No more Half Life Episodes

See below for what they mean by "TF2 approach".

Same source as OP said:
Games will no longer be cut into slices, he says, but instead will become their own platforms that Valve can continually evolve and update through Steam.
“We went through the episodes phase, and now we’re going towards shorter and even shorter cycles.
“With episodes, I think we accelerated the model and shortened development cycles with it. If you look at Team Fortress 2, that’s what we now think is the best model for what we’ve been doing. Our updates and release model keeps on getting shorter and shorter.”
By the time you read this, Team Fortress 2 will have passed its two hundredth update on PC. The game was released late in 2007.
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So they give you levels 1-15 on release, then release 16-20 later on, then 21-25 after that?
 
What is "the TF2 approach"? Microtransactions?

edit: beaten. :D

I don't think that will work nearly as well for single player games.
 
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What's Half Life? Ooooh, that game from years ago which has fallen out of relevance? They misses the boat for EP3

Don't get me wrong, I loved HL/2/Episodes, but how long? October 2007 was a long time ago and makes the Episodic nature of the franchise a bit of a joke :(

Hope they make it a PS3 exclusive tbh /runs :D
 
So they went from full games with addons, to episodic content which fell flat after two attempts to an even smaller time-frame between content? (Small content at that)
Also, I'm of the sort that doesn't see stupid hats and skins and guns being extra or new content but cosmetic fluff I don't care about now, never will and didn't 12 years ago.

original article said:
“We went through the episodes phase, and now we’re going towards shorter and even shorter cycles."
“With episodes, I think we accelerated the model and shortened development cycles with it."
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Sorry, wait wait wait, let's step back a second. "We went through the episodes phase"? - Two games?
" accelerated the model and shortened development cycles with it." - Not really? They've shown they couldn't deliver through this method.

I don't think they should pat themselves on the back and make it sound like it works.

"If you look at Team Fortress 2, that’s what we now think is the best model for what we’ve been doing" -Ugh I dread this, I know exactly what they want to do, just like many other developers.
Microtransactions, cosmetic customisation for the masses, loads of unlocks which shouldn't interfere with gameplay but does (weapons), a good side is community maps introduced as offical.
 
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It's not as if Valve have let us down yet, until they do I will have faith in whatever decisions they make.

With regards to the micro-transactions in TF2 and, bizarrely, in Portal 2 you don't need to buy anything. They're simply there for impatient people who couldn't be bothered to wait for items to drop. They also don't change the game a massive amount since they're being continually balanced.

I did buy a hat or two when the Mannconomy update was released but that was to support one of my favourite developers not to have a new hat to display.
 
reflux said:
Tbh Valve just release HL3 already and stop mucking about. It's been far too long.
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Ah valve gave up doing sensible things a long while ago...

Probably means the end of hl2 has been written but no ones been bothered to get out of their gold plated cars and just make the game :o
 
One thing is sure, I'm not paying full price for 10% of a game (esp from Valve) on the promise that they will add bits to it, if and when they feel like it. Secondly, I'm not paying 150% of the full price of a game for separate small sections of a game that was probably finished ages ago. They need to be careful with this strategy tbh
 
Based on previous performance I'd give Valve the benefit of the doubt and expect this to work in the future if priced reasonably.

Anyone who bought TF2 really got their money's worth, that can't be in doubt, when you look how much map packs for titles like BlOps and Halo sell for and then compare this to the maps, modes and weapons that have been given out for free is excellent.
 
d_brennen said:
One thing is sure, I'm not paying full price for 10% of a game (esp from Valve) on the promise that they will add bits to it, if and when they feel like it. Secondly, I'm not paying 150% of the full price of a game for separate small sections of a game that was probably finished ages ago. They need to be careful with this strategy tbh
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Day 1 DLC will go down like a **** sandwich tbh.

If they give out free DLC and added levels for free (Portal 2) then I could see more people willing to pay full RRP on launch.
 
Argh, I need Episode 3 now, I'm not bothered about collectable hats, I just want to kick some more Combine ass.
 
Sorry but I don’t get this.

So I (hypothetically) buy HL3, complete it then they update it. I have already completed it so why would i want to play it again every time they produce an update...

Plus out of all the games they keep updating they pick TF2? I would say CS is far more popular and could use some updates and improvements.
 
Chaosboss said:
I have liked the TF2 approach, keeps people more involved in the game for longer...
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KraniX said:
Anyone who bought TF2 really got their money's worth, that can't be in doubt, when you look how much map packs for titles like BlOps and Halo sell for and then compare this to the maps, modes and weapons that have been given out for free is excellent.
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I disagree, I played TF2 a little bit when it came out and it was ok. Then they started adding things and I lost focus on what was going on. Now it feels like the game changes every time I load it up (I play very infrequently), to the point I have no interest in playing it any more.

If they're going to do big itterative updates to the same game (also look at MMOs) then I think they need to have a better plan and strategy to prevent alienating some of their playerbase.
 
bsoltan said:
I disagree, I played TF2 a little bit when it came out and it was ok. Then they started adding things and I lost focus on what was going on. Now it feels like the game changes every time I load it up (I play very infrequently), to the point I have no interest in playing it any more.
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That's exactly how I felt, I come back to the game after ages and it's like... oh my, everyone's using all these different weapons and items, I have no idea what they do, lets spend ages learning it all. (I hate not knowing my enemy, so I want to know their strengths/weakness). In fact I don't know any official resource to do that, its all 3rd party thankfully?
 
I suppose this makes me a fanboy but Valve are the only dev/pub that I have complete and utter faith in. As much as I'm annoyed by the lack of Ep3 I know whatever they do will be worth waiting for.
 
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