How do you most want HL3 to be announced?

Wii U exclusive, with meme-based DLC, an online pass and always-on DRM. The shitstorm would be fun to watch.

Hmm...maybe as a Steam update? So the UI would be filled with 3s, and the store instantly opens HL3's page, with the game in your cart :P

I expect nothing less than a giant Lambda symbol to be etched onto the surface of the moon one day.

Massive press conference. Opening VT featured Gabe Newell, shirtless and covered in bandoleers full of ammo, carrying two massive machine guns like Arnold Schwarzenegger here but with more Gaben man-tits. Cue a swarm of 3s all attacking him, "FUCK YOU THREE!!!!" he screams, his chins wobbling, almost quivering with anticipation at the 3 blood bath to come! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! He shoots the bastards, one by one the threes go down in pools of blood!

"WE'VE GOT YOUR KIDS GABE, WE'VE GOT YOUR KIDS!" They shout, adding to tension, the fear, the anticipation. But Gabe cuts a path through the army of marauding threes. Sometimes shooting them, sometimes Van Damming the shit out of them, sometimes he just gets behind them and looks like he's anally violating them, and it sounds like it too as they go "Uh-uh-uh-uh..." but actually he's snapping their necks, Metal Gear Solid Style.

Eventually he gets to the lead 3 -

"Give me back my kids..." he says.

We see his children being held with guns to their heads. They are Half Life Newell, Portal Newell and Left4Dead Newell. All adorable little bastards. "Ha! Did you think it would be so easy!?" the lead 3 says - and he strips off revealing a ripped torso. "You must defeat me - Bareknuckle style, naked as the day God made us..."

"Well, you're a number, God didn't make you you're actually a conceptualisation of quantity devised by humanity - but that's besides the point - I want my kids back!" Gabe replies.

Gabe strips down, until his flabby form is completely starkers, and he begins to fight the three. The three is perfectly fine, he's ripped and has good cardio. Gabe looks a bit like Jabba The Hutt in that scene from Return of the Jedi where he's being almost kinkily choked by sexy slave Leia. But, Gabe has something only he and Roy 'Big Country' Nelson have, the ability to kill a man with one belly-flop and that's what he does in a rather pathetic and anticlimactic fashion to take out the lead 3.

"Cough...splutter...Take them...aw....ay...." he utters with his final, blood-dribbling breaths. His henchmen managed to take Portal and Left4Dead away - Gabe must fight for them another day. But he manages to disarm the other henchman with some rather toxic gas released via his bowel and hugs Half Life lovingly and slightly creepily given how he is still in the nip.

End VT - Press room goes completely pitch black. Suddenly, the lights go up and on stage is Gabe Newell, completely billy bollocks, with only the Half Life logo covering his chode.

"Ladies and gentlemen...You've waited for this for so long. It's the most anticipated event in Valve's history, and possibly the century. I give you...

...

...

..."

It gets tense, he's so silent. People wonder if maybe he's had a stroke or something.

"...

...

...NEW HATS FOR TEAM FORTRESS!"

The room erupts into a riot. Chairs being thrown, people making love in the aisles, someone's got some tear-gas - where the hell did that come from! But Gabe continues...

"Hats to signal the coming of a brand new game from Valve for Steam users..."

Ooh, the anticipation again. Everyone settles down. The lovemaking is interrupted by more important business, people politely put their chairs back - even the tear-gas just dissipates because it doesn't want to interrupt.

"A TRADING CARD GAME!" Gabe shouts...

More tear-gas, riots and spontaneous sex.

"Featuring new cards from..."

Everyone listens again...

"HALF LIFE 3! Here's a trailer."

This is shown

Everyone dies of Trollitis.

Half Life 3 comes out three months later.

A secret link just being posted on some random book that comes out (not popular book) where it shows a steam code which send you to the page of it, no other way to find the game. Or on a porn video or something.

At the E3 with a big 3 behind him.

I want a GabeN sex tape to be leaked wherein he loudly grunts the details of when HL3 will be released during climax. We may then deduce from who breaks the story first what kind of sick shit the reporter in question is into.

I want Gabe to burst into my room in the middle of the night, Dressed as Ned Stark, Climb ontop of me gently, And whisper in my ear "Half Life is coming", Then jumps out my window cutting the air with his giant diamond encrusted katana and lands perfectly on a tron bike, and goes straight up, Into the mothership

On tv while the advertisements Gabe shows up with a big smile holding HL3 in his hands nothing else.

Added to my account while I'm sleeping.

Gaben walking on stage during E3, doing this and walking off again, no words said. (also I already have the game so that's not what I'm here for :P)

Gabe walks out on the stage, takes a long deep breath, and yell out: "After many years of development (or is it?), it's finally HERE!" Everyone starts cheering as the lights fade off slowly and then the screen starts to play:
Ricochet 2 / Day of Defeat 2 reveal trailer

I want Gaben to launch a nuke into the moon and have it explode, and what's left will look like the Half-Life 3 logo...

I want steam to surprise me with a dialogue window that tells me I have new game added to my account. It's free. It's Half Life 3. It's year 2017.

At this point I am not even excited for HL3 anymore.

GabeN will get on stage with some kid (preferably one of those CoD screeching ones everyone loves), tell us that this is new voice actor of Gordon Freeman, but we can buy old voice (or lack of it) for $60 as DLC.

Gabe makes a SteamGifts account and create a thread about it here.

Gaben becomes a serial killer only targeting people resembling Gordon Freeman, and chops up their bodies into 3 pieces

a CIA agent reveals it and then has to flee the USA.

I feel like there should be a dancing with Ronald McDonald, Grimace, and the Hamburglar... and Skeletor.

I'd like to have my announcement read:

"Congratulations! You are the lucky winner of our secret Half-Life 3 Jump-Starter Giveaway!"

In an ARG like Portal 2, it was an amazing experience

I would like him to say in the stage of E3: "Your prayers have been answered!" and then take the box of Half Life 3 from his bag and show it to the world!

As a MannCo Crate drop. Just imagine it: some random bored guy opens some chests, hoping for an unusual hat, only to find...a copy of Half-Life 3 in it. I'd probably have a heart attack.

A video replacing the front page panel of the steam store where new releases/specials are displayed. A video of Gabe standing on a stage saying stuff like 'IT'S HERE' and 'WE HAVEN'T FORGOTTEN YOU', with lots of sporadic zooming in and out, all chopped up and pitch shifted to make a dubstep track. The video will have intermittent shots of Gabe with a big grin and his arms outstretched as orange balloons and confetti rain down on him and he's basking in the glory of our love and admiration.