Valve will sell hardware if it has to - Gabe Newell

Valve cofounder and managing director Gabe Newell has told Penny Arcade that the publisher has not ruled out the possibility of making and selling hardware.

Asked whether Valve would ever consider a future in selling hardware, Newell replied:

"Well, if we have to sell hardware we will. We have no reason to believe we're any good at it; it's more we think that we need to continue to have innovation. And if the only way to get these kind of projects started is by us going and developing and selling the hardware directly, then that's what we'll do.

"It's definitely not the first thought that crosses our mind; we'd rather hardware people that are good at manufacturing and distributing hardware do that. We think it's important enough that if that's what we end up having to do, then that's what we end up having to do."

In the interview, Newell also addressed Valve's long development times on games, saying the company recognizes that it can be frustrating not to know what's happening with franchises that so many gamers love.

"We try to go as fast as we can and we try to pick the things that we think are going to be most valuable to our customers. And if there's some magic way we can get more work done in a day, then we'd love to hear about it," Newell said. "But we've always somehow, you know, part of the reason that we backed off talking so much about what was happening in the future is that when we've done that in the past, you know, with Half Life 1, it was a year after we originally said it would be...Half Life 2 basically if you go and read the forum posts apparently took us 50 or 60 years to get done. So we're trying to be careful not to get people too excited and then have to go and disappoint them."

In the interview, Newell also talked about the direction for Steam, combating piracy, Valve's relationship with its users, and the next generation of home consoles.

The full interview can be found here.