German gaming site Gamestar.de (thanks HalfLife.de) has an article up (translatable by Babel Fish) speculating that Valve plans on releasing Half-Life 2 by the end of this year. Supporting their theory that the game of the year sequel is more imminent than the lack of updates on its progress would indicate are hints they've uncovered in an NVIDIA conference call, quotes from an ATI press release, and a comment from Valve's own Robin Walker.