Rumours have been fired off left right and centre during the past week as nerds world-wide start to panic, "will HL2 make Sept 30th?!".

With only 10 days until the apparent shelf release date, fans start to wonder what Valve are playing at. No "Gold" press release, no advertising campaigns, and yet no official word about a delay. On top of this, the new Radeon cards (which are supposed to be bundled with HL2) have started distribution earlier than expected, but with no hard word on whether the cards in transit are actually boxed with HL2 or not.

Recently a fan was taken on a tour of the Valve offices, during this visit Gabe Newell mentioned that information regarding Steam's HL2 release would be made availible on the 22nd, and that Steam HL2 subscribers would be downloading an encrytped version of HL2 prior to release to ease the load on content servers come the 30th. This encrypted version obviously not being "unlocked" until the world-wide retail release.

This promotes the general idea that they're still set for the 30th, unfortunately Valve are keeping tight-lipped and haven't confirmed nor denied any release date speculation. I hope Valve have something up their sleeve, for their sake.

This encrypted version obviously not being "unlocked" until the world-wide retail release.

Sounds like a hacking challenge if ever I've heard one! Still, a better idea given the recent Steam shenanigans. I emailed Vivendi after we got their last product release schedule and it didn't have Half-Life 2 on it (like last week), and they didn't respond, so I guess they're either in the dark as well, or its just a big conspiracy.

im not going to bother with hl2 unless they make a cs2 for it

I guess valve are in a way trying to keep a low profile and sort of minimise hype. I mean, doom3 has to live up to a GIANT reputation after the hype over it for so long. HL2 was sprung on us so unexpectantly that I guess there wasnt really time to hype it. Although we have seen a fair bit now and a bit of hype has been generated. I reckon it might be a fair bit less than if they had gone on a massive add campaign etc. In the end though, if they dont release the game by the 30th LOTS of people are gonna be mighty pissed off that it didnt come out so soon :)

yes rec. I think that he was. It certainly seems so at least...

HL2 :D
I really cant wait to run this :)

Steam is gay and I really don't want to understand it, but does this mean you can download HL2 through steam?

I want my boxed version tho

Id rather a boxed retail version, instead of chewing up 1.2gig - 1.8gig of my download cap...

Haha, trog wants to buy a Half-Life game.

Jerry, I'm going to go out on a limb here, but were you dropped at birth?

why?

so, I'm guessing this means HL2 is going to be steam only? If there's no word of "going gold" I guess there's no CD's on the way :(

That's gonna suck for people on dialup

Something else that I guess might explain the secrecy is that they're trying really, really, really hard not to let this one leak out to the warez channels. I'm sure they're as sick as most publishers of seeing their games hit the warez scene before they're even on shelves.

I reckon valve are keeping their mouth shut because they know anything they say will be written in stone by the community and they would rather not have the pressure of a million people attacking them if they miss the date.

Maybe right now there just busting their chops to get it done ASAP. If done before sep 30th. yay for everyone, valve made it. If not, then it will just be postponed till it is done.

Releasing STEAM a few days ago was a good test for them to see how it would handle the load. I mean if a CS release crumbles, imagine a HL2 release...

any word on what the go is with team fortress 2? is it being bundled with HL2 as well? i've been waiting for that title since i first heard its name.

I can't wait. Not sure how well their Steam release will go though, I can't see too many people wanting to get a few bucks off at the expense of a CD or two and the box.

I wonder how far they'll push it back if they miss the 30th...?

i was talking to vivendi a couple weeks back, the reason they dont have a release date is simple,

the results of earlier anouncements have resulted in 'damage prevention'

they consider the september 30 release date unreliable as everyone else does and are not prepared to announce any imformation regarding release.

they appear annoyed by valve, perhaps to do with valve striving to sell this huge game through steam and not let vivendi take all the heat.

that last comment is my opinion only.

