ValveTime

This past week was relatively hectic in regards to the amount of news coming from Valve and their partners. Just this past week we've seen the arrival of eight new leaked screenshots from the cancelled Half-Life 2: Episode Four project, a number of major gameplay balance updates for Dota 2 and the announcement that classic Counter-Strike map "de_mirage" is set to return to the series in an update to Global Offensive set to be released sometime in the next week.


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We thought not much more info would materialise for the long cancelled Half-Life Episode 4 or Return to Ravenholm as it was also known. However, we've been sent more examples of content produced for the game by Arkane Studios.

It's interesting to see that Arkane intended to put their own stamp on Half-life with many of their own original assets. Work such as this also gives us some clues to where they intended to take the spin-off. If you're curious then check out our ValveTime Spotlight video as we dissect the images below!





View the full album below or for the avid Half-life fans, watch our full Spotlight Content Analysis video above.

This week saw the arrival of CES 2013, and Valve were there in force as the first SteamBox was revealed by Xi3. We also received a lot of other news this week, such as the arrival of Medusa in a Dota 2 update, the retiring of the nine original Team Fortress 2 hats and a version of the Half-Life alpha was leaked onto the internet. Oh, and we found some Half-Life 2: Episode Four screenshots, which we think you might be interested in.

Half-life 2: Episode 4 or Return to Ravenholm was a title being developed by Arkane studios between 2006 and 2007 before eventually being cancelled. Little of the game beyond concept art and an animation reel demo has been seen before now. All images are verified as work from Episode 4.

Our investigators have uncovered a selection images which show some in-game shots of the title which show new textures and models Arkane had planned for the game. You may notice a HUD element saying 'Absorption' in the images, if you have any suggestions what that might be, we'd like to hear them!

You can also check out our video showing all the media from Episode 4 right here.


Read More & Watch our Episode 4 Media Video [...]