The Valve and Steam Platform Discussion Thread

[IDtenT]

http://www.pcgamer.com/2013/02/13/valve-layoff-hardware-mobile/

UPDATE: Garry’s Mod creator Garry Newman tweets the appearance of a number of differences on Valve’s staff page seen through Diff Checker. The comparison tool indicates the removal of nine employee bios from the People section of Valve’s company page, listed below:

• Moby Francke, Half-Life 2 character designer and Team Fortress 2 art lead
• Jason Holtman, director of business development for Steam and Steamworks
• Keith Huggins, character animator and animator for Team Fortress 2 “Meet the” video series
• Tom Leonard, software engineer for Half-Life 2 and Left 4 Dead
• Realm Lovejoy, artist for Half-Life 2, Portal, and Left 4 Dead. She was also part of the original DigiPen-turned-Valve team that created Narbacular Drop, the inspiration for Portal
• Marc Nagel, test lead for Half-Life, Counter-Strike, and patch updates
• Bay Raitt, animator for Half-Life 2, Team Fortress 2, and Portal
• Elan Ruskin, engine programmer for Left 4 Dead, Portal 2, and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
• Matthew Russell, animator for Team Fortress 2 “Meet the” video series

UPDATE: Valve boss Gabe Newell sent along his response to Engadget: “We don’t usually talk about personnel matters for a number of reasons. There seems to be an unusual amount of speculation about some recent changes here, so I thought I’d take the unusual step of addressing them. No, we aren’t canceling any projects. No, we aren’t changing any priorities or projects we’ve been discussing. No, this isn’t about Steam or Linux or hardware or [insert game name here]. We’re not going to discuss why anyone in particular is or isn’t working here.”

What the fuck is going on? o_O

Newell has always been incredibly secretive about any and all activities. To be perfectly honest, I don't think he's the great boss everyone seems to think he is - I very much think he is motivated by more billions of dollars.

Has Newell actually engaged in any philanthropy? Just curious.

 

[Menckenstein]

"Daddy, tell me again about the Great Video Game Collapse of 2013."

"Well son, the end times were dark indeed. Popamole was abundant in all genres, once prestigious RPG devs were begging for donations putting up "Will code for food" signs on the internet which people say "kick started" the game apocalypse. And then, Valve software, run by Gabe the Hutt, tried to take on the console market with a very expensive piston. I think it was designed to launch a projectile at the face of anyone who was trying to turn on an Xbox. People were such horrible masochists then, voluntarily playing the most horrible game-based torture and murdering their minds, it almost seemed like a good idea."

"Wow, so what happened?"

"Nobody bought the damn things, Valve lost all their money and Gabe was rolled out onto the street and was left 4 dead. Later the day, the Steam servers went offline and we all lost our game libraries."

"*child crying*"

 

[Kane]

bunch of underperforming faggots were purged, is all.

i hope that means gaben is out hunting for some decent coders, because the blarghsparghle that source did and does to my hardware since half-life 2 can only be called "rape".

 

[JarlFrank]

"Nobody bought the damn things, Valve lost all their money and Gabe was rolled out onto the street and was left 4 dead. Later the day, the Steam servers went offline and we all lost our game libraries."

Would be sad for the, what, 20 games I have on steam, half of which were gifts or free.

Good thing nothing will happen to my REAL game library.

 

[Metro]

Steam Boxes are marketed towards console gamers, not PC gamers.

 

[Xi]

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/...egins-with-the-piston-a-1000-pc-in-a-console/

 

[Infinitron]

Piston ‘Steambox’ Gets Pissed On By Valve

 

[Jaesun]

“Valve began some exploratory work with Xi3 last year, but currently has no involvement in any product of theirs,” Valve’s communications man Doug Lombardi told an inquisitive Eurogamer this morning. Wuh-oh.

r00fles!

 

[Infinitron]

Er, OK: Xi3 Claims Valve Asked Them To Make Piston

 

[Jaesun]

The plot thickens apparently...

 

[Achilles]

Nah. Valve commissioned a prototype, it wasn't what they were looking for and they bailed. Xi3 went on to sell it themselves. Seems pretty straightforward.

 

[Infinitron]

DOTA 2 TAKES UP 2% OF ALL INTERNET BANDWIDTH USAGE: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/03/14/gabe-says-valves-business-grew-50-in-the-last-year/

This is kind of cool. When Gabe Newell accepted his BAFTA fellowship last week, he crowd-sourced his speech in the Valve offices. All he received was sarcastic responses, which he then told to the audience. He was then interviewed backstage, and without the yoke of his cruel workmates he dropped a few amazing stats. The first one is that Valve’s business grew massively in the last year, by about 50%. I’ll bet it’s mostly Dota 2 related. And it’s an easy way to put paid to the notion that Valve’s recent lay-offs might be because of financial trouble. That was never going to be the case, but now it’s unfathomable. The other one is actually more impressive, and I’ll tell you that and include the video below. You’ll never guess.

