Well... didn't see this one coming.

    Yeah, distribution only. Lots of people are freaking out unnecessarily.

    I was surprised by this, though; I don't know who else remembers but Activision and Valve had signed a multi-title deal a while back, the first release being Day of Defeat. I had just assumed that would hold up when Valve shipped new retail copies of HL2 after the Vivendi split, and I think a lot of other people did, too (I saw lots of forum posts where people just assumed ATVI distribution). Wonder if EA just offered up a metric fuckton of moneyhats or something.

    Who knows, maybe that ATVI deal still stands for other projects and Valve is working with multiple publishers. Independents have that luxury.

    Quote from Section_Ei8ht

    Man, I was voting for Activision or THQ. wtf.

    Well....it kinda makes sense for Valve to go with EA for the physical retail distribution.

    1) EA probably is giving Valve more $$$ than either Activision or THQ would have

    2) EA has the strongest sales force in the industry...and the widest international reach where penetration of broadband (and hence, Steam) is lowest

    Both of which would result in the maximum $$$ for Valve. As for the ATVI-Valve deal on Day of Defeat, I think that was a one product deal for just that iteration of DoD.

    What's interesting is that HL2 might be the first major M-rated game EA ha signed or internally developed. Anyone else remember any M-rated EA games?

    Quote from User Err0r

    and an annoyingly long ea logo when you start any future valve games...

    Which you can never skip.... Also to the general idiotic public it shall now be known as "EA's Half-Life2" Just like "EA's new BF2"...................makes me sad

    Quote from Mazy

    That's how it always starts. Then later theres running and screaming!

    you now this is how CS became lame LOL Valve starts to help them in beta 5/6 and then buys them out by version 1.0 and then ruins it. Its all coming to an end.

    EA in-house development studio /= External development studio

    And as previously mentioned, this is distrubution only, it doesn't have any influence on the development of a Valve title. Another smart move by Valve though, first they fuck over Vivendi by selling HL2 via Steam and now they got a deal with the fiscally strongest player in the business right now for selling a few more copies of their games.

    I'm wondering if this partnership has any consequences for the distribution of future Valve titles though...

    Seems like a good deal for Valve; now they both got Steam and the worlds biggest publisher. If however this includes EA logo videos playing everytime you start a Valve game, then it suck big time.

    Quote from wacko

    you now this is how CS became lame LOL Valve starts to help them in beta 5/6 and then buys them out by version 1.0 and then ruins it. Its all coming to an end.

    Was it not just Barking Dog who helped them with those betas?

    Yay, future HL2 buyers have to wait for 35minutes everytime they start HL2 for that FUCKING EA logo to stop boasting, I was just wondering, was it EA that gave Valve the money hats or was it Valve who gave EA something, like perhaps the right to publish games through Steam, hmm :roll:

    Either way, you don't trust rapist even if he gives you a wad of dollars, he is still going to fuck you in the ass, nuff said.

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