Quicker than you can say "boo" - assuming you elongate it out by a few hours - Valve followed up yesterday's TF2 comic with Scream Fortress, their fifth annual Halloween event. This time around it's the Payload Race map Hightower that's been spookified, turning it into the corpse-pushing Helltower. Also: there are skeletons, and the mercs have magic spellbooks now.

"Everybody gets a spellbook gifted to them automatically, which you can equip in your Action Slot in order to pick up and cast spells," explains the TF2 blog. "The team that wins the race will be granted a buff for the final climactic battle, where you will fight for the ultimate Halloween reward: Your own lives. And a reward."

Naturally, there are a bunch of items and achievements that can also be awarded, found and bought. Scream Fortress is live now, and will run the 11th November.

I like Team Fortress 2 but, at this point, I think I like Team Fortress 2 comics more. Luckily, one usually coincides with the other, meaning that everyone wins. At least, everyone except those traumatised veterans, huddled in their corner, muttering about how everything was better when this was just a patch of dust, and before fancy headwear meant that everybody looked fabulous. The next update will, inevitably, be the annual Halloween event. In preparation for that, here's a comic about some ghosts.

The TF2 blog isn't giving any hints as to what the update might contain, but - if I were to guess - I'd say a spooky 'Event' version of an existing map, and possibly some form of boss NPC. You know, like Valve have done every year. Personally, I'd quite like to see a return to the more subtle, ghostly presence of the very first Harvest event map, who's haunting I always preferred to the killable boss battles. It probably won't be that, though, what with the comic mentioning a portal to hell.

There's no timetable for the update's release. It's likely to be soon, though, because Halloween is only two days away.

As mentioned in yesterday's highly speculative Half-Life 3 news, people have been scurrying through Valve's project management database JIRA again. Now, NeoGAF user 'angular graphics' has posted the full list of Valve staff assigned to the still unconfirmed Half-Life 3 and Left 4 Dead 3 development teams. If nothing else, it's a rare glimpse into the company's internal working, and what happens to its employees after they're sworn to the Valve code of silence.

The Half-Life 3 team contains lead writer Marc Laidlaw, series composer Kelly Bailey (seemingly having returned to Valve after leaving in 2011), and series designer Steve Bond. It also lists Adam Foster, the creator of Minerva (as well as the Portal 2 announcement ARG). The other instantly recognisable name is Portal writer Erik Wolpaw, who appears on both Half-Life 3 and Left 4 Dead 3's lists.

If anything, the Left 4 Dead 3 team is the more surprising. It contains not only familiar Valve names like Chet Faliszek and composer Mike Morasky, but some of their more notable newer hires. Both Clint Hocking, of Far Cry 2 fame, and Doug Church, of System Shock 2 and Thief fame, are attached to the project. Now more than ever, I'm pretty damn excited about the possibility of shooting up some zombies.

Standard caveats still apply, the most notable of which is that we don't know how accurate this data is. At best, it could represent a single moment in time for each project, as Valve plays its endless game of musical chairs. And, of course, people working on a project is now indication of when that game might be announced.

Concept art source: ValveTime.net

Update: It seems as if we were duped. The trademark filing has since been removed, suggesting its initial listing was a hoax. Original story below.

Here's some small news about the obscure indie collective Valve, and their potential follow-up to cult hit Half-Life 2. The game/Steam/OS/virtual hat makers have filed a trademark for Half-Life 3 with the European Office For Harmonization In The Internal Market. Before you travel downtown to GIFtown, note that this doesn't really mean much beyond the fact that they've decided to protect the name Half-Life 3. In fact, perhaps the biggest news here is that, before this, Valve didn't have a trademark for Half-Life 3. Dammit folks, we could have made it ourselves!

The trademark (search "012180394" to see it for yourself) is categorised as "video game software", suggesting that Half-Life 3 could be a game, and not, say, an official Gordon Freeman announcer pack for Dota 2. Really, though, we're in the same place that we were previously: assuming that Half-Life 3 is being made, but not knowing anything beyond that.

That said, NeoGAF, who also discovered the trademark, did some digging around JIRA - Valve's internal tracking tool - and found a Half-Life 3 project group currently comprised of 46 people. They also noticed a Left 4 Dead 3 group containing 71 people. Again, it's by no means confirmation, but by all means treat yourself to a mini freak out.

Rounding out its set of living room-centric announcements this week, Steam Controller has been revealed by Valve, a 16-button, haptic-driven gamepad that Valve says is hackable, includes a touch screen, will feature sharable configurations, and has the ambitious goal of “supporting all games in the Steam catalog.” No price was announced for the controller, and it doesn't appear to feature motion control.
In place of analog sticks, Steam Controller features two circular, clickable trackpads. Valve claims that PC gamers “will appreciate that the Steam Controller’s resolution approaches that of a desktop mouse,” and goes as far to promise that the controller makes games that aren't traditionally suited to playing from the couch--RTSes, 4X games, simulations, and others--controller-friendly.

