Someone's recent account of their Valve tour (*SPOILERS*)

E

Ezmartini

Guest
Okay, I've been asked to take this down by the author. NOT because it is inaccurate, he just does not want me posting it in all entirety.

The gist of the article **SPOILERS**

-Valve is very cool when it comes to giving tours.

-TF2 is well underway, and models/classes are being refined.

-There is a gameplay sequence in Aftermath involving you being weaponless, shining a flashlight in the darkness so Alyx can shoot things. When you recharge your flashlight (which takes 8 seconds) they will oftentimes spawn an enemy near you to give you a scare.

-You undoubtedly play as Gordon in Aftermath.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=183451&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0
 
Great news. ;D

''The piece starts to play while you and Alyx make your way through a dark Zombie infested tunnel. You don’t have any weapons, but Alyx does. You need to use your flashlight to help Alyx aim. When your aux power drains, you need to wait 8 seconds for your flashlight to be fully charged again. After these 8 seconds of darkness, Kelly plans to put in a “Hit.” A Hit is when another piece of music breaks in. The game designers can put a Zombie right in front of you during these 8 seconds, and when your flashlight pops back on, there might be a nasty surprise waiting for you in the shadows. I know some of you may already be making Doom 3 jokes, but at least you’ll be able to defend yourselves against the Zombies while using a flashlight.''

Sweeeeeeeeet.
 
Maybe they are gearing up for a TF2 showing at E3! *prays* :p
 
And the very last sentence says who you play as (if the guy is telling the truth).
 
Ezmartini - do you have a link to where you found this post originally handy? Thank you much for posting it here and at Fallout!

I guess this is what Lincoln was talking about a few days ago!
 
good read,that tunnel section with alyx will scare the crap outta me when i get to it,if i get to it....*sniff*no credit card
 
SPOILER BELOW ON AFTERMATH! This is what was said:

On April 15th, 2005, I got a tour to Valve Software. There I met many cool people, and saw things that you guys won't see for a while. Now I'm not trying to gloat, but it's hard not to. But I'm writing this so you all can share the experience with me. When I first got to Valve, Kay Lee Vogt greeted me, offered me a can of soda, and asked if I could wait while Gabe came down to take me on the tour. Valve’s offices are located in the tenth floor of an office building in Bellevue. The lobby is lined with awards, and the boxes from all Valve’s previous games. And sitting on desk were what appeared to be action figures or sculptures of the Scientists and Marines from Half-Life, in the typical situation you saw the Marines and Scientists involved in. Even the fabled Golden Crowbar sat on a pedestal, and a giant Valve sat in the center of the room. Gabe Newell arrived right after I had the chance to look around. We then sat in a conference room, where we had a chat. We talked about games, and what my interests were, and what I might want to pursue in life later on. I like working with computers, and if I could go into a job involving that, or even a job involving games, that would be great. Gabe gave me some advice, saying that the fact I got good grades in school was a good thing, and that I shouldn’t **** about and mess up my chance to pursue a good job. He mentioned how he wished someone had told that to him when he was young, though as a former Microsoft Millionaire and the owner of one of the most successful game companies ever, I’d say he’s done well for himself. But you don’t care about that. You care about what I saw at Valve, and I’m going to tell you just that.
 
