For all those PC gamers, this is an awesome announcement!

For XBOX owners, this is news story contains a bitter-sweet message...

HALF-LIFE 2 OFFICIALLY DATED

Worldwide release officially confirmed for November

9:51 Okay it' s the story, you, we and every connoisseur of PC games in the world has been waiting, for an official date for Half-Life 2 has finally been confirmed by Vivendi, with the most eagerly awaited PC game in the world debuting in stores on November 16.

Ending months of rumour, speculation, setbacks and downright fibs, November 16 will finally see Valve' s epic sequel erupt onto desktops worldwide and CEO of Vivendi Games, Bruce Hack had this to say: " Half-Life 2 has surpassed our expectations in every sense - its high-quality graphics, ground-breaking physics and immersive first-person shooter gameplay set a new standard for PC action games. Half-Life 2 will go down as one of the best-selling PC titles, and we are thrilled to deliver this ground-breaking title to the worldwide gaming community this fall."

However despite the excellent news which we tipped you yesterday and on Friday, the announcement has added one further twist, with Valve' s very own Doug Lombardi' s comments to the US media appearing to cast doubt over HL2' s appearance on Xbox, fuelling speculation that it may now appear on Xbox 2.

Still that' s a story for another day and the real story is HL2, in your hands, in under a month.

Are we excited? Just a bit.

It' s going to be a pretty good month for FPS fans. Halo 2 then Half Life 2...can' t ask for much more than that. Now if only I had a powerful enough graphics card...

Well, judging from the release, those guys sound fairly confident--and I suppose it' s rightfully so. Still, with the Xbox version officially in limbo, I think my chances of actually playing the game are kind of slim. ...Xbox...2? Bah. Ah well--at least the game' s actually being released...too bad my computer doesn' t have the slightest chance of actually playing it.

Sounds like the 16th will be a very good day for gaming--let' s just hope this isn' t all one more stumbling block, or yet another sharp case of Deja Vu. At any rate, this topic heralds wonderful news; the waiting' s over! Hopefully this will mark the end of that whole nasty Valve vs. Vivendi fiasco. After all, Valve' ll make money, and so will Vivendi, and the rest of us will have a great game (hopefully) in our hands. Everybody wins! I can already see Half-Life 3 rolling by.

Until then, get ready to once again brandish your crowbars, fellow gamers. All things considered, HL2 might very well be that wicked ride we' ve all been waiting for.