Valve veteran Jay Pinkerton has returned to the developer a year after he left the company.

Pinkerton left last June, following other high profile departures from Erik Wolpaw, Chet Faliszek, and DOTA 2 writer Marc Laidlaw.

Now, thanks to eagle-eyed Redditor OWLverlord (via PC Gamer), it seems Pinkerton is back on Valve's staff page, listed under the "Other Experts" category.

Pinkerton co-wrote not just Portal 2, but also contributed to Left 4 Dead and Left 4 Dead 2. He also penned the Team Fortress 2 comics, which has some Redditors speculating that's what he's back to do.

As Tom reported at the time, outside of operating Steam, Valve's future as a games developer remains unclear, and despite confirming three VR games, it's all gone pretty quiet again, so it'll be interesting to find out just what Pinkerton's new role will be.