Half-Life: Alyx - Valve's full-length flagship VR game set between HL1 and HL2

[RRRrrr]

It doesn't look that bad, actually. I didn't expect Source could look so modern. Also, people seem to like the VR aspect, but I am too poor to see for myself. Also, not a moron to spend so much money on this before it is a thing.

 

[Zariusz]

It doesn't look that bad, actually. I didn't expect Source could look so modern. Also, people seem to like the VR aspect, but I am too poor to see for myself. Also, not a moron to spend so much money on this before it is a thing.

But isnt this Source 2 not orginal source?

 

[Jenkem]

JEFF is blasting my ass boys

 

[Shaewaroz]

"...and Alyx was like whateveeer..."

Gotta love Alyx's new personality.

 

[rezaf]

Anyone else oldskool enough to feel that it would have been much cooler to have a HL VR game set in Black Mesa?

Especially in hindsight, this isolated location was for me far more immersive than all that resistance / City 17 stuff. Obviously I must be in a minority or even alone thinking that way.

 

[A horse of course]

Anyone else oldskool enough to feel that it would have been much cooler to have a HL VR game set in Black Mesa?

Especially in hindsight, this isolated location was for me far more immersive than all that resistance / City 17 stuff. Obviously I must be in a minority or even alone thinking that way.

I'd be fine with a Black Mesa VR game using GoldSrc-level visuals for the sake of ensuring smooth performance and increased interactivity.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

It's the most fun I've had in a video game since Kingdom Come Deliverance. The more interact-able a game is, the better it is in my view. Take that for what you will.

Okay, thank you for your feedback.
Perhaps I will pick up a VR headset once I have purchased a new PC. Not really any rush with it at the moment.

 

[taxalot]

So.

Is this moddable or what ?

 

[schru]

A map editor should be available at some point according to the official web site: https://www.half-life.com/en/alyx/ (it's lower down).

 

[vortex]

https://www.engadget.com/2020-03-23-hp-reverb-g2-vr-headset-teaser.html


New VR 650$$$ from HP, Valve and Microsoft.

Prediction: In not so distant future schools will be virtual with virtual kids attached to VR.

 

[RRRrrr]

But isnt this Source 2 not orginal source?

It is, but the Source engine Source 2 is based on is so flawed when it comes to rendering open spaces that they are still created and rendered as if they are big rooms (corridors) instead of real open spaces. Every single open space is based on the illusion of openness, having to create the outside objects just as the players would see them from his position in the corridor that is just decorated as an open location, but really isn't. The Source engine is so limiting it is ridiculous. The fact that they managed to do all of these work arounds is still impressive from a labour point of view, as the game looks pretty acceptable.

The fact that all open spaces are limited corridors really ruins my experience with source games.

God help anyone having to deal with this engine. It is probably the worst engine to develop on, which is why it isn't really used outside of Valve.

 

[Venser]

So.

Is this moddable or what ?

Yes

Valve believes Half-Life: Alyx will be modded to play without VR

It’s a question of when, not if

You need a virtual reality headset to play Half-Life: Alyx. For now.

But PC games end up in places that are often very far from where they began, and no one knows this better than Valve’s Robin Walker. Walker co-created the original Team Fortress mod for Quake, before working on Team Fortress Classic and Counter-Strike for Valve, as well as many of the Half-Life releases).

He’s keenly aware that someone out there, right now, is likely working very hard to modify a version of Half-Life: Alyx that can be played on a standard screen, with a mouse and keyboard.

“I know it’s going to happen,” Walker told Polygon. The bigger question is what the fans will think of this ported version of the game.

THE GRAND EXPERIMENT
It’s strange admitting that a game designed to be played in one very specific way may soon be played in a manner never intended, and I was curious if Walker, or anyone at Valve, was worried about the idea of someone modding the game in this way.

“The answer to this diverges significantly depending on which members of the team you talk to, so this answer is definitely just from me,” Walker explained. “There are a set of people on the team that are concerned about that. Personally, I’m not concerned about it at all.” The reason is pretty simple: The game just wouldn’t be much fun as a standard release.

“It will clearly demonstrate to people why we did this in VR,” Walker said. “It will be a very crisp way of seeing all the stuff we got for the move into VR. If people play [a modded version on a standard display] and say this is is just as good, that will teach me a lot. I will realize I’m wrong, and we didn’t get as much as we thought, and I love to know whenever I’m wrong.”

The first areas in the game, in fact, introduce a handgun, some barnacles, and some head crabs, along with a few rooms of interactive objects. It’s all there to teach the player how the controls and combat will work in VR by giving them a way to play around and learn how to interact with the world.

They’re engrossing areas of the game when played in VR, because learning how to manually reload your weapon is much more fun with a hand-tracking controller than just pressing a button, but they would be boring as hell if played as a standard non-VR game in which the same action only required a button press.

The magic lies in being inside the world, being able to touch it, and interact with it, directly. The game’s design and pacing would lose all meaning if played as a standard game, even if more players would be able to experience the story for its own sake.

“Yes, it’s going to happen. I’m fine with it, for the sake of the other members of the team I don’t want to say I encourage you to do it, but it’s going to happen,” Walker said. “I think people will then hopefully have an even greater understanding of why we decided to build the product in VR than they do now.”

 

[Morgoth]

But isnt this Source 2 not orginal source?

It is, but the Source engine Source 2 is based on is so flawed when it comes to rendering open spaces that they are still created and rendered as if they are big rooms (corridors) instead of real open spaces. Every single open space is based on the illusion of openness, having to create the outside objects just as the players would see them from his position in the corridor that is just decorated as an open location, but really isn't. The Source engine is so limiting it is ridiculous. The fact that they managed to do all of these work arounds is still impressive from a labour point of view, as the game looks pretty acceptable.

