Virtual History | Half-Life

[The video version of this article can be viewed here: https://bit.ly/2oyxw6t]

[Note - This article is pretty much just a paste of the video script. I've changed some parts here and there so they actually make sense to read, though of course, some parts will translate better with visual accompaniment.]

Wolfenstein, Doom, Halo - some of the legendary hallmarks of the FPS genre. Wolfenstein introduced much of the basic framework, Doom brought in much of the audience, and popularised FPS multiplayer, and Halo remains one of the most paramount FPS console successes there is. They, among others, set in stone the everlasting popularity of the genre. 

Speaking of others, let’s talk about the Half-Life games. Half-Life combined first-person shooter gameplay with fun platforming, puzzles, and an engrossing narrative in a way no other game had to that point. One of the other things that sets the series apart, is that unlike Wolfenstein, Doom, and most definitely Halo, we haven’t actually seen a Half-Life game release in forever, which is surely something that has not been forgotten.

But how did the franchise become the acclaimed rumour-mill churner that it is today? How did it get to the point where no gamer can think of the number 3 without shedding a tear? In this article I’m going to delve into the history of Half-Life, detailing the series game by game, plus talk about some of the theories on why there’s been an absence of one over the last decade.

Half-Life

In 1996, former Microsoft employees Mike Harrington and Gabe Newell founded Valve Software. Their plan was to make a horror-themed 3D action game, and they utilised id Software’s Quake Engine to start development on Quiver, later re-named Half-Life. The final name was chosen as they felt it suited the game’s themes well, and they liked the corresponding Greek lambda symbol, which became the franchises’ logo.

Both founders had done well at Microsoft, which allowed them to majorly fund the project themselves. Initially they struggled to find a publisher to work with, as many considered their plans overly ambitious for a team new to the industry, but ultimately they teamed up with Sierra On-Line. Among the people Newell and Harrington hired to work at Valve was science-fiction writer Marc Laidlaw who joined to work on the story, characters, and setting, though as it turned out his work would influence the main gameplay majorly too.

Announced at E3 1997 and initially due to release later that year, the team decided to delay Half-Life significantly. Why? They found that the work they had done so far contained some good elements, but together they didn’t make a cohesive experience. That, plus other issues, is what made them decide to pretty much start over, something their status as a largely independent team meant they could do without their publisher going apeshit.

So, they took all the good elements they had, put them into a single level, and worked on that one level until it represented what they knew their game should be, sort of like a publicly unseen vertical slice.

While the team at Valve had initially searched for a so-called “godlike” game designer to work on the structure of the game, something they were led to believe they needed, they couldn’t find anyone who they felt fit that description. So rather, they combined the strengths of members of the team they already had into a group they named “The Cabal”. The Cabal would then create the design document containing the overall structure of the game, from NPC introductions to plot devices to major enemy fights, plus how they expected the player to interact with their game, and how they could ensure the player knew how.

It was painstaking work, the final document had more than 200 pages, and separate Cabal groups were formed throughout, all working on different elements of Half-Life. Yet it was the process, through all the planning and teamwork, that created almost everything you see in the game, and was one Valve continued to use in future projects.

Overall Valve’s development philosophy was threefold: First, each level must have significant events that occur, activated through player proximity, rather than being time-based. Secondly, player actions must leave an impact, no matter how minor, such as gunshots leaving damage to the environment (something, of course, we take for granted today). Last, danger must be forewarned, and consequently avoidable, rather than leaving players dead without warning. This MO would, in their eyes, finally give the game that critical thing it once lacked.

Ultimately, they were right, as when the game released in November 1998, all the work had been worth it. Half-Life received wide acclaim, and over 50 PC Game of the Year awards, now being regarded by many as one of the greatest games of all time.

Two demos were released for Half-Life - Half-Life: Day One, which features a whole fifth of the game, and was released before the full version; and Half-Life: Uplink, released after, which featured revised levels cut during development.

Enough exposition. Let’s get on to what Half-Life actually is.

Half-Life tells the story of one Dr. Gordon Freeman, a Research Associate Scientist at the Black Mesa corporation. Only wanting to come in for his 9 to 5 and leave, he is unfortunately caught up in the epicentre of a science experiment gone wrong, in that alien beings from the planet Xen invade the centre and start killing all of the employees. Thankfully, Freeman’s theoretical physics degree gave him the necessary skills to handle all sorts of dangerous firearms and over the course of the game, he goes absolutely ham on the alien force and every other threat in his way.

