I take back what I said about Steam being evil because it made me buy Alpha Protocol. How can you hate Valve? Those guys crack me up.
Big outlets (read: not us) got an announcement today, regretfully informing them that the Portal 2 event at E3 was canceled. But as is always the case with Valve, there’s more to it than that.
Yon message:
Dear Subject Name Here,
Aperture Science is pleased to inform you that we have partnered with Valve to announce the gala CANCELLATION of the June 14 Portal 2 event at the Regal Theater. The event will be replaced by a surprise. And even though the cancellation of the event certainly counts as a surprise, we are pleased to further announce that the cancellation of the event is not THE surprise. However, per International treaties regarding the definition of the word “surprise”, of which both Aperture Science and Valve are signatories, the time, date and content of the actual surprise will only become available as you experience the surprise.
If you’d like to ask fruitless questions about the E3 Portal 2 surprise or, more fruitfully, schedule an appointment to attend a Portal 2 screening at the Valve booth during E3, please contact Valve’s Special Envoy to Surprises, Doug Lombardi.
Thank you for <<RECORD SCRATCH!!!>>
PS: The surprising record scratch is also not the surprise.
So. A “surprise.” What could it mean?
Speculations abound, and the speculation is Half Life 2: Episode Three, to which I say “it’s about Christly time, you whores.”
Others speculate Left 4 Dead 3, to which I say “that ship has sailed, where’s my Episode Three, you whores?”
Still others speculate that it might be something else entirely. Me? All I know is that I wasn’t invited to the event even before they canceled it, and I’m not going to E3 anyway, which makes me sad.
Commence the speculating!
Email the author of this post at steerpike@tap-repeatedly.com.
Let us forget for a moment that Half-Life 2: Episode One and Episode Two co-exist with Half-Life 2 itself which is completely retarded as far as naming conventions go, and just focus on what’s important: Where the bloody hell is Episode Three?
I thought all those teasers going on back in… March, was it? I thought all that was building up, cleverly, to Episode 3, but no…it turned out to become Portal 2. This had better be Episode Three
About Christly time, indeed.
My guess is a completely new game. Half-life 3 will never materialise as Valve have set the bar so high they fear what the reception of a full sequal would be!
I hope I’m wrong 🙁
I agree with xtal. I hate the naming convention.
It utterly confused me. When Steerpike so very kindly gifted me Half-Life via Steam many moons ago, I started playing Half Life 2: Episode 1 first, because, well, it’s called EPISODE ONE. It was only after I called him to complain about it, that he informed me that I should play “Half-Life 2” before playing EPISODE ONE.
That helped.
Oh those whores! When will they get around to making Episode 3?
I mean, they’re taking longer then most book trilogies.
I entirely agree with the sentiment that they need to finish something that they start, so it’d be welcome they finish their episode trilogy at some point in the next…um, wait, decade is too long… heh.
If it’s L4D3, hell, I am actually going to join the boycott. I mean L4D2 is ACE but let’s not go overboard on this, lest we want Valve to turn Activision. And also, they friggin OWE us Half Life 2 Episode 3 before the universe freezes over!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Me personally, the best surprise Valve could pull wouldn’t be to actually announce Half-Life 2: Episode 3 or Half-life 3. It would be to simply release it. Radiohead In Rainbows style. That would be a proper surprise. But then again, Valve seem to do no wrong…
Did any of you follow the Portal updates that transmitted encrypted noise/static clues through that radio you get in the first room? By using the radio in certain test chambers there would be a transmission which some fans meticulously decrypted into images, a bit like in the film Contact. Each clue pointed towards the announcement of Portal 2. It was genius and only something that Valve could do using the Steam platform and its auto-update system.
[…] there’ll be one at all or whether Valve will just go straight to the third installment. The Big Surprise the company will be unveiling at E3 is not Episode Three, unless Valve is pulling a fast one on […]