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.'"

Re:Noooooooo

[Goldberg's Pants]

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.

Re:Noooooooo

[Goldberg's Pants]

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).

Re:Noooooooo

[antin]

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 cont

Re:Noooooooo

[Ciderx]

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

Re:Noooooooo

[Goldberg's Pants]

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 mea

Re:Noooooooo

[droper]

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.

Re:Noooooooo

[Kelz]

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.

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

Huge surprise.

[Sevn]

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?

Re:Huge surprise.

[rwven]

LOL i had to laugh at that one... im glad someone cleared that up for this poor guy. The source engine is a completely original work by valve... The HL engine was actually a completely rebuilt Q1 engine. Nothing to do with the Q2 engine... they downright "bought" the Q1 engine from it's creators and rebuilt it. hence the reason they were able to get graphics as "good" as those out of the Q1 engine

Mod Parent up, informative

[gumpish]

Thanks.

Re:Huge surprise.

[Sevn]

That's one way of looking at it. Another way is that a professional company doesn't do what valve has done in the past and say "too bad you are screwed. we can do NOTHING about it". Then repeat that over and over and over again while the most popular graphics cards don't work correctly with their product. Then magically they do something about it 10 months later. A PROFESSIONAL company does whatever they can for their customer. Valve is not that company, or hasn't been in the past. I'm willing to entertain

Re:Huge surprise.

[(54)T-Dub]

Maybe this is OFN but i remember seeing doom 3 at E3 a in 2002 and they were running it on an ATI card. They said that it was optimized for ATI because of some fancy feature they have that nvidia doesn't.

Re:Huge surprise.

[DeadScreenSky]

Actually, it was mainly because ATI's fastest product at the time was way beyond what NVidia was capable of providing. NVidia had a lot of delays getting their latest cards out. Apparently the newest NVidia cards do run Doom3 a little faster, but that is using a special renderpath that is lower precision, among other things. Using the 'standard path' ATI is using, they get about half-speed.

That said, ATI's cards are definitely faster nowadays.

Re:Huge surprise.

[(54)T-Dub]

That said, ATI's cards are definitely faster nowadays.

I remember when I would run away from ATI cards. They used to be the worst name brand cards on the market. Ironically enough my next card will be an ATI. The gforce seems to have gone the way of the voodoo, taking the same card and overclocking the hell out of it. At least NVidia still has that awesome NForce chipset.

Re:Huge surprise.

[DeadScreenSky]

NForce does rule, though I wish they would be a little more open with the driver specs (don't want to be tied to one OS if I get one).

It is funny, to some extent, that it isn't even so much the fact that ATI has improved (though they still have), but more that NVidia has dropped the ball themselves that makes them so less popular. Ah well, they could still certainly perform a turnaround.

Re:Huge surprise.

[(54)T-Dub]

With both 3dFX and Nvidia it seems that a prologned period as the only serious player in the market has lead to their demise. They seem to slip into a comfort zone where they feel invincible. The irony is that Nvidia bought 3dFX, so you would think they might have learned this lesson already.

Well maybe they have learned something from it. Branch out and don't paint yourself into a single market.

Re:Huge surprise.

[Firehawke]

You can't blame Valve for Nvidia's problems. There's a known issue here, and they've said even with the NVIDIA-SUPPLIED optimizations, it doesn't run the way they'd really like it to. This is a fault in the card, not the software.

Re:Huge surprise.

[Sevn]

You obviously do not know the history behind Valves problems with HL and the lies they told related to drivers and hardware problems. There have been numerous problems in the past with ATI, NVidia, and other cards with HL and they always said "it's the drivers" or "it's the hardware". Then they silenty release a patch many months later. So unlike every other game company that doesn't care what the problem is, they blame it on something else then fix problems "when they get around to it". I can remember a pr

Steam

[Joff_NZ]

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

Re:Steam

[Anonymous Coward]

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

I get it. Steam, iron out... Clever bastard.

Re:Steam

[Soul-Burn666]

^ A problem they could easily solve by using BitTorrent in thier system.

