Valve pledges support to 360

Half-Life developer Valve's announced that it's developing for Xbox 360.

In a brief release issued this evening, Valve said it was pleased to announce development of future games for 360 using a customised version of the Source Engine that powers Half-Life 2.

Although there's no word on what Valve's actually creating, the developer said its first 360 title would be coming soon - so we should probably expect an announcement in short order. Goodness - if only there was some sort of trade event taking place in the next few weeks!

President and co-founder Gabe Newell said that the combination of Source and 360 would empower game designers. "Whether developing a traditional FPS, RTS, RPG or delving into new genres, the Xbox 360 is a great platform for expanding Source and our game experiences," he added.

Valve's previously worked with Microsoft on an Xbox version of Half-Life 2, which took centre-stage on the platform holder's E3 2005 booth and went on to achieve critical acclaim.

Sales of the game were relatively light - something Valve says came as a surprise - but that doesn't seem to have deterred the company, which is also responsible for the likes of Counter-Strike and Day of Defeat, and has recently started handling games for other developers through its PC-only digital distribution system Steam.