I reckon them keeping quite is just adding to the hype not avoiding

You can feel the suspense thicken as we reach closer to the 30th as Half Life fans around the world wait with baited breath. How excitement :D

HL2 is not going to be Steam only. Valve have stated the Steam version won't be released until retail shelf version are.

If that is the case, you can blow off 30th september, as EB has got it listed for the 1st of November.....

So whats this about the game alternatively being shipped with the new ATI card? How much will it cost?

Can someone shed some more light on this?

ta.

mayb valve are pushing it back to avoid it coming out at the same time as halo - even being hl2, some sales will be hurt being at the same time as halo (not as many as other games but yeah) they might just be giving ppl some room between halo and hl2

My money is on a later release date because, Venendi (the distribution company in Australia) know nothing about it, I have their release lists at work. Counter-Strike is on the list but HL2 is not...

and if they dont know about it, then how can anyone place any orders?!!!

and how can Hardly Normal be taking pre-orders for a product that doesnt technically exist!!!

theres something strange afoot here, ether valve is lying, or they are about to make f00ls of the whole gaming comunnity!

I went and pre-ordered my copy of HL2 with EB on thursday night :-)

According to the dudes working its still being released in the USA on the 29th of September but we don't get it till November 1 in Aust...

They have as much a clue as us.

I'm guessing Valve has kept quiet because they didn't know how well the release of Steam will go. HL2 will need to be validated via steam even for single player I presume, so I don't think any outside guesses would be accurate.

....watch Alcatraz in San Francisco on the 30th.

If they release HL2 in Australia a month later they are just asking for trouble, ppl will get pissed and download it instead for free.

dear god... what will we do... *looks at large axe outside* ...hmm...

*in background: someone think of the children*

Seriously people, your local game shop does not know anymore then you can already find out on the net. With such large online communities do you really think the news about one of the most anticipated PC releases ever would get all the way down to that snotty nosed kid behind the counter at your local EB store without being posted across like, the_entire_f***ing_internet_.

and hows EB suposed to know when vivendi who suply valve software to them dont even know.

the whole reason why the halflife2 release date was pulled from their release schedule.

we'll find out before eb does :P

Soon as it goes gold you can pretty much say what month its gonna come out in. If it goes gold any time soon then you can pretty much assume it will be out on the 30th.

Otherwise... keep on waiting till its done.

....watch Alcatraz in San Francisco on the 30th.

Spill psycho.. what do you know?

I'd be surprised if it's still on for the 30th... I posted a while ago trying to find online PC retailers that had a release date for the 30th and couldn't find one. I still haven't found one.

I really hope it will be the 30th but I have my doubts.

Spill psycho.. what do you know?

Supposedly the release party is to be held on alcatraz island... ;)

A member of the TF2 dev team spoke to an OZTF admin earlier in the year stating that they hope to have TF2 completed around the same time as HL2, if not before. However he also mentioned that the chances of it being a simultainious release is dim.

Also, the pope was talking to jesus the other day. Apparently Jesus will be doing that second coming thing any time now.

awesome
i get to hide behind a crate that looks real.

hey jude :p

downloading games online is a sucky system as everytime you want to install it you have to download the damn thing again instead of just pulling out a cdrom.

a good idea would be that when you install it from the online server, setup your key bindings, video options etc etc is that it sends this info back to the server and when you have to install it again due to your hdd dying or whatever, when it reinstalls it all your settings are put back in for you as well.

couldn't you just do like CS and copy the cache onto a CD, then when you want to reinstall copy it back to hard drive?

edit: w00t 4000 AGN total and I wasted it in a half life/ CS thread......at least I got to say hi to jude though muwhahaha >:-)

Look at all the people that download warez, this kind of shows that people are perfectly willing to download a couple of gigs for a game... whether they are also willing to pay though is another matter.
For payment, MMORPG's show that people are willing to pay for games they access online.