The fact that all open spaces are limited corridors really ruins my experience with source games.

God help anyone having to deal with this engine. It is probably the worst engine to develop on, which is why it isn't really used outside of Valve.

God forbid such "flawed" engine forces Valve to create real level design.

 

[Sentinel]

That post is basically conjecture anyway. It's not actually clear how much of Source 2 is completely reworked from Source 1, or how much it inherits from it, since no one outside of Valve has access to it.

 

[ADL]

If I recall correctly, Source 1 BSP files were limited by 32-bit values while Source 2 packages them in a 64-bit VPK file exponentially increasing the theoretical map size. Extremely large maps would then only be limited by asset streaming/culling tech. Source 2 tools like Hammer has been massively overhauled and I can't imagine they're still using Havok. Lua scripting support and a Vulkan-based renderer too. Even if it shares a large codebase with Source, enough work has been done to consider it something new.

These are some great changes. A while back there were some interesting datamines about a Source 2-based RPG. Presumably something open world so if they end up doing that, I'd imagine the engine would be modified to accommodate that. Can't really blame them for designing their engine to handle the tasks they perform when they're the only ones using it.

 

[Dexter]

I'm about 6-7 hours in now. Voice acting gets a bit less annoying after you get used to it a few hours into the game, I still find Alyx's new voice a bit grating.

Gravity Glove mechanic where you target items, press Trigger and flick your wrist, then have to catch them mid-air is very satisfying to use, not sure about the item storage since you have to pick them up and drop them in the backpack at your back and I already hit the Index's off-ear headphones slightly twice while doing so early on, you also get used to that though.

That's strange. It looked like it was possible in this video (3:47 if the time-stamp doesn't load)

You can throw things at stuff to stagger them and slow them down or use it to keep them away like that Headcrab video, but even metal bars don't have physicality to them when you hit zombies over the head and you can't kill them with it.

It's sad because other recent games like Boneworks and Walking Dead: Saints & Sinners did this a lot better to great effect:



Collectible Resin makes you play like a hungry Hobo looking for food, peeking into every locker and corner, emptying boxes, looking into the garbage cans and trash containers to get those precious Upgrades earlier. I've got the Reflex Sight for the basic pistol in Chapter 2 and it's useful for identifying weak spots on enemies and better targeting than just aiming by eye, but you have to use it as a sight. I got the final Upgrade Laser Sight in Chapter 3 and now can aim at shit without having to use the sight.

Chapter 2: Quarantine is pretty much an Exploration and Combat Tutorial (the one they've been showing off as a Demo before Launch) and it's still interesting, but exploring Metro tunnels or following that Sewers and Warehouses so far seems much less prestigious than the Walking Sim part at the beginning of the game through the city with all the scripted sequences.

A lot of the Tech and some of the environments you encounter look organic and bug-based:

By Chapter 3 Reload becomes a more important game mechanic when 3-5 Headcrabs or 1 Headcrab and 2 Zombies that can spawn Headcrabs of their own upon death come at you or you have to deal with the tougher Headcrabs, also you get a Flashlight for your left arm while exploring entirely dark parts of Sewers with it being the only light source.

Got to Chapter 4, fought about a dozen Combine so far, they seem to be somewhat tougher and act together more than your usual Xeno, advancing towards your position, laying suppressing fire etc. but nothing too complicated yet.

Also, has Valve been paying attention? Finding kitchen rolls and toilet paper everywhere is breaking my Post-Apocalyptic immersion. REEEEE

A lot of the more annoying or grating design elements I've noticed so far always seem to come from Valve's obsession with "comfort" and "accessibility", for instance the opinion that you can't take control of the player's camera from him or it might cause discomfort is probably responsible for the area transition problem in a few places which looks like this and having to "teleport" for Jumping:

The walking speed can also feel more like crawling at times which can be probably traced back to the same reason. Teleporting feels more fast-paced like a sort of Quicktravel. They almost compel you to use teleport at times by how slow they've made the fucking walking speed and there's no sprint.

Which is also weird, since this for instance is a thing:


Another thing they apparently did is have all weapons be one-handed just to be "handi-capable". I mean, "comfort" or "accessibility" features are nice to have I guess for the people that need them, but if you design basic elements of your entire game around it, it gets retarded quickly. I wonder what game you'd get if you'd design it for an individual that has no arms, no legs and gets VR Sick easily with a HMD on: https://uploadvr.com/half-life-alyx-one-hand/

The worst thing is they're being praised for this by morons: https://www.reddit.com/r/ValveIndex...k_you_for_making_alyx_handicapped_accessible/

 

[Latro]

neo scavenger VR when

 

[Venser]

 

[Jenkem]

finished it last night. game is amazing, definitely the VR GOTY, possibly the general GOTY. so many memorable setpieces and the best gman sequence

suck it poorfags

 

[ADL]

With his YouTube bucks, you think he'd be able to afford a fucking SSD in TYOOL 2020 instead of bitching about load times.

 

[Jenkem]

With his YouTube bucks, you think he'd be able to afford a fucking SSD in TYOOL 2020 instead of bitching about load times.

Yeah I didn't know what the fuck he was talking about, I was using a regular SSD, not an NVMe or anything and the longest load time was like 20 seconds

 

[Sentinel]

best gman sequence

what? how? the sequence in episode 2 and at the end of half life 2 are better by quite a margin.

 

[Jenkem]

 

[ADL]

Yeah I didn't know what the fuck he was talking about, I was using a regular SSD, not an NVMe or anything and the longest load time was like 20 seconds

Same

 

[Egosphere]

best gman sequence

what? how? the sequence in episode 2 and at the end of half life 2 are better by quite a margin.

Seems like he's dropped the stuffy bureaucrat persona in this one, and really relishing fucking with the main cast's plans