https://uploadvr.com/half-life-alyx-2-million/
Half-Life: Alyx Surpasses 2 Million Owners On Steam, Steam Spy Suggests
Harry Baker
December 04, 2020
Valve’s flagship VR game Half-Life: Alyx has surpassed 2 million owners on Steam, according to SteamSpy.
Previously, the game was marked in the 1 million – 2 million owners bracket on the platform, but recently changed over to the 2 million – 5 million bracket. These aren’t official numbers from Valve itself, so can’t be taken as definitive, but Steam Spy has long served as one of the few means of estimating game sales on Steam.
While this means that at least 2 million people own the game in their Steam library, it does not represent sales figures. Owners of the game also include those who received the game for free as part of a promotion, of which there were many for Half-Life: Alyx.
The most notable promotion, which is ongoing, is that all owners of Valve Index hardware receive a copy of Half-Life: Alyx for free. This applied not just to the full Valve Index kit, but even just to people who solely bought the Valve Index controllers to use with a different headset.
Likewise, HTC partnered with Valve multiple times for various promotional bundles that offered Alyx for free with the purchase of a HTC Vive headset – the most recent of which only just ended.
Taking these promotions into account, a decent chunk of those 2 million Half-Life: Alyx owners could be from these offers, but it’s impossible to determine the breakdown of sales to promotional copies. Nonetheless, surpassing 2 million copies, regardless of method, is an impressive feat for Valve’s first fully-fledged VR game.
Half-Life: Alyx released in March, and remains one of the best releases of the year. If you’re one of the few people who hasn’t played the game and is still on the fence, be sure to check out our review.
*** Ensure to download all eight maps of Return to Rapture 1-8, you will transition from map to map ***
*** Ensure to have at least two free save-files while playing the campaign ***
From the creator who brought you "The Lost Case".
I proudly present you my latest Half-Life: Alyx campaign: RETURN TO RAPTURE
8 ALL-NEW LEVELS IN THE BIOSHOCK UNIVERSE!
The Combine have discovered the whereabouts of Rapture.
Rumors exist that the suitcase of Andrew Ryan has yet to be found. Within it are the secrets to ADAM and the plasmids.
The quest for this artefact is not archeology, it's a race against evil. If it is captured by the Combine the armies of darkness will march all over the face of the earth.
This is an all new, original campaign merging the worlds of Half-Life and Bioshock!
• Original soundtrack created just for the campaign! by RPM STUDIO warszawa
• Exciting story complete with dialogue from our new professional voice actor Seamus Bryner!
• Atmosphere and visuals never seen before in Half-Life: Alyx!
Plus some old favorites Bioshock fans will love to see!
• Vita Chambers to save your game: Hack the panel, and go inside! You’ll hear the sound and see the light!
• Audio diaries
• Little Sisters machines
• In-game, original vending machines
• Fully animated and modeled fauna!
• Plasmids!
• ... and more to experience!
Praise for Return to Rapture!
https://uploadvr.com/half-life-alyx-bioshock-mod/
https://www.pcgamer.com/explore-bioshocks-rapture-in-this-half-life-alyx-mod/
https://www.gamesradar.com/explore-bioshocks-rapture-in-vr-thanks-to-this-half-life-alyx-mod/
https://gamerant.com/half-life-alyx-bioshock-rapture-mod/
https://www.dualshockers.com/half-life-alyx-mod-bioshock/
https://comicyears.com/gaming/half-life-alyx-bioshock-mod-takes-us-back-to-rapture/
https://3dnews.ru/1023393/modder-vossozdal-kusochek-bioshock-na-dvigke-source-2-iz-halflife-alyx
https://www.levelup.com/noticias/59...oShock-al-VR-en-nuevo-mod-para-Half-Life-Alyx
Other Half-Life: Alyx mods by Wim Buytaert:
RESIDENT ALYX: biohazard
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2311859241
The Lost Case
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2116238135
The Lost Case - Revelations
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2283886985
If you’d like to support my work, feel free to donate! Anything is appreciated!
