We all know how Valve doesn't dig Sony's PlayStation 3. We've all heard Gabe Newell bash the console public on more than one occasion, after all. But what's this going on? Valve Corporation is having a change of heart? No less than Doug Lombardi confirms as much.

We all know that Valve's Half-Life 2: Episode 2 kicked some serious booty last year, and it's still among today's favorites because of its superior gameplay. The only downside in this scenario is that fans are asking for more, and they've started looking at E3 2008 as the possible birthplace of the next episode. Valve says "not yet", but they've got another thing for itchy trigger fingers. More after the jump.

Sometimes, companies get that urge to do something different from what they're normally accustomed to doing. This appears to be the case with Valve Corporation, makers of the first-person puzzle game known as Portal. In fact, Valve is considering making a Wii game for kids, as well as trying its hand at the MMORPG arena. More on these prospects after the jump.

As the world draws closer to affordable broadband service and does away with easily scratched optical media, online distribution services, such as Valve Software's Steam, continue to reach a wider audience. Valve was able to look back to 2007 and discovered that their user base has just topped off to over 15 million registered accounts. And what's more, their sales growth peaked to approximately 160% year-on-year over the holidays.

 A fan of Valve Software's The Orange Box expressed his disappointment about what he believes as a sub-par PS3 version of the game, posting it in a well-written open letter addressed to Valve Software. A Valve employee replied to the letter, saying that he hopes that they will fix the issues in the future. Is this a confirmation of a future patch or does Valve still believe that the PS3 is "a waste of time?" More details in the full article.

If you've hummed to the tune of Still Alive one too many times, or fantasized going into war with the invigorating sounds of Team Fortress 2 (Xbox 360, PC, PS3), then you might want to consider buying the original soundtrack of The Orange Box.

This disc full of unique audio goodness can be yours for the paltry sum of US$ 9.95. Check out the newly-released product in the full article.

Many followers of gaming news probably know how some developers - like Valve's Gabe Newell - are complaining about how difficult it is to create games for Sony's PlayStation 3, with some even going so far as to say that developing for the PlayStation 3 is a waste of time.

Reacting to this, Sony Computer Entertainment of America's (SCEA) CEO Jack Tretton talked about the general air of dissatisfaction currently surrounding the PS3 with Level Up's N'Gai Croal.

Tretton said that the general complaint that the PlayStation 3 is hard to develop for has been already said about the PlayStation and the PlayStation 2, but both systems later proved to be console winners in the long run.

He also commented that while there were other consoles that were easy to develop for, those other consoles didn't prove to have the same "staying power" as the previous PlayStation incarnations. He continues:

If it's put in a perspective of ten years, the first 8-10 months is taken relative to getting out the gate quickly and potentially fizzling out in less than ten years. That's certainly never been our intention. We sacrificed short-term challenges for long-term wins.

Check out the entire interview in the Read link!

It's no secret that Valve's Gabe Newell has had his issues in the past with Sony's PlayStation 3 game console. In a recent interview with Edge Magazine, the respected developer didn't hold back on his comments for the system again, saying that Sony should go for a do-over of their high-end machine.

"I think PS3 is a waste of everybody's time", says Newell. He also tackled the idea of the Sony PS3 being "future-proof", remarking that investment on the Cell Processor and the SPE yields no real long-term benefits. "There's nothing there that you're going to apply to anything else", he reasons.

"You're not going to gain anything except a hatred of the architecture they've created," confides Newell. "I don't think they're going to make money off their box. I don't think it's a good solution."

Still, Newell says that even if it can be tough to develop for the Sony PS3, Valve will go on with game projects on the platform. The Orange Box will still launch on it as scheduled. He even commended Electronic Arts for putting together a team for the job that has people with lots of experience with the PS3 architecture.

"I think the people who have The Orange Box on the PS3 are going to be happy with their game experience," concludes Newell.

It's always a wonder why gaming is not so big in Macintosh as much as it is in Windows operating systems, and its just a shame why there's so many games that don't make it to Apples and Macintoshes. Case in point: the Half-Life franchise. Kikizo talked with Valve's big boss Gabe Newell about the issue, and things aren't looking so cool with the future of gaming in Apple's operating systems.

Newell said that he tried to talk with Apple about how to improve gaming on the Macintosh, and while they gave a positive response, he said that Apple didn't follow up on what was agreed upon:

Well, we have this pattern with Apple, where we meet with them, people there go "wow, gaming is incredibly important, we should do something with gaming". And then we'll say, "OK, here are three things you could do to make that better", and then they say OK, and then we never see them again.

An even sadder fact is that whenever Newell meets with another group sent by Apple, they were most likely unaware on what was agreed upon in previous meetings. Because of this, Newell is now convinced that Apple is not serious on gaming at all. "None of the things developers ask them to do are done," he said. "And as a result, there's no gaming market there to speak of."

It truly is a sad outlook for Macintosh users hoping to get more games in the future. Hopefully Apple will listen this time: Newell does seem to know what he is talking about after all, with his valuable inputs about managing a company as well as dealing with customers.


Check out the Read link for the entire interview!

After passing the buck to the gamers themselves on Half-Life's (could be last) episodic content, Gabe Newell is confidently saying that Valve is far from losing steam on the said franchise. Especially not when they're inching closer to the grand finale in the form of Episode Three.

In fact, there's still so many possible angles and universes for them to cover. Says Newell:

We'd certainly love to be working in other universes because any time you get two Valve people together they come up with five game ideas and thirteen universes that they would like to tell and play them in. So there's a lot of Half-Life left at Valve.

Portal was also mentioned as one of those carrying the interesting stories, such as those on Aperture Science, even before the team came up with the idea that it could be host to other stories in other Half-life universes. It certainly sounds like the spirit of Half-Life will live on even after Episode Three. Stay tuned for more clues, hints, and news on the matter.