The environment at Valve is special. The only floors that are carpeted in Valve are the ones in the offices, the rest of it being concrete. In the lobby I noticed a few pipes sticking out of the ceiling. Pictures hung on the wall, for example a picture from Spirited Away. The most memorable of which was a wall covered with a lot of pictures of switchblade knives. All of these details serve as inspiration for games. People working at Valve are well fed, too. Their kitchen is filled with various snacks, candies, and beverages. And employees get to choose where how they work, by themselves, with an office-mate, or in 4 person cabals. The first office I stopped into was one of the mappers. She was working on a map for (gasp) Team Fortress 2, the remake of tf_well. She showed us a sheet or images that she was using for inspiration, various pictures from train yards and such. The map was looking very nice, even though it was in the “grey-squares” stage of development, meaning textures, props, skyboxes, and effects still needed to be added. I had talked to Gabe about the map Lincoln and I were working on, along with a few members of our clan and members from PA. Lincoln went onto PA to find a mapper willing to help us, and we got a few builds done before the map was pretty much abandoned. Gabe gave me some advice on that, and so did the mapper, talking about how it was valuable to get the design of the map done before we applied art to it. We had done some of that, taking inspiration from Half-Life 2 and pictures of Eastern Europe. Then we went to a room filled with concept art for the classes in TF2. Gabe did a little test on me, asking which class I thought each concept was. Then we met a couple of guys, who put me on a test with newer concept art from TF2, in the same kind of test. I got 8 out of 9 classes, messing up on the Scout concept, though I got basic gist of his job as a fast in-and-out kind of guy right. I don’t know, I’ve just got this weird preconception of what a scout should look like in my head. The concepts were very different from what the characters looked like in TFC. They were no longer random guys in armor. These concepts added character to the classes. The Medic wore a long WW2 style German trench coat, wielding a large syringe and sporting a pair of round framed glasses. The engineer wore a hardhat, goggles, and overalls, with a wrench in one hand and a welding torch in the other. When asked what I thought about the pictures, I told them that I thought concepts really captured what that particular class did, and they really liked hearing that. I was then taken to some of the animations for the Heavy Weapons Guy. The chain gun he held in his hands was humungous, with a cylindrical ammo carrier twice the size of his head mounted under the main part of the gun. His legs looked like they were struggling with the weight of the chain gun, and while the animation on the upper-body was only still placeholder, it still portrayed the strain carrying the gun was having on his body. All in all, I really like the new concepts for TF2. They’re like something you’d see in a comic book, and that’s the vibe I get from TF, like you’re in this sort of battle where afterwards, the survivors would shrug it off, and go have a beer.
 
Valve is very hard at work on the new Half-Life 2 expansion pack, Aftermath. From what I saw of it, it’s coming along very nicely. Everybody at Valve has a good grasp of the Source engine now, and Aftermath looks like it will definitely reach its summer release date. Gabe and I stopped in one of the cabals, where everybody was hard at work on levels in Aftermath. I saw one person take a flat wall, and within seconds transform it into a realistic looking rock wall. I couldn’t tell much from what I saw, as many things were using placeholder textures, but some of the geometry looked familiar. We discussed more about level design, and how a sort of clover leaf design works very well, as a way of having all the paths lead to a central point in the level, where a lot of the action happens. Gabe said “When you get into the mind frame that you’re designing a clover leaf, and not a level, that really helps.” The cabal set-up seems like a really efficient way of getting a game done. Gabe made a joke about how they don’t force people to work in a small room with a high temperature, but they do it anyways by choice. We also stopped in Kelly Bailey’s office. Kelly is the sound designer for Half-Life and Half-Life 2. Anything you hear passes through his fingers. His room wasn’t very crowded, and they weren’t many instruments around. Most of the instrumental pieces are done right in the computer. Kelly played us bassoon piece he had just finished up for Aftermath. The piece starts to play while you and Alyx make your way through a dark Zombie infested tunnel. You don’t have any weapons, but Alyx does. You need to use your flashlight to help Alyx aim. When your aux power drains, you need to wait 8 seconds for your flashlight to be fully charged again. After these 8 seconds of darkness, Kelly plans to put in a “Hit.” A Hit is when another piece of music breaks in. The game designers can put a Zombie right in front of you during these 8 seconds, and when your flashlight pops back on, there might be a nasty surprise waiting for you in the shadows. I know some of you may already be making Doom 3 jokes, but at least you’ll be able to defend yourselves against the Zombies while using a flashlight.
 
One of the offices we walked into was particularly odd. In the office there was a man sitting in chair that had birthday balloons tied to the back. Quite odd. Gabe introduced me, and I found out that our birthday boy was working on The Lost Coast. He and Gabe explained to me how HDR and Tone Mapping works, which was quite interesting. The man at the desk used a jury rigged way of demonstrating the HDR, by using keys binded to specific console commands. There were a few new models scattered about, and normal mapping was abound. The rocks in the sand looked like they were models, but of course were just bump mapped surfaces. At certain angles, it was easy to see where the textures repeated. But, while playing the level you’ll be doing more drooling than critiquing the placement of rocks. We then noclipped up to the monastery. Incense burners hung from the ceiling, and distorted light passed through windows. The models for the incense burners were very detailed, and like most everything in The Lost Coast, normal mapped. The windows in the monastery were breakable, and looked absolutely stunning. It’s amazing how things you take for granted in life seem like the coolest thing ever when we see them in video games. There won’t be any new weapons in The Lost Coast, but that doesn’t rule out new enemies. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens, as there are still quite a few bugs to be worked out. Please note that despite all rumors of HDR being applied to all other Source games released so far are just that, rumors. I’ve seen nothing to make me think it will be included in Aftermath, or if it will be it will probably be optional. I don’t think Valve would be willing to completely screw over those who are unable to afford a better computer, and it sure as hell isn’t going to be added into Half-Life 2 or Counter Strike: Source as a mandatory feature.
 