Re:Steam

[I(rispee_I(reme]

Well, you see, if they used BitTorrent, anyone with a browser or a third-party BitTorrent client could download their stuff. They'd rather make you install and beta test their reinvention of the wheel so that they can charge all of their customers monthly fees for what was once a "buy-once, enjoy forever" product.

Re:Steam

[(54)T-Dub]

You can still "buy it once and enjoy it forever". The steam version basically allows people to try it out at a cheaper rate than buying it. If they play it more than 3 months then valve starts making money on it. You also get additional legacy content (ie: half-life 1) and any new content that they produce (ie: expansion packs, new games, CS 2). Don't get me wrong, i'm still gonna buy the CD in the store, but it'll be great for valve fan boys.

i hate steam.

[fireduck]

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...

Re:i hate steam.

[brkello]

I don't know what the heck you did, but I didn't have a problem at all. Downloaded steam, it convertied my CS to 1.6, found a server using steam, double clicked on it, and was playing right away. Some items are popular to download on the web, that's not valve's fault. Just run the download over night like every normal person out there. I don't doubt you had/have lots of problems with it...but I think the majority of people don't have any problems at all. The people who do have problem are the minority,

Re:i hate steam.

[wpc4]

I must agree I hate steam too. Although in it's defense the steam+content package that has all games is nearly 800mb. Sounds like you got just the CS+HL+Steam one.

Re:Steam

[Scooter]

Well of course it was slow - what with all those steam powered servers :)

er..

Is that my coat?

Thanks :P

One has to wonder

[ReyTFox]

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.

Re:One has to wonder

[__aafkqj3628]

Well, sept. 30 was never an official release date was it? I didn't see any huge posters with that on it (actually, I haven't seen any HL2 posters).

Re:One has to wonder

[BrookHarty]

Compusa has it listed as Sept 30th.

I'm still waiting for Duke Nukem Forever!

Re:One has to wonder

[Sevn]

Amazon HAD it listed at Sept 30th also, but now they have it listed at December First [amazon.com]. Who wants to bet cash it isn't ready by Christmas?

Re:One has to wonder

[__aafkqj3628]

Since when does Amazon or CompUSA count as official?

Re:One has to wonder

[Sevn]

Oh yeah. I'm sure they both just pulled the date right out of their ass. They made a release date up and were not told one by Valve. What is your point exactly?

Re:One has to wonder

[PainKilleR-CE]

They usually do pull release dates out of their asses, and many people repeatedly asked Valve what the date was when the Sept. 30th date came out, and every store was reporting something different (usually much later). Valve confirmed the Sept. 30th date on quite a few occasions. Take a look back at the E3 press releases, as that's when Valve announced both the game and the release date.

Re:One has to wonder

[Sevn]

So.....

I was wrongight?

hehe? :)

Re:One has to wonder

[Gogo Dodo]

Delay is far better as long as the delay isn't too long (see Duke Nukem). If you delay the game, but then come out with a smash hit, nobody will remember that it was delayed a few months. However, if you publish too soon and get slammed in the reviews for not working, you're toast and will never make up the good will. You don't see many "Game v1.1" reviews out there.

Initial impressions make all the difference.

Anyone surprised? Anyone? Bueller?

[pommaq]

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.

Re:Anyone surprised? Anyone? Bueller?

[ymgve]

I seriously want to hurt anybody who drags TF2 into a HL2 delay discussion. TF2 was only delayed because they had this little game called Half-Life 2 they wanted to work on instead, and they wanted to use its engine for TF2 also.

I bet that before 2004 is over, both TF2 and CS2 will be released. Just wait and see.

Re:Anyone surprised? Anyone? Bueller?

[fireduck]

this isn't entirely true. Half-Life Fortress was announced prior to HLs release. All online retailers had both products listed. So I think there was the expectation in Valve's mind, at last, that it was going to be released as a retail mod soon after HL was released.

