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Valve Corporation
Type Private
Founded Kirkland, Washington, USA (1996)
Headquarters Bellevue, Washington, USA
Key people Gabe Newell, co-founder and managing director
Industry Software & Programming
Products Counter-Strike: Source
Half-Life
Team Fortress Classic
Team Fortress 2
Counter-Strike
Day of Defeat
Deathmatch Classic
Steam
Half-Life 2
Source engine
Valve Anti-Cheat
Revenue Template:Profit$70 million USD (2005)
Employees 144[1]
Website www.valvesoftware.com

Valve Corporation is an American video game developer based in Bellevue, Washington, USA, made famous by its first product, Half-Life, which was released in November 1998. The company has followed Half-Life's success by developing mods, spin-offs, and sequels including Half-Life 2. Only two fully produced games, Half-Life, Half Life 2, have been released by Valve, along with a number of episodic, multiplayer, expansion, and campaign titles including: Half Life 2: Episode One, Half Life 2: Episode Two, Portal, Team Fortress Classic, Team Fortress 2, Counter-Strike, Counter-Strike: Condition Zero, Counter-Strike: Source, Day of Defeat, Day of Defeat: Source, Ricochet, Half-Life 2: Death Match, Half-Life 2: Lost Coast, Half-Life: Blue Shift and Deathmatch Classic.

Contents

Half-Life

Main article: Half-Life

Long-time Microsoft employees Gabe Newell and Mike Harrington founded Valve on September 24th, 1996.[2] After securing a license to the Quake engine (through the help of friend Michael Abrash of id Software) in late 1996, they commenced working on Half-Life. Originally planned for release in late 1997, Half-Life launched on November 19, 1998. Valve acquired TF Software PTY Ltd. in May of 1998, the makers of the Team Fortress mod for Quake with the intent to create a standalone Team Fortress 2 game. The Team Fortress Classic mod, essentially a port of the original Team Fortress quake mod, was released for Half-Life in 1999. Team Fortress 2 was released 2007-10-10, bundled with Half-Life 2: Episode Two along with a game called Portal.

Valve continued work on Half-Life, releasing several more extensions to the game and collaborated with other developers to port it to other platforms. They also took on-board the development of the highly popular Counter-Strike and Day of Defeat Half-Life mods.

Steam

Main article: Steam (content delivery)

Valve announced its Steam content delivery system in 2002. At the time, it looked to be a method of streamlining the patch process common in online computer games. Steam was later revealed as a replacement for much of the dated framework of WON and Half-Life multiplayer and also as a distribution system for entire games.

Between 2002 and 2005, Valve was involved in a complex legal showdown with its publisher, Vivendi Universal (under Vivendi's brand Sierra Entertainment). It officially began on August 14 2002 when Valve sued Sierra for copyright infringement, alleging that the publisher illegally distributed copies of their games to Internet cafes. They later added claims of breach of contract, accusing their publisher of withholding royalties and delaying the release of Counter-Strike: Condition Zero until after the holiday season.

Vivendi fought back, saying that Gabe Newell and marketing director Doug Lombardi had misrepresented Valve's position in meetings with the publisher. Vivendi later countersued, claiming that Valve's Steam content distribution system attempted to circumvent their publishing agreement. VUG sought intellectual property rights to Half-Life and a ruling preventing Valve from using Steam to distribute Half-Life 2.

On November 29 2004, Judge Thomas S. Zilly of U.S. Federal District Court in Seattle, WA ruled in favor of Valve Corporation. Specifically, the ruling stated that Vivendi Universal and its affiliates (including Sierra) were not authorized to distribute Valve games, either directly or indirectly, through cyber cafés to end users for pay-to-play activities pursuant to the parties' current publishing agreement. In addition, Judge Zilly ruled that Valve could recover copyright damages for infringements without regard to the publishing agreement's limitation of liability clause.[3] Valve posted on the Steam website that the two companies had come to a settlement in court on [[April 29 2005.[4] Electronic Arts announced on July 18, 2005 that they would be teaming up with Valve in a multi-year deal to distribute their games, replacing Vivendi Universal from then onwards.[5]

As of September 2, 2007 over 200 PC games are available on Steam, and there are approximately 13 million active users.[6]

See also

References

Template:Reflist

External links

v • d • e
Video games developed by Valve Corporation
Half-Life series Half-Life (Opposing Force, Blue Shift, Decay) · Uplink (demo) · Half-Life: Source

Half-Life 2 (Episodes One, Two, Three) · Deathmatch · Lost Coast · Survivor (arcade)

Portal (Still Alive) · Portal 2
Counter-Strike series Counter-Strike · Condition Zero · Counter-Strike: Source · Counter-Strike Neo (arcade) Counter-Strike Online
Day of Defeat series Day of Defeat · Day of Defeat: Source
Team Fortress series Team Fortress · Team Fortress Classic · Team Fortress 2
Other games Deathmatch Classic · Left 4 Dead · Ricochet · The Orange Box
Soundtracks Valve Soundtracks' Tracklist
v • d • e
The Half-Life series and related topics
Main series Half-Life (Opposing Force · Blue Shift · Decay)
Half-Life 2 (Episode One · Episode Two · Episode Three)
Portal series Portal (Still Alive) · Portal 2
Other releases Codename: Gordon · Half-Life 2: Deathmatch · Half-Life 2: Lost Coast · Half-Life 2: Survivor · The Orange Box
Playable characters Doctor Gordon Freeman · Corporal Adrian Shephard · Barney Calhoun · Doctor Gina Cross · Doctor Colette Green · Chell
Other characters Alyx Vance · Doctor Arne Magnusson · Dog · Doctor Eli Vance · Father Grigori · G-Man · Doctor Isaac Kleiner · Doctor Judith Mossman · Colonel Odessa Cubbage · The Resistance · Doctor Richard Keller · Doctor Rosenberg · Doctor Wallace Breen
Information and fiction Combine · Headcrab · Vortigaunt · Other creatures · Locations
Others Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar · Concerned
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