While walking through the halls of Valve, we passed by a conference room filled with people. Gabe made mention of how Half-Life 2 for the Xbox wasn’t working right now, but we walked past an office that had what looked suspiciously like a menu for Half-Life 2 on a TV. Oh well, that wasn’t what I came for, but it would have been nice to see what was happening with it.
 
On a wall in Valve is a whiteboard. No, the whiteboard. And on that whiteboard is the plot summary for Half-Life 3. I’ll relay to you the more important points here.

On a wall in Valve is a whiteboard. No, the whiteboard. And on that whiteboard is the plot summary for Half-Life 3. I’ll relay to you the more important points here.

HL3 PLOT SUMMARY, DO NOT ERASE:
G-Man Golf Tournament
Steam on the Nintendo DS
Gordon dies early
Alyx has a baby (Vortigaunt?)

Of course, that’s all a joke, just like the “Things Cut From HL2” including Eli’s Leg, and Xen 2. The whiteboard is just there as something for employees to scribble on, as proven by the weird art and the random anime-style head also scrawled on the board.

At the end of the tour, I got to meet Marc Laidlaw. Laidlaw, who wrote the story for Half-Life and Half-Life 2, is a nice guy. He occasionally dabbles in Hammer, though everybody else have left him in the dust, not that it’s his job to make maps. Interesting tidbit for you, Marc’s current desktop is from Katamari Damacy. Just thinking about that game makes me want to go “Na, na na na na na na na na, Katamari Damacy . . .”

If you have any questions, about the TF2 concepts or something like that, just ask Lincoln and he’ll forward them to me.

PS. You play as Gordon in Aftermath. No debate about it.

Ok got it all. Sorry for the multiple posts but the spoiler tags only take up so much words. :rolleyes:
 
God! That's so ****ing tempting, hool10300. :hmph:

Must... Hold... Back... !!!

/me resists
 
joule said:
God! That's so ****ing tempting, hool10300. :hmph:

Must... Hold... Back... !!!

* joule resists
Click to expand...
It really doesn't spoil much at all.
 
joule said:
God! That's so ****ing tempting, hool10300. :hmph:

Must... Hold... Back... !!!

* joule resists
Click to expand...

Don't worry, it really doesn't ruin anything. At least not anymore than Merc's trip did for Half Life 2 (which was not at all).
 
How do we know this is real and that some guy didn't just make all this stuff up?
 
I changed the first post so it wouldn't get out (author's request). So much for that idea.
 
Why would anyone make that up? There's nothing unrealistic about his report..
 
I'm interested to see whether it was TF2 or TFC:S the person saw, considering the person talked of seeing a tf_well remake. :)
 
Ezmartini said:
I changed the first post so it wouldn't get out (author's request). So much for that idea.
Click to expand...

It's on hl 2world (where I got the Valve trip story) also on hlsource and other places. So it was always out in the open. :rolleyes: And it doesn't spoil anything really. It just talks about who the main character will be, describing a scene in Aftermath, and he described the concept art for TF2. So I guess there is no spoilers. *And yes their will be new enemies!
 
This is Lincoln, the one who informed the author of this thread to take down this information.

The reason being of course that, I myself did not write this, and only I was given permission to post this information at one specific place.

So, here is the link to the thread on Penny-Arcade. http://www.penny-arcade.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=183451&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

And to all those of you wanting proof, you can email Gabe, or just take into consideration that many people from these forums have gotten tours to Valve before.

EDIT: And yes, what my friend saw was TF2. They were remaking tf_well for the Source Engine, with pretty trains and everything.

He also saw what may be concepts for new enemies, but he doubts that what the concepts were for.
 
Awsome... but, does valve just give tours to anyone who walks in off the street or something? Or does it cost money or something related? I was kinda surprised that Gabe did the tour and all...
 
I think you can probably get one if you play your cards right and ask them long enough in advance.
 
Gordan unarmed?
Pfff.
He can always bitch slap the zombies with his metal gloves.

" A duel I say!"
 
I'm just happy that they are actually working on Team Fortress 2. I was worried they'd drop it and work on another Counter-Strike because it's more popular.
 
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