Unconfirmed Release Dates

Chris D

Chris D

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We're hearing unconfirmed information from Eurogamer that release dates have been set for Half-Life 2. Whereas the reports confirm the general consensus that the game would be released in November, in my opinion, parts of the information doesn't sound accurate:
The long, drawn-out Half-Life 2 release date saga appears to be drawing to a close at long last, with Vivendi-Universal Games' expected to formally announce a November 26th release date for Europe, with US gamers getting the game three days earlier on November 23rd.
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If this is indeed true then let the countdown begin![br]
[br]
You can find the full story here at Eurogamer.net.[br]UPDATE: With more and more sites reporting on this story, including statements from their own sources, it seems more and more likely that I will end up eating my words. Here's a few different perspectives:[br]Computer & Video Games[br]gamesindustry.biz[br]Eurogamer.net
 
A Simulataneous worldwide release could never really happen.

Games don't launch on Friday in the States. And games never launch before Friday here.

This current release date information will have been confirmed by an upper management retail source. One of Eurogamer's writers says that in the forum thread accompanying the article on the site.

That's why I tend to believe this information.
 
Sprafa said:
You shouldn't have done this :p
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Hmm yep, this is sort of another "my local EB told me..." announcement in disguise :LOL:
 
It's not going to be a November release. The game is done, and the longer VU doesn't give the thumbs up to Valve's RC, the longer it will take for VU and Valve to make their millions of dollars off of sales.
 
CB | Para said:
Hmm yep, this is sort of another "my local EB told me..." announcement in disguise :LOL:
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You'll probably be proved wrong. Eurogamer will have checked their sources before posting this, and it won't have been a poor one. ;)
 
Concept said:
You'll probably be proved wrong. Eurogamer will have checked their sources before posting this, and it won't have been a poor one. ;)
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I said don't quote me! Heh :LOL:

Okay I'll give 'em the benefit of the doubt, I was just hoping for October but I guess November does seem like a more lucrative time period or whatever.
 
Concept said:
A Simulataneous worldwide release could never really happen.

Games don't launch on Friday in the States. And games never launch before Friday here.

This current release date information will have been confirmed by an upper management retail source. One of Eurogamer's writers says that in the forum thread accompanying the article on the site.

That's why I tend to believe this information.
Click to expand...
I wrote this once and i'll write it again:
Releases are not bound to certain days. However you can discuss that Vivendi might not want to wait the extra couple of days to get it properly synchronized as a worldwide release.

However they should be pretty careful because when Half-Life 2 is released people will have the game 3 days early.

Now about the rumour:

CD-Wow contacted customers a couple of days ago saying that their orders would be dispatched/processed soon.

Someone inside VUG spilled the beans and said they were going for an early november release. However you could say it was later turned down when someone inside VUG said they would deliver it before Thanksgiving.

So although it doesn't fit entirely i think it's pretty believable
 
any idea why VUG doesn't announce gold status for HL2?

i mean valve is releasing CSS next week which implies that the Source engine is DONE! :dozey:
it surely doesn't take VUG 2 whole months to box HL2 and ship...

comments...
 
A non-global release date is in valves favour. You get the game 3 days late? Better order off steam then. Ohh look, valve makes more money.

/me is ordering off steam anyway.

*Sits back with holiday application in hand and waits for release date confirmations :)*
 
FISKER_Q said:
I wrote this once and i'll write it again:
Releases are not bound to certain days.
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Yes they are. In the UK, games are only released on a Friday.
 
FISKER_Q said:
I wrote this once and i'll write it again:
Releases are not bound to certain days. However you can discuss that Vivendi might not want to wait the extra couple of days to get it properly synchronized as a worldwide release.
Click to expand...

I agree with you in theory, but in practice it has never happens here. Half-Life 2 (officially at least) won't be sold in the UK on anything less than a Friday.

Just as Halo 2 won't. Or San Andreas. Or any of the other big games.

Retailers mostly have the say on what day it's released in their stores, and GAME have somewhat of a monopoly here unfortunately (they used to be EB).