Half-Life’s presentation was unique at the time, as it delivered an FPS with a substantial plot and interesting, cryptic, characters while at no point relinquishing control in favour of showing the player cutscenes or the like. Half-Life’s plot and gameplay developments are shown in the normal first-person view right in front of the player’s eyes, a staple which would continue throughout the whole franchise. Half-Life was designed this way to increase immersion on the part of the player. Freeman was also made silent and unable to be seen at any point for the same reason.

Half-Life was also unique in how it integrated a first-person shooter campaign with puzzles and platforming, often required to advance, and sometimes to deal with the game’s most menacing threats. A large variety of weapons are given to the player, ranging from the standard, to the not-so standard, and the enemies you use these weapons to kill range similarly.

Half-Life is almost 21 years old, but holds up really well. Valve’s first title remains one of the best FPS adventures you can play, and you should really give it a go if you haven’t.

Half-Life Expansions and Mods

Half-Life’s expansions were primarily developed by Gearbox Software, who also handled the original game’s porting to PS2, and would later be known for Brothers In Arms and Borderlands. These expansions were Half-Life: Opposing Force, released in November 1999, Half-Life: Blue Shift, released in June 2001, and Half-Life: Decay, a co-op expansion released only as an extra on the PS2 port alongside it in November 2001.

The first two were standalone and available on PC only, yet all three expansions showed the Black Mesa incident from different perspectives and run pretty much concurrently to the main Half-Life storyline. Opposing Force takes place from the view of a soldier tasked with “cleaning up” the incident, Blue Shift from security guard Barney Calhoun, who would later appear in Half-Life 2, and Decay from two Black Mesa scientists.

All three featured additional weapons, enemies, and were received favourably by critics, though the true gem is of course Half-Life itself. If you like the main game, you’ll probably like these too.

Half-Life’s legacy was further cemented still through the modding scene, accelerated through Valve’s own support of it. Many great and varied mods for the original Half-Life are available for free download, ranging from additional fan-made levels designed to take place in the main canon, to pretty much entire games of their own right. And of course, some of these mods later would become games of their own right, as the Counter-Strike and Team Fortress franchises both started as Half-Life mods, with their developers being hired by Valve full-time. Genres found in these mods range from tactical multiplayer shooters, like Counter Strike, to full on horror titles, such as Afraid of Monsters and Cry of Fear, two of my personal favourites. The latter released a whole 14 years after the original game’s release, absolutely free.

Valve would also release Half-Life Deathmatch, a multiplayer mod for the original with gameplay similar to, and inspired by, the original Quake. It wasn’t overly popular, but further variations of it would come in the form of Deathmatch: Source, and Half-Life 2: Deathmatch, the latter of which remains populated to this day.

While the most significant waiting period of the franchise is definitely the one we’re stuck in now, this is by no means the first long period of waiting in the franchise’s history. The sequel to the original Half-Life was announced almost two years after the last expansion, and over four years after the release of the original game. Half-Life 2 was announced in May 2003, and would release the next year…

Half-Life 2

Half-Life 2’s development started less than a year after the original’s release. For this title, Valve nearly tripled their size, and they decided to create their own engine, which became Source. Some of the main goals for Source were to have an engine capable of a realistic physics system, as well as believable facial expressions. Valve would also re-make the original Half-Life in the Source engine and release it in June 2004.

In its five-year development cycle, many different ideas were developed for Half-Life 2 and eventually scrapped. For example, the game was originally going to be darker and feature a grittier art style. It was going to have a bigger focus on the enemy alien force stripping the Earth of its natural minerals. And if another idea had come to fruition, Half-Life 2 would have focused on Gordon Freeman’s journey across multiple planets fighting aliens from Xen. But alas, such is the nature of game development.

Gabe Newell turned his focus largely away from Half-Life 2’s development a couple years into it and turned his attention to developing Steam (and I’m betting he doesn’t regret it one bit). This left the main design team to work on the game with less supervision. Mike Harrington meanwhile, would leave Valve amicably a few months into Half-Life 2’s development.

