14 DAY TRIAL // Back in videogaming pre-history, when Valve announced that Half Life would become an episodic game, the plan was to release Episode 3 of Half Life 2 in time for Christmas 2007. It's now close to Christmas 2008 and there's no sign of the game coming any time soon. After all, about a year ago, Valve announced that instead of a stand alone Episode 2, it planned to release the Orange Box, which would include the highly acclaimed Portal and Team Fortress 2.
Doug Lombardi, the marketing director and official voice of Valve, talked to gaming blog Kikizo about its company and the way Episode 3 would come around. He didn't offer any clear date but, when asked about the moment the company would have something substantial to show regarding Half Life, Lombardi said “We may at the very end of the year”.
He elaborated on the matter and stated that “The next time you play as Gordon will be longer than the distance between Half-Life 2 to Episode 1, and Episode 1 to Episode 2”. This practically means that even if we get an announcement at the end of the year we might have to wait for the actual game until sometime in 2010. And that's a long wait, during which fans of the Half Life universe might give up and become interested in other videogames.
At the moment, Valve is very busy promoting its upcoming Left 4 Dead, a game which will soon launch for the Xbox 360 and for the PC. The company is rumored to spend around 10 million dollars on the advertising campaign for the game which casts you in the role of a survivor of a zombie infection who has to fight his way to safety together with other three characters. Valve says that team work and cooperation are essential in a game where the odds are heavily stocked in favor of the zombies.