Valve has a number of Easter eggs in its games. It's become a staple for the studio to hint at a larger connected universe within its most popular properties. The latest Easter egg is a reference in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive for Portal, but it's not a tease for Portal 3.
Twitter user Tyler McVicker posted an e-mail message on his Twitter account that he received from the head honcho of Valve, Gabe Newell, where it was revealed that the small Easter egg in the new Counter-Strike: Global Offensive map that was part of the free-to-play update that added the Battle Royale mode. The Easter egg was a complex message that had to be decoded, which displayed a line that was from the credits of Portal 2, as reported by Eurogamer.
In the e-mail it shows that McVicker contacted Gabe Newell directly and asked if the hidden Portal messages in the survival map of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive was an augmented-reality game or was it just a standard Easter egg. Newell responded to the e-mail message with a very simple reply that said "Easter egg."
Now, what is the significance of this? Well, typically Valve has a number of hints, teases, and ARGs to give gamers a heads-up about some new projects.
When Valve has an ARG it usually means that gamers have to go on a wild goose chase to find out what's actually going on. Not every ARG results in an actual discovery, though. For instance, there was a massive ARG that took place a couple of years ago where there were hints and images located in some of the game pages of the Steam Winter Sale. This led gamers around a crazy wild goose chase trying to figure out what was going on.
This stretched from across the Far Cry 4 page all the way to the Hitman page and then it circled around to the Half-Life games, which led some people to assume that the ARG would be related to a reveal for Half-Life 3, as chronicled by GMZ.
The goose chase turned out to be a red herring and there was actually no big reveal to be had regarding Half-Life 3. Instead it was just a troll by Valve, which most gamers should be used to by now.
Seven years ago, back in 2011, there was another troll by Valve for Half-Life 3 where team members were wearing a t-shirt for the game that never came to be.
In this case, gamers were under the impression that there could have been an ARG being put together for Portal 3 after gamers discovered a hint in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. However, before gamers went back on the chase for clues via an ARG, the whole thing was nipped in the bud by Gabe Newell, the acting president of Valve.
For gamers who have been hoping that there was a new Portal inbound, it doesn't sound like there's going to be a new game coming out. Valve's most recent game is the collectible card game Artifact, and so it's doubtful that a new Portal would be inbound soon, as confirmed by Newell.
