Whispers of the project have been doing the rounds for a while now, but last week Valve boss Gabe Newell gave the first confirmation that, yes, his studio had at one point been making a space game with the initials "SoB".
Where theories on what that meant ranged from "Stars of Barathrum" to the more obvious "Son of a Bitch", Newell says in this video the game was code-named "Stars of Blood", and while describing it as an "internal project", says it was a "space pirate game". Oh, he also says it "never saw the light of day".
Well, except for the concept art you'll see below, courtesy of former Valve artist Peter König.
I hear the words "space pirate" and I think Privateer. Then I think of Valve making a game like that, hear they're not making it anymore, and I get really sad.
Valve SOB Project Was Called 'Stars of Blood' [Valvetime]