Valve skips PlayStation to avoid “stepchild version”, says Lombardi

Ok, thanks for that Valve.

The PS3 version of Orange Box scored 89 on Metacritic. That’s hardly ‘nowhere near’ the other versions!

Joystiq seems to be reporting the same story in completely the opposite light to CVG:

http://www.joystiq.com/2009/07/02/valve-up-on-idea-of-ps3-development-waiting-to-build-talented/

From the tone of what he said it doesn’t sound like he’s ‘up on the idea of PS3 development’. He says they can’t do it unless they have a dedicated team, but doesn’t actually say that they are hiring a dedicated team.

Armitage—- Interesting how the P.O.V of the people reporting completely change the meaning of the article, eh? Jem Alexander of Joystiq has always been a PS3 fangirl, while (I may be wrong but)Patrick here has never shown a particular bias towards the PS3 during my time reading here.

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@blerk

Joystiq: When asked whether Valve is actively seeking to hire PS3 developers, he noted that “Valve is always looking to hire people. So yeah, definitely.”

In that interview they seem to be explaining more why they aren’t developing for PS3 at this time. But that they are looking to putt together a team who will do this in future.
Not that they never want to do it.

@Blerk

The “up on the idea” thing was in quotes, so make of that what you will. Still, him then saying “we have to get people under our roof who are dedicated, talented PS3 guys and then all bets are off”, I don’t know, doesn’t sound like Valve is exactly ruling out all PS3 development ever to me.

Well, no. But it doesn’t sound like they’re actively pursuing them either.

It seems odd to me to stop doing the outsourced versions for the platforms they’re not geared up to support. If they’re worried about the quality not matching up, why not just pay more attention to the studios doing the port?

I dont’ know but maybe because that choice it’s up to the publisher

It doesn’t sound like they’re actively pursuing them? When asked that question he said “Valve is always looking to hire people. So yeah, definitely.”

Why are we confused by this? This is why Valve has brought crappy ports to the PS3:

http://news.teamxbox.com/xbox/12568/Gabe-Newell-PlayStation-3-Is-a-Total-Disaster/

Remember that?

Now that Sony is proving Gabe wrong, Valve has no choice but to begin to think about ways to make more money. Valve will eventually come around but first they have to restructure the direction that Gabe was taking them.

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A bit silly really imo.
I mean PS3 has 2 thirds install base so it would surely make sense to be developing for both at present.

@Armitage: But that sounds like a general “yeah, sometimes we hire people” rather than a “at the minute we’re working hard to put together a kick-arse PS3 team”.

Valve aren’t short of a few bob, I don’t think they need to do something they can’t be arsed to do and PS3 development appears to fall into that category.

@Blerk

Yeah fair enough.

I wonder if Sony has ever thought about treating its studios as outsourcing studios for third parties.

Maybe Sony Santa Monica could work on L4D after they’ve done God Of War.

L4D + Blades of Chaos = Immersion

I wonder if you were a PS3 developer and applied to Valve they’d treat you like some sort of social leper.

I don’t think Valve are coming round the the PS3 at all and it seems he only said it to show that their is no real bias with him. Valve are rich, silly rich actually. They are a private company and one of the largest digital retailers in the world. I don’t think we’ll see them on the PS3 tbh.

Valve may not, but EA might dev Valve games in house for PS3 as they’re the pubs of some of the games.

Who really cares though…just get the Valve games on PC if they don’t come to PS3.

Nvm, ignore this post. It was a bit of a rant, I’ve edited it away, apologies.

There is no such thing as a company being so rich that they’ll ignore obvious and feasible ways to get richer. No human institution says “we’ve got enough money now, let’s chill out now and relax”.

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@ TheTwelve
Patric did show a lot of bias article in the past.

about Valve
Valve = laziness.

Supporting another platform is always a risk, you can’t just say that they’re being ‘lazy’. They’d have to put a whole bunch of extra money into hiring a team, doing the ports, etc. with no guarantee that people will actually buy the end product. Their titles sell to a particular hardcore audience, so perhaps their thinking is that the percentage of that potential audience who only own a PS3 is likely to be quite low. Given that porting to an entirely different architecture is likely to be non-trivial, is it really worth the risk?

Blerk, I really don’t think it’s impartial to interpret it either way.

They are interested in hiring people in general; people with experience on PS3 come into that, but until they have a team who can produce an equally great game on the platform, they aren’t interested in supporting the PS3 at all.

They aren’t exactly the only developer on that PC/Xbox360 boat.

Lazy, incompetent arses!

You may laugh Patrick, but god damn those guys are lazy! I am right, becuase it has been a good two years since episode 2, and it’s taking ages not becuase it’s quality, but becuase they’re lazy. I KNOW that. It’s the truth, forever.

That’s all.

Rofl-copter: No_Puding they are not lazy they just take their time with development same as Blizzard take their time. Just look at Starcraft 2 development or diablo 3 development.

Valve are a PC developer first console developer second. The only reason they even have put valve games on the 360 is cause its simaler in programing language to the PC. If the 360 didn’t have that similarity you can bet your ass Valve wouldn’t bother. Fact is they make more than enough money to be dicks about what format they develop on.

They are dicks not lazy.

Valve are 360 fanboys with a history of anti-PS3 rants. Should we expect anything else from them? Do we have to hear about it every time they whine about PlayStation?

I was joking, but whatever you too.

Cort- I agree

Well they’ve stated they’re looking to hire PS3 developers. That they are “up on the idea” of PS3 development. Sounds like they are looking to develop games for the PS3 at some point.

Ah nvm

No_PUDing I would rofl but I can’t find the joke.

That’s becuase joke has two definitions.

One of which is funny, the other is not so much, just means someone is not serious.

I believe Valve were supposed to be hiring people for a PS3 team, as well as a Linux team, nothing seems to have come of either though. And it doesn’t help that Left 4 Dead was really rather shit on the 360 compared the vastly superior PC version too (look up comparisons, please don’t just take my word for it).

I don’t think Valve can do consoles period looking at TF2 (EA did it for the PS3) and how far behind it is, and how poor the L4D port is. I think that Microsoft just threw them a big bag of money and they’re trying, but that they don’t give much of a damn about any console out there is painfully transparent.

Valve have, are, and always will be a PC-first developer.

The only reason we get stories like this is because Sony hasn’t offered any financial encouragement yet. Look at Bethesda as an example of this model; they went on about how impossible it was to do DLC on the PS3, about the limitations of hardware, the way the RAM was split, and any other ludicrous idea they could come up with.

I pointed out how ludicrous this was at the time and that their motivations weren’t at all related to PS3 development difficulties, if anyone cares to remember. So a bit o an ‘I told you so’ there. But I digress…

The fact of the matter is, anyone can buy an effort, and that’s what the 360 ports are, albeit an incredibly poor effort. Valve will probably find a magical way to suddenly develop for the PS3 too if they’re encouraged enough, because money talks after all.

But really, even if they did, it’s only going to be a shallow, poorly ported excuse of a game anyway.

TL;DR: If you want to play anything developed by Valve, you’re going to need a Personal Computer, of either the desktop or laptop variety.

About Bethesda… erm, what? I don’t remember that, all I remember is Bethesda outright saying Microsoft had paid them money to keep DLC on the PC/360.

@Razor (despite me being about a day late) EA only distribute the physical product for valve, they own no right to any part of Valve or its games.