So there are people who dont mind downloading large files for games, and there are people who dont mind paying for them, so valve just has to get where these two markets intersect and then profit.

that is so true Drfragg about not wanting an unfinished project coming out.

its just awesum for valve to accually want to completely finish this before they release it.

lets hope we can smell the polish :D

haha check what else is for sale there.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B0000AJMPK/103-2699808-7976603?v=glance&n=1060624&s=toys&m=A3UN6WX5RRO2AG

counterstrike for the XBOX

hmm, whats your thoughts on that?

obveously cs has its problems on pc, but xbox might be a different matter.

should have high res models, skins, textures etc.

wonder what maps they've included. interesting

usedtobecool: amazon (and any other shops) don't know. There just giving a date because they are taking pre-orders and customers would like a date before they put down some cash.

As soon as valve give a proper date (to anyone) you can expect it will be palstered all over the inernet in like 5 seconds flat.

As soon as valve give a proper date (to anyone) you can expect it will be palstered all over the inernet in like 5 seconds flat.

haha yea fully ay,

radios and TVs are gonna go mad with 'news updates' letting us know the internet is fuked coz everyones telling everyone else that halflife2 is gonna come out on steam only on december 30th.

warning last paragraph is my nightmare only.

Where would Valve confirm the release date? On the steam site?

Why is this even a news article? Apart from the news that they'll start pre-streaming encrypted data on the 22nd, we've gone over all of this already a number of times, and yet there are still morons who go "oh man no box versions" and "if they dont release it here at the same time it'll promote piracy" crap.

Here we go, yet again:

There are still going to be box versions - three, in fact (Normal, Collectors edition, and a lite "SP-Only" edition)

Half-Life 2 will be out on Steam on September 30th, and then in boxes a week or two later. I'd imagine Australian boxed release will be longer since it needs OFLC approval.

You can buy it off steam for a one off fee, or you can get a steam subscription for a low monthly fee. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO GET A MONTHLY FEE TO PLAY HL2, YOU CAN STILL BUY IT OVER STEAM. f***tards.

You won't run into the same issues that Steam did in the first 48 hours because they're streaming the bulk of it a week before release

You shouldn't be able to play it before September 30th, because Valve aren't streaming the exe until September 30th - just all the content.

Warez should be down a lot, since you can download it and play it straight away for a small fee. I know I'd pay money to download a game legally over a fast connection rather than warez it off some crappy hub or torrent.

mayb valve are pushing it back to avoid it coming out at the same time as halo

What are you, retarded?

awesome
i get to hide behind a crate that looks real.

i love it :)


I also want this to come out, all the games at the moment SUCK MAJOR BALLS! HL2 should be good!

I just hope all the lil f***tard plebs that ruined dod and cs cant afford HL2 + DOD2/CS2

well spray me n wipe me off,

coz i can feel the love in this thread :P

What are you, retarded?

ahaha that made me roffle

"You can take that to the bank to, because that's straight from the horse mouth."

Don't count your chickens until they've hatched and crossed the road.

The last date released by Valve was September 30th, any other date is simply rumour or an opinionated guess.

as i said in some of my previous posts.

how is ANYONE going to know if valve havnt said so.

Oh, and to all you idiots that are saying "man I've looked at dozens of online retailers, their release date says November/December!!!!". Are you retarded? NO retailers have legit stock/release dates for Half-Life 2, NONE OF THEM. This is why the release/shipping date varies from retailer to retailer, because they're talking out of their arse. They've created imaginary dates (which they estimate might be likely) so they can start taking pre-orders. The last date released by Valve was September 30th, any other date is simply rumour or an opinionated guess

Huh? Wouldn't you think that large retailers would be aware of the release date when the supposed release date is just over a week away and NOT advertise dates that differ so badly from the supposed release date of the 30th?

Obviously I'm retarded because I don't get it. As far as I'm concerned, either

a) HL2 hasn't got a snowballs chance in hell of being released on the 30th or,

b) Valve has one major FUD campaign going and it is going to be released on the 30th... so good, in fact, that nobody but Valve has a clue when it will be released.

