Slashdot Mirror
Half-Life 2 Officially Delayed
sm4k[X-D] writes "According to Shacknews, the PC first-person shooter Half-Life 2 has officially been delayed. They quote Valve's Doug Lombardi as saying: 'The previously announced September 30th release date for Half-Life 2 is being pushed back. We are currently targeting a holiday release, but do not have a specific 'in-store' date to share at this time. We will release that information as soon as we have confirmed a new date.'"
Maybe it's because they want to make sure their GNU/Linux port is perfect.
HAHAHAH!
But I digress. I'm really not looking forward to this game. You can mod me down for my opinion if you want, but it's how I feel. This is the first engine they have done completely on their own. I have little doubt that there will be massive problems that they will blame on either hardware or drivers because that is what Valve does. It doesn't take long to look at the long history of problems with HL that were blamed on drivers or hardware that Valve ended up fixing silently with patches later. They seem to have problems fessing up to issues with their products. Don't get me wrong, I'm STILL completely addicted to counterstrike. But Valve didn't make Counter Strike did they?
For every annoying gentoo user, are three even more annoying anti-gentoo crybabies. Take Yosh from #Gimp for example.
I think one of the major reasons for this is the Steam delivery platform... the servers were hugely overloaded and there were a lot of problems for a lot of people - I expect they're going to try and iron out some of those problems before HL2 gets put out
The revolution will not be televised. It won't be on a friggin blog either
Could Valve have fucked up more this past month? A lot of people I know, Valve has lost all credibility now. I've never seen a softco's status sink so quick. In a month they've
1) Screwed the CS 1.6 beta testers by removing the bots, with no official comment from Valve.
2) ROYALLY bollocksed up the release of Steam, to a degree that most MMORPG's could point and laugh at. Be playing your favourite games in minutes they said... HAHAH! More like weeks.
3) Delaying Half Life 2.
Let's not forget that Condition Zero was originally scheduled for around October 2001!
In short, Valve, in just a few short weeks, have royally fucked up any good will they had amongst a good chunk of the gaming community. The fanboys will still be there, but a lot of the people who loved Valve, but weren't fanboys will now go elsewhere. Will they go bankrupt over all this? Nah, but the profits for the company will sure take a hit.
Oh yeah, there's also Team Fortess 2 which was due, what? 1999 or so?
Christ, it makes the guys behind Duke Nukem Forever look swift... (If that game makes it to market and doesn't suck to Daikatana levels I'll be amazed).
Whether it's worse for their PR image and sales to delay the game or release a mess. Considering the level of anticipation involved, it might go either way.
I knew this would happen. Valve have sort of a... history with this. Team Fortress 2, anyone? In this post-Daikatana world (sorry) perhaps they should have taken a hint and reined in their hype machine a bit. Goes for ANY game developer who isn't 100% sure they can deliver on time.
Oh well. Either way, I'm not holding my breath. Yeah, it could be an awesome game, but haven't we seen enough hyped games *cough*Black&White*cough* fail to deliver on their promises? I was going to wait for the reviews anyway.
Blatantly they want it out for christmas to get all that xmas present money...
Daniel
Carpe Diem
Isn't this old news? Valve has made the announcement that they are going for a holiday release ages ago.
Besides, we all knew they wouldn't meet their release date, no game does. What are you all so disappointed about?
I find it some what amazing (and then in a way I don't, people have such short memories) that so many people are surprised by this. Let's not forget that HL was delayed well over a year from it's original release date. The HL-SDK was delayed again and again, and was a bit buggy at release. TF2 is still vaporware. Steam has had a less than stellar launch. While I'll admit to being a hopeless gameophile that will preorder HL2 no matter the release date I at least will be expecting it to be a good 3 months after I collect my copy before I own a playable game.
Dear PhlegmMaster,
We here at Valve appreciate you backing us up on Slashdot. Even though it is obvious that we fucked up badly with Steam, and most people see our mistakes for what they are, it is nice to know that our marketing has worked on at least 10 percent of our fans. Please call our offices tommorow so you can receive a free copy of HL2.
Sincerely,
Gabe Newell
Half Life 2 has been renamed Half Life: Forever.
I heard it was going to be released on October 15. Maybe I'm getting muddled up.
The philosophy of the Duke Nukem developpers seems to have caught new disciples...
I'm pretty sure that Half-Life Chapter 1 is a compelling legacy, and that all what Valve want is to not daikatanize it, so I am just fine waiting for something good.
As Yoda said (possibly while "playing" Angel of darkness) "If you choose the quick and easy path, you will become an agent of evil".
Just hope I'm not waiting for good (Duke where are thou?)
