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[jbug617]

Is this a new thing Keighley is doing? The twitter he linked on twitter for Gameslice has no info up yet.

Geoff Keighley sits down with Gabe Newell and Erik Johnson from Valve to discuss the state of one of the most respected video game companies in the world. Hear Gabe and Erik discuss Steam VR, Steam Machines, Source 2, and the future direction of Valve.

Key timecodes:

5:30 - Why Valve Moved Into Hardware
9:06 - Valve's Electronics Plant
10:45 - Valve's Hardware Workshop?
12:05 - Titanium vs. Plutonium
13:43 - Erik on the Valve Hardware
16:11 - Valve's Forward Investing
19:10 - Linux vs. Windows
24:31 - Gabe on VR
32:40 - Erik on VR
34:50 - Will Valve Make VR Content?
46:42 - Source 2 Plans
38:46 - When Will Valve Make Another game?
44:18 - The Voice Workshop?
46:45 - Mobile vs VR
53:13 - DOTA Driven by the Fans
57:12 - Gabe's Toughest Decision

Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/gameslice/valve
Website: http://podcast.gameslice.com/

edit: More info from Geoff about this project
https://medium.com/@geoffkeighley/g...-from-valve-on-gameslice-podcast-a31f3bb3ff33

Lately I’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about how the game and media industries are changing — and how I can keeping making a meaningful contribution. One area that has caught my interest is the podcast space, or more specifically narrative audio. (If you want a great example of this, check out Alex Blumberg’s StartUp, the gripping and honest tale of Alex starting his own podcast company). Podcasts are an evolving art form, and as I thought more about it, I started to get excited about building a podcast that was part narrative but also included longer-form interviews.

There’s no better place to start than Valve, a company that just celebrated 9 million concurrent players on Steam this past weekend. A month ago Gabe Newell invited me into Valve’s Seattle office for a sneak peek at its new VR headset. The demos — which were publicly shown at the Game Developers Conference a few weeks ago — blew me away, and I could tell that Gabe was proud of what the team had accomplished with Steam VR, Source 2 and Steam Machines. It felt like the start of a new era for Valve.

Shortly after my visit, I asked Valve if they’d be open to participating in this experiment and they said yes. I wanted to dive deeper into Gabe’s philosophy and give fans a bit more insight into how Valve is thinking about its customers and business in 2015. (Wait until you hear Gabe discuss why Valve is focused more on VR than Mobile). Along with Erik Johnson, a jack-of-all-trades at Valve who is best known for his work leading DOTA2, we sat down at GDC for an hour-long conversation. The Game Awards showed me the power of our community banding together behind compelling content, so I hope this podcast find an audience as well — although it was a lot cheaper to produce ☺As I mentioned before, this podcast is an experiment. There’s no advertising, and I can’t promise how often I’ll publish new episodes. (That said, Gabe, Erik and I ended our chat with a few ideas on where this can go). Please have a listen and let me know what you think on Twitter @geoffkeighley. If you’d like to see more of these in the future, you can subscribe or drop a donation at http://podcast.gameslice.com

 

[Compsiox]

Key timecodes:


Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/gameslice/valve
Website: http://podcast.gameslice.com/

No summary?

 

[strafer]

57:12 - Gabe's Toughest Decision

Cancelling Half Life 3?

 

[Xater]

This could be interesting if Jeff does not go to soft ball on his guests.

 

[antitrop]

All I want to know is how he felt about being called Gary, that one time.

 

[Nibel]

Listening to this as I write this; very good stuff so far and a bunch of interesting anecdotes.

 

[maquiladora]

No summary?

Geoff Keighley sits down with Gabe Newell and Erik Johnson from Valve to discuss the state of one of the most respected video game companies in the world. Hear Gabe and Erik discuss Steam VR, Steam Machines, Source 2, and the future direction of Valve.

 

[Compsiox]

Geoff Keighley sits down with Gabe Newell and Erik Johnson from Valve to discuss the state of one of the most respected video game companies in the world. Hear Gabe and Erik discuss Steam VR, Steam Machines, Source 2, and the future direction of Valve.

A must listen podcast. Can't wait. Thanks for this.

 

[Sianos]

Does he find out when

Spoiler

the pit lord

is coming?

 

[Volotaire]

I'm up for it. I'll give this a listen.

 

[juicyfruitas]

Awesome - GK doing a gaming podcast seems like a great, natural fit.

looking forward to a long and healthy run for this series

 

[BUNTING1243]

We don't appreciate Geoff Keighley enough. Man's doing really cool stuff in the industry.