FISKER_Q said:
However they should be pretty careful because when Half-Life 2 is released people will have the game 3 days early.
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That's why I'm going with Steam, assuming people outside of the US can play/purchase the game over it on the 23rd.
 
And just because Valve haven't confirmed the date, doesn't mean it's not true. They haven't denied the date either and if VUG are going around saying it, it's likely to be true.

Similar thing happened with Doom 3, if I recall correctly.
 
Novemebr 26 seems so far away, and it doesn't make much sence anyway. Those who have pre-loaded Half-Life 2 would still have almost two months to wait. What would be the point of letting nearly 4 gigs of files just gather dust for three months. I bet they just got that release date from the faked Half-Life2.com gold announcement
 
BlackMesaDude said:
gabe answer plz
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Ahem, you know he's not your man slave or anything, please address the Savior in a more appropriate fashion and capitalize his name!

Besides Valve have never confirmed and/or denied any retailer dates to my knowledge.
 
Actually, a non simultaneous worldwide release might not be good for Valve. In parts of the world that get the game later than others, I guarantee you there will be a flood of hundreds and thousands of people trying to get HL2 off Bit Torrent. If I'm not mistaken, the same thing happened with Doom3.
 
Seppo said:
Novemebr 26 seems so far away, and it doesn't make much sence anyway. Those who have pre-loaded Half-Life 2 would still have almost two months to wait. What would be the point of letting nearly 4 gigs of files just gather dust for three months. I bet they just got that release date from the faked Half-Life2.com gold announcement
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yeah it seems ridiculous to wait that long, staring at those gcf files that contain all that joy. But if it's a real date it probably has to do with some weird VUG strategy instead of processing time
 
Concept said:
Retailers mostly have the say on what day it's released in their stores, and GAME have somewhat of a monopoly here unfortunately (they used to be EB).
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Erm, what? Publishers decide the dates, and I would guess that the release was down to chart rules and stuff. I know that music singles have to be released on a certain day, and be below a certain length otherwise it doesn't go in the charts.

I was trying to look up this information but it's hard to find.
 
Seppo -

Except the dates as far as I know for that (fake Half-Life 2.com announcement) were: Nov 23rd US - 1st Dec UK.

Slightly different. And just to quote one of their journalists on their forum for further emphasis:

Krudster said:
VU has told UK retailers this date. This is how it works - retailers get to hear all sorts of things before they're "officially" announced. Shelf space has to be booked, window displays booked, ad campaigns taken out - this has all only just been given the green light. This isn't idle speculation and comes from very good sources. Trust us, ok, we're not a crappy rumour site.
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Seppo said:
Novemebr 26 seems so far away, and it doesn't make much sence anyway. Those who have pre-loaded Half-Life 2 would still have almost two months to wait. What would be the point of letting nearly 4 gigs of files just gather dust for three months. I bet they just got that release date from the faked Half-Life2.com gold announcement
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This is what makes the least sense to me. Why would they start a preload 4 months in advance? And if it does turn out to be a late November release date, that would mean an early to mid November gold announcement, which would mean the completed version of HL2 would be sitting around doing nothing for well over a month, since we know the game is done now, and all we are waiting for is VU's approval of the RC.
 
Feath said:
Erm, what? Publishers decide the dates, and I would guess that the release was down to chart rules and stuff. I know that music singles have to be released on a certain day, and be below a certain length otherwise it doesn't go in the charts.

I was trying to look up this information but it's hard to find.
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I'm not saying that. What I'm more or less pointing out is that it's probably the case that GAME also have some say on what day they sell a product in their store.
 
Just a matter of time now...(it has been for like over a year)
 
So says the Department of Trade and Industry's UK Competition Law and the Competition Commision.
 
Pi Mu Rho said:
Yes they are. In the UK, games are only released on a Friday.
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Not sure... Dawn of War was released over here on a Tuesday (21st September)
 
dfme said:
any idea why VUG doesn't announce gold status for HL2?

i mean valve is releasing CSS next week which implies that the Source engine is DONE! :dozey:
it surely doesn't take VUG 2 whole months to box HL2 and ship...

comments...
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CSS is being released on Steam, so supposedly can be updated easily if VU come up with any new bugs. Therefore it needn't be gold.

