If you are a gamer and have liked the first two installments to the Half Life video game series, then you know as well as anyone that it has been more than ten years since the last game. In most cases, fans would have called the game dead and moved on to something else, but fans of the Half Life series are still waiting for the third installment in the series. An installment that just might not ever show up.
Fans that crammed into the recent E3 convention were hoping that Valve would release some information about Half Life 3, but by the end of the event, that was not the case. In fact, nothing was even mentioned about the game. This bothers some fans, while other realized that it has been a long time and the company is obviously working on other projects. The founder of Valve has come right out and told fans that the game has not even made it into the production phase.
The bad news is that the founder, Gabe Newell did not say that the game was a bust. As you can imagine, that leaves a sense of hope in the fans that the game will be developed at some point. Hardcore fans are expecting to see the game show up at some point and even though Valve might not seem they want to continue the project, the company could hand it off to another that has more motivation to complete it.
In terms of success, the reason to not continue the series cannot be for fear that it would not do well. The first two games were a global success and there is no reason to think that the third would do worse. Video games are a huge business these days so that is not a reason that Valve would risk not releasing the game, unless they are working on an even bigger project. If that is the case, Newell did not reveal a game was in the works, so everything is sort of just left to speculation.
Even though another company can give it a go with Half Life 3, some fans would rather not see a game then see that happen. With a new developer takes over it often time results in a completely different game. Much like replacing a director to a movie that is half way done being produced already and not expecting some things to change. Given the fact that the first game was released back in 1998, with the second coming almost ten years later, fans might have another year or more to wait for a third installment based on that timeline.