Half Life has an enviable fanbase and history of acclaim. It started out in 1998 when Valve brought out a shoot ‘em up fr the PC called Half-Life. This game got migrated to the Playstation, with the sequel coming out in 2004, Half Life 2. This game was a long time in development, with a couple of add-ons – Episode One and Two – with the promised Antarctic third instalment never seeing the light of day.

All the titles were hugely popular, and with games developers often shy about sequels, there was a lot of speculation about Half Life 3. We’ve heard nothing from Valve about this, but there have been a few mutterings off-stage.

Gabe Newell, head of the company, said last November that it was working on a new game engine.

He also spoke to some guys from 4chan.org, who, as well as wishing him a happy 50th birthday, were also having a good nose about upcoming games. Newell said: “We’ve been working on new engine stuff for a while, we’re just waiting for a game to roll it out with”.

He didn’t name check Half Life 3, but you do have to wonder.

In Gamescom last year, T3 found what might be evidence of Half Life 3 – a PDF taken from the game show’s website, which listed the three titles thought to be up for announcement at the event.

Half Life 3 wasn’t announced, as it happened, but there was still speculation about it being revealed at some point in the future.

One of the biggest and most believable rumours so far has come from a French games website. This site claims that Half Life 3 is actually in development, with some RPG elements thrown in, as well as a Skyrim-style open world aspect.

This source also said that the game’s development was an on-off sort of job, and the focus has been shifted about several times. A realistic launch date is 2014, and now we’re in June 2013 with no announcement, this seems to ring true.

This month we saw some “concept imagery” from Half Life 3, from another source. It may well be images from previous games, but some details do look as if they could be from a post-Half Life: Episode 2 story.