Half-Life 2: Episode Three
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- "We could have shipped it. It wouldn't have been that hard. The failure was... My personal failure was being stumped. I couldn't figure out why doing Episode Three was pushing anything forward."
- — Gabe Newell[src]
Half-Life 2: Episode Three was the planned final installment of what was intended to be a trilogy[1] of episodic games that served as a continuation of the 2004 first-person shooter game Half-Life 2. This article outlines the known information on the game.
Contents
Plot[edit]
Continuing on from Episode Two, players were to once again assume the role of Gordon Freeman as he and Alyx Vance were to travel through the Arctic on a mission to take control of the Aperture Science research ship Borealis before the Combine could use it for their own needs.
One plan for the storyline of the game was made available in the form of Epistle 3, a short story by series writer Marc Laidlaw released after his retirement from Valve. However, Laidlaw himself noted that this was not a concrete design document as he emphasized that the direction of such a framework would inevitably change and evolve over the course of development as a result of having an entire team come up with ideas on how to realize these concepts.[2]
Characters[edit]
- Gordon Freeman
- Alyx Vance
- Wallace Breen (in host body)
- Judith Mossman (Appears in Epistle 3)
- The G-Man (Ditto)
Proposed Epistle 3 appearances:[3]
Enemies[edit]
Episode Three would have introduced the Blob - a transparent creature with thorn-like tentacles on the inside connected to a "brain". Upon finding an enemy, it will come into contact in it and "consume" the enemy, dealing 5 points of damage every 0.0225 seconds.
Work was also done on two new Combine enemies - the "wpnscanner", described as a "Scanner with a gun", and "combine_armored", a heavily armored Combine infantry class,[4] but they ended up getting cut from the project.[5]
Returning enemies from Half-Life 2 included the Combine Soldier and the Gunship.[6] Concept art also depicts Hunters, Combine Elites and, most commonly, the Combine Advisors, indicating plans for them to also make appearances.
Weapons[edit]
Half-Life 2: Episode Three was intended to feature multiple new weapons, in contrast with the previous episodes, which retained the standard Half-Life 2 arsenal. These included the ice-creating Ice Gun,[6] the Weaponizer - a device utilizing concrete, liquid, and metal in some fashion, as well as a Flamethrower and the Teleport Gun.[7] In addition to the brand new armament, the Tau Cannon and Gluon Gun, originally seen in the first Half-Life, were planned to return as well.[8][9] A weapon called "proto1", which could consume physics props to use as ammo,[4] was also designed, but it was eventually removed from the game.[5]
A gameplay video shows a brief glimpse of an unidentified weapon. It is unknown which, if any, of the aforementioned weapons this is.[6]
Development[edit]
The earliest concept art for Half-Life 2: Episode Three is dated to 2005, around the time Valve chose to develop a trilogy of smaller-scale sequels to Half-Life 2.
In May of 2006, Episode Three was first announced for a tentative Christmas 2007 release. Initial plans for Half-Life 2's episodic trilogy intended for two teams inside Valve to develop the series: the first team would work on Episode One, and after finishing work on the game, it would move to develop Episode Three. The second would develop Episode Two concurrently to both projects.[10] While the Episode One team would, as planned, begin development on the third episode following the former's completion, it was later assigned to work on Episode Two and the other games included in the Orange Box collection.[11]
Following the release of the collection on October 10, 2007, Episode Three continued development. In November, and later in July 2008, Valve would release pieces of concept art in order to tease the game. However, they soon ran into problems. During 2008, the team working on Episode Three, which is said to still be in the early stages of production at this point, was struggling to find ways to innovate with the gameplay, especially within the confines of the Source engine.[12] At some point leading up to the release of Left 4 Dead (November 17, 2008), the Episode Three team would halt progress in order to help with the development of this other game at the studio which had a tight shipping schedule. By the time L4D released, enough time had passed that, when considering resuming work on Ep3, they felt the ideal release window had passed, and the game now needed a new engine to deliver a Half-Life title of proper size and scale that fulfilled players' growing expectations after the first two Episodes. Rather than return to the third Episode, some of the people involved here would go on to work on other projects like Left 4 Dead 2 and Portal 2 instead.[6]
Gallery[edit]
Screenshots[edit]
The Ice Gun being used.
The Ice Gun creating a ramp.