Now he might be just trying to help out the slightly clumsy interviewer, or maybe’s attempting to impress Jonathan Ross, but Gabe drops a Steam bandwidth bombshell, saying that one recent Dota 2 updates was responsible for 2% of all mobile and land-based internet activity at the time it was released. Guh? Is that even possible?

 

[Morgoth]

One day Gabe will eat the whole Internet on his own!

 

[Metro]

They have the same item/crate microtransaction shit in DOTA2 that they have in TF2, I'm sure they make a killing.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Got a friend with 1,000 hours played of DotA2 and he actually buys keys on occasion. He even found an unusual, which looking at what it was and the effect he could probably peddle for $100-300 fairly easily, but he can't be assed with trading at all. If they ever let you sell unusuals on the Steam market he probably will since it's easy, but that's about it.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Capcom and Valve are pleased to announce the Resident Evil® 6 x Left 4 Dead 2 project.
This crossover project between two of the interactive entertainment industry’s most respected publishers will see characters from Left 4 Dead™ 2 featured exclusively in the forthcoming PC version of Resident Evil® 6, while enemies from Resident Evil 6 will invade the PC version of Left 4 Dead 2. All content will be made available completely free for fans of either game to access and play.

Owners of Resident Evil 6 PC will be able to select one of four survivors from Left 4 Dead 2’s iconic cast – Coach, Nick, Ellis and Rochelle – when playing PC exclusive mode, The Mercenaries No Mercy. Each character will have a special customized weapon load-out created just for use in Resident Evil 6. In addition to the four survivors, two of the infamous Special Infected zombies from the Left 4 Dead franchise – the Witch and Mini Tank – will also make a cameo appearance in this mode, relentlessly attacking players regardless of whether a character from Left 4 Dead 2 or Resident Evil 6 is chosen. This new and exclusive content will automatically be downloaded in the background to all owners of the PC version of Resident Evil 6 from April 5.

Making the leap to the PC version of Left 4 Dead 2 will be some of Resident Evil 6’s most fearsome enemies – Lepotitsa, Napad and Ogroman. All three characters were brought to life in Left 4 Dead 2 by Valve’s renowned developers using its Steam Workshop tools. Owners of the PC version of Left 4 Dead 2 will be able to face a new deadly challenge when Resident Evil 6 characters infect Valve’s classic zombie title this spring.

Commenting on the crossover project, Chet Faliszek from Valve stated: “We’re huge Resident Evil fans, so when the opportunity arose to work directly with Capcom to combine L4D2 and RE6, we jumped at it.”

Resident Evil 6 Producer Yoshiaki Hirabayashi added: “The Resident Evil 6 team really enjoyed working on this crossover, and we’re confident that our fans will have a great time with it too! We hope you enjoy this unique content.”

 

[Tehdagah]

Why not Left 4 Dead 1?

 

[Morgoth]

What, new hats confirmed?

 

[Crooked Bee]

I hope Doug Church is the lead on Half Life 3. I mean, are there even any other good designers currently at Valve?

 

[Infinitron]

I hope Doug Church is the lead on Half Life 3. I mean, are there even any other good designers currently at Valve?

Good by whose standards? They probably have lots of designers who are revered by FPS fans. RPG fans not so much.

 

[Crooked Bee]

I hope Doug Church is the lead on Half Life 3. I mean, are there even any other good designers currently at Valve?

Good by whose standards? They probably have lots of designers who are revered by FPS fans. RPG fans not so much.

Good by anyone's standards, really. Who are the FPS designers you speak of? Are the original leads on Half-Life still at Valve?

I mean, Doug Church was the lead on Ultima Underworlds and System Shock. Is there anyone else at Valve who can compare to him in design credentials? Anyone who created games of comparable impact/originality?

EDIT: Plus, I don't think they would've have hired him for a non-lead role anyway.

 

[Infinitron]

Good by anyone's standards, really. Who are the FPS designers you speak of? Are the original leads on Half-Life still at Valve?

I don't know, I'm no shooter connoisseur. They say people rarely resign from Valve unless they have family emergencies and stuff like that. They could still be there.

It doesn't help that they don't really use job titles at Valve.

 

[DalekFlay]

They should have the balls to make hl3 a Steam exclusive across the board.

 

[Morgoth]

They're gonna release HL3 as a showcase for Source 2. Since Source 2 is still in development, don't expect anything before 2015. Then add Valvetime.

 

[Jaesun]

Dave Gilbert ‏@WadjetEyeGames
Steam says they'll review the next Blackwell and "let me know" instead of just taking it. Have I earned at least one "Come ON, guys!" yet?

Dave Gilbert ‏@WadjetEyeGames
.@RavenValor95 We have 8 games on Steam. 9 if you count Emerald City Confidential.

Just want to document more of STEAM's bullshit.