Paypal: wim.buytaert.1988@hotmail.com
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=37046657&fan_landing=true
download them all right here some links
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426339777 Map1 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426346180 Map2 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426350986 Map3 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426356519 Map4 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2427251963 Map5 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2427282036 Map6 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2427356209 Map7 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426572660 Map8
are you stuck look at this from willhart
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXlqud_jS2If4lhpwsDyn4M4MJkdzmSJ0
special thanks to remo. he is the biggest support i could wish!!
special thanks to Adrian Wasilewski for creating the new sountrack with his studio RPM studio warszawa
special thanks to Saemus Bryner for his awesome voicework. look him up on fiverr
special thanks to current patreon!!
special thanks to willhart for tips and support
i used assets from
lumoize//morty brosevelt//more polys/amarveer/schmold.art/pc-noodles/traian dumbrava//froggreen
i also asked permission from original owners bioshock when creating this campaign!! hope the like it
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426339777
*** Ensure to download all eight maps of Return to Rapture 1-8, you will transition from map to map ***
*** Ensure to have at least two free save-files while playing the campaign ***
From the creator who brought you "The Lost Case".
I proudly present you my latest Half-Life: Alyx campaign: RETURN TO RAPTURE
8 ALL-NEW LEVELS IN THE BIOSHOCK UNIVERSE!
The Combine have discovered the whereabouts of Rapture.
Rumors exist that the suitcase of Andrew Ryan has yet to be found. Within it are the secrets to ADAM and the plasmids.
The quest for this artefact is not archeology, it's a race against evil. If it is captured by the Combine the armies of darkness will march all over the face of the earth.
This is an all new, original campaign merging the worlds of Half-Life and Bioshock!
• Original soundtrack created just for the campaign! by RPM STUDIO warszawa
• Exciting story complete with dialogue from our new professional voice actor Seamus Bryner!
• Atmosphere and visuals never seen before in Half-Life: Alyx!
Plus some old favorites Bioshock fans will love to see!
• Vita Chambers to save your game: Hack the panel, and go inside! You’ll hear the sound and see the light!
• Audio diaries
• Little Sisters machines
• In-game, original vending machines
• Fully animated and modeled fauna!
• Plasmids!
• ... and more to experience!
Praise for Return to Rapture!
https://uploadvr.com/half-life-alyx-bioshock-mod/
https://www.pcgamer.com/explore-bioshocks-rapture-in-this-half-life-alyx-mod/
https://www.gamesradar.com/explore-bioshocks-rapture-in-vr-thanks-to-this-half-life-alyx-mod/
https://gamerant.com/half-life-alyx-bioshock-rapture-mod/
https://www.dualshockers.com/half-life-alyx-mod-bioshock/
https://comicyears.com/gaming/half-life-alyx-bioshock-mod-takes-us-back-to-rapture/
https://3dnews.ru/1023393/modder-vossozdal-kusochek-bioshock-na-dvigke-source-2-iz-halflife-alyx
https://www.levelup.com/noticias/596077/Llevan-Rapture-de-BioShock-al-VR-en-nuevo-mod-para-Half-Life-Alyx
Other Half-Life: Alyx mods by Wim Buytaert:
RESIDENT ALYX: biohazard
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2311859241
The Lost Case
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2116238135
The Lost Case - Revelations
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2283886985
If you’d like to support my work, feel free to donate! Anything is appreciated!
