For those looking forward to Portal 2, Valve has now given us a release date to put on our calendars.

It'll be coming out on Windows, Macintosh, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 on the 9th of February 2011. So not as bad as many of us had feared earlier this year when Valve said it would be sometime next year, often bringing worries about it being the end of 2011.

Update: And it has now been confirmed to be delayed until 21st of April.

A Portal 2 trailer was shown at Sony's press conference yesterday. The reason Valve were hanging out there is because they've brought the Steam Cloud over so now your saved games on PS3 will be stored like they are on the PC with games which support the Steam Cloud ie on the Internets.

Here's the trailer and some gameplay footage that IGN captured, I must say I'm quite impressed.

Part 2 and Part 3.

Portal 2 will be released for PC, Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 next year.

G4 TV has brought to fruition an interview with Gabe Newell of VALVe Software regarding Left 4 Dead 2. In this interview it has been confirmed that VALVe still aren't quite ready to unbound Episode 3 details upon the community at large, as yet. Here's an excerpt:

G4: So, you don't regret it??

Newell: I want to make sure that I don't sound like I'm dismissing user's issues, right? I get a ton of email everyday saying why aren't you talking about Episode 3? And there are very good reasons why we're not talking about Episode 3, which I can't talk about yet, but I will. So, I think there's frustration there and I'm not somehow going to say that that's not legitimate or length isn't a concern or regularity. The speed with which these updates are coming out, people say,Hey, gee, these episodes are supposed to be shorter and you take 25 years to ship each one. So, I don't wanna somehow dismiss those, or sort of throw them under - but I think we're in much better shape than would have been, in terms of our ability to move stuff, technology, products, uh, forward faster by changing how, ya know, being different than, ya know, there was Half-Life 2, and then there was post-Half-Life 2 in terms of how we were approaching these things and yea, I think that we're overall pretty happy without somehow dismissing the legitimate complaints that people should have towards us. But, we're happy with that choice that we made.

Kikizo have flared up an interview (3 pages long) with Doug Lombardi of VALVe Software regarding both Left 4 Dead and some small tid bits on Episode 3:

Kikizo: When are we going to start to hear about Episode Three? Because the gaps seem to be quite long based on the first couple of episodes.

Lombardi: Yeah, the next time you play as Gordon will be longer than the distance between HL2 to Ep1, and Ep1 to Ep2.

Kikizo: Won't you announce or show anything on Episode 3 this year?

Lombardi: We may at the very end of the year.

And not available on PlayStation network, as Doug Lombardi confirmed whilst speaking with CVG:

"I'd call that today's rumor," a Valve spokesperson told CVG when quizzed on about Portal. Today's rumour, but tomorrow's news, we said. "You're smart to ask. But no," Valve told us.

A.V. Club has struck up an interview with Mike Patton, someone who's provided voice acting for VALVe Software (and Portal). Here's a select bit of it:

AVC: You also had a brief appearance in Portal, the Valve game, and there's talk about you perhaps appearing in their game. MP: I think what they did is they took some material that I'd already recorded for Half-Life, maybe it was vice versa. Basically that came out of the same session of work.

As announced at E3 2008. Check out the trailer at GameTrailers.

Dejecting, but it is so. Head on over to Kotaku to read up on the matter:

According to Valve's marketing director Doug Lombardi Half-Life 2: Episode 3 won't be making an appearance at E3 this year, with the listing chalked up to a "misprint (or something)." We would assume that if Valve is showcasing anything at E3 this year, it will be Left 4 Dead which is planned for a November 4 release.

In regards to Episode Three, Portal's sequel, etc, check it out at CVG (here's a select excerpt):

You guys are taking your time with the Half-Life episodes, too. How's Episode Three coming along?

Lombardi: Well, the gap between Half-Life,Half Life 2 was six years. It's not quite four years since then and we've already released two follow-ups that we're really proud of. We didn't milk the cow, so to speak, and pump out more of the same content.

While the word 'Episodic' conjures up this idea of TV where episodes are aired every week, maybe that's not the best term to use for this. I do think that we've hit upon something that allows us to have a more enjoyable development experience - to spend six years on the same game is kind of a death march.

We've hit with episodes around every 14-16 months. It won't be another six years until you see Freeman, but it won't be next week. I think we're improving our ability to produce interesting new content in a more timely fashion.

Maybe it won't be as long as Half-Life 2, but hopefully it'll be just as good and just as innovative.