List of Possible Hints For Next Half-Life: Source Engine 2 And More!

Posted on 17 March, 2012 by exterminat

Half-Life Next, Source Engine 2

List of Possible Hints

by exterminat

©2012 Nicholas Laborde

Half-Life 2: Episode Three.

Half-Life 3.

Something Else From Valve That Will Be Half-Life Oriented.

See? You’re already getting excited.

That’s what Valve is going for in terms of marketing whatever is next for Gordon Freeman, as they are adhering to the utmost of secrecy as to not “disappoint fans” by promising something that won’t arrive in their hands at some point before the end of days.

They are one hell of a sneaky bunch; they don’t even have the “good” employees that leak things and give us easy views!

Instead, they have easily one of the most unique, definitive communities in the world. That community has come together to concoct a list of every single reference Valve has given us so far.

Some men just want to watch the world yearn

This entire list has been compiled on the Steam forums by user “Ded-” and all credit goes to him. The original post can be viewed here.

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Whiteboards

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive whiteboards, located in one of the beta’s maps, “weren’t supposed to be there.” Apparently, they were supposed to be seen when cs_office releases. And they haven’t released it yet. These whiteboards have jokes about shipping a game without fixing the bugs, along with listing certain Half-Life characters as “test subjects.”

DOTA 2 Files

When the DOTA 2 beta began last year, files within the client were leaked ahead of time. These files contained “ep3″ in the title, but refer to a “weaponizer,” the scrapped paint gun from Portal 2. It also somewhat validates the fact that the game will either have cooperative play, or some sort of revamped multiplayer component.

Zombie Aperture

In the Portal 2 files, a particular set was discovered bearing the title “npc_sounds_zombie_aperture.txt.” Your guess is as good as mine on this one. Possibly traveling to an Aperture in the final days of having its human presence?

Alien Swarm SDK Files

Right after Alien Swarm‘s SDK (software development kit) was released, modders discovered specific files with the extension “Ep3.” They were promptly removed when they began to make a buzz.

Skyrim Hint

When the Skyrim Creation Kit hit Steam last month, players could grab the Space Core from Portal 2 to accompany them in their journeys, courtesy of Valve. What’s intriguing, though, is that the weight of the Space Core was listed as “3.1″, and on that same day, Valve appeared on the list of companies attending E3.

Portal 2 Animation Files

These are some of the more interesting items on this list. As with many other items, these animation files were in Portal 2, and they are NOT from Half-Life 2: Episode 2, because in that instance, animation files began with “mag_” whereas here they begin with “magnuss_.” These are definitely from the next Half-Life project. Check out a video of them in action here.

Source 2

Finally, we have an even more exciting discovery: there is definitely going to be a second Source engine, aptly entitled “Source 2.” This information comes in the way of the Alien Swarm SDK, where a notification appears.
// ** NOTE FOR INTEGRATION **
// This was copied over from source 2 rather than integrated because
// source 2 has more significantly refactored tier0 logging.
//
// A logging listener with Win32 console API color support which which prints
// to stdout and the debug channel.

Time, Dr. Freeman?

These discoveries are entirely inconclusive about what the next Half-Life title will be, but we can safely say that it is, in fact, in development and should hopefully release sometime before we die.