Recent speculations mention that game developer Valve is planning to develop a virtual reality (VR) title for its biggest game franchise, "Half-Life." Sting codes from other applications that were also developed by the studio gave it away.
Valve News Network reports that an update to "DOTA 2" revealed a line code that says, "used to force the HL:VR to speak." Fans are aware that Gordon Freeman, the game's protagonist, never uttered a word in the whole game, so it is believed that this version will not give him control. The line is, therefore, most likely directed to the player.
Prior to this, another set of code was revealed from Valve's "Destination" that pertains to weapons, VR controller movement, ammo clips, and other features. The said application is a VR title that allows users to explore real and virtual places. The activity can also be performed with their friends, and the app receives regular updates.
However, observers suggest that the code in question might just be remnants of VR experiments that were conducted by the studio. According to VG247, the codes that were discovered could be considered as excess baggage from game codes that were not thoroughly refined.
Valve is known in the tech community as a company that fully supports VR. Aside from developing a lot of game titles on Steam, the company is directly a part of the development of the HTC Vive VR headset that was released earlier this year. If this "Half-Life VR" proves to be true, then it is speculated that it would provide a big boost to the virtual reality industry.
It remains unclear, however, if the studio intentionally left the code to be discovered so that they could tease the fans, or if they simply forgot to remove the line from the code.
Jeep Barnett, a Valve programmer, stated two years ago that the company would not decline to develop a VR version of "Half-Life." Barrent explained back then: "We're not saying, 'no', but we don't know what the right thing is [yet]. Our most precious resource is time, and we don't have enough time for people to do everything. Would we like to make all of our franchises in VR? Absolutely. But we don't have enough time or people. So we have to figure out what's the best fit, what plays to the strengths of VR."
Valve has not issued a statement in relation to the current rumors.