To compensate for the trackpads’ nature as less-tangible input devices than conventional analog sticks, Steam Controller includes “dual linear resonant actuators” that produce vibration. Valve adds that the controller can serve as a speaker. What seems to distinguish the Steam Controller’s square touch screen from other touch screens is click functionality. “Actions are not invoked by a simple touch, they instead require a click. This allows a player to touch the screen, browse available actions, and only then commit to the one they want,” Valve states in the announcement.

Although Valve was vague on how it plans to implement this policy, it emphasized the openness of the device. "We plan to make tools available that will enable users to participate in all aspects of the experience, from industrial design to electrical engineering. We can’t wait to see what you come up with," Valve says.



We'll await details on price, materials, and an opportunity to try Steam Controller ourselves soon. Snuck into the very end of the announcement is a mention of Steam Machines and SteamOS, the prototype of which Valve says it will share "detailed specs" of next week.

In the meantime, you can become eligible to beta test Steam Controller by following the same steps outlined for the Steam Machines beta.

By announcing SteamOS yesterday, Valve declared that PC gaming is more than desktop gaming, that Windows is not our master, and that—finally—cats can own Steam accounts. The free, Linux-based, cat-friendly operating system is designed for gaming on living room PCs, because PC gaming according to Valve isn't about WASD and DirectX—it's about openness and collaboration.

We're free to choose our hardware, our software, our mods, and soon more than ever, how we play, where we play, and whether or not Microsoft gets a cut. If SteamOS takes off, PC gaming will undergo one of its most dramatic changes ever—possibly one more significant than the introduction of the free-to-play model and crowdfunding. That's thrilling, but also scary as hell, so we've worked through our fears with a list of SteamOS pros and cons, followed by deep breaths in anticipation of tomorrow's announcement.

The Pros
 
It's free. If you have a living room PC, or plan to build one, you can ditch Windows for free. That feels really good to say, but the adoption rate hinges on SteamOS launching with native support for everything we want in a media and gaming center. Streaming games from a secondary PC is neat, but we'd rather run them natively on the machine we paid to put in our living room. It also needs native Netflix and Hulu apps, and all the other media services offered by the consoles.

Valve says it's got this covered, announcing that it's "working with many of the media services you know and love," and that "hundreds of great games are already running natively on SteamOS," with native "AAA titles" to be announced in the coming weeks.

It encourages competition in the console market. May the best Steam Box win! Windows isn't designed for TVs, so neither are many PCs. Now Valve is giving away a platform for games, movies, and music, challenging hardware manufacturers to make systems that are powerful, quiet, and inexpensive. It used to be Microsoft vs. Sony vs. Nintendo fighting for the top of the living room ecosystem's food chain—soon it may be Microsoft vs. Sony vs. Nintendo vs. Everyone.

It should run some games better. One of the few advantages consoles have over PCs (whether or not they always make the best of it) is an OS specifically designed for gaming. Meanwhile, we have Windows, which is clearly not designed to be an ideal gaming platform. With SteamOS, however, Valve claims it has "achieved significant performance increases in graphics processing," and is now working on "audio performance and reductions in input latency at the operating system level."

Last year, Valve posted a performance test of Left 4 Dead 2 running on Windows 7 and on Ubuntu, and the Linux build came out ahead, saying that the test "speak to the underlying efficiency of the kernel and OpenGL." This isn't close to being an objective experiment—and we'll look forward to making our own evaluations—but it is encouraging.

It means more Linux games, and more couch-friendly PC games. SteamOS is as much about ditching Windows as it is putting PC gaming in the living room, so it affects even those firmly planted in their desk chairs. If SteamOS achieves the install base it needs for developers big and small embrace Linux, the Microsoft shackles may be broken forever.

The Cons
 
Steam Boxes may struggle to compete in price. A PC designed to run SteamOS skips over the Windows fee, but unlike a console, the manufacturer can't rely on game licensing fees to recoup costs—that money goes to Valve. Sony and Microsoft, however, can price their consoles competitively with that revenue in mind, which gives them the advantage. Valve itself could price hardware this way, but that would undercut third-party hardware manufacturers and could turn out to be anti-competitive. Unless, of course, Valve makes the unlikely move to subsidize the cost of these systems.

It could increase development costs. Major game developers aren't going to ditch Windows, the platform with the world's largest install base. If SteamOS becomes a competitive gaming platform, competitive developers will have yet another version to make, soaking up more resources.

The pessimistic angle is that this can only result in either lower quality games or more expensive games. The optimistic angle is that SteamOS will be embraced and prioritized by developers with the same enthusiasm as the consoles.

It could further fragment games and smother certain genres. If SteamOS eclipses the popularity of desktop gaming, developers will have less incentive to develop desktop games. Just as developers rushed into mobile and Facebook development, we could see a flood of controller-based Steam games that push niche and classic-style PC games into the slums.

