There is now new reason to believe Valve is working on both Half-Life 3 and Left 4 Dead 3. Surprisingly, the evidence was found in the files in a Vive performance tool.
The tool is simply called SteamVR Performance Tool. To help test out individual computers, the entire Aperture Science VR demo is included within. The demo does not come with sound, but for the purposes of testing computers for VR, it has everything needed.
Our source from the Valve News Network found files in the tool that directly reference both projects, and imply that not only are they in active development, but that they are being worked on for VR. Part of this is based on speculation that these projects would have been built on Valve’s own engine, Source. However, our source goes further and says he was aware of the existence of these files months before. He was told not to discuss them then, but because these files reappeared in the demo, there is no need to keep them secret anymore.
One file in particular appears to be data for a new character to appear in Left 4 Dead 3. Our source says this character is named Rebelhead. He has no knowledge if the character is a random grunt or a major figure, but he does go through the other files and what they imply could be in both games.
Half-Life 3 and Left 4 Dead 3 have been rumored for years but neither have been confirmed active projects by Valve. Even three years ago, a project tracker seemed to indicate the projects were in the works. You can read more samples of rumors for both through the years here and here.
You can watch the video that goes through the revealed files below.