The Cabal process would again become crucial but was largely expanded for this title to compensate for the game’s larger scale. Some cabal groups were responsible for roughly one-third of the game each, and others were made for particular areas such as sound, and art. Somewhat far into development, the team would even create a cabal creatively-named the ‘Cabal Cabal’ to playtest and provide feedback to members of the previous cabals.

This cabalception would benefit hugely Valve’s iteration process for development. That is, members of the team playtesting Half-Life 2 all the way through, cutting and improving sections as they went. It’s also a process credited as being fundamental to Half-Life 2’s success, with it allowing the game to be largely improved fairly quickly (with the second pass through taking quote: four months, which I guess is thought of as quick in the world of game development).

A pivotal step would come in the Summer of 2001, when after a couple years of development that had left Valve mostly with just concept art and ideas, the team completed their first level in the Source engine, named ‘Get Your Free TVs!’. The level was fairly simple but demonstrated some of the major concepts that would make their way into the full game, even if the level itself wouldn’t. The success of this level persuaded the team to work on a trailer, with the plan being to show it off, and finally announce the game, at E3 2002.

Newell who, to remain unbiased, had stayed largely away from the Half-Life 2’s development, wasn’t fully impressed by the quality of the trailer. It was too long-winded, with one largely dialogue-comprised sequence lasting 20 minutes, and Valve’s new technology wasn’t being demonstrated quite as well as it could be. Team morale stagnated somewhat, but the team got back to work, and months were spent on improving the trailer, and the game itself. The rebuilt trailer more than satisfied Newell, and Half-Life 2 was finally announced at E3 2003, to huge acclaim and excitement. From this point on, Half-Life 2’s development picked up.

Valve also announced Half-Life 2 was to release on September 30^th, 2003, though some in the team felt unconfident that date could be made, and ultimately their suspicions proved correct. Half-Life 2 was delayed, just a week before it was supposed to ship. This was to the extreme anger of some fans, some of whom felt they had been misled for months by Valve. In truth, Newell had known for months the game wouldn’t ship by September but was unsure on how to handle announcing the delay, leading to the delay’s…delay.

Then, not long after the news broke out, the Source engine code and many of the game’s maps were leaked onto the internet. Furthermore, these maps were largely unfinished, again raising concerns about how far the game really was from releasing. Morale dropped yet again.

The leak would lead to the FBI getting involved, and in what is probably one of the most savage video game industry plans of all time, the perpetrator was led to believe through correspondence with Gabe Newell, that Valve wanted to hire them. Valve were to even pay for the flight, with the hacker scheduled to be arrested by the FBI on landing. However, the German suspect was later arrested in his home country after the German government got wind of the plan.

While some may have considered this period an all-time-low in Half-Life 2’s development, the team again got back to work. Eventually, after multiple setbacks, controversies, and a major delay, Half-Life 2 was finally released in November 2004.

Half-Life 2, like its prequel, was met with wide acclaim, and is on many greatest of all-time lists, for good reason. In my eyes, should you for some reason care, the sequel managed to surpass the original, and is another must-play. A demo containing portions of some levels was also released in December 2004 and is still available on Steam, if you’d like to try before you buy.  

Half-Life 2, again written by Marc Laidlaw, puts the player back in the shoes of Gordon Freeman, now under not-so-willing employment from The G-Man. 20 years after the Black Mesa Incident, Earth is now under total control by the alien force known as the Combine, after a rather inconvenient Seven Hour War. Many humans work as an oppressive force under the Combine, tasked with keeping the rest of the populace under control. Freeman is placed by the G-Man in this time and works to combat the Combine in the Eastern European City 17, with help from the local resistance, and prominent figures within.

Mechanically, Half-Life 2 works largely the same as the original, but thanks to the Source engine, with a greater emphasis on physics, significantly utilised in the game’s puzzles. These largely involve the new Gravity Gun, which allows the player to pick up, drop, and throw most objects at will, which is useful..pretty much everywhere honestly. There’s also much more vehicle gameplay, with a few airboat sections that the player has to navigate through.

Some weapons, characters, and enemies return from the original alongside new ones, and the game retained the original’s sense of horror.

Half-Life 2: Episodes One and Two

Like Half-Life 1, Half-Life 2 was followed by multiple standalone expansions, basically serving as sequels. Newell has even gone on record to say that these episodes are together essentially Half-Life 3 (though I don’t think anyone has ever seemed satisfied with that). The main difference with these compared to Half-Life 1’s expansions though, was that Valve themselves actually made them. Valve also further supported the modding scene with Half-Life 2, releasing the SDK for anyone to use, and many more great mods have come from it.