I can't wait for the Single Player Game. I loved the first one, this one looks quite alot better. The first one even made me jump at certain places (the first time a face hunger thing jumped at me...), I hope this one has the same suspenseful bits.

Multiplayer wise, I owned at Original Halflife =] I hope that translates over into this game.

Im sure there will be plenty of MODs released, and probably a few expansions. Once the game engine is released, I can't wait to see some of the other games using the same engine. From the show reels, it is quite an impressive total game engine.

Anyway, cant wait to see what happens. May need a machine upgrade too, but I doubt it =]

This is merely speculation, Gabe Newell has stated numerous times that the Steam release will be a simultainious one with boxed retail.

Can you quote his statment to this effect for me?

heh, all that is going to happen with steam is someone will work out a hack to download HL2 from steam for free...

a big "thank you steam" from all warz monkey's.

I looked up three ozy retailers and non of them show HL2 being released this month. 1 read 30oct another late november and one had no release date yet.

Did you read this thread by any chance?

I ordered mine just before for $72 AUD inc delivery,

Delivery is 4-6days, should be good. :)

yeah that sounds like a great idea

"Me: Greetings Shopkeep. I'll just give you this money and you promise to give me a copy of some unfinished software on cds that haven't been stamped yet in boxes that haven't been made that you got from crates that haven't been shipped yet"

you could invest that 72 dollars and earn a good 25c or so before the release :)

just to let you know the delay with condition zero has to do with steam.

halflife2 is a byproduct of all this 'shenanagins'

vivendi IS ... upset.
they are trying to work it out.

but keep this to yourselves as im not supossed to tell you... :P

you wont see me till end of month since somehow were 1.5 gig over our 3g limit with telstra, funny considering telstra cuts out every 5 minutes, therefore we dont use it much. also none of us has downloaded anything near that amount.

i dont usually complain about telstra but now they're gonna charge me a s***load for a service which is s***house.

im doing this from work, ive unplugged cable modem till end of month. :(

point of all this is, let me know the important bits when i come back :D i have a qgl addiction..

im still attending: qgl anominous.(sp?)

i am an optus cable slut

and i lub it :D

welcome to the forums tiny, nice way to start posting.

Has anyone got any news on the supposed new Radeon Card/HL2 bundle pack?

I was just about to buy a 9800PRo, but do you reckon it's in my best interests to hold off and see what the new card can do?
Will it really be that much better than the 9800Pro?

if you read my above post,

you'll realise the delay is about vivendi having the rights to all of valves products,

and yet valve are trying to sell through steam, therefore vivendi is losing out from lost sales.

they are working out the legal issues, once thats done then c0 will be out and hl2 will be the reason we dont turn up to work.

As long as we are on the vido card topic though, I have GeForce FX 5800, is anyone else on the Geforce boat and a little worried about the HL2 benchmark results poseted on gamespot last week??

Dude if I had an FX series card I would be a LOT worried. Not just for the performance in HL2 but for any DX9 standard game thats to come. Not a lot of developers are going to write specific 'mixed mode' code just for the FX cards when ATI's product is doing so well with MS standard right out of the box.

Check the DX9 performance and IQ in Aquamark over at Driver heaven recently using Nvidia Det's 51.75, you'd sell your card in a flash.

where the hell did they get the 51.75 det, 45.23 is the latest one available to the public,

haha dude 45.23 is the latest that have been officily released. another words drivers that they know work properly.

latter ones are either ones that have been leaked or ones that nvidia have given out to the 'hardcore' sites so they can test em, therefore get more feedback at the same time.

The 51.75's are drivers released by Nvidia to review sites for benhcmarks purposes...it sort of backfired on them when it was obvious they sucked and were still perfoming Image adjustments in the driver to boost fps at the expense of image quality.

