Valve filed for Half-Life 3 trademark two days ago

One of the internet’s longest running gags is to trump up any unusual or mysterious event into a confirmation of Half-Life 3. Gamers have been waiting years for Valve to announce, or at least acknowledge the next chapter in the iconic first-person shooter. At long last there is a hint that something may finally be happening behind the scenes — Valve has quietly filed for a trademark on the name “Half-Life 3.”

Valve’s new trademark for “computer game software” was filed in Europe with the Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market (OHIM) on September 29th. There is not yet any trademark publically listed at the US Patent and Trademark Office.

Half-Life 2 was released way back in 2004 as a launch title on Valve’s Steam game service. The title garnered widespread praise for its effective storytelling and enjoyable combat. It was also a remarkable technical achievement — the game’s Source engine was incredibly advanced for the time, and has since been updated and deployed in many other games. Rather than follow up this success with Half Life 3, Valve released smaller “postscript” titles known as Half-Life 2: Episode One and Episode Two. Since EP2 in 2007, there has been no news on the fate of Gordon Freeman.

There are gamers out there getting in on the Half-Life 3 jokes who were too young to play the last installment when it came out. The fact that it has remained so prominent in the collective consciousness of the extremely fickle internet is a testament to the power these games have. Go ahead and say it with me now: “Half Life 3 confirmed!”