New Steam Console Announced Amid Half-Life 3 Rumors

Valve has announced an expansive new line of hardware, including a new console, amidst rumors and speculation that Half-Life 3 is imminent. Valve is one of the most interesting companies in the gaming space because unlike its competitors, it does thing completely on its own terms. It doesn’t adhere to generations, it has a PC storefront that has dominated for decades, and Valve only makes games when it has a truly great, innovative idea that can push the envelope. They’re also not owned by some larger corporate entity forcing them to go down anti-consumer roads, allowing a lot more freedom with how they execute things.

That’s partially why Half-Life 3 has taken so long to get made. Despite excessively high demand from fans, Valve hasn’t rushed the game out. In fact, Half-Life 3 was even cancelled many years ago, but it seems like it may be back on. Half-Life Alyx resolved Half-Life 2: Episode 2‘s cliffhanger ending and rewrote history to allow for a new story, seemingly writing the team out of a corner to finally make a new game. With that said, rumors have been swirling that Half-Life 3 is not only in the works, but it is coming soon. A new announcement from Valve may have just added more fuel to the fire.

Valve Announces New Steam Console, VR Headset, and More Amidst Half-Life 3 Rumors

Valve has announced three new pieces of exciting hardware, a new Steam Controller, a spiffy new standalone VR headset known as Steam Frame, and a brand new Steam Machine. The latter is probably the most noteworthy, as it is Valve’s take on a console. Fans may recall that Valve took a crack at this a decade ago with previous iterations of the Steam Machine, but the market wasn’t quite ready for a PC/console hybrid and the reliance on Linux also led to people rejecting it.

However, things have dramatically changed. The new Steam Machine is a compact machine capable of running your entire Steam library, including the latest AAA games in 4K 60 FPS with Valve claiming it is 6x more powerful than the Deck. You can get a better look at how this thing works courtesy of Digital Foundry below.

No pricing has been announced for this bad boy, but it is set to launch in 2026 with Valve drawing inspiration from people using their Steam Decks on TVs. So, how does this connect to Half-Life 3? Well, Valve released Half-Life Alyx as a premiere marquee title for the Valve Index VR headset. Although Index launched in the summer of 2019, Alyx came out less than a year later in March 2020. It was like a new Mario game for Nintendo or a new Halo for Xbox, it was the game that drove people toward the hardware.

It’s entirely possible that this new line of hardware is being done in conjunction with a release of Half-Life 3 next year. It’s unclear if Valve would bring the game to Xbox or PlayStation, but if it doesn’t do that, having its own console offering would be pretty lucrative. Of course, all of this is speculative, but it would be a massive title that would drive people toward all of this hardware. Half-Life 3 would likely be a traditional game, but I could see there being VR compatibility after the success of Alyx, making it a good fit for Steam Frame.

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