Valve is a bit of an enigma in the PC gaming industry.  As developers, their track record is nearly flawless, they created Steam, the most important method of game distribution on the PC, and through Steam, they have become uniquely able to profit off their competitors’ products.

And they’re beginning to piss me off.

It began in February 2006, when Valve announced  that they would be hopping on the episodic gaming bandwagon.  My anger wasn’t targeted at Valve specifically, but toward the idea of episodic content that was being pushed by Valve, Telltale, and the guys behind Penny Arcade Adventures and Sin Episodes (yes, I know they’re different devs).  I continue to maintain that episodic content wrings consumers out of more money than they’d be paying for a full game.  Three Half-Life 2 episodes, for example, cost $60, excluding the tax on three different games, as opposed to $50 for a game of around the same length as the episodes.

As if this weren’t irritating enough, Valve has completely botched the concept.  Episodes were meant to be released every 6 months to a year – already a long time for about 6 hours of gaming – but Valve has lengthened that cycle.  Episode 2 came out a year and four months after Episode 1, in October 2007, and as of today, it’s been just over two years since the release of Episode 2.  Episode 3 is predicted to come out in 2010, but by the time of its release, it will have been (HOPEFULLY) two and a half years since Episode 2.  Stellar.

Left 4 Dead left a sour taste in the mouths of many people.  It was one of the most highly-anticipated games of the year, but given its function as mainly a multiplayer game, it fell ever so slightly on its face.  Though the included campaigns were long, the depressingly low number included resulted in the game getting very old, very fast.  Of course, gamers were promised DLC to a degree similar to that of Team Fortress 2, so no one complained too much.

The server browser on the PC side was also a significant flaw.  PC gamers have long been used to a server browser displaying a vast list of different games to choose from.  In Left 4 Dead, Valve (or Turtle Rock, depending on how you want to look at it), incorporating the same matchmaking system used on consoles.  Players could join games their friends were in, but not create private servers or selectively pick a game.  Dedicated servers were also a no-no.

Insult to injury was given when Valve announced Left 4 Dead 2, which will be coming out around a month after this is posted.  It will be coming out only a year after Left 4 Dead, a game which, had it been given the DLC treatment it was promised, would still have a vibrant multiplayer scene.  Instead, in the year it’s been out, Left 4 Dead has seen one addition: a campaign half the length of the ones included in the release copy.  Apparently, the devs deemed it a better investment to work on a second Left 4 Dead than to add that content to the original, as was arguably promised.