Valve enters the console wars
On the 15th floor of an upscale office building in Bellevue, Washington, security guards line the halls. They're here to make sure we don't stray - because I'm visiting Valve's headquarters, a place few journalists ever get to go. The guards help escort me to a tiny demo room, where a pair of Valve engineers show me their pride and joy: a glowing 6-inch cube, barely bigger than a box of Kleenex, that they hope might be the future of video game consoles.
For a moment, I feel like I'm watching history repeat itself. Twelve years ago, in a different Valve office half a mile away, the maker of Half-Life and Portal showed me what ultimately bec …