Ah, Valve; Gabe Newell, Doug Lombardi, Robin Walker, Marc Laidlaw, and dozens of other writers, artists and programmers whose names are not as recognizable but who are all equally important. For the past decade Valve has been on the forefront of excellence in game development. Very few studios could point out with pride such a long-running and consistent tradition of critically acclaimed, bestselling titles that are always raising the bar for this industry. Combined; over a hundred Game of the Year awards from around the world, one of the most popular online PC games of all time and two flagship titles that have successively held the unofficial stamp of “greatest game ever made” for ten years strong.
But it hasn’t all been flowers and sunshine. Let’s not forget Valve was once guilty of one of the most convoluted and infuriating game delays outside of Duke Nukem Forever, although thankfully for not nearly as long. Come to think of it, just how much do you know about the history of Valve? Let’s take a stroll down memory lane, shall we? It all starts a little over nineteen years ago..
A complete suite of publishing and development tools – ranging from copy protection to social networking services to server browsing – now available free of charge to developers and publishers worldwide.
“The announced content of Left 4 Dead 2 does not warrant a stand-alone, full-priced sequel and should instead become updates (free or otherwise) for Left 4 Dead“
“Looking back, was the Orange Box a rip-off?” He said, on initial complaints at having to “buy” Half-Life 2 again in the compilation. “Give us a fair shake on this, read more about it, find out about it, we’ve already let people play it [at E3]… After that, if you want to vent, post to the forums. We do read them, we read all the forums.”
As we transition from entertainment as a product to entertainment as a service, customers and developers need open, high-quality Internet clients. The Mac is a great platform for entertainment services.
When the PlayStation 3 was introduced, I was the one of the platform’s biggest critics. However, Sony Computer Entertainment has proved that the PlayStation 3 is the most open platform of all the current generation consoles and has worked extremely hard to make the platform the most desirable for consumers and developers. As such, we are delighted to announce Portal 2 for the PlayStation 3 and believe the Steamworks support included will make it the best console version of the game.
With Steam Guard enabled, anyone attempting to login as you from an unrecognized computer or browser must first provide additional, one-time authorization. A special access code will be sent to your contact email address, and this code must be entered into Steam before your first login on an unfamiliar computer is complete. You will also be notified if any login attempts from computers other than those you’ve authorized occur. Steam Guard essentially acts as a form of “User Rights Management,” where you as the user have greater control over access to your stuff.
The year has marked major development advances to the platform with the introduction of support for Mac titles, the Steam Wallet and in-game item buying support, and more. We believe the growth in accounts, sales, and player numbers is completely tied to this work and we plan to continue to develop the platform to offer more marketing, sales, and design tools for developers and publishers of games and digital entertainment
“[Its] just way too hard to develop content right now, both for ourselves and for third-parties, so we’re going to make enormously easier and simplify that process a lot.
With 1GB of personal Steam Cloud storage, you can upload thousands of screenshots to show off your best moments for all your friends to see. Or you can make them private if you’d rather keep them to yourself.
The Portal 2 Authoring Tools include versions of the same tools we used to make Portal 2. They’ll allow you to create your own singleplayer and co-op maps, new character skins, 3D models, sound effects, and music.
The International is the first public Dota 2 event and will give the tens of millions of gamers playing Dota around the world their first look at the new game, said Gabe Newell, president and founder of Valve. I have had the good fortune to watch the competitors as they prepare for the tournament, and the level of play is extraordinary.
With the Steam app, gamers around the world may chat with Steam friends, browse community groups and user profiles, view screenshots and user-generated content for their favorite games, read the latest gaming news, stay up to date on unbeatable Steam sales, and more.
“[Valve is] pleased that we could come to an agreement with Blizzard without drawing things out in a way that would benefit no one. We both want to focus on the things our fans care about, creating and shipping great games for our communities.”
Steam Greenlight will allow developers and publishers to post information and media about their game in an effort to convince the Community that their game should be released on Steam. Greenlight piggybacks on Steam Workshop’s flexible system that organizes content and lets customers rate and leave feedback.
“We were working on getting Dota 2 running on some tablets,” he said. “That ended up being kind of a disappointment. But the good news is that tablets are getting faster very quickly, so I think we’ll get the kind of performance we want and other game developers want in the near future.”
In the past nine months, over 1,300 new titles have been added to Steam. We know you can’t play them all, so we’ve updated Steam with new features and functionality to help you discover the best new releases, the classics, and the unique indie gems you might be interested in.
“We provide enough information on our website and within our trading system to help users make good trading decisions.”, “All trade scams can be avoided.”
The winners of the first annual Steam Awards are announced.
The seventh Dota 2 International is held once again in Key Arena, Seattle.
This year the prize pool reached $24,787,916The winners of the second annual Steam Awards are announced.
Valve removes controversial school shooting game and denounces developer as “troll with history of customer abuse”
The Steam video game store has changed its content policy to “allow everything”, unless it is illegal or “straight up trolling”.
Valve plans to bring Steam to China in an official capacity, expanding the reach of its distribution service and games library to a huge additional audience.
The plan was announced today in conjunction with Perfect World
The eighth Dota 2 International is held this time in Rogers Arena Vancouver.
This year the prize pool reached $25,532,177The winners of the third annual Steam Awards are announced.
Valve’s Index VR headset will ship this June, with pre-orders to start on May 1st
Valve’s Full Index VR headset kit to cost just under $1000 with options to buy components separately.
The ninth Dota 2 International is held this time in the Mercedes-Benz Arena, Shanghai.
This year the prize pool reached $34,330,068French court rules Steam games must be able to be resold
Valve announce Half-Life: Alyx alongside its trailer.
The game is available for pre-purchase and plans to ship in March 2020.
Those lucky enough to own an Index already own the game
The winners of the fourth annual Steam Awards are announced.
Portal’s abandoned prequel, ‘F-Stop,’ surfaces in a new video authorized by Valve
Also known as Aperture Camera, players solve puzzles by photographing and duplicating objectsCoronavirus: Valve Index Production Impacted, Fewer Units Coming Soon
Valve will have “far fewer” units of the Index VR hardware to sell during the coming months due to the impact of the Coronavirus.Half-Life Fan Remake Black Mesa Finally Fully Released
After 14 years of development the fanmade interpretation of Half-Life 1 is released.Half-Life: Alyx will preload for owners on Friday 20th March with the game releasing at 10am Pacific Time
Gabe Newell and Robin Walker interview with IGN discussing Half-Life: Alyx, VR and Valve’s Future (in BCI nonetheless)
Half-Life: Alyx is Now Available
The Half-Life: Alyx Workshop is now open.
Steam purchases now earn Points
Steam has introduced a new meta-currency for users to earn, called Points. Whenever a user buys a game, DLC, Valve hardware, application, soundtrack, or in-game items, they will earn 100 Points per U.S. dollar spent.
This timeline is an up to date continuation of an article written by Alex “ACPaco” Capriole and John Phillips that can be found on Planet Half-Life.
I have continued the timeline from where they left off in 2008 as well as adding in a few milestones that i felt important.
If you find anything here that is incorrect or if you think I can add something else please send me an e-mail.
Thanks for checking it out!
Cathal
See Also:
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