Summary
Over the weekend, Half-Life 2: Episode One celebrated its 19th anniversary. It’s a bit of a weird number to highlight (just wait until the 20th!), but The Game Awards tweeted it anyway.
Like a hungry ichthyosaurus smelling blood in the water,Half-Lifefans swarmed onto the post as proof that Half-Life 3 will be announced by Geoff Keighley at Summer Game Fest this Friday. Why else would you highlight such an obscure anniversary? Please, we’ve been through this before.
“Makes Me Think Something Is Definitely Coming Soon”
Fans also hyped up that Half-Life 3 would be unveiled at The Game Awards last year, and whenOkami 2 was the big showstopping reveal, it left the community in complete despair. That was based on a VR developer teasing that Gabe Newellmightbe at the event. Hardly substantial evidence.
An innocuous tweet is even less concrete, and it’s not even the only oddball anniversary that TGA has posted about in the last couple of weeks. It also shared that the firstInfamousgame had turned 16, and thatThe Forestwas released 11 years ago on Steam into alpha. A quick scroll through its Twitter and you’ll see that tweeting about Half-Life 2: Episode One doesn’t mean anything.
“It’s [A] Nothing Burger”
Half-Life 3 is in development and appears to be in the optimisation phase.There is plenty of datamined evidence to support that. G-Man and Barney Calhoun actor Mike Shapiro even teased"unexpected surprises" for 2025with the Half-Life hashtag.Somethingis happening.
Valve will likely announce the game this year, putting to bed the ‘Half-Life 3 confirmed’ meme for good. But that doesn’t mean it’ll show up at Summer Game Fest. There’s always a chance that itcouldappear, but there’s nothing to suggest that right now — temper you expectations, and if it does happen, then it’s a nice surprise. Otherwise, you’re setting yourself up for disappointment.
While past games have made appearances at events like E3, the most recent entry,Alyx, was revealed in a random tweet on a random Thursday. It’s impossible to predict the whims of Valve. For all we know, it could drop Half-Life 3 on Steam out of the blue.
