Valve Tin Foil Hat Theory

Alright, I've been thinking about this for a while but I have no idea where to put it, so I guess I'll just write everything out on here and you can do with it what you will. Just put on your tin foil hat for a second.



So, in the past year or so, we’ve seen quite a few long-time Valve employees (10+ years) decide to leave Valve and move on to other ventures. While it’s not uncommon for game developers to quit working for studios, I find it odd that so many of the “veterans” of Valve are choosing to leave all around the same time. Alright, put a pin in that for now.



It’s also been well known that Valve recently has rented out a very large office space in downtown Seattle and plan to move their offices from their long-time office building in Bellevue into this noticeably much larger work space. They said they were aiming to move July of this year, but of course - according to Valve time - this hasn’t happened yet.



For me, the only conceivable reason for why they are doing this is so they can take on a larger workforce than they already have. Which itself is not confirmed, but why else would they spend so much money and time on moving... if it wasn’t for a relatively important reason? I personally think it’s because they plan on expanding their dev teams.



However, back to the whole “veterans leaving” thing… why would so many long-time developers choose to stop working at Valve... now that they’re planning on expanding? Well, here’s where my tin foil hat theory really takes off: I think Valve has plans to not just expand their workforce... I think they’re making a transition from their notorious “flat organizational structure” to a more traditional one.



Everyone knows that Valve works in mysterious ways; one of the most obvious things being that they essentially have no bosses. This enables each developer to work on whatever they want to work on, making sure that their current project is something they are actually passionate about, which makes for higher-quality products.



However, not only has this structure proved to be increasingly difficult to justify from a consumer standpoint since games are not produced quickly, certain projects are favored over others while others get naturally neglected as they age (ahem, yeah...), and developer communication (which has now become a staple in modern gaming) is one of the worst in the business at Valve…



But also, multiple employees who have been fired from Valve in the past cited the reasons behind their termination as that they “just didn’t fit in” and have gone on record as saying that while a flat organization structure does allow more developer freedom, the “no bosses” thing simply isn’t true. At Valve, certain cliques naturally form within certain project circles and the people who are a part of these cliques hold a noticeable amount of "unofficial" power and influence over others.



So basically, the flat organizational structure just doesn’t seem to be working out anymore; at least from the outside looking in. And I think even Valve as a company is starting to notice that it’s affecting their public image... a lot.



So, back to the veterans leaving: I theorize that at sometime during the beginning of this year, Valve had a company-wide meeting to decide if they wanted to reform their management structure. And I think that while the majority DID vote to switch to a more traditional thing, the people who wanted to keep the current structure… are the people who are deciding to leave. It only makes sense, they’ve been there the longest, so they are probably the most accustomed to the way a flat organizational structure works, and are the most opposed to eventually working in an environment where they have a team lead telling they what they should be working on.



So that’s why I believe that Valve COULD be reforming itself very soon. So IF this tin foil theory is correct... is it good news? Well, for the consumers - I think very much so, yes. For Valve as a company? I think it could go very well, especially if they hire enough new developers who are as passionate about innovative games and gaming technology as Valve has always claimed to strive towards. Could it affect the quality of games, since not everyone could end up being 100% into the project they’re working on? Maybe. But overall, I think that this theoretical "turning over a new leaf" would be a good change for Valve that will bring their company out of the shadows and into the [current year] of gaming.



I also realize (and you should too) that this is all speculation and not based on anything but simple observations and blatant assumptions. I know I probably look like an idiot to anyone who actually knows the truth, but that's fine. It's all just guesses and theories and basically just a little fan fiction I've cooked up in my head. Thanks for reading.

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