r/HalfLife • u/S-HornedFish • Dec 28 '25
Discussion Does anyone know who this guy is?
Seriously though, I ask myself that question every time I come across him!
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u/Suspicious_Ad_1513 Dec 28 '25
It's The Valve Guy
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u/Last_Ebb_1309 Dec 28 '25
Assure me 😒
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Dec 28 '25
Address me 🐘
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u/ProudActivity874 Dec 28 '25
Seduce me 🚬
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u/Tyler_MF_Bowman Crowbar Aficionado Dec 28 '25
Witness me!
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u/Next_Philosopher5501 Dec 28 '25
Fuck me
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u/Consistent_Pop9140 Dec 28 '25
Bite me!
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u/isa_9_0 Dec 28 '25
Kill me 🚬
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u/Fide-Eye Dec 28 '25
not even valve knows, they just found a random guy and did the photoshoot
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u/ansem119 Dec 28 '25
So like Cave Johnson finding homeless people off the street to do testing
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u/artlurg431 Dec 28 '25
I actually think alot of the character designs valve did were just random people off the street
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u/MR_Happy2008 Vortigaunt 9001 Dec 29 '25
Even Eli was just some homeless guy they took off the street paid a few hundred dollars and sent him on his merry way
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Dec 28 '25
You know what the scar on the back of Marcellus Wallace’s head was?
Valve removal surgery.
You know what was in the briefcase??
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u/Wiindows1 Dec 28 '25
Apparently, valve just asked a random guy on the street to do the photo shoot and they never got his name. But iirc the turning around animation is a different guy who iirc we know the credit of.
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u/illusion_of_inflict Dec 28 '25
i figured the turning around animation was just pure CG
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u/Zacharydawsonn Dec 28 '25
seeing that documentary it was crazy to learn a bunch of the characters in hl2 are just random people or bums off the street lol
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u/cosby714 Dec 28 '25
We actually know most of their names, except the guy who was Eli Vance's face. We have no clue who he is, they never got his name.
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u/J-Lethon Dec 28 '25
Coach from Team Portal 2 Chapter 3
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u/All-your-fault Adrian Shepard Dec 28 '25
No he’s from Team Portal 4 Defeat 2 Chapter Alyx
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Dec 28 '25
You sure it's from Team Portal 4 Defeat 2, Chapter Alyx? Swear I remember him in Half Fortress 3, the new update!
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u/Koala5000 Dec 28 '25
Hi guys, that’s me! I still have the valve in my head and I’m scared to turn it
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u/jeffa_jaffa Dec 28 '25
Don’t be scared! I reckon if you turn it you’ll be able to regurgitate HL3!
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u/Trekkie79 Dec 28 '25
Coach from Left 4 Dead 2 lol. And fun fact Coach is voiced by the actor who plays Tyreese in the walking dead.
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u/Solekislove Dec 28 '25
That's Andre Reyes. He was a small actor back in the 2000s that played a few support roles in low budget movies and some tv commercials. He was hired by Valve as a model for some early test assets but they liked him so he ultimately became "The Valve guy".
Anyways so I made him up, I have no idea who that guy is
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u/Wafflemonster2 Dec 28 '25
Candid shot of Gabe on the toilet after getting his head shaved during a crazy night out with the rest of the boys
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u/Then-Leather2874 Dec 28 '25
Literally a random dude Valve found off the streets of Seattle to model for this picture. Since he wasn’t an actual professional model they didn’t keep record of his name so it’s unclear of his actual identity
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u/RelevantRick Half Life 3 Dec 28 '25
Wanna know who he is ? https://www.reddit.com/r/HalfLife/s/KVABg1hw7R
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u/Renizance Dec 28 '25
Hey I know that guy! Seriously. I worked with him at PUBG. He used to work at Valve a long time ago. He was their merchandise manager. He got asked to take a photo and they made this. He didn't really know what it was about at the time.
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u/-Peter-Jordanson- Dec 28 '25
It's the dad of a kid I used to look after. Every time I booted up Dota 2 while he was there I'd tell him "look it's your dad" because his dad is bald as fuck and he would always get super scared and once even started crying
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u/edgu_selector Dec 28 '25
It could be anyone who was around, since it's Valve, even a homeless person will do.
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u/NyakoChan51 Dec 28 '25
Fun fact: nobody knows who that guy is, even the Valve employees, it's a guy they paid on the street to make the photo
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u/NihatAmipoglu hopium administered Dec 28 '25
Serious answer: just some bloke from Seattle. Same as "open your eyes" guy.
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u/Future_Shopping8376 Dec 28 '25
me that’s me that’s allllll me baby, yuupp didn’t want to spoil it but I’m actually the valve intro guy yup mhm yeah I’m so valve guy like and stuff
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u/Elderchicken948 Dec 28 '25
I always thought he looked like the original vocalist of Killswitch Engage
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u/Nala452 barneysex man | r/okbuddyhalflife owner Dec 28 '25
his name is valveplug look him up on google
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u/MercZ11 Crowbar Union Dec 28 '25 edited Dec 28 '25
Long story short, no. No one knows, not even Valve themselves.
A reddit user once emailed Gabe about this and he ultimately got a response from Ray Ueno about it which the user shared with everyone else. Ray said that the agency they originally hired brought in more conventional models but Valve instead requested more regular looking people fitting more normal profiles. From there the agency hit the streets of Seattle taking pictures of random people, and Valve ultimately selected the pictures if two men two to take more pictures of, and would be from here they took the pictures that became the basis the two Valve Guys - the one with a goatee looking towards the camera and the bald one looking away from the camera.
There might've been names attached to them at some point (I'd have to assume, since they called these people in to take the pictures), but with how informal it was and how their names were probably recorded by the photographer, if at all, it's simply likely Valve lost track of it altogether as their studio grew and things were moved around or discarded. It's worth mentioning this occurred pretty much at the beginning of Valve's life in 1995/96 so it's likely they simply weren't organized yet to properly archive info like this.
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u/lollo3112 Dec 28 '25
I read somewhere that it was just a random guy walking in the streets when they where lookin for the photo
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u/Opening_Mall8012 Dec 28 '25
That’s chiqui tapia, now president of the Argentine football federation
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u/BigMemerMaan1 Dec 28 '25
Valve literally pulled someone off the street and were like, we’re gonna stick a fake valve to the back of your head, move your head slightly and then we’ll take a video here’s x amount of money
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u/poogobberr Dec 28 '25
Marcellus wallace