The bottom of the page there is a countdown that will expire at midnight Eastern standard Time tonight.
This company claims to be in Boston. They’ve received federal grants. I’ve done a small amount of digging, but it would be entirely within valves resources to set up such a company. They have a LinkedIn, but it doesn’t really seem like anyone really works there? It seems like a viral marketing campaign.
There was a Reddit thread. A while back. Some people noticed classes in the HTML that referenced other half-lifey things. But, some people in that thread shut it down as nothing out of the ordinary.
Then, there have been recent leaks with regard to a new game being developed. Someone found a resume suggesting that a person had done voice-over work for an unreleased project with Valve in 2023.
There was also a leak of some files with .hlx file types, and I guess prior to the half-life alyx release some .hla files leaked.
In the .hlx file leak, I guess there was found references to things like the EV suit.
Here’s a YouTube video that touches on all of this.
What money is it spending exactly? A lease for a small building and a small town in Massachusetts? Maybe 10 grand a month? A salary for, as far as LinkedIn tells us, 2:00 to 10 individuals, we’ll call it a million dollars.
Are you telling me that Valve isn’t willing to invest 2 million dollars in advertising the most anticipated video game of all time?
What do you think valves marketing budget is?
Do you think there’s a modulation when it comes to expenditures for half-life 3 should they arise?
When was the last time you saw an ad for a valve game outside of the steam ecosystem?
Bedford isn’t a small town. There’s a bunch of other biotech facilities in that area. It looks like it’d be a relatively cheap building to lease, but not as cheap as you’re thinking.
I think if they were going to spend $2m on marketing, they’d actually use it for marketing, not spinning off a biotech company.