The rumor mill has been extremely busy with Half-Life 3 for quite some time now. The latest leaks regarding the game are hinting towards the fact that the game is currently under development and will be released sometime in the future. Its developer, Valve is leaving no stone unturned to maintain a secrecy about everything related to the game.
SteamDB has been able to get their hands on a list that features the names of games that has the possibility of showing up in Steam in the future. The list includes the names of Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD, Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture which is a PS4 hit and Half-Life 3. Valve’s PC sharing program contained evidences of the game in the hl3.txt file that was found in an update for DOTA 2.
Fans are speculating that this leak might be a hint that the game will indeed release sometime in the future as the source of the information is Valve itself. However, it should also be noted that third party Steam developers are at liberty to develop their own apps and packages and name them as per their choice.
Thus it should be kept in mind that the mere inclusion of Half-Life 3 as a file name is not enough to provide confirmation that the actual game is being referred to in this case.
According to another website, Steam Sale Detective, a Reddit user claims that Steam is dropping clues which might possibly refer to Half-Life 3. A Lambda logo was spotted in the background during a Steam Sale for Santa Baby which has sparked rumors that this is an indication that the game will actually see the light of the day sometime in future.
The site drew attention towards another clue related to the game which has apparently made appearance in the form of a WAV file. This WAV file when played says letters of phonetic alphabet which actually forms an anagram of “BULLET HELL”. Fans were assuming that this word was a password for an ARG that is related to Half-Life 3.
The rumor was promptly shot down by Marc Laidlaw, the writer of Half-Life through an email. Marc stated in his email that he had to enquire about the whole matter of ARG and password as he had no idea about it and some fans were asking him to shed some light on it. He clarified that the matter is completely related to the Steam sale and in no way connected to the game as far as he knew.
Another rumor related to the game doing rounds on the internet suggests that a movie by the name of Half-Life 3 might be released in 2017 and this movie will provide insights about what to expect from the third installment of the Half-Life franchise of video game.
It sounds a bit too far stretched but if the movie actually happens, Edward Norton might be seen dawning the role of the game’s protagonist Gordon Freeman in it.
Various reports are also suggesting that the renowned game company Naughty Dog is interested in acquiring the rights for Half-Life 3. Apparently, the company wants to continue the franchise. The creative director of the company, Neil Druckmann took to Twitter to announce that the company is in talks with Valve over the matter.
He said that if Valve, hands over the rights of the game to Naughty Dogs, the company will go on to develop and release the game in future. However, there has been no response from Valve yet regarding the matter.
Early reports related to Half-Life 3 claimed that the developers had started working on the development of the game but decided to stop half-way due to certain reasons. A skeleton crew of 10 people are reportedly working on the game at present.