Valve is the company behind some of the industry's most iconic titles, bringing classics like Half-Life, Portal and Counter Strike to players all over the world. Over the years however, the company decided to switch its focus to Steam and more recently, Hardware, leaving many players wondering if there ever will be another game from them after DOTA 2. Gabe Newell, president and CEO of Valve, revealed at a presentation that his company is getting back into developing new games, starting with the DOTA 2-themed card game, Artifact.

"Artifact is the first of several games that are going to be coming from us. So that's sort of good news. Hooray! Valve's going to start shipping games again."

Artifact isn't the only game that Valve has in its pipeline, as at a 2017 Reddit AMA, Newell said that there is at least one new fully-fledged single player game in the works. In addition, three big VR games will also be coming from them. When asked about specifics, Newell replied:

"We aren't going to be talking about it today, but sort of the big thing, the new arrow we have in our quiver, really, is our ability to develop hardware and software simultaneously."

Newell described Valve's focus on Steam and hardware as an investment in the future, saying that Valve has always been jealous at companies like Nintendo who are experts at developing hardware and software.

"We've always been a little bit jealous of companies like Nintendo. When Miyamoto is sitting down and thinking about the next version of Zelda or Mario, he's thinking what is the controller going to look like, what sort of graphics and other capabilities. He can introduce new capabilities like motion input because he controls both of those things. And he can make the hardware look as good as possible because he's designing the software at the same time that's really going to take advantage of it. So that is something we've been jealous of, and that's something that you'll see us taking advantage of subsequently."

What do you think? Is there hope for a new Half-Life, maybe?

Source

 

[Hyborix3]

So they're jealous of Nintendo and now are making THREE VR GAMES and only one singleplayer game? Okay.

 

[SirNapkin1334]

What is that icon?

 

[Capitan]

I just want Left 4 Dead 3.

 

[Xzi]

Left 4 Dead VR
Counter Strike Source VR
Half Life Episode 2 VR

I dunno. I still don't think they know what the number 3 is.

We've known they've been working on a couple VR games for a while now, but I think they'll be new IPs. That way they don't even have to risk counting to 3.

 

[RattletraPM]

[...]at a 2017 Reddit AMA, Newell said that there is at least one new fully-fledged single player game in the works.

My gut - no wait, my soul wishes it's going to be Half-Life 3, but something tells me it's going to be Left 4 Dead 3 instead.
Left 4 Dead 3 would be more like an online coop game rather than single player, but considering how much stuff has leaked about it over the years I wouldn't be surprised to see it released soon™

 

[boombox]

OMG...please bring Portal 3, L4D3 and everything else 3 out Valve!

 

[supergamer368]

please make portal 3

 

[TotalInsanity4]

"We've always been a little bit jealous of companies like Nintendo."
What are they, 3?

They can't count that high, remember?

 

[pedro702]

They can't count that high, remember?

yeah lol they always leavue stuff at 2 xD

 

[the_randomizer]

Lol Valve is jealous because Nintendo actually has made a game in the past ten years.

 

[Xzi]

Lol Valve is jealous because Nintendo actually has made a game in the past ten years.

The quote is seemingly more about hardware design than games. When he's talking about designing controllers and using motion controls, that's probably a reference to Vive and other SteamVR HMDs.

 

[the_randomizer]

The quote is seemingly more about hardware design than games. When he's talking about designing controllers and using motion controls, that's probably a reference to Vive and other SteamVR HMDs.

Either way, if they want to do something about it, then they should.

 

[Mikemk]

Announcing Portal 3.
System requirements:
...and a patented Valve® Portal® gun ($99.99)

Digitally reloading the 25¢ plastic toy costs a $2.99 microtransaction, and comes with a useless hat. You have to pay shipping on the hat

 

[The Real Jdbye]

My gut - no wait, my soul wishes it's going to be Half-Life 3, but something tells me it's going to be Left 4 Dead 3 instead.
Left 4 Dead 3 would be more like an online coop game rather than single player, but considering how much stuff has leaked about it over the years I wouldn't be surprised to see it released soon™

L4D3 might very well be coming, but I doubt very much that they would call it single player if they were talking about L4D. It can be played single player, but it's primarily a multiplayer game.

Announcing Portal 3.
System requirements:
...and a patented Valve® Portal® gun ($99.99)

Digitally reloading the 25¢ plastic toy costs a $2.99 microtransaction, and comes with a useless hat. You have to pay shipping on the hat

Is it life-sized? If it's life-sized I'd want it just for fun

 

[Xzi]

Either way, if they want to do something about it, then they should.

