Valve are, as usual, surrounded by mystery and a lot of unknown, as the studio seems more focused on their Steam service at the moment and aren’t that active on their actual game fronts. Fans of the company have been wondering when they can expect to see a sequel to various franchises, among those the famous zombie shooter “Left 4 Dead” which has been without a new installment for quite some time now.
There were some recent rumors claiming that the game was in production and Valve were getting ready to release it soon, but in the end it was revealed that this was most probably not going to happen anytime in the near future. Valve are indeed apparently focused on other projects at the moment and the studio has no plans to put any work on “Left 4 Dead 3” from what we can tell, but one never knows what surprise they might be planning.
After all, it’s Valve – it’s perfectly possible that the studio has been preparing “Left 4 Dead 3” quietly behind the scenes all along and the studio is just getting ready to bring the game out to the market, but at the same time we would have probably heard at least some rumors about this until now. Even though Valve are generally very good at hiding secrets, even they probably wouldn’t be able to conceal the production of a game like that if it really was in the works and in active production.
One of the more interesting rumors about “Left 4 Dead 3” that we’ve heard recently is that the reason for the game’s delay is none other than “Half-Life 3”, the title that Valve’s fans probably want to see the most, and the one that will generate the most hype among audiences if it turns out to be true. Of course, rumors about “Half-Life 3” have been plentiful for years, so they should be taken with huge grains of salt nowadays, but it’s entirely possible that the studio has been gearing up to revive their iconic franchise.
There have also been rumors claiming that this is never going to happen, on the other hand, as Valve are apparently never going to be able to jump over the bar that they set with “Half-Life 3”, and this has doomed the franchise to never be continued. That would be a strange development, but it also sounds somewhat plausible considering how much time has passed since “Half-Life 2” and the two expansions that came after it.
It was supposed to be a small project, the third episodic sequel to the last game in the series, but then it evolved into a more major production that has more serious implications for Valve, and it’s clear that the studio might be a little in over their heads at this point. Especially if they want to make the game even more successful than “Half-Life 2” which based a lot of its success on the fact that it game out at the right time and in the right state of the market.
It’s also possible that Valve are working on another project related to “Half-Life” that is not “Half-Life 3”, and if that turns out to be true we might see a revival of the episodic idea, or even something more unusual. This is just a minor unconfirmed rumor however, and we don’t know if Valve really are planning something like that or not.