This news doesn't suprise me in the least! Watch - come around the end of December it still won't be out then VALVE will say it'll be out by April, then pushed back again until September 2004 and maybe by then the STEAM problems will be ironed out and it will have been delayed another year. Just like Microsoft products. :D
You must master your joystick like a fisherman masters bait! - Gimpy
as I mentioned in the previous thread on Steam, I have had nothing but horrible experiences with it.
Valve tells everyone to download the steam+content version (the 300+ mb file) after the small steam file fails for a lot of people. Sure, I got that, install it (after scouring the net looking for a site that doesn't have a 300+ person waiting list). And when I go to install the games that already have the content in the steam file, it instead goes to the net to download it. ??? I want to play Day of Defeat, it takes me 2 days to eventually download the content (even though there's a 358 mb file already sitting there).
And the program doesn't even really tell me that it is downloading stuff, unless I go out of my way to find out. You click a game, and it freezes the system nicely. One has to alt-tab, back to steam, to check the monitor to see what's going on.
First time you then actually play a game, for some reason it takes 10-20 minutes to validate resources. And during this point, I don't know if it's validating or downloading new content (as it apparently has done both on me).
There is NO way they can use this to distribute HL2. Gamers want their games now. They don't want to wait 3-4 days to get a game online, when they can drive to the store and go home 15 minutes later with the product...
... just went down in my eyes.
Don't say anything you can't do. If you have to say "When its done" up until its in boxes waiting to be FeEx-ed then do that.
First you said Sept 30, then denied when your parent company said the end of the year, then days before the deadline, you say you can't get it out.
Get your crap together.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
I wish I could believe that Valve was reacting to the negative press about Steam and DRM, and was busily reworking things to remove the dependancy upon Steam in HL2.
I wish I could believe that Valve was working with Icculus.org to make HL2 for Linux.
Unfortunately, I don't. I beleive Valve IS working on Steam, but not to make HL2 less dependant upon it, but rather more so, so that no matter how bad Steam is, you will be FORCED to use it to play HL2.
Oh well, as George Thourogood said, "that don' confront me", as I don't plan on downgrading my OS to play HL2. I'll just wait for Doom3, and play that instead.
www.eFax.com are spammers
As someone who will have to upgrade my PC to place HL2 and Doom3, I welcome the delays. The longer Id and Valve wait, the more power I can get for my money.
Take you time guys.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Delayed so that they could add in real time shadows after seeing the Doom III tech demo.
Valve's original Half-Life was an incredible game although very buggy (but fixed with patches). I have no doubt they can release a similarly excellent game. Just because it's delayed doesn't mean it will be infinitely delayed.
Blizzard for example is notorious for delays in releasing their games. But when they do, they are, in a word, spectacular.
As far as Steam goes, yes it's having major issues at the moment. But you have to give Valve credit for trying something different (I'm not saying new because I know that someone has probably done it before). If they can get it to work properly, more power to them.
It would be great to see developers released from using publishers. It means lower prices for us and more creative freedom for the developers.
give it time... Halo PC comes out on weds Oct 1st (or Sept 30th in some places) and it looks to be killer. there are a LOT of people who have a sneaky suspicion that Halo is going to overtake CS after given some time... I'd suspect as much after reading some of the previews i've read about it... we shall see...
Especially seeing that Amazon.com has had a "November" release date for awhile now, while Buy.com has said "December" for quite some time.
I belong to the ______ generation.
I am looking forward to Half Life 2 and I was really hoping to have played through it before Knights of the Old Republic comes out. Oh well, Sept. 30th was nothing more than a dream anyway.
As for Valve credibility, I don't think they ever had mine to begin with. Sure I can think of ONE game they made that I liked. Hell, I can't even think of any games by Valve besides Half Life. Until I see a phenominal Half-Life 2 or something else, Valve will just be a one-hit-wonder.
In other news insiders have spotted Duke Nukem in the halls of Valve's offices.
If you check here http://www.ebgames.com/ebx/product/235059.asp
You will see a ship date of Nov. 14th. It has been at that ship date for a few weeks. I have learned to check what dates retailers are using as ship dates before I get too excited.
Just read the preview of Doom 3 that just came out. Kept wondering.
1. Okay, when I played Doom, I didn't notice much of a story. Just a lot of aliens running about in James Cameron-land.
2. Now, we're told that Doom _had_ a story. Seems that scientists were doing research that got out of hand, and suddenly creaturs from another planet began zapping in through the Dimensional Vortexes, or something.
3. Which was Half-Life's story.
4. Not only that, but in Doom 3, we now have nonplayer characters, like injured scientists, who offer assistance and aid to the player. These are not cut-scenes, but are rendered in real-time in the game engine.
5. Which was Half-Life's biggest innovation over Quake.
I get the feeling that Doom 3 and Half-Life 2 will continue to be delayed, as they each encounter delays in order to play catch-up to the other's latest media release.
