6. A New Engine
Again, youve got to ask yourself
why Half Life 3 has been so long in development. After all, Valve have generally been pretty timely with their episodic content since Half Life 2, so what exactly is the big hold up? Well, several sources out there point to the argument that Valve are in fact completely recreating and redefining their Source engine for the next HL instalment. I dont know if you remember or not, but back when Valve released their Source engine, the entire gaming world went bats**t crazy. It was a true gaming innovation which offered incredible, never before seen ragdoll physics, stunning character models and generally updates to all the trimmings (lighting, rendering etc). I shudder to think, with the aggressive development of technology since then, what theyll offer with a brand new engine again. As I mentioned, Valve have always been on the forefront of innovation in gaming. Thats why HL 3 cant come even a second too soon. If it represents even half as monumental a shift in sheer quality that the original Source engine did, I imagine were looking at history in the making.