Half-Life 2 Ep 2: Valve Software Interview

We talk to Valve's Doug Lombardi on the making of Half-Life 2, what's really in store in Episode Two... and beyond!

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By Adam Doree

The incredible Half-Life 2 series is gearing up for its next episode later this year, in the shape of Half-Life 2: Episode Two - what Valve has described as its very own 'Two Towers', before the 'Return of the King' finale with Episode Three.

Valve, partnered with EA for the series' episodic updates, is releasing a sensational pack called The Orange Box for PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 that includes the original Half-Life 2 game, Half-Life 2: Episode 1, the anticipated Episode Two, as well as Team Fortress 2 and the mind-shattering original shooter that is Portal - demonstrating the true world-class level of this developer's output, supported by EA's publishing strength.

The strategy of offering fans episodic follow-up content to the landmark sequel, which debuted back in 2004, has been the subject of interest and debate - and it's the Half-Life 2 series itself that forms the basis of this exclusive interview with Valve bigwig Doug Lombardi - who has possibly the most infectious laugh of anyone we've ever met in the games biz.

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Frankly, we can't wait to see what these guys have in store for the future. But here's a glimpse into the minds behind Half-Life and, pehaps, some of the awesome stuff we can expect next.

Kikizo: I've heard that 25% of purchases of Half-Life 2 have been through Steam. Where would you say things are at with Steam in terms of your original vision and where things are now?

Doug Lombardi: I think Steam has come a long way since we first started working on it. Originally, the idea came out of trying to better serve the people who are playing our games online, so things like auto updates were a big deal five or six years ago, when we were first talking about it. The success of Counter-Strike and Team Fortress classic just made us realise, we have to do a better job of servicing these customers. So auto updating, messaging, better server browsing etcetera were the first set of features, and once we got down that road we realised, well, we can deliver full content this way as well.

Doug Lombardi, Valve Software Bigwig

Since we launched Half-Life 2 and Condition Zero, which were the first two titles that came out, we've learned a lot about how to do a better job about delivering the full games over Steam as well, and I think now we're at a great point where we're not only serving out own but also great independent games from people like Introversion, and the Tripwire guys who did Red Orchestra. But we've also moved on to supplying other big, commercial games such as Dark Messiah of Might and Magic from Arkane, and other titles.

Kikizo: The atmosphere in the original Half-Life 2 game was this dystopian society, very bleak, and some interesting progress is made towards the end of the game, but how would you describe the changing atmosphere in the new episodes?

Lombardi: So as we progress through the trilogy, we move from City 17, post Half-Life 2 where things are more grim and whatnot, and Alyx and Gordon have sort of moved towards their journey beyond the city at the close of Episode One. In Episode Two, you're out of City 17 and you won't be going back. At least not for a while. [Smiles]. And you're in this very expansive forest, that opens up the gameplay to a broader scale. The hunter - the new creature that's been introduced - is designed to take advantage of that; he's much faster and he can traverse both the landscape as well as indoor areas. And we're also providing a new vehicle that you'll be spending a lot of time in, moving quickly through that forest, fighting large-scale battles against striders and packs of hunters etcetera.

Kikizo: It's popular in a lot of entertainment to have big shocks like major characters suddenly dying. Are you planning any surprises story-wise that the fans won't be expecting?

Lombardi: Yes. Haha. By the time you get through Episode Two, at least one person that you've... that has been a colleague of yours for a while, will no longer... be moving on.

Kikizo: I hope it's not DOG. Because that guys was awesome! How soon are you planning to reveal to fans, some of the stuff that left them really confused at the end of Half-Life 2, and to an extent, wasn't really solved at the end of Episode One? Are you going to give people some answers they've seeking in Episode Two?

Lombardi: In Episode Two you'll find our more about G-Man and his relationship with Alyx. I don't know that we will ever sort of open up and say, you know, here's all the details, "the G-Man is Gordon's father!" or whatever... you know, those types of revelations. I think that part of the charm of the games is the mystery, and for folks to be able to sort of form their own hypothesis of how the fiction is intertwined and what those connections are - it's part of the fun. We see the game as being the user's to author, and all we're trying to do is set a framework through which they can author that experience. It's why Gordon never speaks, it's why you never see Gordon - we want the player to connect as if they're Gordon, to that world and to be able to form some of their own conclusions or at least hypothesise.

The forthcoming The Orange Box compilation will possibly be the ultimate value-for-money high-end product you can buy on any system.

Kikizo: Cool, let's talk about the physics of Half-Life 2 - this was one of the biggest talking points when it first came out. With things like DirectX 10 and dedicated physics hardware, how could you see things being taken even further with physics - could they be even more integral to gameplay?

Lombardi: One of the great things about doing episodic is that we're able to embrace the new hardware as it comes online, and support things such as DX10 as it arrives. And also just by doing more frequent releases, we're able to sort of add on to the gameplay that we're using in physics, more quickly. So examples would be, in Half-Life 2, there was some basic physics stuff where you could manipulate the world and manipulate objects - now, in Episode Two, we're moving to cinematic physics, where objects in the world that are large-scale items such as buildings and what have you, are actually active, physical objects. In Half-Life 2, if we wanted to have a strider attack or blow up a building, it was always a building that you couldn't go into, because technically we had to have it be a set script moment, and a set piece that was behind an invisible wall.

In Episode Two we're able to sort of remove that physical wall now, and you'll be able to go into buildings, battle, and the strider will be able to take that building out and it will explode in all physics glory and whatnot.

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