RPS talks to Valve employee David Speyrer about working at Valve, various ways to kill Hunters, and Episode Two's design challenges.

Quote:
In Episode Two we did really want to bring more humour into the franchise. I mean, Half-Life had plenty of humourous moments, if a dark kind of comedy. The setting and premise of Half-Life 2 was pretty dark, and we did try to make you believe in the Combine oppression of humanity. But over time, as a team, we wanted to bring back some of the Half-Life humour into the franchise without diluting the sense of gravity.

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/?p=554

Its a good interview, I was hoping for a tiney glimpse into ep3, but thats probably asking a lot, especially so soon after ep 2.

I missed barney in episode 2, I was suprised they managed to add so much of his style humour in without him.

I think some of the humor was "inside" humor, especially reguarding the Borealis. For those of you that don't know, the Borealis was where HL2 was going to begin and the first part of the game was going to take place in the Arctic. They obviously scrapped that idea, but all of the maps were in the leak from way back when. It was really hilarious to hear Kleiner and Eli talk about the Borealis, and have that in mind.