 

[luffxan]

Thanks for the heads up. Definitely adding Gameslice to my RSS feed if the rest of the content is going to be anything like this.

 

[Brick]

We don't appreciate Geoff Keighley enough. Man's doing really cool stuff in the industry.

Couldn't agree more.

 

[jediyoshi]

Not a fan of the voice filtering he has in the opening, feels kinda cold and hollow. NPR it up, Geoff.

 

[Mikey Jr.]

43:00

Talks about HL3.

Doesn't sound super good.

 

[Lingitiz]

43:00

Talks about HL3.

Doesn't sound super good.

It didn't sound to me like he revealed anything one way or the other.

He basically just said they will build upon everything they've learned and that them making MP games as of late doesn't mean they will never revisit SP. At the same time they feel like they must do something different with single player that fits in line with games as a service and user generated content, which is what they've been alluding to for years now.

 

[ShinMaruku]

We don't appreciate Geoff Keighley enough. Man's doing really cool stuff in the industry.

I would think that's in his job description. If what he's doing is an outlier that's a stunning condemnation of this industry. I always though the man did good work. But if he's an outlier we need better media and better pr. However that will never have that with the consumer we have today and the execs we have today.

 

[NervousXtian]

43:00

Talks about HL3.

Doesn't sound super good.

yeah.. hmm.. yeah.. I don't like that part.

 

[DannyDanger]

i like Geoff

 

[Neuromancer]

It didn't sound to me like he revealed anything one way or the other.

He basically just said they will build upon everything they've learned and that them making MP games as of late doesn't mean they will never revisit SP. At the same time they feel like they must do something different with single player that fits in line with games as a service and user generated content, which is what they've been alluding to for years now.

That doesn't sound super good.

 

[dakun]

i like Geoff Keighley.. A podcast is perfect imo. He's seems much closer to devs than most websites with podcasts so that's certainly a good thing he could get going.

 

[Lingitiz]

That doesn't sound super good.

If you're looking strictly for a game in the exact same vein as HL2 and it's episodes, I bet it doesn't.

I assume Valve is looking at the bigger picture of HL3 being a launching point for a lot of UGC to come for years. Like the endless amount of mods that have spawned from HL2 but on a much bigger, accessible, and more organized scale, where they can guarantee it's lifespan for a long time.

Or they could just not be making it. Fuck if I know. Just putting together the pieces from interviews and Valve's general direction over the last few years. Whatever the hell that game ends up being, it certainly won't be just a straightforward boxed $60 12 hour SP game.

 

[Weetrick]

I have a lot of respect for Geoff, so I'll give this a listen. He has a great relationship with key industry people and usually doesn't avoid asking tough questions.

Can't wait for the inevitable Reggie episode.

 

[Nzyme32]

This sounds really cool, and its always great to get an insight into the wacky world of Valve. Cheers for the heads up OP, will listen to it shortly

 

[sanhora]

Gaben talking about Pratchett and Discworld... What a timing.

 

[BaronMonstro]

Dewritos pope doing damn good work as always.

Sounds interesting, will listen to later

 

[Guri]

As for Half-Life, what he said is what I was suspecting. Usually, when game developers are faced with an issue they can't fix, it is cut. But it seems that Valve instead wants to create the technology to support that idea, delaying the game until they can deliver with that. We can't be sure when they will think they will be ready, but I believe it is clear from this podcast that they still plan on delivering games based on their franchises.

Gaben talking about Pratchett and Discworld... What a timing.

Yeah, that was heartbreaking. :/

 

[Nibel]

Done with it, and yeah, as expected it's pretty great. Hope to see more podcasts in the future, especially with people that don't do a lot of interviews just like Gabe.

 

[AJLma]

Sounds great, downloading now.

 

[dmr87]

GabeN: "Oh shit, I counted to 3"

Ohyou.jpg

Listening now.

 

[Darkangel]

They should just finish up the Half-life 2 story arc with a 5 hour Episode 3. Nobody cares if it isn't "innovative" enough, we just want to know what happens.

Not every game needs to be turned into a moneymaking "service."

 

[~Kinggi~]

GabeN: "Oh shit, I counted to 3"

Ohyou.jpg

dat son of a bitch

 

[jooey]

They should just finish up the Half-life 2 story arc with a 5 hour Episode 3. Nobody cares if it isn't "innovative" enough, we just want to know what happens.

Not every game needs to be turned into a moneymaking "service."

purchase half-life 3 plotlines from the community

 

[jediyoshi]

Not every game needs to be turned into a moneymaking "service."

