A Valve developer said “HLX” out loud at a public panel this week, the first time anyone at the company is known to have used the name fans believe is the codename for Half-Life 3 or another unannounced Half-Life game. Composer Mike Morasky mentioned it in passing at GameSoundCon on October 21 while explaining how Valve’s audio engine handles HDR sound. Valve has not announced Half-Life 3 or any new Half-Life game, and it has not commented on the remark.
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What the Valve developer actually said about HLX
Morasky, a longtime Valve composer and music designer, sat on a GameSoundCon panel about Valve’s “open and flexible” audio engine in Source 2 with Valve sound designers David Feise and Carlye Nyte, according to Kotaku. Answering a question about how many sounds the engine can play at once, he described how different Valve teams tune the system. Insider Gaming quotes him as saying “Deadlock has their own version of HDR, you HLX has it’s own version, so on so forth.” PC Gamer and Kotaku transcribe the same line slightly differently, but all three agree on the key words: Deadlock has its own version of HDR, and “HLX has its own version.”
That puts HLX next to Deadlock, Valve’s hero shooter, as a project with its own audio setup. It is a reference to an internal project name. It is not an announcement, and Morasky did not say what HLX is.
PC Gamer and Kotaku report that Feise, seated next to Morasky, whispered “nice work” right after the comment, and PC Gamer says Feise later joked, “Good job, you only said HLX once.” The clip spread on October 22 after Valve watcher Tyler McVicker posted it on X.
Half-Life: Alyx (2020), codenamed HLVR, the last Half-Life game Valve released. Image: Valve
Is HLX Half-Life 3? What is rumored and what is not
This part is unconfirmed. Fans and dataminers have long believed that HLX is the internal codename for a new Half-Life game, often assumed to be Half-Life 3, but Valve has never said so. The guess rests on the name itself: Valve’s codename for Half-Life: Alyx was “HLVR,” and HLX follows the same pattern. As PC Gamer noted when the name first surfaced, the X could mean anything, and one early theory was a cross-platform version of Alyx.
The new clip does not settle that. What it adds is a Valve employee speaking about HLX as a current project with its own engine work, which several outlets, including IGN, read as a sign it is still in active development.
Timeline: how the HLX codename surfaced
| When | What happened | Reported by |
|---|---|---|
| March 23, 2020 | Half-Life: Alyx (codename HLVR) launches as a VR-only game, the last Half-Life release so far | Steam store |
| February 7-9, 2024 | Dataminer Gabe Follower finds “hlx” in strings from a Counter-Strike 2 update, next to code for “Citadel,” the multiplayer project that became Deadlock | PC Gamer, Feb 9, 2024 |
| 2025 | Tyler McVicker reports that HLX is playable from start to end; Morasky reportedly nearly says “HLX” on stage before switching to “Alyx” | Kotaku, PC Gamer, Insider Gaming (all Oct 22, 2026) |
| October 21, 2026 | Morasky mentions HLX alongside Deadlock at a GameSoundCon panel | Kotaku, PC Gamer, IGN, Insider Gaming |
The 2025 claims come from leakers and Valve watchers, not from Valve, so treat them as reports, not facts.
Half-Life 2 (2004), whose story fans hope a new game will continue. Image: Valve
Why it matters for Valve and Half-Life fans
Valve rarely talks about unannounced games, and Half-Life has been quiet for a long time. Half-Life 2 came out on November 16, 2004, and Half-Life 2: Episode Two followed on October 10, 2007. Alyx in 2020 was a prequel built for VR headsets, which limited its audience. A new non-VR Half-Life would be Valve’s biggest single-player release in years, and it would land while Valve is still working through reservations for its Steam Frame VR headset, which ships with a free copy of Alyx (see our Steam Frame price and availability explainer), and building out Deadlock, which added its final hero on October 20.
IGN also points out that Alyx went from announcement to release unusually fast, so if HLX is real, a long marketing run is not a given.
What’s next
McVicker said on X that he is preparing more on “HLX files.” Outlets including IGN and Kotaku point to The Game Awards in December as the next big stage where Valve could show something, but that is speculation. Until Valve says otherwise, HLX is a confirmed internal name with an unconfirmed identity. We will update this story if Valve comments. For more on Valve’s current shooter, read our Deadlock Nurse Harrow guide.
Sources: Kotaku, PC Gamer, Insider Gaming, IGN, PC Gamer (Feb 2024), Steam.
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Featured image: Valve