Paypal: wim.buytaert.1988@hotmail.com
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=37046657&fan_landing=true
download them all right here some links
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426339777 Map1 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426346180 Map2 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426350986 Map3 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426356519 Map4 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2427251963 Map5 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2427282036 Map6 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2427356209 Map7 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426572660 Map8
are you stuck look at this from willhart
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXlqud_jS2If4lhpwsDyn4M4MJkdzmSJ0
special thanks to remo. he is the biggest support i could wish!!
special thanks to Adrian Wasilewski for creating the new sountrack with his studio RPM studio warszawa
special thanks to Saemus Bryner for his awesome voicework. look him up on fiverr
special thanks to current patreon!!
special thanks to willhart for tips and support
i used assets from
lumoize//morty brosevelt//more polys/amarveer/schmold.art/pc-noodles/traian dumbrava//froggreen
i also asked permission from original owners bioshock when creating this campaign!! hope the like it
Half-Life Alyx, One Year Later
It's been quite the year since we launched Half-Life: Alyx, our full-length virtual reality return to Half-Life. Shortly after its debut, we enabled Steam Workshop support to open the doors for the creativity of mod-makers and make it easy for players to expand on the Alyx experience. Later in 2020, we released over 3.5 hours of developer commentary, adding a new way to experience Alyx while hearing directly from the team about how we built the game.
We are grateful to have been honored by our industry as well as the community of Half-Life: Alyx players. As developers, there is nothing more rewarding (or terrifying) than releasing your work to the public. We are both proud of what we put out and humbled by how it has been received. In addition to receiving nominations from the D.I.C.E. Awards and BAFTA, Half-Life: Alyx won a slate of awards including:
- GameSpot: Game of the Year 2020
- Destructoid: PC Platform Game of the Year
- The Game Awards: Best VR/AR Game
- VR Focus Awards: Game of the Year
- 2020 VR Awards: Game of the Year
As we close out the first year, the number of mods created and shared via the Steam Workshop is in the hundreds, ranging from simple model replacements to full-on campaign experiences. With over 800 now available to try, we thought it would be interesting to shine a light on some of these great mods available to the community, so we enlisted the help of journalist, writer, and Alyx-mod-aficionado Craig Pearson to play and write about his favorites.
Exploring some favorite Half-Life: Alyx mods
Guest writer Craig Pearson takes a look at some of his favorite mods from the Steam Workshop
We are super grateful to the Half-Life community, and we hope this post gives you a chance to enjoy Alyx in some new ways. Gaming has been a much-needed bright spot for a lot of us in this past year, and we consider ourselves lucky to be a part of it.
Exploring some favorite Half-Life: Alyx mods
Guest writer Craig Pearson takes a look at some of his favorite mods from the Steam Workshop
As we celebrate the one-year anniversary since the launch of Half-Life: Alyx (more on that here), we thought it would be interesting to look at some of the great mods that the community have been creating that bring so much more life to HL Alyx. We enlisted the help of Craig Pearson, a journalist, writer, and Alyx-mods-aficionado, to play and write about his favorites.
--
I’m Craig Pearson. I’ve worked for PCG, IGN, RPS, Facepunch, and more. I’m also a big fan of Half-Life: Alyx, and I’ve craved more ever since /that ending/. The community didn’t disappoint me. Just weeks after the game was released, before the official tools were out, there were mods to play. Then the Workshop arrived with the bespoke tools, and I’ve been stuck in City 17 ever since.
There’s been a steady drip of weapons, levels, and oddball scenarios to keep me entertained. Armed with this experience and, more importantly, an intimate knowledge of the development team’s home addresses, I begged them to let me put together a list of my favourite mods.. They “agreed”. They following is a collection of the mods that kept me locked in my Valve Index during 2020.
I’ve made two lists: the first is for those of you looking to replay the campaign, and it adds new enemies and new weapons, and new play styles. You’ll have a blast taking on the Combine while carrying their shield. The second list is full of levels that’ll challenge and surprise everyone who thought they knew what the original game was capable of. You can’t get further from the intense battles with the Combine than a round of mini-golf.
I hope you enjoy what’s here. To me, there's no better way to celebrate the first anniversary of Alyx than with more Alyx. Even more so, I hope you share your experiences, favorite mods, and exciting moments from Valve’s return to the Half-Life universe.
