Films, VR plans, new IP, Source 2 Engine, support issues, and more.

Valve Software chief Gabe Newell logged into Reddit on Tuesday to answer questions in an "ask me anything" thread. As expected, waves of fans shouted "HALF-LIFE 3?!" as if that blurt were a question.

Unsurprisingly, Newell didn't offer hard answers about any closure to Valve's beloved FPS series. He and his coworkers have dodged such questions for years now—but he did offer a mix of pessimism and optimism regarding the Half-Life universe in general.

Early in the AMA, when he was asked what his favorite single-player Valve game was, Newell answered that it was Portal 2. A joke response from an apparent Half-Life fan prompted this Newell follow-up:

"The issue with Half-Life for me is that I was involved in a much higher percentage of the decisions about the games, so it's hard for me to look at them as anything other than a series of things I regret," Newell wrote. "There's no information in my response about what we'll do in the future. It's simply easier for me to be a fan of things that in which I was less directive." (From that phrasing, we can guess that the series is neither confirmed alive nor dead; it's just a less than fond memory in his own eyes.)

When asked by another fan what his biggest regrets were, Newell answered, "If you are involved in a game, everything ends up being a set of trade-offs. Anything in a game is a sacrifice of things not in the game. I just feel those more personally about Half-Life for a bunch of reasons. And Xen."

"The number 3 must not be said"

Gabe wasn't ready to confirm a game with "Half-Life" in the title, but he did come close. When asked if Valve was working on a "new IP" set in the combined Half-Life and Portal universes, Newell answered simply, "yep."

Newell also took the opportunity to confirm that the company's previously announced filmmaking collaboration with J.J. Abrams hasn't ended, in spite of silence surrounding that project since 2013. "They're coming," Newell wrote. That short phrase seems to confirm more than one film project. Newell and Abrams had previously hinted to these films possibly taking place in the Half-Life or Portal universes. Newell's answers didn't clarify if the aforementioned "new IP" fit into this film plan or into a brand-new game, but he did confirm that the company is actively working on at least one new "fully fledged single-player game."

The AMA thread included a "stickied" series of questions at its top, which included a direct question about the status of Half-Life 3 and/or Half-Life 2: Episode 3. Newell responded to this by simply saying, "the number 3 must not be said." (The same question thread asked about recent reports claiming that HL3 projects had been canceled; Newell replied, "I personally believe all unidentified anonymous sources on the Internet.")

Newell also hinted at a "full-sized" VR game coming directly from Valve by answering "yes" to a question about the company's interest in such a game (meaning, not entirely confirmed). "We think VR is pretty important as a tool for interesting games," he added. In another question, he said Valve's "VR games" (as in, plural) were being worked on alongside the design of the company's new "knuckles controller." Newell may be referring to this protoype Vive VR hand controller revealed in late 2016, which more closely resembles the Oculus Touch.

When asked about the possibilities of a new Left 4 Dead game, Newell was ambiguous. He offered a convoluted answer about new game ideas arising within Valve to explore new types of technology or business ideas, then vaguely added, "Left 4 Dead is a good place for creating shared narratives." (Meaning, he fielded the question without fully answering it, which, in my opinion, says plenty.)

Whatever games are or aren't in production at Valve, Newell confirmed that anything currently unannounced is being built in the Source 2 Engine. He further confirmed that Valve will eventually make that engine "available free of charge" for other developers to use. As in, no royalties.
Newell's public appearances tend to hint at major company initiatives, and this AMA wasn't an exception. He tucked this snippet into a question about Valve's future: "Some of us are thinking about some of the AI work that is being hyped right now. Simplistically we have lots of data and compute capability that looks like the kinds of areas where machine learning should work well. Personally, I'm looking at research in brain-computer interfaces." (If you're wondering how machine learning and artificial intelligence might sidle up nicely to each other, give this a read.)

Most other questions—as in, the ones that have nothing to do with Half-Life or other known series—revolved around questions and complaints about support issues, both with the Steam client and with games like Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. Newell praised his company's efforts to expand support issues. He said the company's Steam support staff is now five times bigger than it was roughly a year ago and is operating with a new ticket system to improve response times. "We definitely don't think we've done though," he added. He said the company's biggest issue is increasing response times in other regions and languages.