Still, this blog post does offer some closure to the plight of Gordon Freeman, and what happened to him after the events of Episode II. Half Life 2: Episode 3 was never released, and over time people eventually just started referring to it as Half-Life 3 - assuming that Valve was working on a fully-fledged sequel rather than a. Valve didn’t like the way the game was shaping up and revamped it with the bright, stylized cartoon feel that still remains today. Valve was never shy about revamping aspects of a game’s plot to make it flow better Tem Fortress 2 was originally a realistic (as realistic as you can get in the early 2000s, anyway) game with standard military gear and uniforms. It’s also not clear if this blog post represents the final form of H元’s story, or just where Laidlaw was in the creative process when the game was effectively put on ice. Whether the long-term plan was to create future HL games based around a new protagonist or not is something we’ll never know. The company promised it would be the last in a trilogy that would conclude by Christmas of 2007. As Laidlaw writes: “Except no further correspondence from me regarding these matters this is my final episode.” It was May 24, 2006, when Valve said the third Half-Life 2 episode was in development. The ending is surprisingly grim and its outcome was apparently meant to be the effective end to Gordon Freeman’s adventures. The Borealis, as seen in Episode II of Half-Life But the Combine has its own reason for seeking the craft - and it’s not just to keep humans from possessing it. As implied by the end of Episode II, Episode III would’ve focused on the search for the Borealis, a vessel that could hold the key to allowing the Resistance (the group of humans and Vortigaunts fighting back against the Combine) to push the Combine off of Earth. I don’t want to spoil the story, so I’ll keep my remarks general. I do first apologize for the wait, and that done, hasten to finally explain (albeit briefly, quickly, and in very little detail) events following those described in my previous game (referred to herewith as Episode 2). In the time since, I have been able to think occasionally about how best to describe the intervening years, my years of silence. This was the case until eighteen months ago, when I experienced a critical change in my circumstances, and was redeposited on these shores. I can hear your complaint already, “Gordon Freeman, we have not heard from you in ages!” Well, if you care to hear excuses, I have plenty, the greatest of them being I’ve been in other dimensions and whatnot, unable to reach you by the usual means.