Part 1 - New enemies and new weapons, and new play styles
Scalable Init Support
Scalable Init Support
A Workshop Item for Half-Life: Alyx
By: Epic
This mod-loader enables a limitless amount of init-based VScript mods to be active at the same time, keeping the necessary code all in one centralized location for easy maintenance.
Not the most exciting addition, I’ll grant you. But it’s a mod-loader that you should just enable and leave on, so download it before we get to the good stuff.
Campaign+
After /that/ finale, you might need a few moments--or months--to take stock of what happened. And if you decide to return to see it all again once more, Campaign+ is a great way to do that. It’s a fairly chunky overhaul of the main game, and assumes you’ve already been through everything. You start off with upgraded weapons, but that’s balanced out with new enemies, encounters, and more.
The enemies have new variations and spawn in new places, but they often come with new weaknesses to help you out. The Armoured Grunts have armour which forces you to headshot them. There are Combine Medics, running between their comrades and healing them in battle. The Shield Squad all deploy their barriers as they move around, which takes 20 bullets apiece to destroy, but you can also target the power source.
Every encounter is far tougher, far more fraught with danger, but also hugely rewarding.
Handheld Combine Shield
This evens the odds between you and the Combine, adding one of their shields to each level (aside from the intro, outro, and J**f) as an item. Just stick it in a wrist pocket and deploy in battle.
It gives you some excellent new options during combat, fundamentally shifting Alyx to a more aggressive playstyle. With it you can melee enemies and deflect grenades or bashed chairs, and it of course lets you fight in open areas without worrying about the need for cover.
Recurve Bow
Right-handed or Left-handed
Valve took the controversial decision to make a VR action game without a bow. This rights that wrong and turns you into Hawkeye in the process. Though it doesn’t fit as snugly into the game as your hands do into the Russells, it does complement the guns quite nicely.
The bow is an item in the game that spawns at the beginning of a number of chapters. You stow it in your wrist slots, and when grasped in either hand (there are versions for lefties and righties) you can draw an infinite number of arrows.
It adds the same sort of friction to the combat that trying to reload while surrounded by enemies does. Pulling the arrow, knocking it, and firing is a learned skill. The results are brutal one-hit kills, or hilarious, panicked retakes. Aiming is a challenge, and I’d much rather it just replaced a weapon and was bound to a hand, but that’s a limitation the mod has to live with.
Glorious Gloves
This handy addon turns the Russells into full-blown gravity gloves, bringing the Zero Point Energy Field Manipulator into Alyx’s grasp.
It allows you to pull large objects across the level. Instead of leaping into your hand, the object floats just in front, waiting for the player to punch it at a victim, though it takes some training to be accurate. There’s no subtlety when you do; you simply hurl whatever you were holding at an enormous velocity. Aiming and maiming in one clenched fist.
Auto Pickup
A mod that I can’t live without, now. Seriously. I uninstalled it and I’m now writing this in a coma. Instead of having you toss all your ammo over your shoulder, Auto Pickup simply stores it as soon as you grab it and let go. It has reduced the terrible blight of Alyx Shoulder that has been overwhelming sports doctors all over the country.
Energetic Hands
Ever wanted to fight like a Vortigaunt? To send an arc of green lightning from your fingertips capable of killing whatever it strikes? You have? Same! Here fistbu -- fashhhhhhhooom!
Energetic Hands gives Alyx the ability to power up energetic blasts from the Russell’s and fire them right from the start of the game. It’s not a simple procedure, though. You use movement and gestures for different effects. Grasping your hands like a prize-fighter powers them up, then you can blast the energy out by throwing your hands out like a dramatic magician, or tilt them open to produce grenades. It’s a fun shift in the dynamics of the combat, putting you in a position of power and endless mayhem in ten seconds bursts.
