In Which I Get Real Excited About Something Probably Meaningless

BREAKING: some guy wore a t-shirt. The ramifications are potentially huge. What? Oh yeah, sorry. A Valve employee wore a t-shirt, and that t-shirt says “Half-Life 3”. Now it’s a big deal, right? Spotted by an employee of Uber Entertainment, developers of the rather good Monday Night Combat, at an industry event, the offending garment is pictured below. 

Half-Life news gets me very excited, no matter how totally inconsequential it is. Four goddamn years have passed since fans were left hanging in the middle of an unresolved narrative by the last game, and Valve have said about twenty words about the future of the franchise in that time. It’s complete fucking radio silence on one of gaming’s most beloved series, it’s become a joke, the new Duke Nukem Forever; I think a little excitability is excused.

This is weird, though. Why the fuck does this guy have a Half-Life 3 shirt? The game hasn’t been announced, they haven’t even finished with Half-Life 2’s episodic expansions. Did he make it himself to wear around the office, get a laugh from his coworkers while they continue to not make it? If it’s official HL3 merchandise that raises even more questions, chiefly- why does official HL3 merchandise exist? Valve are incredibly tight-lipped whenever anyone asks them about the future of Half-Life, and this is the closest to official word there has been. They’re not above simply messing with the fans, but to do so with Half-Life 3 would be cruel; there’s a huge amount of love out there for these games, and their continued absence hurts everyone that cares.

Putting my analytical hat on for a second, since I rarely get to do so for my paranormal detective agency, the shirt looks strikingly similar to one they sell already, bearing the official HL2 logo. There’s a notable difference, though- on that one, the iconic lambda is within the circle and the 2 is without, but here the big ol’ 3 is centre-stage- whether it’s official or otherwise, the designer didn’t want it to be mistaken for the old logo, they wanted people to see that three. I’m no artist, but that makes sense- it’s still distinctly HL, but the emphasis on the three gets nerds like me all excited. Not sure what that actually proves, though. I guess it shows a little more work than simply swapping the number has gone into the logo, which means that if it’s a fake it had at least a moment’s thought given.

It’s hard to tell what to make of this, but I’ll hope against hope that there’s something big coming. Four years is a long-ass time, after all.