Indeed they have, they released the Steam controller some time ago, and SteamVR is the dominant force in PC virtual reality. They've been busy upgrading and designing hardware for VR, the 2.0 base stations ship this year and they've got knuckles VR controllers coming soon too.

 

[TotalInsanity4]

I honestly wouldn't be surprised if Portal 3 isn't in the works, and will be a SteamVR exclusive

 

[RattletraPM]

L4D3 might very well be coming, but I doubt very much that they would call it single player if they were talking about L4D. It can be played single player, but it's primarily a multiplayer game.

Is it life-sized? If it's life-sized I'd want it just for fun

Honestly, I hope so. If they really mean single player and nothing else, then it's either Portal 3, Half-Life 3 or a new IP - all of which I'm excited for. (And I don't mean that L4D is bad, hell, I had lots of fun playing it with my online buddies, but it isn't exactly one of my favourites)

Spoiler

...Or Ricochet 2.

 

[Old Reprobate]

Valve...sigh....They have made some fantastic games over the years, however; I believe they have lost their way, to some degree. I for one, love that they brought Steam to Linux, and love Half-Life, Portal, etc.....but that doesn't change the fact that they created one of the largest (if not the biggest) cliff-hanger endings in video game history and then......crickets......... Honestly Nintendo is five times the company they are, they don't alienate their customers. I would have never wasted my time and money on their product if I would have known it was going to end with them giving up....Yeah, Gabe...you suck!

 

[the_randomizer]

Indeed they have, they released the Steam controller some time ago, and SteamVR is the dominant force in PC virtual reality. They've been busy upgrading and designing hardware for VR, the 2.0 base stations ship this year and they've got knuckles VR controllers coming soon too.

Not a fan of VR to be honest *shrug* I'm the minority when it comes to VR. As far as games go, HL3 is dead.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Honestly, I hope so. If they really mean single player and nothing else, then it's either Portal 3, Half-Life 3 or a new IP - all of which I'm excited for. (And I don't mean that L4D is bad, hell, I had lots of fun playing it with my online buddies, but it isn't exactly one of my favourites)

Spoiler

...Or Ricochet 2.

Or a reboot or prequel to either Portal or Half-Life. Or a spinoff/side story.
Making a direct sequel to Portal would be hard, but something with an alternate timeline or a prequel (especially a prequel) would suit me just fine. Half-Life doesn't interest me personally so I'm hoping it's Portal.

Not a fan of VR to be honest *shrug* I'm the minority when it comes to VR. As far as games go, HL3 is dead.

VR isn't quite ready for mainstream yet I think. It has to get higher resolutions (4K minimum), wider FOV so it feels less like looking through binoculars, and at the same time get cheaper, while solving the issues plaguing some people like motion sickness/headaches (personally I don't have much trouble with it but I wouldn't want to use VR for more than a couple of hours at a time or it could get disorienting), that might not be something that is 100% fixable but as long as it gets as good as it can be that should be good enough. And PCs also need to get powerful enough to run VR in 4K without needing to buy the highest end gaming GPU available to avoid framerate issues that can exacerbate the motion sickness/headache problems.

All of this is going to take time. We might not have very long to wait for 4K VR but it will be a while longer before hardware able to run it is mainstream enough.
All of these things are essential for immersion though, and in VR, immersion is everything; it's all about making you really FEEL like you're there, even though deep down you always know you're not, for a while you can forget about that, which really changes how you experience games.

Have you actually tried proper VR? If it didn't impress you the first time (and you weren't using a Rift DK1 or something like that which doesn't really give you a good idea of what VR is like now), then as the technology gets better it should be more impressive.
Personally it impressed me the first time, but once the novelty wore off all the flaws became obvious and harder to ignore. One of the most obvious flaws right now is the resolution, it's simply not high enough to prevent you from seeing individual subpixels, which kind of ruins the illusion whenever you stop to think about it. Second is the FOV. It's easier to forget about, but still very obvious once you stop to think about it, plus having a wider FOV would also help you see more of the game world without it feeling weird, and it being hard to see things along the edges would be less of a problem.
I do think that VR is the future of gaming. It might not be in this form, maybe people will invent some new technology that obsoletes VR headsets, although probably not any time soon. It provides much greater immersion than conventional displays and has the potential to provide even more as the technology gets better. And while it probably won't ever replace conventional gaming, at least not in the current form, simply because it's less convenient and costs more, it can live comfortably alongside it.