Valve announces VR-Only Half Life: Alyx. [2020]

[iroboto]

Looks. Fucking. Awesome.

Might finally be the tipping point for me to invest in VR.

I had a great experience with the VOID VR rooms. So i'm definitely more interested in this after having a good experience there. The Oculus Rift 1.0 made me vomit; but the void walking room experience was solid. Hopefully I'll be able to play this without issue, but I'm not sure yet.

 

[BRiT]

I think we'll know in 4 hours, but I'd throw my bet into 8-12 hours.
They wouldn't call flagship to a 5 hour game.

But 5 hours for VR is flagship for VR Experiences.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Well a few things of note.

It's priced as a full price 60 USD title. So, there's a chance this may be a proper Half-Life game and not just a VR tech demo masquerading as a game.

Owners of a Valve Index will get the game for free. So that's some consolation if someone spent up to 1k USD for the full setup.

It'll also ship with modding tools.

A set of Source 2 tools for building new environments will ship with the game, enabling any player to build and contribute new environments for the community to enjoy. Hammer, Valve’s level authoring tool, has been updated with all of the game’s virtual reality gameplay tools and components.

So that's a huge plus for the game. The teaser looks amazing but doubt I'll be playing it as I have no confidence that I won't end up getting nausea while playing it. I'll at least try it at a friend's place probably, just to see.

Regards,
SB

 

[homerdog]

Looks good. Too bad it's such a niche thing and this isn't really going to change that. Valve can do this since they don't have to worry about making money.

On the plus side maybe this will get them interested in doing a proper HL3 at some point. A man can dream

 

[PSman1700]

The PS5 may launch at $500, and it'll still be a whole lot less than an equivalent VR-capable PC using off-the-shelf components.

If this game is ever coming to ps5 that is, and if it does the pc will probably offer more in performance/gfx/best vr experience, that ppl want to pay more for.

The pc vr market will bigger then ps5’s.

 

[techuse]

If this game is ever coming to ps5 that is, and if it does the pc will probably offer more in performance/gfx/best vr experience, that ppl want to pay more for.

The pc vr market will bigger then ps5’s.

I dont think it will unless Sony abandons VR.

 

[orangpelupa]

That scene where the player can wade thru clutter.

Its so SIMPLE but AWESOME

Why? Because so many developer forgot you should be able to touch and move anything, and it's jarring when you can't

 

[PSman1700]

I dont think it will unless Sony abandons VR.

If they are cheap maybe, and offer more competitive performance.

 

[cheapchips]

On the plus side maybe this will get them interested in doing a proper HL3 at some point. A man can dream

From the dev interview it seems like there a good chance of more HL games if Alex is well received. In VR.

From the way they were talking, it doesn't sound like they'd ever go back to desktop Half-life.

 

[AlphaWolf]

What do they consider well received? If everyone with a VR headset buys 2 copies it will sell almost as many as the orange box.

 

[PSman1700]

From the way they were talking, it doesn't sound like they'd ever go back to desktop Half-life.

You never know, Valve going back to half life at all wasn't anything anyone would believe in either. It all depends on how big the VR market is/going to be. A potentional HL3 would make people flock to steam like nothing else, now with Epic etc trying to steal market share that isn't too unrealistic of a thought atleast.

 

[Malo]

Why? Because so many developer forgot you should be able to touch and move anything, and it's jarring when you can't

They didn't forget, it just wasn't something useful in most FPS games. On desktop you basically have shooting and regular click interactions on doors, devices etc but you don't have hands. So other than interaction like Skyrim were you can pick up and drag anything, it's mostly useless in an FPS. It's very clumsy to perform basic interactions with a mouse/controller that are otherwise trivial in VR.

 

[swaaye]

Skyrim VR is the dream then? Does that let you decorate your fantasy dwelling to perfection?

 

[orangpelupa]

They didn't forget, it just wasn't something useful in most FPS games. On desktop you basically have shooting and regular click interactions on doors, devices etc but you don't have hands. So other than interaction like Skyrim were you can pick up and drag anything, it's mostly useless in an FPS. It's very clumsy to perform basic interactions with a mouse/controller that are otherwise trivial in VR.