Sustenance Mod
There’s food all over City 17, so why not have a bite to eat to recuperate instead of squashing that poor whateverthehellthatis in the health station? Sustenance Mod not only lets you snack yourself back to health all over the City, but it also means when you’re offered up dinner, you can be a good guest and eat what’s given to you. Drink doesn’t have an effect, and rotten food harms you. Balanced? No. Delicious? Also no.
Gordon's Crowbar
You know you want this. It adds a heavy, two-handed crowbar to the campaign. It can be used for melee attacks, prop-breaking, and starting off insurrections against a powerful alien hierarchy that’s slowly consuming all life on the planet. It is very hard to play the game with it, but it looks so good in your hands.
Part 2 - New levels and campaigns
C17YSCAPE
C17YSCAPE is set in City 17, between the events of Half-Life: Alyx and Half-Life 2. You’re a prisoner whose Combine jail cell has malfunctioned, letting you escape through the terrifying underbelly of the occupied area. C17YSCAPE feels a lot like lengthy sections of Half-Life 2, where you’re undoing the nuts and bolts of the Combine’s vast empire. With bullets.
The opening 10 minutes is slow going, but it pulls it all together with some frugal ammo and health and wonderfully timed enemy encounters. I’ve played a lot of Alyx, but I’ve never spent this much time cowering behind pillars or crouching and timing my shots between enemy reloads. Instead of holding onto health syringes for later, they get jammed into my arm like a champion bodybuilder aiming for a dubious world record. Even after picking the laser pointer to help me conserve my ammo, every encounter was TENSE. That’s right, I capitalized, boldened, italicized and underlined the word. I blame the shotgunners.
An excellent addition if you like shooting the bad guys and want about 90 minutes more of that.
Overcharge
A map that was built before the official tools were released. Overcharge is a hefty chunk of Combine-infested City 17.
There’s nothing here that hasn’t been done in Alyx, but that’s not an issue. The space that you’re playing through, where backdrops spotted through windows will become part of the level, guides you neatly though the enemy encounters and puzzles. It’s economically designed. There aren’t many moments where you’re overwhelmed by a huge number of enemies, but you will be taken by surprise a few times as you wander the level. There are a couple of metrics you can use to gauge how good a VR game is. During Overcharge my face sweated and my cable got tangled. That’s at least 7/10 from IGN.
Depending how you play, this should take about 45 minutes to complete.
Belomorskaya Station
Belomorskaya Station starts off in a dim room and barely gets brighter than that. You’re crawling through a zombie infested subway in a straight-up scavenging survival horror level. Swathed in shadows and screams, Alyx is constantly fretting over her low ammo count. You have to check every nook for sneakily hidden shotgun shells.
You’d think in such a dark and dismal space that finding a flare would be a cause for celebration, but here the blood red light cast by it feels utterly feeble in the onslaught of darkness. It’s of no comfort whatsoever.
It lasts about 20 mins, but it feels like you’re down there for days.
Brewery Break-In
Set before the events of the main game, Alyx has to investigate a brewery. There seems to be a lot of these in City 17, which often leads to some excellent levels but bad morning afters.
Though there’s nothing bright and shiningly new in the level, it’s built very well. The puzzles are well-connected and the level loops in and around itself, letting you plan ahead a little. This is simply more Alyx, but there’s nothing wrong with that.
It’s only about 15 mins long, and sadly part 2 has yet to materialise. If you’re reading this, Jake… *waggles eyebrows*
Goon Squad
There’s more to this map than I’m willing to tell you about. You’re part of a Combine patrol squad stuck in a quarantined sewer system. You have to escape. It’s about 30 mins long, depending on how much of a coward you are. That means it took me 7 hours.
Xenthug
Xenthug was released before the mapping tools were made public, but even with that limitation it’s a fun, new way to play. You’re in a single level beset by waves of enemies. Survival is a little bit more complicated than just shooting them. You have to pay for the pleasure.
Each wave spawns all around you, leaving you frantically trying to duck around abandoned trucks and piles of boxes to gain a few seconds to reload. Some, not all, enemies drop Resin, and in between hordes you can speedily spend this in vending machines on simple ammo, health, and more.
