Half-Life HLX: every leak so far, and what Valve has said

HLX is the codename of an unannounced Valve game that fans read as Half-Life 3. It has no release date. On October 21, 2026, a Valve composer said "HLX" out loud at a conference. He never said Half-Life. Valve has confirmed nothing.

"HLX" was named on stage at GameSoundCon on October 21, 2026

Mike Morasky, who composed the music for Half-Life: Alyx, Portal 2 and Counter-Strike 2, spoke on a panel called "Valve's Approach to an Open and Flexible Audio Engine." He described a group system as one of three pieces that build an HDR, meaning high dynamic range audio. Dexerto quotes him as saying "Deadlock has its own HDR, HLX has its own HDR." PSU has a longer version: "Deadlock has its own version of HDR, HLX has its own version, and so on and so forth." 80.lv says his voice dropped right after "HLX."

Dexerto says the sound designer next to him, David Feise, appeared to whisper something before steering the room back to groups. The leaker Tyler McVicker posted the clip and said that the man next to Morasky murmured "nice work." Dexerto does not say what was whispered. It is also not Morasky's first slip: in a 2023 interview he referred to more than one Half-Life game before correcting himself to one.

The remark itself names Deadlock, Valve's invite-only multiplayer game, and HLX. Nothing in it says what HLX is. I think it still matters more than any file on this list. A Valve composer said it on stage.

HLX follows the codename pattern Alyx used

Half-Life: Alyx went by HLVR before launch. GGRecon argues HLX is a codename in the same style. Alyx came out on March 23, 2020. The Half-Life game before it was Episode Two in 2007.

A voice actor's résumé listed a project called "Project White Sands," which surfaced on Reddit and was read as a Half-Life tie-in. Evgeniy Evstratiy, a Deadlock concept artist, said on the CG Voices podcast in 2025 that he had been in the room where the third installment was made and saw only "computers and whiteboards."

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Counter-Strike 2 and Dota 2 files tie HLX to an HEV-suit game

Valve has had a Half-Life game leak before, when the code of Half-Life 2 left its network in the 2003 Half-Life 2 leak. The first dated item here is from February 7, 2024, when the leaker Gabe Follower shared a line in the Counter-Strike 2 files pointing to a file called hlx_2d_basic. GGRecon called the evidence slim and the reading wishful.

More strings turned up later. GosuGamers wrote that data-mined Counter-Strike 2 and Dota 2 strings use HLX as the codename of an unannounced singleplayer game, with a player character in an HEV suit, the hazard suit from the series, who goes "off-world." No date is given for the strings. They sit in the updates of two free Valve games, Counter-Strike 2 and Dota 2.

Hidden groups named hlx, hlxaudio and hlxartists were reported in March 2025

On March 24, 2025, 80.lv reported that hidden groups called "hlx," "hlxaudio" and "hlxartists" had turned up in Valve's internal system, next to a zombie gorilla from Half-Life: Alyx found in the Source 2 files. The same piece relays Gabe Follower's claim that HLX was being tested internally among staff and their families. CGMagazine repeated the story on October 23, 2026. It says the names came from a new method of checking hidden group names. The names say nothing about what the project is.

The non-VR Half-Life claim and the "playable" claim from McVicker

McVicker first mentioned HLX in 2024 as a "new, separate, non-VR Half-Life title" he thought was close to completion. In a livestream of more than three hours in 2025 he went further. Notebookcheck, on May 1, 2025, relayed his claims: the game is playable end to end, it is being playtested widely, and he expected an announcement in summer and a release in winter. Engadget ran the same claim two days later and said to take it with a grain of salt.

The 2025 summer and winter passed with no announcement. Those dates were McVicker's predictions, not a Valve schedule.

A Dota 2 variable about reading variable names is a joke

On June 20, 2026, Gabe Follower shared a variable from a Dota 2 update: m_bHackWhyAreYouGuysReadingOurVariableNames. Notebookcheck read it as a jab at dataminers who find Half-Life 3 hints in every new line of code. It says nothing about the game.

Valve has confirmed nothing, and the leakers describe a non-VR game

No outlet reports a statement from Valve on HLX: Dexerto notes that Valve never confirmed any of the leaks or announced a sequel, a trailer or a date. To me the strongest evidence is still a codename in files plus one sentence about audio. Neither one contains the words Half-Life.

McVicker and Gabe Follower both describe a non-VR Half-Life built on Source 2, which would make HLX no follow-up to Alyx. That is their claim, not Valve's.

Questions people ask

Has Half-Life 3 been confirmed?

No. Valve has not announced a new Half-Life game, and the GameSoundCon remark names HLX without saying what it is. Everything else comes from data-miners and leakers.

Is Half-Life 3 in development?

Nobody outside Valve can say for sure. The leaks point to an unannounced singleplayer project under the codename HLX, and Morasky's remark on stage shows that something called HLX has its own audio setup. Neither one is a confirmation that it is Half-Life 3.

What is HLX in Half-Life?

HLX is a codename found in leaked Valve files and now heard in a Valve composer's talk. Fans read it as the next Half-Life game, much as HLVR was the internal codename for Alyx.

Is HLX Half-Life 3?

That is the leading reading, and it is unproven. Morasky's words on stage never say Half-Life, and the non-VR claim comes from leakers alone.

Is Half-Life 3 canceled?

There is nothing to cancel on the record, since Valve never announced it. In June 2026, Notebookcheck wrote that HLX is referenced often in Counter-Strike 2 and Dota 2 code.

When did Half-Life: Alyx launch?

Half-Life: Alyx launched on March 23, 2020.