with regards to it being dvd only. I dont get what the big deal is really, since virtually ALL pc's capable of running the game will be new enough to have a dvdrom by now anyway.

lets look at the facts here.

If they delayed hl2 until next year just for some obscure reason to trya nd spite some hacker, they lose two fold, firstly they lose one SHITLOAD of christmas sales (which is why they would REALLY want it out before christmas it physically possible, even if it has bugs). And as someone else said they would have handed the hacker a huge amount of power on a plate.

So as far as im concerned they have no intention of releasing it next year and will infact release it when its done, which if at all possible, WILL be at least a couple of weeks before christmas, minimum. I think they are full of shit myself, crying like a kid with a skinned knee "right someone hacked us because we was a dumbass and used microsoft email clients which are known to be insecure and have shitloads of security holes, so we gonna delay the game by 6 months". gimme a break.

"Valve is obviously interested in hearing more about their [Sony and Nintendo] next-generation plans and discuss the possibilities of doing something with them."

LOL, no doubt thats because they plan a simultaneous release of the pc version with the PS3 and gamecube 2

they probably DO overcompansate and STILL get it completely wrong because of their sheer incompetance.

"I keep hearing how we try to help other countries"

not sure where you are hearing that from but I just read in a newspaper that the USA has one of the lowest percentage of helping out other countries in the world, with less than 0.01% of their income going to help other countries.

They also spend £200million on military which is more than china, south korea, germany, france, UK, russia and india COMBINED.

Since the money obviously isnt going to help other countries, perhaps unemployed americans should consider joining the military, there doesnt seem to be any shortage of funds there

It was them that originally said the date was 17th and the street date was 30th so people didnt "make it up".

Also I think youll find that invariably these companies WILL announce when a game has gone gold because it generates extra publicity and anticipation for when it arrives in the shops.

If they suddenly announced it had gone gold and was available on steam i think steam would ground to a halt with all the people downloading 1.2gb each off it (i assume 2 cds worth).

wasnt HL2 due to go gold today? id have thought some sort of news on the subject would be out before now whether it is or isnt.