PC Gamer recently spoke to Valve CEO Gabe Newell about the possibility of a Half-Life film. Newell explained that Valve had been approached by filmmakers to do the film, but ultimately the company decided that the only team that could do the film correctly would be Valve.
“As a WoW player, I would much rather that the WoW team made the movie, right? Than anybody else. I like Sam Raimi, I’ve been a fan ever since Evil Dead came out, but I would rather see Blizzard making the movie,” he told the magazine. “We think that customers are like, ‘OK, we’re kind of sick and tired of the way you guys are slicing and dicing the experience of being a fan of Harry Potter, or Half-Life, or The Incredibles, and you need to fix it.’ And the people that fix it will be rewarded, and the people that don’t will be on the rubbish heap of history, or whatever the phrase is.”
Newell explained that Hollywood’s ideas for a Half-Life film were nothing short of dire.
“There was a whole bunch of meetings with people from Hollywood. Directors down there wanted to make a Half-Life movie and stuff, so they’d bring in a writer or some talent agency would bring in writers, and they would pitch us on their story. And their stories were just so bad,” he explained. “I mean, brutally, the worst. Not understanding what made the game a good game, or what made the property an interesting thing for people to be a fan of.
Since then, Valve has done a number of CG video shorts for Team Fortress 2, as a test of its movie-making capabilities. Newell told PC Gamer, “That’s when we started saying ‘Wow, the best thing we could ever do is to just not do this as a movie, or we’d have to make it ourselves.’ And I was like, ‘Make it ourselves? Well that’s impossible.’ But the Team Fortress 2 thing, the Meet The Team shorts, is us trying to explore that.”
From all indications, gamers looking for a Half-Life film starring Hugh Laurie should probably not hold their breath.
