Founding and Half-Life (1996–2003)

Gabe Newell (foreground) and Doug Lombardi (background), 2007
Valve was founded as Valve, LLC, in 1996 by former Microsoft employees Gabe Newell and Mike Harrington. Newell had spent the prior 13 years at Microsoft developing Windows, including the Windows 95 port of Doom. Wanting to move onto a new venture using their shared wealth, Newell and Harrington founded Valve, L.L.C. in Kirkland, Washington (about five miles from the Microsoft campus in Redmond), on August 24, 1996, Newell's wedding day. Alternative names considered by Newell and Harrington include Fruitfly Ensemble and Rhino Scar.

Valve's first game was Half-Life, a first-person shooter (FPS) with elements of horror. The development was aided by access to the Quake engine by id Software; Valve modified this engine into their GoldSrc engine. After struggling to find a publisher, Valve eventually signed with Sierra On-Line. Half-Life was released in November 1998 and was a critical and commercial success. With its realism, scripted sequences and seamless narrative, it had a lasting influence; according to IGN in 2014, the history of the FPS genre "breaks down pretty cleanly into pre-Half-Life and post-Half-Life eras".
Give me a history of Valve
Founding and Half-Life (1996–2003): Valve was founded as Valve, LLC, in 1996 by former Microsoft employees Gabe Newell and Mike Harrington in Kirkland, Washington. Valve's first game is Half-Life, a first-person shooter (FPS) released in November 1998. It was developed using the modified Quake engine GoldSrc. After struggling to find a publisher, Valve eventually signed with Sierra On-Line.