would have been for the next story arc. Unless they changed their mind.

[gemeaux333]

They are most likely to finish what have been started (with the Borealis and else)... many ways have been imagined for Half-Life 3, such as RTS and Open World FPS, the consensus is that Half-Life 3 will benefit of the VR (the price of the VR kit is constantly decreased and more games will join the library, so it will me more affordable and more that just a gimmick), Gabe have announced that many games using the Source 2 engine will be released in the upcomming months and one of them is set in the Half-Life universe

[necroslut]

 MusicallyInspired, on 22 July 2017 - 06:36 AM, said:

It has been said that episode 3 would end the Half-Life 2 store arc though. So at least things would be tied up. Whatever the cliffhanger would have been in ep3 it woukd have been for the next story arc. Unless they changed their mind.

I really doubt that it would tie up a lot of things. Half-Life always relied a lot on the mystery.

[MusicallyInspired]

I'm sure there would be a cliffhanger, but for an entirely different story beyond the Combine. Half-Life 1 ended on a cliffhanger too.

[necroslut]

 MusicallyInspired, on 22 July 2017 - 03:57 PM, said:

I'm sure there would be a cliffhanger, but for an entirely different story beyond the Combine. Half-Life 1 ended on a cliffhanger too.

Yeah, all Half-Life entries have ended on a cliffhanger of sorts. I still don't think there's ground for believing a lot of answers would be given. It's like X-Files, you know - each door just leads to another three.

[MusicallyInspired]

I didn't say answers would be given. I said the story arc would end. That was an official statement. A resolution to the Combine story arc. That's also what I meant when I said "tie things up". Not answers, just resolution.

[Player Lin]

I don't care if cliffhangers on the end of "story arc", since the HL2 story arc was supposed to finished on EP3 but it never happened, even it will still in cliffhanger but at least finished.
Also I just don't get why Valve want to make the game to something else(RTS/OpenWorldShooter/whatevergenreis), yeah... make something different would be good but it also may cause fans just don't like the game since it's not what they want/get used to...

(Just looks at those spin-offs for Fallout universe at Interplay era, the BGS era just "lucky" when FPS/TES style did worked in FO3 but still many old fans just against that style of Fallout)

[MusicallyInspired]

 Player Lin, on 22 July 2017 - 08:35 PM, said:

Also I just don't get why Valve want to make the game to something else(RTS/OpenWorldShooter/whatevergenreis), yeah... make something different would be good but it also may cause fans just don't like the game since it's not what they want/get used to...

Whoa whoa whoa. Hold on now. What?

[Player Lin]

 MusicallyInspired, on 22 July 2017 - 08:52 PM, said:

Whoa whoa whoa. Hold on now. What?

Well, maybe just rumors from 4-5 years ago since nothing happens after that...

[LkMax]

(Spoliers ahead)
Yeah, it's one thing to end on "let's work toghether in the future" and "Congratulations, you destroyed the big mean tower probably freeing the city" and another thing to end on "important character was captured and your fate is unknown".

At this point though I just gave up, it's not the first interesting story to get canned in a clifhanger (e.g. I liked the Sarah Connor Chronicles :/ , there's also this Firefly thing that people talk a lot about), and after a decade of not even confirming it's in development and a lot of people leaving Valve, it's better to expect nothing anymore and be happy if it actually ever happens.

[gemeaux333]

An other interesting point : Mark Laidlaw thing that Wallace Breen was under-exploited, and he was thinking of making him return as a grub of a combine advisor : https://twitter.com/breengrub

[MusicallyInspired]

I remember that being a theory. Nice to know it was official at some point. I think there was a reason he was in the very beginning of the Episode 1 intro. And then as you're exploring the ruined Citadel, you and Alyx run into a room that shows a playback of Breen from the end of HL2 and then the screens turn to a Combine who then slides through the floor and transports away. It was all right there. A shame they didn't pursue that.

[----]

 MusicallyInspired, on 24 July 2017 - 06:04 AM, said:

A shame they didn't pursue that.

A shame, they don't pursue HL anymore at all.

[MusicallyInspired]

Er, yeah... A shame that Valve operates without a hierarchy and everyone just does whatever they feel like doing.

[----]

 MusicallyInspired, on 24 July 2017 - 07:32 AM, said:

Er, yeah... A shame that Valve operates without a hierarchy and everyone just does whatever they feel like doing.

Yes, I agree that this is currently their biggest "problem".

Or they don't have any good talent there anymore that is capable of motivating people there with a great concept and a great vision to assemble a team and work on a new game. And all that in a company that gets a lot of money when for example id releases a new DooM (and of course all the hundreds of other titles (big and small) released everyday. With Steam Valve is basically the only large studio* that can pursue a great vision without strict time- and money-constraints from a publishers which also would dictate the direction of the gameplay and story ... but they do nothing in that department/direction.



*) Maybe also EPIC to some smaller degree.

[MusicallyInspired]

It's no wonder that Laidlaw left since they weren't really doing anything creative in a storytelling department.

[----]

Currently I would be fine with a mod of the quality of BMS to wrap up the story entirely.

I would also even help for free with the writing of Gordon's lines.

[MusicallyInspired]

I'm just not convinced that anyone can recapture the same sense of mystique and allure of Laidlaw's writing. It was like nothing I'd ever played before or since.

[gemeaux333]

15 peoples are working on Half-Life 3 since the beggining, look like more were working on Half-Life 2