Half-Life 2 RTX
An insider says that the announcement of Half-Life 3 is not far off — the game can be played from start to finish.
Famous insider Tyler McWicker said this during the last stream dedicated to Valve’s internal developments. According to him, the game is undergoing full testing. The announcement may be made in the third quarter of 2025, i.e. by the end of summer. The release itself is likely to take place in the winter.
«HLX is being playtested so religiously and so widely that there are individuals who will just talk. This is the furthest (HLX) has ever been. Period. The game is playable – end to end. Period. [Other HL3/Ep3 projects have] never been that far. And they’re optimising, polishing, and they’re probably content-locked and if they’re not then they’re mechanic locked», — the insider says.
HLX is the internal codename of the game, which, according to leaks, is Valve’s next big project in the Half-Life universe. Last year, insiders found references to it in the code presumably due to a leak from one of the developers. Valve itself has not officially commented on the existence of this project, but recently references were found in the code for the second time.
McWicker emphasized: «Half-Life 3 — is not a VR game». Also, last year, testing the project became so widespread that people started talking about it outside the team. But he doesn’t want to share any details about the plot.
«I personally have a policy of avoiding any story-related questions or information wherever possible, so I currently have avoided all of them. But I’ve been offered it by people whom are trustworthy and I know some of my contemporaries have been given it so there is information out there about the plot» — McWicker adds.
At the same time, he suggested that Chell from Portal might appear in the game and reminded that Eric Volpo «is keen on making Portal 3». According to him, this game can become the next big single-player development of Valve. It all depends on whom «will retire» after HL3 is finished.
Another important detail is procedural generation. McVicker refuted the common perception that it concerns the plot or levels. According to him, Valve uses a system that does not change the geometry of levels but only varies the location of entities: doors, physical objects, enemies, items, and NPCs. The plot will remain scripted, not procedural.
The history of HL3 began in 2013-2014. The first version of the game was supposed to be a replayable action game with procedural generation, inspired by Left 4 Dead. But it was canceled because Source 2 wasn’t ready at the time. Now it seems that Valve is once again close to bringing Half-Life 3 to release — for the first time in all these years. Or so insiders say.
Source: Eurogamer