Update: Though Valve’s website did go down, and their email page is still blank, there no evidence that it was the website https://valve.software/ responsible for the attack. This website was discovered to have been around as early as 2015. However, it was mostly an homage/parody site that did not comment in anyway on Valve or their practices. It was not until September of 2017 that it took the aggressive tone it now has. We are still seeking details from either Valve or the parody site.

Early this morning, Valve’s primary website – http://www.valvesoftware.com/ – was taken down by a possible cyber-attack. Instead of the usual greeting, the webpage was replaced by a blank “Forbidden” page. All other pages connected to the main site – such as the Jobs and News pages – provided the same response. Following the take down of Valve’s homepage, a new website appeared – https://valve.software/ –  that criticized and satirized Valve.

The false homepage opens to one of the most famous songs from Half-Life 2 – “Triage at Dawn” – and features a crossed out Half-Life 3 symbol. It appears nearly identical to the actual homepage, with all of the links correctly working and redirecting to Valve’s actual pages, but the rest of the page is a stark criticism of the company.

The attack on Valve varies from accusing them of having off-shore banking accounts to stating that Valve is only looking for the best people “to make our company the most money”. The rest of the content of the site crosses out statements by Valve to replace them with condemnations of the direction Valve has taken in recent years.

Valve’s homepage has returned since it was taken down; however, the email page for Valve – which famously listed all of the internal emails for the company – still directs to an entirely blank page – http://www.valvesoftware.com/email.php. The contact page now lists only generic contact information for services. It is uncertain if Valve is intentionally leaving this page down after the attack or if they have not recovered it yet.

This scandal follows the headlines that three Half-Life writers have made this year. Writer Marc Laidlaw, perhaps the most important writer to the franchise, wrote a lengthy piece on his blog titled Epistle 3, which many believe is the background for what would have been Half-Life 3, published perhaps with the knowledge that it would never come to be. Preceding that were the departures of both Chet Faliszek and Erik Wolpaw from Valve, meaning the entire creative mind of the series and Half-Life 3 has been dismantled.

Though the attack was unexpected, it is no surprise. Many fans of the series have been extremely vocal about Valve’s departure from gaming and have criticized the company in recent years for abandoning the Half-Life series and instead focusing on their Steam marketplace. As of last year, Steam owned 41% of the total market for releases and distribution, beating all releases for console and handheld devices combined.

At this time, Steam has no comment on the attack or of the new site that has appeared. We will update as we know more.