Three letters were all it took to send the Half-Life community into a frenzy again. During a game audio panel this Wednesday (10/21), veteran Valve composer Mike Morasky mentioned a project called “HLX” as if it were the most normal thing in the world. The catch: Valve has never announced a game by that name. For fans, HLX is the internal codename for Half-Life 3.
Gordon Freeman in official Half-Life 2 artwork. Image: Valve.
What happened on stage
Morasky shared the GameSoundCon stage, an event dedicated to game sound and music, with Valve sound designers David Feise and Carlye Nyte. The panel covered the audio system in Source 2, the company’s engine. During the audience Q&A, he was explaining how each game uses its own version of the audio HDR system when he said:
“In fact, I think Deadlock has their own version of HDR. HLX has its own version, so on and so forth.”
— Mike Morasky, Valve composer, at GameSoundCon
Right after, you can hear Feise, sitting next to him, whisper a sarcastic “nice work” before moving the conversation along. That reaction is what made the moment go viral: it sounds a lot like a coworker realizing someone just said too much. The clip was first spotted by Tyler McVicker, a journalist who has covered Valve for years, and by Reddit users.
So what is HLX?
Valve has never officially announced, teased or even hinted at HLX. Fans only know about it thanks to more than five years of datamining the files of the company’s other games, where references to the project keep showing up. The community has even built a board cataloging everything found so far.
According to Kotaku, McVicker reported in 2025 that HLX was already playable from start to finish. Valve has not confirmed that.
Half-Life: Alyx (2020), the latest game in the series so far. Image: Valve.
Not Morasky’s first slip-up
Here’s the interesting part: in a 2023 interview, Morasky himself mentioned “both the Half-Life games” he had worked on, then quickly corrected it to “well, game.” Officially, he’s only credited on one entry in the series, Half-Life: Alyx. That hastily corrected plural had already raised a lot of eyebrows.
Morasky is far from a newcomer. He did sound and music for Team Fortress 2, Left 4 Dead, Portal 2, Half-Life: Alyx and Counter-Strike 2, and before games he worked on visual effects for The Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Matrix.
- 19 years
since Half-Life 2: Episode Two (2007), the last chapter of Gordon Freeman’s main story.
Should you get excited?
Easy there. Nobody on that panel promised an announcement, and it’s become almost a yearly tradition for the community to latch onto any Half-Life clue only to be let down later. Still, it’s hard to ignore a Valve veteran saying “HLX” in public, with mics and cameras rolling, followed by his coworker’s reaction.
Kotaku is betting all eyes will be on The Game Awards in December. Meanwhile, Valve keeps its other games busy, like the Dota 2 Halloween event. Do you think this is finally it?
Sources: Kotaku, GamesRadar+, GameSpot, IGN