Personally I think Nov 26th is a little far away if it's gonna go gold soon - normally games are on shelves 2-3 weeks after gold status.

Admittedly they are going to need to duplicate more copies than with most games, although any delay will get more and more people buying off Steam, so they can wet their appetites with CSS.

Valve (with Steam) are gonna be the winners here I think...

Krusty
 
Sigh...I personally would be majorly bummed if the game was released over 2 months after the first RC. I think it's highly unlikely that the game hasn't gone gold yet and what the hell reason would either company come up with to release it that late. I am glad that Half-Life 2 is coming out and I'll love it when I play it but I'll go on record as saying I've never been jerked around by a company(companies) so much before. It's really kind of rediculous how far this has drawn out. And I'm not really going to forget either. Next time Valve announces their latest and greatest project, I'm gonna take it with a huge grain of salt (the "this could just end up being vaporware" kind of grain). And it's really ashame things have to be that way. I don't think there's any reason to doubt that the code theft wasn't the only thing to delay the game by a _year_. If you have a network stream encrypted in a certain way, it would take hardly any time to simply modify the encryption algorithm. And if it was actually a robust form of encryption, it wouldn't even help anyone in cracking it to know how it's implimented. It's become pretty clear to me the attitude Valve has towards keeping promises. I really, really do wonder just what it actually was that set this game back a year. I'm 95% sure it had nothing to do with anything Valve has told us. Ah well, in the end this game is gonna rock and Valve really does possess some serious talent when it comes to their development team, but something over there still isn't right. And that something (whether it resides in Valve or Vivendi) basically reduced Half-Life 2 from a potentially legendary title to a simply excellent title. I sure hope they learned their lesson.

Edit: Perhaps the delay was caused by an internal database failure or something along that line. I suppose Valve wouldn't dare come clean on that one cause of how much flak they might get. I hope some day we find out what truly caused this delay.

2nd Edit: Wouldn't it just be painfully silly if the game ended up coming out 2 months after the first reviews of it were available? Does that ever happen??

So basically to sum things up, I'm saying that whoever was responsible for this mess, I want their head on a platter :E
 
I don't think this is any to be too excited about. It is just an unconfirmed released date. And November 28 is still a long way away (as opposed to in my computer tomorrow).
 
I really hope that this is not true !

We must get a worldwide release date and not favourtise people
 
a November 26th release date for Europe, with US gamers getting the game three days earlier on November 23rd.
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If i have to wait 3 days, ill use steam.
 
Sushi said:
This is what makes the least sense to me. Why would they start a preload 4 months in advance? And if it does turn out to be a late November release date, that would mean an early to mid November gold announcement, which would mean the completed version of HL2 would be sitting around doing nothing for well over a month, since we know the game is done now, and all we are waiting for is VU's approval of the RC.
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when will you people understand. valve controls steam. valve does not control retail. why would they repload four months in advance? perhaps because they were ready to release the game. but because they are does not mean that vivendi is. Furthermore, valve originally stated that the intent of spreading out preloads was to balance the load on valve content servers. imagine if everyone who bought hl2 on steam when it was released downloaded all 5+ gigs at the same time. the servers would choke, and likely crash. and tons of customers would be extremely angry that they just payed for a game, and they cant download it, because the whole world tried at once and choked their servers.
 
DreamWraith said:
when will you people understand. valve controls steam. valve does not control retail. why would they repload four months in advance? perhaps because they were ready to release the game. but because they are does not mean that vivendi is. Furthermore, valve originally stated that the intent of spreading out preloads was to balance the load on valve content servers. imagine if everyone who bought hl2 on steam when it was released downloaded all 5+ gigs at the same time. the servers would choke, and likely crash. and tons of customers would be extremely angry that they just payed for a game, and they cant download it, because the whole world tried at once and choked their servers.
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I will agree with that. Hey, finally the game is coming, no longer is it suspected Vaporware, nor is it going to become the new Duke Nukem Forever. I'm just glad it is finally coming out. Now I'm debating on wether or not to buy it from Steam.
 
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