Ex-Valve writer says he wouldn’t touch Half-Life again “with a 10-foot pole”

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Chet Faliszek, a former writer at Valve, has stated he has no desire to work on another Half-Life game, saying he would actively avoid the series.

These remarks were taken from a video posted on Faliszek’s YouTube channel on May 15th. In the video, he talked about the difficulties of writing follow-up stories and managing the long history and details connected to franchises such as Half-Life.

Chet Faliszek says sequel lore is a “disaster nightmare”

The conversation started when a viewer commented that creating a theoretical Half-Life 3 would be surprisingly simple. This led Faliszek to share his own insights from his time working at Valve.

During a conversation about past discussions regarding the backstory of Half-Life 2: Episode Two, Faliszek made it clear he wasn’t hinting at any future plans for the series.

Honestly, I was hoping for another sequel or spin-off, but he’s said that he’s really not interested in going back to those old worlds anymore. He’s just not finding them creatively inspiring, which is a little disappointing, but I respect that he wants to do something new!

Faliszek said he generally avoids working with things that already have established stories or histories behind them.

Honestly, I’m starting to get a little scared of long-running game series. All that backstory and established lore can be overwhelming! It reminds me of a conversation I had years ago with some devs at Bungie – they were already dealing with a huge amount of lore in their games, and it sounded like a real challenge. Now, with franchises building up decades of canon, it feels like it’s only getting worse.

“I don’t know that much lore about my own life, let alone your games,” he added.

Faliszek later said making sequels was a terrible experience he’d never want to repeat, and he specifically didn’t want to work on another Half-Life game.

He stated he wanted absolutely nothing to do with it, emphasizing his refusal even if he could use a device to keep his distance.

Faliszek has a history with Valve, having contributed as a writer to popular games like Half-Life 2: Episodes One and Two, and the Portal series, among other projects.

In March 2026, while discussing the game Highguard and its eventual shutdown, Faliszek asked people who were happy to see it fail to refrain from publicly expressing that sentiment.

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2026-05-18 17:48