Avid Valve fan and collector David McGreavy just shared a huge collection of never-before-seen concepts for Half-Life 2: Episode Three and other unreleased Valve projects as part of its effort to preserve this history for the future.
Over a decade ago, Valve started releasing smaller episodic sequels icon of 2004 Half life 2. These shorter, standalone games continued the story of Gordon Freeman and the human resistance against interdimensional invaders, with the idea that Valve could develop and release them at a faster pace. 15 years after his release Second Episode, looks like that plan didn’t work, and the long-awaited third episode will probably never see the light of day. But at least we have these never-before-seen pieces of concept art to look at as we wonder what might have been.
David McGreavy is a longtime producer at 2K, but in his spare time, he collects Valve merchandise, artwork, and other pieces. He has amassed one of the largest Valve collections that I know of, and has sources among current and former Valve employees, allowing him access to things not usually available to the general public. A few months ago he bullied that he took a ton of Valve concept art and was working on scanning it so it could be shared online.
now, he is finally releasing some of the first scansand although he is not quite satisfied with the quality, he still agreed to share the artwork with her my box and helped to explain what is what. According to McGreavy, the art comes courtesy of a former Valve employee who was looking to “downsize” their collection of swag and other Valve-related artifacts.
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The most interesting work of art for Half a life fans is likely to be the concept art of Half life 2 villain Dr. Breen as an alien worm. This plot point – that the once human Breen would turn into an alien worm after his death in half life 2 –was first confirmed in former Valve writer Marc Laidlaw’s book.Letter 3.” This was a rough outline of the plot Laidlaw was released in 2017 that showed what The third episodeHis story could be before he left the company. And now we have our first good look at BreenGrub.
Other artwork released by McGreavy involves more concept art Half-Life 2: Episode Threeshowing a ruined coastline covered in rusted boats and debris.
Interestingly, McGreavy told me that the two pieces of art showing Dog and Alyx are not from The third episode, but were part of a short-lived attempt to build a game around the two seemingly separated by The third episode or Half life 3.
Also worth noting is a concept for the unreleased space game Valve was working on back in the day, called Blood stars. While we’ve learned a bit more about that project over the years, it’s still a mystery what it would have been and how far Valve had gotten into it. Just another unfinished project to throw in the pile.
While we have see some concept art of The third episode in the past, it’s still nice to see more of what might have been. We know Valve tried to do too much Half a life games after the release of the first two episodes and ahead of the 2020 VR-focused release Half Life: Alyx. Based on information that came out in 2020, Valve had at least four or five different ones Half a life projects of various sizes under development between 2010 and 2017.
So it makes sense that there should be even more concept art for all these different, canceled games out there, probably buried in old hard drives or boxes in Valve’s basement. And hopefully fans and collectors like McGreavy can help bring more of this stuff out of the shadows, preserving it for the future. Fans may not have to wait too long for more, as McGreavy tells me there’s more Half a life concept art to share. In fact, he claims to have released only half of what he has so far.
“I’m a lover of physical goods,” McGreavy said. “But I’m really looking to digitally preserve, catalog and inventory all Valve items available on the market, as well as employees/internals, to whatever extent I can.”