Page 4: A Bittersweet Goodbye
By all accounts Half-Life 2 was going to be a hugely ambitious project. Most of the team members from the original game were more than happy to reenlist for the sequel. But one key member started having second thoughts. He happened to be the cofounder of the company.
Mike Harrington was one of the Gabe's old buddies from Microsoft. They worked together for years and left Microsoft in 1996 to form Valve, a true 50-50 partnership between two best friends who balanced each other out. Gabe was the ambitious dreamer, and Mike was the practical realist who "liked to ship product," as he often told friends. Newell became the public face of Valve, but Harrington was the company's secret weapon--he was responsible for much of the programming on the original Half-Life. As plans for Half-Life 2 began to solidify, Harrington had to decide if he wanted to devote at least another three years to a new Half-Life game. "Part of the problem for Mike was that we succeeded so much out of the gate with Half-Life," Newell says. "I think he said to himself, 'Do I really want to put my ego and self-worth at risk again?'"
Harrington decided the answer was no, in part because he had long planned to take an extended vacation with his wife, Monica, another former Microsoft executive who worked as Valve's first director of marketing. Mike and Monica had dreams of building a boat and exploring the world. They had enough money from their days at Microsoft--the question was whether Mike had the time. Harrington spent weeks contemplating what to do. Eventually he realized that making one Half-Life was enough. "At Microsoft you always wonder, 'Is it me being successful or is it Microsoft?'' he says. "But with Half-Life I knew Gabe and I had built that product and company from scratch." So Harrington decided to leave on a high note. On January 15, 2000, he checked in his last piece of code and then dissolved his partnership with Newell. "It was really sad that first day after I left Valve," he recalls. "Something that was so intense, so powerful, and so engaging was completely gone from my life."
To the outside world it would seem like nothing had changed at Valve. But to Newell, Harrington's departure was much more significant. It made him feel isolated and alone. "It was really hard," Newell admits. "Mike was the one person who I could talk to more than anyone else about things that worried me." Still, Newell wasn't about to retire and shut down Valve. "I'd go insane if you put me on a boat or if I tried to learn how to golf," he says. (Harrington, on the other hand, did just that: He and Monica built their own 77-foot boat, the MV Meander, which they now sail around the world).
Harrington's departure was tough on Newell, but he couldn't dwell on it for long. Valve needed to aggressively push forward with Half-Life 2 and begin experimenting with new technology.
More Features
Games you may like…
-
Half-Life 2: Episode Two
(PC) -
Half-Life 2: Episode One
(PC) -
Half-Life
(PC) -
The Orange Box
(PC) -
Half-Life 2: Episode 3
(PC)
Users who looked at content for this game also looked at these games.
See More Similar Games