That obviously didn't happen. To appease all the people who bought HL in anticipation of Fortress, they released the free conversion of Team Fortress. At that point they announced that Team Fortress 2 would be a retail product to be released when it was finished. This was years ago, and the product has been demoed in various forms for quite a while now. Demonstrations of the voice - lip synching technology, screen shots, ingame video. I think Valve had every intention of releasing TF2 prior to HL2.

Presumably, they'll actually release it after HL2, but who knows...

Re:Anyone surprised? Anyone? Bueller?

[inkless1]

Exactly.

1) They announced TF2 years before they announced HL2

2) They showed video and screens of TF2 years before they announced HL2

iow, TF2 was supposed to be out well before now.

My theory - TF2 was abandoned long ago, and the tech that worked has been roped into Counter-Strike. VOIP, new map views, spectator servers - all features they were using to hype TF2.

There's no way Valve has the bandwidth to be producing both games at the same time. If we see TF2, it will be in 2005 or 2006. And it will be

Re:Anyone surprised? Anyone? Bueller?

[samsmithnz]

I am definetly not surprised. Valve is getting a good reputation (from me anyway), of taking there time, and not bowing to publisher pressure, which like the music industry, is a rare, (but very good position for the consumer and producer), that can produce the very best (and sometimes the worse, it is possible to add/fix too much) of products...

Christmas sales

[KDan]

Blatantly they want it out for christmas to get all that xmas present money...

Daniel

Re:Christmas sales

[Anonymous Coward]

That would make sense accept that Valve is notorious for making promises and not keeping them. However, it is in character for Valve to delay a release for X-Mas. Much like it is like ID to sandbag about a release date then surprise people by releasing something months or even a full quarter before they said they would. I wouldn't be surprised in the lease if Doom3 came out for christmas. Carmac and gang get SUPER pissy when people *cough ATI cough* release information early, so they pull the hokey misinfor

Re:Christmas sales

[AllUsernamesAreGone]

Maybe I just cut ID too much slack, but I think you're not giving them enough credit. ID are probably about unique in the software development world that in they never give a release date until they are confident that they can make it and they include additional time in case there are unforseen problems. Yes, sometimes a really immense problem can push the release beyond that, but ID do it the right way - give no release date until a date is fairly certain, add on a safety margin and release when the game i

Re:Christmas sales

[fireduck]

I've never really bought the Christmas release date, at least when it comes to the A+ computer games (which HL2 presumably will be).

Blizzard has *never* released a product near Christmas, despite several rumors that they would. Starcraft was hopefully going to come out holiday season 97, but instead was released April 98. Diablo 2 came out in early November, when it presumably could have been held back a month or so. The worst was the original Diablo which, as I recall, was released in January 97 (the 4

Old News

[__aafkqj3628]

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?

Holy Fanboy BATMAN

[Anonymous Coward]

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

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Old News

[op51n]

Nope.
Lombardi himself, even in this months PCZone in the UK, (after the interviewer was advised by PR staff the interview would be cancelled immediately if he asked - suspicious...) said that Sep 30th was still the release date. Now, anyone in the last few days thought it could go gold and out in 5 days?

This is news?

[VenTatsu]

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.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

In Other News

[Red Pointy Tail]

Half Life 2 has been renamed Half Life: Forever.

hey?

[beredon]

I heard it was going to be released on October 15. Maybe I'm getting muddled up.

It's done when it's done

[imperator_mundi]

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?)

Re:It's done when it's done

[Gudlyf]

Shouln't that be:

"If quick and easy the path you choose, become an agent of evil you will."

Laughing my butt off!

[xQuarkDS9x]

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

Valve respect ...

[GoofyBoy]

... 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.

Re:Valve respect ...

[PainKilleR-CE]

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.

Valve doesn't have a parent company...

As for respect for Valve going down over this, I'm amazed anyone is surprised. I've been waiting for one game from Valve for 5 years. TFC took my mind off of it for a while, but frankly Half-Life wasn't a product I wanted or even care about.

Until Valve releases any game on time I'll expect their releases to be late. In fa

Re:Valve respect ...

