Valve, creators of Half-Life 2 has shut down 20,000 steam accounts where it says people were attempting to use pirated copies of Half-Life 2.

In a statement Valve, said that the reason for the closing of the accounts where due to a number of different reasons including credit card fraud, using cracked copies of the game and stealing of other peoples accounts.

The news follows a mixed response from gamers playing the game. Many had trouble activating the game when it first launched as thousands around the globe overloaded the company's servers. Additionally the game has already seen a number of fixes and patches as final bugs are still being ironed out.

>> Vivendi Universal Interactive - Official website of Vivendi Universal Interactive