14 DAY TRIAL // Valve, the company behind the digital distribution service Steam, has decided that any movie project based on its Half Life franchise would happen only if the people who worked on the video games would have full creative control of the way the movie is developed.
Gabe Newell, the Chief Executive Officer and one of the co founder of Valve, has told PC Gamer that, “There was a whole bunch of meetings with people from Hollywood. Directors down there wanted to make a Half-Life movie and stuff, so they'd bring in a writer or some talent agency would bring in writers, and they would pitch us on their story.”
Apparently the company was not too happy, with Newell commenting, “their stories were just so bad. I mean, brutally, the worst. Not understanding what made the game a good game, or what made the property an interesting thing for people to be a fan of.”
Interestingly Newell also suggested that all the work that Valve has put into creating the Meet the Team shorts associated with Team Fortress 2 could be seen as a way of preparing for a bigger project linked to the Half Life world.
Gamers reacted very well to the short movies, with the impact felt even outside the tightly knit community which enjoys the team based multiplayer experience.
At the moment there are a couple of short movies made by fans that are also exploring the universe, some of them with pretty impressive production values.
Valve is at the moment working on Portal 2, which is set to be launched in February 2011, and will expand on the mythology of the first game while also delivering a cooperative campaign experience.
The company is also widely believed to be working on Half Life: Episode 3 but executives and developers have not talked about the new installment and what it could offer.