It's a scary thought, but when we un-jerk our knees and really consider this scenario, it's a very minor concern. Crowdfunding has proven without a doubt that there's still a huge appetite for old fashioned mouse and keyboard PC games. The positive—and more likely—angle is that we'll see just greater diversity in the Steam library.

It gives Valve even more power over PC gaming. Valve isn't PC gaming. We know that, and millions of League of Legends players, World of Tanks enthusiasts, GOG.com users, modders, and more know that. But Steam is the most popular digital distribution service, and soon, it will be a platform. SteamOS may be free, but it's only as open as Valve allows. We don't know yet if we can use SteamOS to play non-Steam games, or if Valve will make exclusivity deals. We've asked, and Valve's answer will be a huge indicator of its intentions.

If you've got a passionate thought about SteamOS, we'd love to include it in our next issue of PC Gamer. We're always listening at letters@pcgamer.com.

Following up on its enigmatic announcement-of-an-announcement last week, Valve has unveiled SteamOS, a free stand-alone operating system “for living room machines.”

The OS “combines the rock-solid architecture of Linux with a gaming experience built for the big screen,” according to the announcement. In-house streaming to a TV, similar to what’s used in Nvidia’s Shield, is a feature of the OS.

Valve also emphasizes SteamOS’s openness. Users can “can alter or replace any part of the software or hardware they want,” and hardware manufacturers are free to “iterate in the living room at a much faster pace,” setting it apart from console-style closed systems.

A vague component of the announcement is Valve’s claim to have “achieved significant performance increases in graphics processing” in SteamOS. Valve adds that it’s “now targeting audio performance and reductions in input latency at the operating system level.” It’s also unclear how many of the 3,000 games on Steam will run natively on SteamOS--Valve says you'll be able to "access the full Steam catalog" through in-home streaming. We're also curious how well the operating system will be suited to desktop PCs or laptops that aren’t used in the living room.

Check back on Wednesday for the second of three announcements expected from Valve this week.

Story by Tyler Wilde and Evan Lahti

I like to think that creators who've had their TF2 Steam Workshop items accepted into the game were alerted to the fact by an ominous rumbling from their monitor. Without warning, the screen gaped open, and a shower of money fired out. Would you like your own money shower? You can have one - assuming you possess the raw talent to create spooky virtual headgear from nothing - because Valve are now accepting Workshop submissions for their annual Team Fortress 2 Halloween event.

Normally at this point, I'd quote a relevant section from the developers' announcement post. As it's TF2, that's not going to work, because said post is full of lines like: "That man was Bruce Willis in the haunted house classic Die Hard, and it should teach you a valuable lesson about showing a little advance respect for Halloween." There are tangents all up in that blog, is what I'm trying to say.

To pick out the relevant details, all submissions must be tagged Halloween 2013 in the Workshop. As with other Halloween items, they'll only be wearable during the event and on full moons. Because of that, creators have more leeway to stretch the game's usual tonal restrictions.

It must be hard for the professional Steam traders. They're forced to work long hours, bartering for and upselling the best cards. They're not even allowed to take the smallest of breaks, lest they miss a chance to secure their future with a shiny foil Dale Earnhardt Jr. It's a stressful lifestyle, with only the promise of vast riches keeping them going. It'll be no small comfort for them to learn that Steam have introduced Trade Offers, a system that lets users send pre-packaged offers for their friends/business partners to accept, reject, or counter-propose.

The system lets you browse a friend's inventory, enter the trading screen, tailor the offer to your liking, and send it off as a proposal. Their are two major benefits to this system, as I see it:


Your friend can be offline while you're making a proposal.
People who don't care about trading cards will tell you to piss off less often when all they have to do is click a button marked "yeah, sure, whatever". Or whatever it's actually marked.


It's not just cards that can be traded. From my limited poking about, most Steam Inventory items can be offered up, including Team Fortress 2 bits. For now, offers are limited to people on your friends list. Valve say that may be extended in the future, although will always respect the privacy options in place for your Inventory.

Finally! For too long, Valve have tied their primary work - funny comics that are posted on the internet - to their hobby project, the computer game and dress-up toy Team Fortress 2. "Can we see the continued adventures of Saxton Hale, manpuncher?" we'd ask, only to be told that no, first we had to wait for a development team to code new maps, weapons, rule tweaks, and approximately 5,000 new hats.

Not any more, though. The multi-media wizards (and occasional game developers) have realised that not everything needs an accompanying piece of headgear, and have released the first part of a six issue TF2 comic saga, sans update.

Well, sort of. A small update has slipped out, in recognition of Team Fortress's 17th birthday. It adds "Rome-vision" sharing, allowing anyone playing an MvM server with an owner of the Hardy Laurel to opt-in to mechanical history. Chemistry sets have also been added. They sound weird, so I'm going to let the TF2 Wiki do the heavy describing.

As for the comic series, it's planned for bi-monthly release. You can read the first part here.