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(Image credit: Valve)
There are certain, well, certainties in life. Death and taxes are two of them, while the fact thatHalf-Life 3 is probably never comingis a fitting third. Despite a bevvy ofoccult rumours and whisperings, prayers and sacrifices to the periodic table have never borne fruit. Silksong, for all itsdespair and mania, can’t even hold a candle to the long, 21-year old flame that fans of Half-Life 2 have been holding for the sequel that never was.
But hark! What’s that cresting yonder hill, a cryptic tweet from G-Man’s official voice actor? Could it be that the end-times are finally upon us? Is the rapture finally come? On the 31st of December 2024, at 10:00PM—basically at the crack of the new year—Mike Shapiro, voice of the beloved and cryptic G-Man, tweeted a slow-pan of the cover art from his music singleBest Long Dog.
#Valve #Halflife #GMan #2025 pic.twitter.com/mdT5hlxKJTDecember 31, 2024
#Valve #Halflife #GMan #2025 pic.twitter.com/mdT5hlxKJTDecember 31, 2024
Tagged #Valve, #Half-Life, and #GMan, what really has engines revving and copium machines flooded is what’s spoken within, as Shapiro’s dulcet tones give way to the stilted delivery of G-Man, his voice like cracking ice on an ancient lake: “Another year already. Good to see and hear from so many of you. May the next quarter-century deliver as many… unexpected surprises, hm? As did the millennium’s first… Then again, time is fluid. Like music. See you in the new year.”
The game’s fan subreddit is already in full conspiracy mode. Oneparticular postnotes that the window featured in the Best Long Dog cover art has a trio of numbers—197, the only stable isotope for gold. In other words, the only version of goldwithouta half-life. The actual length of the video, as sleuthloamiferouspoints out, is also 197 seconds exactly. 197 days is also the length of time between Best Long Dog’s release on YouTube after Shapiro’s last song, Magnetic North, came out.
I am barely chipping the surface of the iceberg when it comes to the numerical alchemy going on at the moment (Shapiro also updated the playlists for histhreesongs very recently) but considering theexactnessof the number 197 showing up three times, I’m absolutely starting to believe there’s some dark sorcery going on here.
This also isn’t the first time that Valve has teased a Half-Life game with ARG shenanigans. In fact, Half-Life 2 had asimilar amount of tomfoolerywhen a decrypted photo of a whiteboard led to a secret website, leading fans on a treasure hunt. If Valve does have something baking in the oven—Half-Life 3 or not—it wouldn’t shock me if it was working with Shapiro to put a new ARG together. Could this be the fabledProject White Sands? Only time will tell. Then again, time is fluid. Like music. Or so a little bird told me.
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