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Gabe Newell is to be made a fellow of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts as a result of his outstanding contribution to video games.
Founded in 1996 by Newell and Mike Harrington, Valve has gone on to produce some of the most popular PC games in history.
Bafta highlighted the likes of Half Life, Team Fortress 2 and DOTA 2 as influential titles, whilst Valve had helped forge a vibrant, game-playing community.
Newell celebrated the award as an "honour" for both himself and everyone at Valve, whilst also praising UK players of Valve’s gaming portfolio, modders and UK press for their continued support of the company and its work.
Harvey Eliot, Bafta’s video games committee chairman, highlighted Newell’s contribution to the games industry as "unique" whilst speaking of Valve’s ability to turn gamers into creators, rather than just players of games.
Valve’s digital distribution service Steam has become hugely popular amongst gamers with over 50 million active users, whilst services such as Steam Greenlight has increased user participation in the service – allowing them to essentially decide the games that appear on the service.
Newell is not the only big name from the games industry to make it as a Bafta fellow, as the Valve head joins the likes of Will Wright, Peter Molyneux and Shigeru Miyamoto.