The first official post-launch downloadable content however was not a mod nor an Episode, but a standalone level: Lost Coast. Available for free on Steam, it was made primarily to show off Valve’s new High Dynamic Range rendering system. Lost Coast is more of a cut-content release than any sort of substantial expansion, since it was originally going to appear in the main game itself but was dropped. Regardless, it did introduce some features that would become standard in subsequent Valve releases. Aside from the HDR system, it was their first product to feature their now common-place developer commentary, found in most, if not all of their released games since.

The real meaty post-launch content came with the release of Half-Life 2: Episode One, released in June 2006, and originally titled Half-Life 2: Aftermath. Announced in a PC Gamer article in May 2005, a year after Half-Life 2’s release, project lead Robin Walker stressed the idea that Episode One would focus on character development. Particularly it would focus on Alyx, Freeman’s companion throughout Half-Life 2.

The bulk of Episode 1 is spent navigating an even further dilapidated City 17 on the brink of total devastation following Freeman’s perhaps not completely thought-out actions at the end of Half-Life 2. A bit of thinking out loud now and then wouldn’t hurt you, Gordon. Alyx and Freeman spend considerable time engaging Combine Forces and helping members of the resistance on their way out of the city. When it came to narrative writing, Laidlaw no longer worked alone, now leading a team consisting of himself, Chet Faliszek, and Erik Wolpaw.

Episode One, like many of Valve’s games after its creation, ran on an upgraded version of the Source engine, and carried on the HDR precedent set by the release of Lost Coast.

To truly deliver on the themes of character development and companionship, Valve made Alyx, well, more of a companion, providing feedback to the player’s actions and being overall much more active. Additionally, nearly the whole episode is spent with her, whereas in Half-Life 2 most of your time was spent alone (not including all of the soldiers and hellish beasts trying to kill you).

Overall, Episode received positive reviews, though its relatively short length and some other things received criticism. According to Steam, I managed to complete it in 3 hours; though maybe I’m just pro.

Developed concurrently by another team within Valve was the sequel to Episode One: aptly named Half-Life 2: Episode Two. It was released in October 2007, alongside The Orange Box. The Orange Box was a collection, released on PC, Xbox 360, and a couple months later on PS3, contained Half-Life 2 and its episodes, the original Portal, and Team Fortress 2. A central theme of Episode Two was the inclusion of less linear, more-open environments for the player to navigate through compared to the environments of the main game and Episode One. Accompanying this was a returned emphasis on vehicles, and this time the player is given a muscle car to wreak havoc in during certain sections.

This time around the plot, again written by Laidlaw’s team, focuses on the resistance’s efforts to prevent the Combine opening a “superportal” that would allow even more of them to invade the Earth. Again, Freeman is the playable mute throughout.

Locales in Episode Two are more unique than in Episode One, since the action is no longer confined to City 17. A couple new enemy types were also introduced, though despite Valve receiving some criticism for doing the same previously, no new weapons are brought in, as the team decided to focus on further developing the Gravity Gun.

This didn’t seem to disappoint anyone, as Episode Two was widely acclaimed, with critics praising the environments and narrative, among other things. It probably also didn’t hurt that the Episode was longer than the last.

Something that did, and still hurts though, was the fact that the same praised narrative ended with a cliff-hanger, that is unresolved to this day…

Episode Three and the Half-Life Legacy

Half-Life 2: Episode Three.

Or is it Half-Life 3? I can never tell. We’ve been spoon-fed small bits of information from insiders, Source leaks, and concept art over the years, which together have managed to keep the idea of it actually happening never quite dead, but never particularly alive either.

Half-Life 2’s Episodes have been officially conceived as a trilogy since before Episode One was released, and Episode Three was even given a planned release date of Christmas 2007 at one point, which needless to say didn’t quite happen.

Not to mention Episode Four, which would have largely concerned Ravenholm, taken place before the end of Episode Two, and was developed somewhat by Dishonored creators Arkane Studios before being ultimately cancelled in 2007, reportedly due to Valve deciding against pursuing it any further.