I meant in VR, not 2d games.

It felt super jarring because in VR, I instinctively goes gabby with everything. Including the clutter and NPC (and see their insides that usually looks hilarious )

 

[orangpelupa]

Skyrim VR is the dream then? Does that let you decorate your fantasy dwelling to perfection?

Unfortunately Bethesda nerfed the grabbing mechanic, forcing you to use fus ro dah or pushing with other objects.... To move dead body around.

Wait.. You don't want to decorate your house with dead bodies?

 

[eastmen]

What do they consider well received? If everyone with a VR headset buys 2 copies it will sell almost as many as the orange box.

If this game is good it would be a required purchase for anyone buying into vr on a pc. This game will have legs for a long time and Valve has two more titles in development and may have put more in development. Couple that with oculus putting out high quality games like asgards wrath and storm front and then the upcoming battlefield and we are getting to the point where vr will have sustained momentum like consoles have now

 

[Rootax]

I'm happy that Vale is using the HL licence again, and it seems good for a VR game. But, yeah, it's kind of a niche market. I would give a lot for a proper HL ep3 / HL3, but I won't do it on VR (I tried 2 solutions in the past, make me kind of sick after 15-30 minutes).

 

[Silent_Buddha]

...and we are getting to the point where vr will have sustained momentum like consoles have now

It's sustaining. I'm not sure there's any momentum to grow it yet. But we'll see how Half-Life performs.

To put it into perspective, all VR thus far still hasn't outperformed the original Xbox. And games on VR are still very VERY far behind where games on Xbox were. VR is still sorely lacking robust full game experiences.

But there are a lot of potentially tantalizing glimpses at some of the potential, but almost all of them still have many flaws that detract from them.

Beat Saber is still, by far the most impressive VR title released to date and the only one thus far with the potential for mass market appeal. The fact that it's arguably the only one at the moment, however, seriously hampers widespread VR adoption.

While I'm sure VR enthusiasts that haven't quit on VR yet (I know plenty that have given up on VR, at least for the time being) will argue with me, but sales don't back that up so far.

The Oculus Quest is currently the most consumer friendly VR device on the market and it still isn't generating massive sales or giving the VR market much momentum.

The infographic that Tottentranz posted above would indicated that at that point the VR gaming market (not including people that try it on mobile and then immediately stop because it's not worth the hassle) was around 8 million or so. The original Xbox sold 24 million and was considered a flop/failure. Basically trying to compare it to consoles isn't a good idea. But then there aren't many successful tiny niche hardware gaming platforms to compare it to.

It's been about 3.5 years so far for this generation of VR, so there's always a chance it'll take off at some point. But currently there is nothing to indicate that it will.

I'm not sure whether Half-Life Alix will change things or not. I'm leaning towards it giving VR hardware sales just a minor bump, but we'll see.

VR still has far too many compromises to make it something most people want to buy. Hell, Sony has the best chance to push it. But even still, only around 5% of PS4 owners have gotten one.

Regards,
SB

 

[BRiT]

So the obvious question that has to be asked, what happens/happened to the magic magnet gloves that cause them to not exist at all in HalfLife 2? This is why I dislike when companies put out new games that are already bookended by other titles. Any different technology in the game world is out of place.

This feels worse than all adjustments Lucas has ever made to the Star Wars universe as time went on.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

So the obvious question that has to be asked, what happens/happened to the magic magnet gloves that cause them to not exist at all in HalfLife 2? This is why I dislike when companies put out new games that are already bookended by other titles. Any different technology in the game world is out of place.

This feels worse than all adjustments Lucas has ever made to the Star Wars universe as time went on.

From what I've heard, this game takes place between HL1 and HL2. So it's kind of like HL 1.5 in terms of the timeline. So it's possible it may not exist yet in the game's universe. Perhaps it's discovered towards the end of the game.

Regards,
SB