It has been a while since new information was unearthed regarding the HLX project at Valve, which is thought to be Half-Life 3. Despite the lack of new details, however, work on the project seems to have been proceeding steadily, and development may have reached the final phase, judging from some recent findings.
In new videos shared yesterday by Tyler McViker and Gabe Follower, it is reported that Counter-Strike 2's massive July 29 update not only brought changes and improvements to the competitive game but also some behind-the-scenes changes to the Source 2 engine related to the Half-Life 3 HLX project. One new line of code in particular, the one mentioning thumpers to scare antlions, which mirrors a line of code in Half-Life 2, seems to be a direct message to dataminers, and further confirmation that the project continues to be in active development.
Not only does the HLX project continue to be in active development, but it may have reached the final phase of development. The most significant change introduced in the new Source 2 engine update is the complete refactoring of AI scripting in the FGD and localization token files. This is pretty significant, as this refactoring has changed how NPCs react to in-game events, going from sounds to what are not called AI events. This has been known to be an HLX feature for a while, but the difference now is that there's a definition file for these AI events, which suggests that the feature is done and polished up to a point that it can be used in scripting and map-making. Hammer, Valve's level design tool, was also recently updated to support many of the Half-Life 3 HLX features discovered in the past few months via datamining, such as vehicle mechanics, wind mechanics, model deformation, thermodynamics mechanics, and more. The fact that the new documentation reads like a tutorial to explain how to use the development tools properly to take advantage of these features also adds more fuel to the fire and even suggests how mod support could be coming not too long after the project launches. Ultimately, this sort of polishing and development tool updates usually happen at the end of development, but considering how differently Valve operates compared to the vast majority of game developers, it cannot be said for certain if the game is close to being announced and released.
Other recent happenings may also suggest that the HLX project thought to be Half-Life 3 could be in the final phase of development. Gabe Follower claims in their video that some parts of the project are already finished and need only to be polished, and developers have started moving on to other projects. Usually, this means the project may have been abandoned, but Gabe Follower believes these developers are moving on to other projects because their work on HLX is no longer needed.
As mentioned, Valve operates differently from other game development studios, so even if the game is in the final phase of development, an announcement and release timeline for the HLX project, thought to be Half-Life 3, remains unknown. Hopefully, it won't take much longer to learn more about what's next for one of gaming's most celebrated series.
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