Yet another Episode that would have taken place at least partially in Ravenholm was also in development around 2007 from Junction Point Studios, led by Warren Spector, of Deus Ex and System Shock fame, but this also never came to fruition. It was cancelled when Disney acquired Junction Point, and in turn we got Epic Mickey.

But back to trois. Over the years, released plot info and concept art has pointed to Episode Three focusing on Freeman and Alyx finding the ship Borealis in the Arctic. The Borealis was previously teased in Episode Two, as well as Portal 2 (the Portal series taking place in the Half-Life universe). Comments from Gabe Newell and other people within and close to Valve have left expectations fluctuating - over, and over, and over.

Half-Life lore mastermind Laidlaw, and his writing team Faliszek and Wolpaw at one point had all left Valve, meaning all of the series’ past writers were gone from the company. Jay Pinkerton was the only main writer for Valve’s own single-player titles still at the company, until Wolpaw returned, but seeming only on a limited contractual basis. While it’s possible that Episode Three is already long-since written, admittedly with these developments release prospects aren’t looking that good.

Many theories have been shared by industry insiders, games journalists, and probably upwards of half of Steam’s user base concerning just where that illusive 3 is. At this point, if it ever does come to be released it will most definitely be on the Source 2 engine, introduced in 2015 but so far most prominently used for Dota 2. Technology also happens to be one of these aforementioned theories, with some saying that Valve has simply been waiting for better technology to be developed so as to provide the best experience that they can. Well, there’s no time like the present, Gaben.

Other theories include Steam’s massive popularity being the reason, and that due to the massive profits it brings in, yet another single-player only experience such as Half-Life or Portal would give meagre rewards in comparison.

Some think the next Half-Life title will come out exclusively for VR platforms. Valve are reportedly working on multiple VR titles at the moment, though Chet Faliszek said in 2015 Half-Life 3 would not be in VR.

Whatever format 3 might come in, and even if it never does at all, there’s no question that Half-Life revolutionised the FPS genre, and will always be a legendary franchise. Half-Life’s legacy was cemented long ago, the series’ sheer quality making this so regardless of any eternal waiting periods. Other efforts separate from the main franchise itself, such as the Portal series set in the same universe, as well as the many, many user mods out there, have also certainly helped.

Another one I haven’t mentioned yet is Black Mesa, a full remake of the original Half-Life which is set to be finished later this year with the addition of the Xen chapters. And, suitably for this franchise, this mod took almost 15 years to finish. Regardless, it’s a fantastic recreation, so give it a go if you haven’t.

While we have yet to see a Half-Life 3, or Episode Three, the Half-Life universe and lore has expanded elsewhere, most recently in an official comic series.

But do I, oh weary listener, think we’ll see another Half-Life game from Valve? Well, I have hope we’ll see Gordon Freeman’s story conclude yet. Personally, I just don’t see Valve leaving that thread hanging forever. Though whether the end of that thread will meet fan expectations, I cant’ say. And perhaps there’s another theory there as to why Valve never released it. At this point, could they even be met?

Though I’ll admit that my hope has wavered somewhat since Marc Laidlaw seemingly revealed what was to be, once upon a time, Episode Three’s plot. In a blog post, Laidlaw went into quite a lot of detail, but switches the genders of the characters and the names of key places and groups, though, if you’re a fan, it’s still pretty obvious what he’s referring to.

So, now I’m less sure.

From Dota 2’s recent single-player additions, Valve’s VR efforts, and that card game, we can see they’re not just focused on Steam and multiplayer titles. Even more recently they’ve said they wanted to start “making games again”. So who’s to say a single-player Half-Life game couldn’t once again rise out of the metaphorical steam? Not too long ago, Valve acquired the staff of Campo Santo, developers of Firewatch and the upcoming In the Valley of Gods, showing that their dedication to single-player experiences is still here, even if they’re not making them themselves.

With some of those previously mentioned recent plot developments though, you’d be forgiven for thinking it’s not currently looking too good.

As has been pointed out, Laidlaw’s final paragraph of his Epistle 3 piece, in contrast to the rest, appears to be from the viewpoint of both Gordon Freeman and himself, or at the very least seems to be a metaphor for Valve’s neglect of the franchise in recent years. To me, it paints a picture of a company moved on, and some have taken it as closure.

What are your thoughts on Half-Life and its future? Will we ever see another? Let me know in the comments. Should the production time of this piece be any sign, I’ll see you in 2023.

Thanks for reading.