got all 3 consoles. couldnt care less about valve and their mediocre games - boring, tired ideas. sony have no room for em - by the looks of it most 360 owners have turned their backs on em - left for dead boycott lol.
their are a dead man walking from where im standing

yeah yeah, gabe Newell hates sony full stop, he made his money working for microsoft years ago and still has some BS loyalty, its just lazy if a developer cant develop for all platforms these days, valve are not some tin pot company, even if they didnt want to build the game they could get someone to do a good port of the game, just lazy,

It's not lazy.

Why should they spend (a lot of) time and money on a port for just one platform?

Are the rewards worth it?

No valve, please don't make games for the PS3. It's more cost effective for me to download them for my PC! Hey, if developers want to be lazy, then so can I, right?

Morne

Simple fact: Developers have a responsibility to entertain people as much as they have a responsibility to make money.

They exist to do both and avoiding an entire mainstream console is pretty sad. To brag about it even sadder.

May just sign that stupid petition now...

No. It's their job to make money by making entertainment. If it's going to cost them too much to make something for too small an audience then they are within their rights not to cater for them.

It's like saying music acts should do small towns as well as cities when touring because they have a responsibility to be available to more people locally.

Developers have no "responsibility" to entertain anyone.
And before you all gang up on Valve, they are hardly the first ones who have expressed the same thought, that they dislike working on the PS3 because of it's arcane design. Kazuo Hirai has even admitted that the system is hard to design for, but that they preferred it that way.
I would also argue that (In general) titles designed for one platform are generally superior to those designed for all 3, if for no other reason than resources that should be used to polish one game instead have to be stretched to barely complete 3. There are exceptions, like the GTA franchise, but let us all remember that that didn't start out multi-platform. There are more complex reasons why multiple platform releases can suffer, but they get increasingly more esoteric and subjective from this point.
And even if you dislike Valve's games, you shouldn't cheer them not coming to your chosen platform - only a fool could deny the commercial success of Valve's games, and while we could get into a "Success doesn't equal great" debate, at the end of the day the more highly successful, wildly acclaimed AAA titles your platform has, the better it stands. To claim that the PS3 has "No room" for the likes of Sony is silly.

Erm. Replace that last Sony with Valve, and insert a smattering of paragraph breaks. It's too early in the morning.

Plenty of other developers are doing fine working on the PS3. If Valve wants to pass, fine, I'll pass on Valve.

Don't worry about the errors, you're still not looking the stupidest here by a long shot.

As far as developers go, Valve is one of the very best. They aren't controlled by a publisher breathing down their neck, and as such, they are able to truly perfect their art and have made what many consider to be the greatest game of all time with the highest metacritic rating. Valve is primarily a PC developer. The only reason they even cross platform to the 360 is because it's extraordinarily easy to do so when building a PC game. Open your ears, there are FAR more developers other than Valve who say the PS3 dev platform sucks, it's just that Valve doesn't have to worry about pissing off a publisher who has games for multiple platforms, so they actually get to say what other people are thinking. I'm 90% positive that most PS3 development decisions come from a publisher, NOT the developer coders. All you haters – before you open your mouths, make sure you have a faint idea on the subject matter before posting.

What a crock...its just lazy and short sighted of them .. while they have produced some fantastic games mainly on the PC maybe they are just too comftable and not talented enough to delove on the next gen consoles..

Imagine if all developers didnt bother because it was too hard we would all still be playing games like space invaders, jet set willy and pacman..

Of course its harder to develop for its new , it takes a few years to developers to get to grips with new consoles..

"No. It's their job to make money by making entertainment."

You may say that as much as you like, but few enter the games industry to be like that. Most developers go to work because they want to make games, and great games.

Your opinion is particularly weak in regards to Valve, a company which has hired a huge number of bedroom devs in, because they showed their desire to make the game.

Valve would still be going absolutely fine if it just made money. But it is 'Valve' because of WHAT it has made.

"If it's going to cost them too much to make something for too small an audience then they are within their rights not to cater for them."

They never mentioned costs. If they did they would have to admit they'd expect a return. This is about the upper eschelons at Valve BEING BOTHERED about making games for more people.

"It's like saying music acts should do small towns as well as cities when touring because they have a responsibility to be available to more people locally."

lol

There's a difference between something being "new" and being "well designed". They aren't even on the same axis. Something can be new or old, and well designed or not. That the PS3 is "new" isn't the issue, developers adapt to new hardware all the time. The issue is that many devs feel that the PS3 is just poorly designed from a development perspective. For example, to quote Jason Booth, one of the Rock Band devs, "Sony let their hardware be designed by a comity of business interests rather than a well thought out design that would serve the game development community". Or to quote Sony's own Kazuo Hirai, "We don't provide the 'easy to program for' console that [developers] want, because 'easy to program for' means that anybody will be able to take advantage of pretty much what the hardware can do".

