It seems game developer Valve is "acutely aware" of exactly how annoyed gamers get with them over their long development times.

Rumours about Half-Life 3 have persisted for months and months, but gamers have heard not a peep out of the company with anything official.

Anticipation regarding a sequel has reached fever pitch, and combined with the blackout at Valve a fan campaign for information on the title was created.

Valve head Gabe Newell said he understands how the fans feel, adding: "It's pretty frustrating to us when we put them into that situation.

"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."

Yet this does not change the fact that Valve do not want to put out information before they know exactly what they have got on their hands.

Mr Newell says that the company will not hype its already highly popular titles to avoid having to disappoint fans, as it did repeatedly when it issued delay after delay to Half-Life 2.

"We're sort of reacting in the other direction and saying 'okay, well let's have things a little more baked before we start getting people all excited about it'," he said.

Valve knows that it takes a long time over games, Mr Newell went on, but with the level of passion gamers have for Counterstrike, Half-Life, Portal and Left 4 Dead, it is important to make sure they are as good as they can be.

"We want to be making sure that those games and those stories and those characters are moving forward while also making sure that we don't just get into terminal sequelitis," he said.ADNFCR-1220-ID-801298793-ADNFCR