[dswensen]

How about if they just ship a half-done game, like so many other developers out there do, and then patch the egregious truckload of bugs later? Would they earn your respect then?

Seriously, they didn't have to delay it. They could just fob off an incomplete piece of junk on the public and probably still make money.

I wish I could believe

[wowbagger]

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 m

A delay is fine with me

[elliotj]

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.

delayed for...

[Tom7]

Delayed so that they could add in real time shadows after seeing the Doom III tech demo. ;)

Not all delays are evil...

[wickedj]

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 bec

give it time

[rwven]

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...

Is anybody really surprised?

[ziggy_zero]

Especially seeing that Amazon.com has had a "November" release date for awhile now, while Buy.com has said "December" for quite some time.

Must feel stupid

[WapoStyle]

Jeeze Valve must feel a bit stupid right now. They have been so very adamant about their Sept. 30th release. Now just a few short days away they decide to delay it.

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

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Half Life Forever!

[Anonymous Coward]

In other news insiders have spotted Duke Nukem in the halls of Valve's offices.

Wow...seems like retailers have known a while.

[zoobaby]

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.

Re:Wow...seems like retailers have known a while.

[PainKilleR-CE]

if you check here http://www.ebgames.com/ebx/product/219676.asp

You will see a ship date of Nov. 14th err... 2004. It has been that ship date for a few weeks. I have learned that retailers pull dates out of their ass.

Yes, I am still waiting for Valve to ship the second game they promised, rather than a game they never promised until this last E3.

Half-Life and Doom 3

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Re:Half-Life and Doom 3

[PainKilleR-CE]

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.

Doom's story was told mostly through text between the major episodes. It had something to do with fighting monsters from Hell, and then (towards the end of the game) going into

Re:Half-Life and Doom 3

[MMaestro]

Doom 1 did have a storyline. It was in the readme file. Heres a copy online (its AOL hosted so it may not be up for long) : http://members.aol.com/ledmeister/doominfo.htm

' For the last four years the military, UAC's biggest supplier, has used the remote facilities on Phobos and Deimos to conduct various secret projects, including research on inter-dimensional space travel.'

Half-Life's story about teleportation? Sorry, but Doom had that nailed down. And incorporating the storyline into the gameplay? The best

Re:Half-Life and Doom 3

[dswensen]

Sounds like a reality show in the making.

Sorry, this is my fault

[Zed2K]

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.

Re:Sorry, this is my fault

[spooky_nerd]

Yeah, me too. I can't afford a new PC right now, so I asked Valve to delay HL2 until I have a bit more cash. Once I get that new computer the game will come out. If you want the game out sooner just mail a new PC to me at . . .

Delayed eh?

[James_G]

Gabe Newell sent us a mail letting us know that the 'news' posted on Shacknews yesterday (story) is a fake and that Half-Life 2 has gone Gold and in production now. Here's the official word: "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 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."

From http://www.gamershell.com/news_BHalf-Life2BGold.sh tml [gamershell.com]

Which site to believe? Who the hell knows?

Re:Delayed eh?

[samsmithnz]

I've seen another reliable site confirm that it is gold, straight from the horses mouth so to say...

damn HL2 & UFO: Aftermath all at once!

Re:Delayed eh?

[jameslore]

GamePlanet (http://www.gameplanet.co.nz/), the 'gaming news' site of one of NZ's big online game stores announce this morning it was delayed. 11:30am (NZST) they updated to say they had just been informed it had gone gold.

Short answer is who knows?

Re:Delayed eh?

[jameslore]

I stand correctly. Latest opinion is that the gold email's are all fake. Headers certainly seem to indicate it.

All would be helped if Valve would actually own up to something....

Source of the email - AKA proof it's fake

[Enucite]

Source of the email sent to Gamershell.com:
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(InterMail vM.4.01.03.37 201-229

How about some Play in "Foreplay" Valve

[space_hippy]

I wish they would at least release a one level demo/play test or something. Come on keep out interest, please.

Typical

[ZeeCog]

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.