Half-Life 2 Authentication Delays

[CSN NewsBot]

Update: This issue has been resolved.



There seems to be some Half-Life 2 authentication delays. The good folks over at Valve are currently investigating the issue and will update us shortly. All of you anxious gamers that haven't yet been able to play Half-Life 2, hang tight and prepare yourself for hours of gaming.



Have you not purchased Half-Life 2? What are you waiting for? Buy it now!

[-:Nighthawk:-]

This is one of those things that tends to be unavoidable... good luck to the boys at VALVe in getting it all sorted out, though. All things considered... it's been a lot smoother of a release than most expected.

[Gameshot911]

OMG GASP NOOO!!!!!!

[Cmoney]

ive been playing it for 6 hours already :P :) :9

[EL17E]

Edited by [user="11884"] @ [time="1100697667"]

will this attribute to the "expecting version 18, you have version 0" map issue? It works fine on my desktop, but not on my laptop. i have all the same gcf's on my latop but when i use the same account to play hl2 and hl:s, i get a wrong map version issue. i assumed maybe this would be an anti-piracy thing, but i logged off on both and logged back in with my laptop only, but it still doesn't work.

[Damien4]

that was quick, gj?

[Cool Mo D]

Valve screws up everything .

[Cutedge]

will this attribute to the "expecting version 18, you have version 0" map issue?



from Erik Johnson:



For people that are running into the bug on startup that looks like:



"Map Version is 0, expecting 19"



Try this to see if it works:



1. Go into your \Steam\SteamApps folder.

2. Rename the file called sourcemodels.gcf to something else.

3. Relaunch the game.



This is going to require a redownload of this file, but if you want to get playing tonight it's probably the best path. There are a couple of people now that were in this situation that were fixed this way.



As soon as we possible we'll release a fix for this that will not require this workaround.



Please let me know if this does or does not fix this specific problem for you. Just shoot me an e-mail at erik@valvesoftware.com. If this does fix it, it would be useful to get copies of a couple of the renamed (bad) cache files.

[DeFade]

Cool Mo D wrote..

Valve screws up everything .

not true. i signed into friends once.



me <3 valve

[-:Nighthawk:-]

Yeah, I signed into Friends once... that was pretty neat the one time it worked. :P



Okay, so Friends hasn't worked properly for me since it had some "bug fixes" early in the 1.6 beta, not that it doesn't work at all, but it doesn't properly update the status of the few friends that it does show. I can call up a friend, have him log on, and never see him, or him me... a week later, maybe one of us will see the other... on rare occasions we can even talk...



Yeah, I almost never see my roommate on Friends even when we're playing in the same server, lol. And this is just talking about the rare times that it does let us log in.



Point being, while I think Steam in general and Friends in particular are great ideas (and VALVe should be complimented for attempting to make forward strides in the industry)... well, they've always seemed shoddy and bug-ridden, and that's not exactly the positive image you want to portray your "futuristic technology" with.

[Andeh]

i have to say, im not pleased at all that no shops in the UK sell the collectors edition, at least not in the stores themselves. I was forced to purchase the crappy standard edition that doesnt even come with a manual for crying out loud. £35 for a disk in a case......... first chance I get im returning the game to the shop for a refund, keeping the CD key and buying the collectors edition online. I hate living in the UK, nothing good is ever released here, we always get the basic stuff.....

[-:Nighthawk:-]

Man, these retail horror stories are almost enough to convince me to brave purchase via Steam.



Almost.

[Andeh]

nighthawk, if you dont want to buy through steam (dont blame you) get the collectors edition. dont waste your money on the standard retail edition, you dont get Half-Life Source or Day of Defeat source. just HL2 and CSS in a case. thats it. for £35.

[EL17E]

Edited by [user="11884"] @ [time="1100696134"]

Cutedge wrote..

will this attribute to the "expecting version 18, you have version 0" map issue?



from Erik Johnson:



For people that are running into the bug on startup that looks like:



"Map Version is 0, expecting 19"



Try this to see if it works:



1. Go into your \Steam\SteamApps folder.

2. Rename the file called sourcemodels.gcf to something else.

3. Relaunch the game.



This is going to require a redownload of this file, but if you want to get playing tonight it's probably the best path. There are a couple of people now that were in this situation that were fixed this way.



As soon as we possible we'll release a fix for this that will not require this workaround.



Please let me know if this does or does not fix this specific problem for you. Just shoot me an e-mail at erik@valvesoftware.com. If this does fix it, it would be useful to get copies of a couple of the renamed (bad) cache files.

thanks man, good lookin out. I'll try that.



*EDIT* yay! it worked

[abysmal]

Andeh wrote..

nighthawk, if you dont want to buy through steam (dont blame you) get the collectors edition. dont waste your money on the standard retail edition, you dont get Half-Life Source or Day of Defeat source. just HL2 and CSS in a case. thats it. for £35.

Well in all fairness HL source is crap, it doesn't do anything new and actually looks the same as HL1 on the old hybrid engine.



DOD source screenshots arent that impressive at all. but things may change, its not due for release till something crazy like jan/feb next year.