The Blob trying to consume a cinder block.
The Blob passing through a grate.
Concept art[edit]
2005[edit]
Concept showing the Borealis surrounded by Combine machinery.
Ditto.
2006[edit]
Concept showing the Borealis' being excavated by the Combine, with Combine Elites in the foreground.
2007[edit]
Combine Advisors following a humanoid figure into the Borealis.
Combine Advisors around the Borealis.
2008[edit]
Gordon Freeman face-to-face with an Advisor.
Bust of Alyx.
Bust of Alyx wearing a reused Soviet army officer ushanka, with "hammer and sickle" cap badge.
Bust of Alyx wearing a chullo and her father's Harvard sweater.
Bust of Alyx wearing her father's jacket.
Bust of Alyx with her ears protected.
Ditto.
Full-size Alyx in a weapon holding position.
Ditto (with long hair).
Ditto.
Full-size Alyx with goggles and jacket.
Full-size Alyx with goggles and vest.
Full-size Alyx, with a "pirate"-ish style.
Full-size Alyx with ushanka.
Full-size Alyx wearing her father's jacket and a sweater similar to that of Judith Mossman.
Unknown character.
Ditto.
Unknown character with goggles and ice axe.
Ditto.
Unknown character.
Ditto.
Ditto.
Character in a suit.
The crashed Mil Mi-8 with unidentified structures in the background.
Ditto, with a large installation in the background.
Ditto, with two figures overlooking the horizon.
Xen islands.
Advisor cornering an individual in Xen.
Unknown entity in Xen with a figure trapped in a bubble of some sort.
Ditto.
Unknown entity.
Ditto.
Ditto.
Ditto.
Dr. Breen in his host body, often called BreenGrub.
Undated[edit]
Episode Three/Half-Life 3 concept depicting a ravaged dry coastline.
Ditto, a similar composition but with a Hunter present.
Ditto.
Ditto.
Ditto, night version.
Concept showing a Citadel in the distance.
Ditto.
Ditto.
Ditto.
An unidentified hallway.
Model render of an Advisor host body.
Another concept showing the Borealis surrounded by Combine machinery, with other ships' hulls in the background.
Another concept of some of the other ships' hulls surrounded by Combine machinery.
Ditto.
3D render of Combine infrastructure surrounding a set of steps.
Concept showing a Resistance-owned submarine.
Concept showing a stranded ship (though not likely the Borealis given the name "Wilson" on it) in the Arctic sea. Note the Combine Gunship in the background.
Concept showing a helicopter (though not the Mil Mi-8) about to crash in the Arctic.
Concept showing an unknown Combine rail system, viewed from above.
Another concept for the Mil Mi-8's crash landing.
Concept showing Hunters in the Arctic.
Other[edit]
Model of Alyx's Gun, later repurposed for what became Half-Life: Alyx.[13]
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ↑ Half-Life 2: Episode One Available June 1 on Steam (May 24, 2006) (archived)
- ↑
Post: "Epistolary Afterthoughts: The map is not the territory. A sketch is only a starting point. Everything changes as you try to make it real..." @marc_laidlaw (Marc Laidlaw) on X (August 26, 2017) (archived)
- ↑ Post: " Is there a role in all this for the former security guard Bernadette? What about cAT?..." @marc_laidlaw (Marc Laidlaw) on X (August 26, 2017) (archived)
- ↑ 4.0 4.1
episodic/Episode3/in Source SDK 2013 on GitHub - ↑ 5.0 5.1 3 cpps of Ep3 in beta? on the Steam Users' Forums (April 22, 2008) (archived)
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3
Half-Life 2: 20th Anniversary Documentary on YouTube
- ↑
Dota 2 Client Leaked – Including Actual HL2: Episode Three Code on LambdaGeneration
- ↑ Episode 3 and SOB FGDs leaked! on ValveLeakware (February 18, 2013) (archived)
- ↑ ep3.fgd
- ↑ The World According to Gabe - PC Gamer, May 2006
- ↑ Beyond the box: Valve cofounder Gabe Newell on the company's future in Games for Windows Issue 13, page 59
- ↑ The Final Hours of Half-Life: Alyx, Chapter 2: Polygons & Presence
- ↑ The Final Hours of Half-Life: Alyx, Chapter 10: The Dark Days of City 17