As for Doom 3 Nvidia will most probably be pinning most of its hopes on NV40 whcih is reported to be taped out and in production by Feb 2004, ATI will most likely be ready to release the R420 chipset by then as well. In the meantime if you want to play DX9 minimum spec games at their best it really is a no brainer that ATI offer the best goods to do so at this point in time.

Interesting slant/scenarios on the HL2 release confusion offered up over at Gone Gold.

HALF-LIFE 2 MYSTERY DEEPENS
I don't usually engage in total speculation here (total stupidity, maybe, but not total speculation), but this Half-Life 2 soap opera has really gotten my attention. Valve, as of today, still says there has been no slippage from the September 30 release date. Vivendi has told everyone in the world that the game is pushed back to November (or December, depending on who you're talking to). To further muck up the works, ATI is going to bundle Half-Life 2 (possibly a special edition with an exclusive level) with the Radeon 9800 XT, which is supposed to launch on September 30 as well.

I've been thinking about it today and it appears that these are the possible scenarios.
1. Valve announces that they've been unnecessarily jerking our chain and the game is indeed delayed until the end of the year. 9800 XT's are launched at the end of September with white slips of paper in them good for a copy of Half-Life 2. This scenario blows chunks, obviously. I'm also hoping that it's unlikely. Why would Valve so stubbornly refuse to make an announcement about the delay unless they had something up their sleeve?

2. Valve releases something on September 30, but it's not the full game. Maybe it's a two level demo with one multiplayer map. That would build anticipation to a fever pitch. ATI could ship that CD and also include a coupon for the full version when available. Again, though, if this was the plan, it could have been announced weeks ago.

3. The grassy knoll, X-Files, green men from outer space conspiracy theory. This is my favorite. Now before I even mention this, let me say explicitly that I have absolutely no inside information to indicate that any of what I'm about to say is true. However, this scenario would resolve many seemingly contradictory pieces of information.

Let's say that after the Blizzard founders left Vivendi (which probably reduced the asking price for their games division by several hundred million dollars), someone from Valve went to Vivendi and said that they were leaving as well--unless Vivendi allowed them to release Half-Life 2 via Steam without it being tied to the retail package release date. Vivendi, desperate to sell off the games unit and even more desperate to not have the price lowered any further, agrees. Plus Vivendi is thinking "How many copies could people buy through Steam, anyway? Ha!"

That 'Ha' was with a French accent, by the way. And the answer to that question is 'a freaking huge number of copies.'

If Half-Life 2 is available via Steam on September 30, and ATI bundles its special edition on September 30, but the retail store version isn't available until November, then everyone has been telling the truth. I know, it's terribly naive of me to think that everyone (or anyone) is telling the truth, but this scenario would accommodate everyone.

Plus we wouldn't have to wait two more months to play the game!

The interesting thing is that Valve as of today still state that the release date for the game is September, 30th.

I reckon they will do it, when you think that way back in May? they come out of the blue and announced the game would ship on Sept, 30th. Not a vauge date or anything like that, a set date. Everyone was surprised, then Valve starts releasing polished in game videos of the product, quite a few of them in fact. Gabe Newell is on record as saying it will be 'close' but not once has there been a retraction by Valve about that Sept date. Recently I read an interview with Newell talking about the games development and it was obvious that the thing was finished and that tweaking and just massive amounts of play testing was happening at the time.

I reckon its a done deal and they will be using their new baby Steam to do the honours (initially) on Sept 30th.

If they come out and announced it has slipped I would be very interested to hear the reasons why when they have left it this late in the day.

Yeh, was for five minutes...seems the release daye has in deed slipped.

http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/28497

grrrr. :(

valve certainly know how to stir up hype for their game.

Thanks for reviving a year-old post!

Doom 3 has been like, the best selling PC game of the year. Hardly a flop. Just because you can't figure out how it is supposed to be played doesn't mean that it ain't selling!

last edited by trog at 20:35:34 31/Aug/04