An Open Letter to Gabe Newell
Gabe Newell, Director of Game Development - Valve Software
Dear Gabe Newell,
Hi, how are you? I’m fine. The weather is finally cooling off, which is nice – won’t have to run the AC as often, which in these harsh economic times means I might be able to save a bit of cash.
But, enough small talk – this isn’t a social call. No, I’m actually writing you (or pretending to write to you via my blog) in order to register a formal complaint on the latest DLC for Left 4 Dead on the XBox 360.
This product is, sadly, buggy and not at all worth the seven dollars you are charging for it. Oh, I’ve read the sob story that Microsoft forced you into charging for the content, that you wanted it to be free but Microsoft made you charge for it… And that’s fine, that’s understandable, I suppose. They want you to charge for it, well… charge for it. But a whole seven bucks? For a level that takes less than half an hour to complete, and is full of bugs? I’d expect this from Bethesda, but not you. You made Portal, one of my favorite games of all time, and the Half-Life series of games, which are astounding.
And you also made… This. This pile of crap. (more…)
