Valve has been having some rough times with the source leak. Now, Omni chimes in on the matter.

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Half-Life 2 Delay: The "Facts"

It seems that everyone from Wired to Computer Gaming Monthly to Time – and every two-bit website in-between – has offered some kind of commentary on the “situation” swirling around the cyber break-in at the offices of Valve. If Gabe Newell, President of Valve, is to be believed, someone hacked his computer from another location and inserted some nefarious electronic “listening” devices. Through this an amount of Half-Life 2’s source code was swiped from Newell’s computer. (How much was actually stolen and if it was restricted to just the source code is entirely up for speculation as Valve has been predictably mum on the subject.)

This situation presents all sorts of questions, none of which have any ready answers. So what does one do when there are questions and no solid answers? One speculates. One draws conclusions with incomplete (and often, incorrect) information. And if you’re like me, your mind runs rampant with possibilities: How did it happen? Was it allowed to happen? If one person is the culprit, what could they possibly have to gain? Is it a big publicity stunt? Is Vivendi Universal’s financial situation some way involved? Does Valve have a disgruntled employee? Is the game less finished than Valve is letting on and made up the break-in (releasing a few nibblets on the net to give the break-in some credibility) as a shield to deflect criticism for “promising” a September release?

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Lots of questions and no answers.

When this is the case, we really have to take a look at what we do know – the facts – then attempt to draw conclusions from there. Below are the facts I’ve been mulling over in my speculative search for answers regarding Half-Life 2’s delay – but it all comes with a disclaimer.

Although the facts are listed below, they may have nothing to do with each other. I can’t – and

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won’t – be held responsible for your own leaps in logic or any conclusions you reach on your own. And you also have to keep in mind; I might not be presenting all the facts. (There just isn’t enough space.) And one last thing, this is just one moron’s ramblings – I just need to get these thoughts out of my brain so I can move on.

But here we go with the facts:

May 2003, just before E3, Valve and Vivendi Universal make the big announcement of Half-Life 2’s impending arrival. ETA: September 30, 2003.

Vivendi Universal’s financial woes are regularly featured in newspaper headlines and serious magazines like The Economist.

Vivendi Universal is Half-Life 2's distributor/publisher.

StarCraft: Ghost (developed by Blizzard, owned by Vivendi Universal) shifts its ship date from Q2003 to sometime 2004.

July 2003, Bill Roper, Erich Schaefer, Max Schaefer, and David Brevik leave Blizzard Entertainment, the gaming giant that brought the world the Diablo and WarCraft series, and StarCraft.

October 7, 2003, CNN Money reports that the thief (or thieves) “stole enough game maps and other components to put together a playable build of the game.”

Half-Life 2 was demoed at E3 2003 at ATI’s booth.

Day of Defeat, a team-based multiplayer Half-Life mod, is released commercially through Activision. Valve takes part of the Developer credit.

According to CS Nation, Counter-Strike: Condition Zero, after passing from Rogue, Gearbox and Ritual Entertainment, lands at Turtle Rock Studios.

Turtles are from the reptile family.

From GameSpy in an article titled, “What’s Next for Valve and Half-Life 2,” states that “[the] only developer known at this time to have licensed the Source engine being used for Half-Life 2 is Troika, who is creating Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines. When asked to comment on how the leak would affect the game and its development, Troika’s joint CEO and producer on the project, Leonard Boyarsky, deferred to Activision, where a spokeswoman for the game refused comment.”

Gabe Newell makes a posting on an online forum stating (in short): “Yes, the source code that has been posted is the HL-2 source code.” Then details how and when it was done, a process that involved “a buffer overflow in [Microsoft] Outlook’s preview pane.”

Gabe Newell worked at Microsoft before establishing Valve.

According to Masters of Doom, by David Kushner, John Carmack is a coding savant and general genius – driven manically forward to make games faster and more beautiful. Well before gamers knew his name, Carmack was caught and charged with stealing computers from his school.

id is working on another anticipated first-person shooter: Doom III.

Activision is the publisher of Doom III.

The original Half-Life was created with a heavily modified Quake engine.

In the same October 7, 2003 article from CNN Money, Todd Hollenshead, CEO of id Software, relates his feelings on having source code problems last year when a playable build of Doom III leaked out.

In an interview with GameSpot (October 1, 2003), Gabe Newell explains that Valve has paid for Half-Life 2’s development: “…we took all that money from Half-Life, and other money we had, and said “OK rather than going and buying Ferraris, we’re going to buy our next game.” Everybody in the company had to buy into that.”

John Carmack bought a Ferrari Testarosa after the money from Doom started to roll in.

The September issue of PC Gamer features a cover illustration of Half-Life’s Gordon Freeman and Doom III’s Marine back-to-back.

According to BBC News, “Half-Life has sold some eight million copies in its various versions.”

The average development time for a game – from scratch – is 2 years.

After the cyber break-in, Valve estimates an April 2004 release for Half-Life 2 – essentially a full year since it was officially announced.

Gabe Newell is quoted in Computer Gaming World, June 2003, that (to paraphrase) “Half-Life 2 has been in development for five years” or since Half-Life 1’s release.

These are the facts and statements that have been tumbling through my brain the last few weeks. The facts don’t do much more than get me thinking – it hasn’t led to an answer of the $64,000 question: Who did it? Valve is currently open for tips to the identity of culprit(s) – helpvalve@valvesoftware.com -- but there’s no mention of a reward, except for possibly five minutes of fame and a free copy of Half-Life 2… when it ships.

I can’t pretend for an instant that I know exactly what’s going on (and I don't think anyone can). I’m skeptical enough to doubt everything I hear – I guffawed at the first mentions of the Playstation 2 – and publicity stunts are nothing new. Can it be written off as a publicity stunt? I’m not sure why Valve would do such a thing. I mean, when word of HL2 was released it snagged magazine covers and it sent fans into a tizzy. And if any game has fans, it’s Half-Life. The sequel will sell buckets whatever happens. Will it be problem free? Free from malicious hackers cheating on multiplayer games? Free from those looking to swipe your credit card information via Valve’s online distribution system, Steam, thanks to knowing how the source code works? There’s only one thing to do: wait. Only when it hits the shelves, and millions start playing it, will we know for sure.

Now let’s leave Valve and its problems to Valve.

- Omni

(October 26, 2003)


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