The story of a single intern saving Steam, Valve, and PC gaming

It's hard to imagine a world where Valve went bankrupt, but it nearly happened.

Where would PC gaming be without Steam? It's a tough what if scenario, and while we don't have to worry about it, Valve surviving as a company at one point hinged on a single summer intern, who managed to pluck the company out of a serious bit of legal trouble.

As spotted by 80 Level, in the new documentary retelling the creation of Half-Life 2, Valve COO Scott Lynch and Gabe Newell talked about how the company nearly went under. Valve's old publisher Sierra was bought out by French conglomerate Vivendi. This company put Counter-Strike in Korean internet cafes and when Valve challenged that, Vivendi sought to counter in court with seriously aggressive tactics, trying to bankrupt the company.

Newell recalls that the company did nearly go under, but thanks to one summer intern identified as Andrew, things took a sudden turn for the better for Valve. As a native Korean speaker, Andrew looked through the documents Vivendi tried to bury Valve in, finding traces in emails of a junior executive destroying documents.

From there, Valve won itself a nice sum, and within a few years, it started Steam, never to look back on the time it was nearly destroyed by a French conglomerate.