The first wave is just headcrabs. If you gain access to the room in the corner (look for the keycard), you can use that to prepare for later fights. But if you trap a single headcrab in there the wave won’t end until you kill it, letting you explore the nooks of the level. You have plenty of time to find resin, grab explosives, and move boxes to get to higher ground.You’ll need any advantage you can get in the later levels, where you’ll discover movement and shooting abilities you never thought you had. It’s a great mix of frantic and thoughtful, and you’ll lose hours to it.
BLOPS17: Emergent
Sometimes the best way to play is to let the game come to you. This is an Alyxifed take on CoD’s zombie mode, where you can toss vodka to kill the screaming, baying, headcrab wearers.
It’s a very different horde mode to XenThug. You’re in a smaller space, constantly moving back and forth to tend to the access areas. Zombies break down the boarded up doors and you have to keep those blocked if you want to live to see another sunrise. It has buyable upgrades for ammo and the defences, but the reset between levels is far more frantic than Xenthug. It’s quite a workout.
Minigolf
You know what’s harder than shooting a Combine soldier in the eye while dodging a Manhack? Golf.
A whole seven holes await you in this baffling but entirely necessary download. No more than ten minutes of your time will be spent knocking the ball about, but the fact that it exists and is well made is enough to consider having a putt.
Northern Star Bowling
You know what’s harder than shooting a Combine soldier in the e -- no, wait. I’ve already done that one. Northern Star Bowling is a fun place to blow off some steam. A secret bowling alley with the G-Man serving his private reserve ales and four bowling lanes for you to try. It’s not a perfect representation, largely because the physics don’t really allow for anything other than a straight toss of the ball, but it’s still an amazing example of what the creators on the Alyx Workshop crafted. The pins reset and there are scoreboards should you get competitive with yourself.
--
You can explore all the Half-Life: Alyx mods in the Steam Workshop here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/546560/workshop/
Valve – Half-Life: Alyx/Episode 2 Follow-Up Not ‘Hot On Its Heels’ But ‘Excited To Keep Going’
Jamie Feltham
March 23, 2021
Valve says it’s probably a bit too optimistic to think that a follow-up Half-Life game after 2020’s Half-Life: Alyx is “hot on its heels”.
The team’s Robin Walker said as much to IGN this weekend after taking home the Game of the Year prize for Alyx at the SXSW Festival. When asked if a follow-up to Half-Life 2: Episode 2 was coming in hot after the release of Alyx, the developer replied: “I think hot on its heels might be a little bit optimistic.”
“I think one of the rewarding things about Alyx was to see that community reaction both to the game itself, which we were super happy with at the end of the game,” Walker continued. “At the point we shipped it we were very happy with what we created and we were really excited for people to get their hands on it.”
Turning to the game’s ending (which we won’t spoil here), the developer said that the team was less confident people would react well to the choices it had made, but ended up pleasantly surprised. “So, yeah, the reaction from people to the story and the narrative choices we made at the end have been really– energizing is probably the right term and so we’re really excited to keep going there,” Walker added.
The question of what Valve does next after Alyx, which set a new bar for VR gaming, has been on the tip of everyone’s tongue. A behind-the-scenes experience chronicling the making of Alyx suggested that some at Valve did want to make Half-Life 3, but it might not be in VR, while the team is also working on a top-secret project. We’ll just have to keep our fingers crossed that the studio is planning more VR content of Alyx’s calibre.
Elsewhere in the interview, Walker noted that he expects to see a bigger variety of VR games in the near future. “I think, if I had to guess, in the next few years we’re going to see a bunch more of other kinds of games come to VR and have that rich content in addition to just the mechanics,” Walker said. “And then in between that I would expect we’re going to start seeing, in the ways that as we did that translation of Half-Life into VR, we’re able to start seeing the ways in which VR could add to Half-Life.”