Why forsake an exponentially larger number of people who play video games for another

 

[BUNTING1243]

I would think that's in his job description. If what he's doing is an outlier that's a stunning condemnation of this industry. I always though the man did good work. But if he's an outlier we need better media and better pr. However that will never have that with the consumer we have today and the execs we have today.

I don't really think what he's doing is in the outlier. It's just that I don't really see a lot of people (on GAF especially) appreciating the work he does with Final Hours, stuff like this, E3 Judges Week/TV coverage, and the Game Awards. He's kinda just dismissed as "the doritos guy" on GAF and I think that's dumb

 

[Lingitiz]

They should just finish up the Half-life 2 story arc with a 5 hour Episode 3. Nobody cares if it isn't "innovative" enough, we just want to know what happens.

Not every game needs to be turned into a moneymaking "service."

Maybe no one at Valve wants to do that? I don't think anyone there wants to do something just for the sake of doing it. It could potentially just result in a bad game they don't really care about.

 

[Ozium]

I don't really think what he's doing is in the outlier. It's just that I don't really see a lot of people (on GAF especially) appreciating the work he does with Final Hours, stuff like this, E3 Judges Week/TV coverage, and the Game Awards. He's kinda just dismissed as "the doritos guy" on GAF and I think that's dumb

He's the Doritos Pope. Show some respect.

 

[ShinMaruku]

I don't really think what he's doing is in the outlier. It's just that I don't really see a lot of people (on GAF especially) appreciating the work he does with Final Hours, stuff like this, E3 Judges Week/TV coverage, and the Game Awards. He's kinda just dismissed as "the doritos guy" on GAF and I think that's dumb

He did have that picture taken. And since he's the big media guy they put their furstations of the media on his holiness, but I think he gets respect here.

 

[Darkangel]

Why forsake an exponentially larger number of people who play video games for another

Valve is pulling in a ton of money from online games like DOTA and TF2. They could easily afford to make a "niche" singleplayer-only game (especially when their last game ended on a cliffhanger).

Gabe said in the podcast that the only way they would go back and make a traditional singleplayer game was if a huge number of Valve employees wanted to. I find it crazy that seemingly no one at Valve wants to sit down and finish Half-life 3. I remember the artist behind City 17 left Valve because the company was no longer interested in making big games like Half-life 2.

 

[jetsetrez]

This is great. This is what I wish we saw more in games journalism.

 

[injurai]

Should I prep my happening bunker?

 

[Baleoce]

giving it a gander now, but from the few minutes I've listenend in on, I'm happy that Geoff is doing content like this, as I feel it better shows off his journalistic side that I know he has.

 

[~Kinggi~]

this is an excellent interview. Also rare cause i dont know of many podcasts with Gabe.

 

[Metroidvania]

Should I prep my happening bunker?

Not for Half-Life 3 in any immediate time-frame, no.

It's not entirely out of the question, but Gabe specifically mentioned that if it were happening, it'd be a different sort of animal, given what they've learned from Portal 2, and other avenues that they've pursued since then.

edit: Interesting that Gabe thinks Smart Phones aren't gonna last long (at least in their current iteration).

 

[injurai]

Not for Half-Life 3 in any immediate time-frame, no.

It's not entirely out of the question, but Gabe specifically mentioned that if it were happening, it'd be a different sort of animal, given what they've learned from Portal 2, and other avenues that they've pursued since then.

I'm resetting the clock. It's at least still 6 years out because they need to launch VR successfully first or something.

 

[epmode]

They should just finish up the Half-life 2 story arc with a 5 hour Episode 3. Nobody cares if it isn't "innovative" enough, we just want to know what happens.

Not every game needs to be turned into a moneymaking "service."

It wouldn't be so bad if it didn't end on such an awful cliffhanger.

 

[Guri]

edit: Interesting that Gabe thinks Smart Phones aren't gonna last long (at least in their current iteration).

I was also thinking about that the other day. The wonder about them is gone and a lot of new devices with not-so-many changes come out frequently. We're almost at exactly 8 years since the iPhone was officially announced. It is a lot of time. I can see something new coming up between now and (wild guess) 2018.

 

[~Kinggi~]

Lmao. the 40 minute area is Gabe carefully navigating a minefield and he knows it.

 

[ShinMaruku]

We all know that HLF3 is in the same place Shenmue 3 is and hopefully megaman. Never coming out.

I find it much more interesting what Valve is doing now anyhow. As facilitators and as a platform.