I'm not saying that the PS3 can't have good games developed for it, because obviously it has, but if a publisher (who has, in the past, published on the platform) looks at their sales, weighs the difficulty of development on the platform verses potential gains, and decides that it isn't worth their time... Well, that's their business. But it shouldn't be celebrated.

Like I said, if you don't know what you're talking about, don't open your mouth little one. TALENT and PLATFORM DECISIONS are separate things. You mean to tell me the same coders who made one of the most versatile, scalable, and modular of game engines are LAZY? PLEASE. Get this through your head: Valve is a PC developer, and the ONLY reason they are in the console space at ALL is because it is easy for them to move PC content to the 360. If it wasn't, I doubt they'd be cross developing at all, because what they care about is the PC. Think about this: they farmed out a PS3 port before, which technically could be compared to hiring more people on as a PS3 port team. The difference is that the port turned out crappy. The obvious solution to that is to have some of the core coders do the work, but that would of course turn focus away from the coding for all their other 6 IPs. No offense, but I'd much rather have them working on great new revolutionary games than worrying about spending lots of extra time getting their PS3 ports right. The day that happens is the day Valve sells out and becomes like every other money grubber. I've said it once and I'll say it again: Valve is a PC developer. If 360 owners are lucky enough to have Valve throw them a bone, good for them.

There's something you need to think about here: the people that make great games are artists and visionaries. The better tools they have to create their works of art, the better the works of art become, because time is spent creating their visions rather than figuring out technical issues or ways to work around roadblocks. As of right now, the entire game industry has been focused on advancing technology. You can think of it as "upgrading", or you can think of it as getting rid of roadblocks and limitations. Anything that requires MORE work without an immediate exclusive benefit is only a step backwards. I have not had first hand experience in developing for the PS3, but I KNOW that there are a plethora of experienced core engine coders out there that heavily denounce the PS3 architecture design decisions. PS3 has become the Apple of the console world. If there was some immediate benefit to the hard work (other than a wider audience that is), I'm sure they'd put the extra time in. Otherwise, WHY? What's the incentive, to please Sony fanboys? Gabe Newell is EXACTLY right.

"You may say that as much as you like, but few enter the games industry to be like that. Most developers go to work because they want to make games, and great games."

But the people who work out how many man-hours and financial cost of converting to the the PS3 on top of making a game do think of these things. If they don't, they go bust.

I love my job, but given the choice of working on a game with room for creativity vs. working on a game and then trying to get trivial stuff working on another platform in overtime ...then guess which I'd pick

"They never mentioned costs. If they did they would have to admit they'd expect a return. This is about the upper eschelons at Valve BEING BOTHERED about making games for more people."

If it was worth their while then they would make a PS3 version. It's the only reason they make 360 stuff.

I think Sony will only prove their critics right when their next console generation is much more in line with the standard development platform, answering the call of the developers themselves (Valve only being one of many). We've already seen Sony go from 1st place into 3rd in this next generation family (and before anyone tries to refute that, please remember that ignorance doesn't help your credibility). Aside from the hardware price difference, I think the development environment is the main reason for their issues and why their exclusive titles are dropping like flies. This past E3 just drove that last nail in and proved that point.

The PS3 being hard to develop on is not an entirely unintended effect, it was a business model gamble on sony's part. The idea was that if they were able to take a majority of the market share, as they did with the PS2, people would have to develop for the PS3 no matter how convoluted it was just because of the shear number of machines out there verses any other brand. Investing so much time working on the PS3 versions of games developers would be less likely to port it over to other consoles. Then the desired cycle begins. A few exclusive AAA titles more than the competition leads to more market share which leads to more exclusive titles...until the competition is eliminated. Given the ps2's success, this is not such an outrageous idea. However it didn't work out that way. Now you have a console in 3rd that developers would rather not have to put a relatively high amount of resources and time into if they could avoid it. So now the cycle starts to work in the opposite direction. A few AAA titles don't come out on your system market share drops, a few more companies drop PS3 support market share drops some more....you are in big trouble. It was a gamble that would seem to be a good one in the planning stages given the track record of the PS2 and first XBOX. but XBOX 360came out a year sooner, the PS3 was expensive and in short supply for way too long and the XBOX 360 was a sweet machine (except for the RROD).

Yeah because people are screaming for a sequel LESS THAN A YEAR after the original.

Taking their time with the PS3 will do everyone a favour.

Fact is, the source engine is old and was not built for something like a PS3, I reckon this has more to do with it than anything else.

"Yeah because people are screaming for a sequel LESS THAN A YEAR after the original. "

The reason they are doing a sequel is because xbox live updates technically don't work so great for the amount of content they would want to put on.

That was the most viable option for them. Just releasing on the PC would have short-changed the 360 owners (as we see with TF2). This is no different to their opinion of ignoring the PS3.

