Valve rumors are a dime a dozen, yet the gaming community stops cold each time whispers of a new game make the rounds online. On Wednesday, this past week, concrete evidence of current games in development at Valve leaked, and may finally force the company’s hand into coming out and talking candidly about what their fans really want – Half Life 3 and Left 4 Dead 3. Half Life 3 would mark the third installment of the much-acclaimed sci-fi shooter adventures of physicist Gordon Freeman. And Left 4 Dead, the four-player co-op zombie apocalypse shooter homage to zombie films has plenty of room for further head-smashing fun.
Valvetime recently acquired alleged screenshots of Jira, Valve’s internal project management software, showing virtually everything the company is currently developing, including multiple tags for both Left 4 Dead 3 and Source 2 (The Source engine is the engine was the engine developed to power Half Life 2 and every Valve title since, as well as any mod based on a Valve game).
The development of Source 2 is not surprising as the current engine is going into its 10th year. But Left 4 Dead 3 is a surprise. Gabe Newell, Co-founder and managing director, has become an expert at pivoting away from questions relating to the company’s popular titles lying dormant at one sequel. Valve’s lack of titles containing “3” has become a popular inside joke within the gaming community.
A second image shows updated mailing lists, including a page for the Half Life 3 group. If these images are accurate, it seems Left 4 Dead 3 is further in its development cycle than Half Life 3, but does anyone even care? If these games are finally both in development, gamers win – period. And what better way to show of a new engine than with two signature titles?