I say we make'em show each other their games, and give'em a two-month deadline afterwards.
I asked Valve to delay it so I can put off purchasing a new PC until after Intel drops the CPU prices. Sorry to all those looking forward to HL2, but this is really all just because of me.
Or so I keep telling myself.
I really doubt it - gaming companies screw up all the time - hell most games release these days with patches already waiting for you before you open the box. And in any case, Half-life 2 doesn't need the good name of Valve to sell, just the fact that it is the sequel to 'everyone's' favorite FPS guarantees that.
Realistically, I doubt anyone expected it to ship on time - there have been hints of delays for a month or two now (denied I know) - and gamers are all talk - they bitch and bitch and bitch and continue to play and buy games anyway.
I think you'll find that to some extents numbers (1) and (3) are because of (2). I, among the vast majority of people who have used Steam, have found it to be absolutely ridiculously poor.
I find it surprising that Valve would risk Half Life 2's early reputation and hype by the smaller side issues which, frankly, the royalties from HL2 will fund.
And Microsoft will be happy. Thanks to the lack of competition, It means a lot more people will be buying the PC version of Halo when that comes out in a couple of weeks! (indeed, I'm surprised that you slashdotters haven't gone for that tin-foil-hat conspiracy)
Thanks.
The bots were removed BEFORE the Steam debacle. The info was snuck in 2 days after the latest changes were posted, but this was before Steam became an unmitigated clusterfuck.
As to the poster saying about peopling bitching and bitching but still buying the games... Well, some of us have balls and stick to our decisions. Won't be buying a Valve title again after all this nonsense. Neither will a fair few of my friends. Sure it ain't much, but just because most people are spineless little bitches doesn't mean we all have to be.
From http://www.gamershell.com/news_BHalf-Life2BGold.sh tml
Which site to believe? Who the hell knows?
I wish they would at least release a one level demo/play test or something. Come on keep out interest, please.
Source of the email sent to Gamershell.com:m tp.ntlworld.com>m tp.ntlworld.com>
==
Delivered-To: news@gamershell.com
Received: (qmail 10758 invoked by uid 1004); 24 Sep 2003 22:53:19 -0000
Received: from gaben@valvesoftware.com by ymer by uid 1001 with qmail-scanner-1.14
(avpdaemon: ???. Clear:.
Processed in 0.030965 secs); 24 Sep 2003 22:53:19 -0000
Received: from mta01-svc.ntlworld.com (62.253.162.41)
by 0 with SMTP; 24 Sep 2003 22:53:18 -0000
Received: from smtp.ntlworld.com ([81.96.191.237])
by mta01-svc.ntlworld.com
(InterMail vM.4.01.03.37 201-229-121-137-20020806) with SMTP
id <20030924225325.GGIY2260.mta01-svc.ntlworld.com@s
for <news@gamershell.com>; Wed, 24 Sep 2003 23:53:25 +0100
To: "" <news@gamershell.com>
Reply-To: "Gabe Newell" <gaben@valvesoftware.com>
From: "Gabe Newell" <gaben@valvesoftware.com>
Subject: Half Life 2 Gone Gold
X-Mailer: Ghost Mail 5.1 http://ay.home.ml.org/
X-Priority: 3 (Normal)
Message-Id: <20030924225325.GGIY2260.mta01-svc.ntlworld.com@s
Date: Wed, 24 Sep 2003 23:53:25 +0100
Half Life 2 as gone Gold and in production now, the release will still remain
on schedule for Sep 30th. People who have pre-orded it via Steam will
still get it before the Sep 30th but we are currently ironing out a couple
of bugs, people may have seen Half Life 2 yesterday for a minute on it
while we were in our testing stages.
The announced delay is all rumors posted up on Shacknews
and the SDK will be available for download tomorrow 2.00pm EST
now you've heard it from the horses mouth so rest assured.
More news to follow on Sep 26th so watch this space.
==
If you know how to read the headers even a little bit, you can see that it was sent using an anonymous mailer (Ghost Mail 5.1) and sent from a UK-based broadband provider (ntlworld.com).
1) Gabe Newell doesn't use an anonymoust mailer client for sending email.
2) Gabe Newell doesn't use a UK broadband provider for sending email.
Everyone here claiming that they've lost respect for Valve and are now going elsewhere will be playing the game the day it comes out and raving about how cool it is. Mark my words.
-Zeecog
you'll buy it and you'll like it. Valve made the mistake of saying something before 100%, but thats about it. Anyways I'm pretty happy with how the game looks so far. They said way back if it takes a few more weeks they will take them. That was at E3 from Gabe himself who i think it the only one to listen to.
Dont make me laugh. If all that shit makes sure that HL2 is a good game, its worth it to me. As to the delaying of it, you'll forget all about it the second you get the game. Remember when Warcraft III came out?