"the source engine is old and was not built for something like a PS3"

I kind of agree with this. It can be done but it's just not worth it for them. It would be a lot of work, take a lot of people and cost a lot of money for little reward.

Same for them trying to get stuff to work on the Wii or Mac.

"Taking their time with the PS3 will do everyone a favour. "

How???

Oh, so a sequel is required because of xbox live? I thought the only reason they did xbox 360 ports was cuz it's easy to port to.

I don't think they're going to do ANY ps3 titles, honestly. I firmly believe Valve is in Microsoft's pocket. Just because MS doesn't OWN the company doesn't mean they won't show them priority over other software houses, and in fact, MS has done it before. There's a REASON MS lost an anti-trust lawsuit.

Xbox has crappy hardware. And I say that just by the failure rate percentages, if a car had those kinds of failure rated, it'd be recalled entirely. But yet, MS keeps the xbox 360 on the market still. The reason it sold more, is because it is CHEAPER. The steep price tag of the PS3 is VERY daunting, especially in this economy. As far as this year's E3 being a nail in the coffin for Sony, that's a bunch of BS pure and simple. The ps3 motion controller and the project natal thing are both NOT CURRENTLY ON SALE, ANYWHERE. So, any technical limitations are at this point unknown. MS or Sony most definitely aren't going to point out negatives to their awesome products in development. All I can say is I'd like to see the finished product, then I'll weigh in on them.

You guys are hilarious.

I think Valve can afford to not have to be in anyone's pocket. It's not like they stop their games being imported ...they do let EA make PS3 versions.

When it boils down to it the 360 was designed by software engineers for software engineers. The kit is a joy to use. The hardware was carefully thought out for good balance and access (minus complete overheated death). The tools are the same or similar to what PC developers use.

The PS3 was designed by hardware manufactures. Parts that existed or were being designed independently were brought together to make it. It's unbalanced and the hardware doesn't work in unison (massive Cell power but weak GPU to actually get it on screen, memory not unified, etc) The devkit is alright but not a joy.

The PS3 can theoretically do more. But at the moment it takes so much work just to get it to do what the 360 can do in a fraction of the time, never mind surpass it, that you start to wonder if it's worth the effort.

Valve have made their decision.

Imported? I meant converted :P

Must have ghostbusters on my mind.

That's all fine. I'll do the PS3 port if you want to outsource to us.

Calling Dev`s "Lazy" for not coding for PS3 is about as stupid as calling Fiat lazy for not making big off road cars. Its not about motivation, its about finance and strategy.

You people have *no* idea what you are talking about. There are bacteria that live in a developers gut which have a bigger IQ than you morons.

Try going back to the "my **** is bigger than yours" arguments - you guys are *much* better at those.

Valve, MS, Sony, etc....are all driven by a dynamic set of factors. One can't pick a single factor as the cause of why this or that happens, you can make logical guesses as to why something "happened" but this is hind-site.
I'm not a genius, nor an ignorant fool..I don't have all the facts "no one really does", but I do have my own gut feelings that are based on my own personal experiences.
Many of our judgment calls are wrong, it is a learning process because we can't learn without making mistakes, and as humans we are gifted with making lots and lots of mistakes, which in turn leads to lots and lots of success.

I have said all of this so that my opinion and those of the others might be looked at from outside one's self.

As far as "my opinion" on the issue of Valve not porting to the PS3, well, who knows maybe all the consoles will go the way of the zip drive, after all they are just specialized computers.

Posting in a legendary thread.

This decision is cold, hard business logic derived from Valve's particular set of circumstances. Any attempt to portray it as some kind of anti-Sony bias or ex-MS dev conspiracy theory is daft.

Keep the nonsense coming though, it IS entertaining.

I can see a lot of similarities with the PS3 to the Sega Saturn. Both of them coming off the back of a very successful console in the previous generation, both of them coming in at a premium price tag, and both having relatively complex hardware that the vast majority of developers are not comfortable with. More to the point, both facing competition from a cheaper, simpler platform with a great library of games and a lot of momentum.

We see the same at work - the PS3s are just much more of a pain to develop for - Xboxes you can run code on with one button press, PS3s use the arcane target manager. Xbox devkits are not much larger than normal ones, PS3 devkits are the size of a server rack. They're relatively minor things that make us, as developers much more likely to run our code on Xboxes rather than PS3s.

PS3s are undeniably harder to code for, Valve are mainly a PC developer, it makes sense really.

I think it is quite obvious that valve is either lazy or not skilled enough to develop for the pc. All I can see here is comments saying " they are a pc developer" or "it is just easier to develop for the xbox" or whatever. If this is the case why are we going forward at all? Why didnt we just stop at Nintendo 64. I mean that was pretty easy to develop for right?