You thought we were done withHalf-Life 3rumours, but, like every year, they’ve kicked up again. However,this time is different.Several dataminers have found filessuggesting that the Half-Life 3 is in development, and at a rate like never before.
We’ve already got a few speculationsbased on the information that’s been datamined, and it seems Tyler McVicker has unearthed more. According to the datameter, Half-Life 3 will not follow the previous game in having a linear approach. It will be more open-ended and feature procedural generation, giving the player more freedom than ever before.
It’s All Coming Together Now
Amidst a series of speculations, McVicker goes back to a quote by Geof Kieghley, who said that while sitting in a conference room with Valve, David Peyrer, who still works there, mentioned that they were working on “a single-player game that would use proceduralism in concert with crafted experience to create something played in an open-ended way.” When asked, Speyrer went on to say that the project was called Half-Life 3.
McVicker explained that Valve started getting tired of the limitations of the Source 2 engine and started experimenting with voxel-based systems around the same time to offer more player freedom. Peyrer is still at Valve, reportedly working on HLX, and things appear to be coming together.
Valve has reportedly ramped up its hiring process, bringing aboard artists and level designers from all over the industry, at a rate never seen before. He claims that Former Valve members have also returned, including one who had worked on the Half-Life: Caged mod.
Intractability Like Never Before
The Half-Life series has always been at the forefront of physics and innovation, and HLX appears to be following suit. McVicker speculates that the game may allow players to interact and manipulate temperature and elements like never before. The “surface attributes” feature, seen in recent updates for Deadlock, dictates how an object will react to external stimuli by the player.
While the Source engine already had this feature, it has evolved into a much more complex form, including aspects like heat conductivity (how quickly an object absorbs heat from nearby sources) and flashpoint (how hot an object needs to be to light on fire. Both elements can also be affected by the type of fuel used on them. This allows for the destructibility of materials to change.
It seems like these may be the most credible series of Half-Life 3 leaks we’ve ever gotten, as McVicker earlier noted thatValve has been covering its tracks by changing file names.
