Half-Life: Alyx

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It’s hard to believe it, but the new Half-Life is out. Alyx is still a first person shooter, but for virtual reality and only for it. What is this game in general, how is it played and felt in a helmet, and is it worth thinking about buying your own VR device for it? The answers to these questions are below in the text.

First impressions, realistic City 17 and surprise from the VR mechanic

Nicely familiar outlines of the city. Roof. The sun. Doves. Citadel. You are Alix Vance, daughter of the famous Black Mesa scientist Eli Vance. The story of Half-Life: Alyx unfolds even before the heroine meets Gordon Freeman. The Alliance captured Alix’s father to find out what he found in the quarantine area. You have to get him out of captivity, but for this you have to go through dangerous and closed areas of the city.

The game starts on the balcony. The first thing that catches your eye is the incredibly charming street lighting. The sun, birds. I just want to grab a coffee and stand there, think about my own, looking at City 17. But the Resistance is waiting! We have to go check who is there for why is making a video call … Oh, wait, what are these markers? Well, wait, it’s time to show your creativity.

I don’t have much experience with VR games. Therefore, at first I got used to the fact that you can not only turn your head, but also your body, reach for objects, walk, squat and pick up the markers that have fallen to the floor. I also needed to realize that in some cases my hands can be permeable – sometimes objects pass through them. The HTC Vive sensors perfectly captured my position and transmitted it into the game without any delay. However, even after a few hours, I still had difficulty opening the doors, as in the very beginning of Half-Life: Alyx. Grabbing a handle, turning, walking away, opening a door (or pushing it and walking through) is a common action in life, but in a video game it feels different. In a way, I had to re-learn the world like a child. As for the movement, the game offers to use the teleport – it’s more convenient.

Moving around the city, I continually noticed realistic and smooth animation of characters, natural reflection and refraction of light. I wanted to shoot literally every frame. Valve has provided graphics worthy of top-end PCs. But in addition to the picture, Half-Life: Alyx also has sensible gameplay. Pretty soon, the heroine is handed gravel gloves with which you can attract objects to yourself. And even that is fun to do, because instead of just getting hold of the jar lying there in the distance, you also have to catch it in flight. Gloves are also useful in that they reflect the state of health.

A little later, you are also handed a pistol and taught to reload (almost like in real life!). But there is no training in shooting. However, you don’t have to wait long for a chance to test yourself. The developers do not postpone your first serious skirmish and let you play for real in the first hour, as if to say: “There is nothing to chill, it’s time to act!”

People captured by headcrabs move moderately quickly and notice you far from a kilometer, so you have time to carefully aim in battle. And then the miracle teleport comes into play, which over time you learn to use intuitively, without hesitation. In addition, I was surprised to find that I aim well. Later, the pistol can be improved with a red dot sight, increase the clip and add a new fire mode.

Of course, there is a lot of interactivity in Half-Life: Alyx. You can take almost any object, turn it in your hand, throw it at the enemy. But this is not at all impressive, but how at the same time one important and ancient aspect of video games has changed – collecting. From the first adventure games, we have been exploring locations in search of various useful or key items. This is what the gameplay of modern games is based on. Thanks to VR, ransacking desks and drawers is much more fun. And I realized this far from immediately. But the impression that you open the cabinet door or drawer of the table by yourself, look around the corners, into bins and boxes, take things from the shelves with your hands or pull them to you with a gravity glove, are amazing. Here it is – the hallmark of a new generation of interactive entertainment. Of course, I wouldn’t be surprised if these features have been implemented earlier in other projects, but this is just one piece of the complete picture of Alyx.

And here’s a hint: it turns out that small wooden boxes can be smashed against the floor or wall – there are cartridges and other useful things.

And when after a couple of hours you feel yourself at ease, briskly teleport, shoot, inspect the premises, the game throws up a new interesting situation – wandering in the dark. One had only to arm himself with a flashlight, as more enemies crawled from everywhere. The situation became tense. Sounds began to play an important role, as did shadows. Nothing is visible around. The flashlight only illuminates a small part of the room. I thought such moments should be terrifying – but no. Either life is worse than zombies and chickens jumping in the dark, or the brain still perceives the game as a game. Nevertheless, after passing this section, I wanted to take a break. And so I played for almost five hours in a row.

But outside VR, a very unusual brain bug awaited me. For about an hour, I periodically did not feel my fingers and hands when I did not concentrate my vision on them. An interesting virtual reality effect.

Alliance gunfights and roller coasters
I returned to City 17. The dark levels are over, long live the surface and the sun. The sawn-off shotgun I found earlier came in handy only a couple of times. Not the most convenient weapon, because without improvements it holds few cartridges, and it takes several times longer to reload than a pistol. Yes, and you should hit the target close, otherwise you risk spending more precious ammunition. It was possible to attach a collimator sight to it – but why? In the case of the pistol, he also showed himself not very well. Aiming has become less convenient, but, however, thanks to the point, you know exactly where you will get.

But the game allowed me to distract myself from all these thoughts. Half-Life: Alyx often dramatically changes mood and tasks. I have just fought off headcrabs and zombies in the darkness of basements, and now on the surface I solve puzzles in daylight. Interestingly, Valve is bringing back what many modern blockbusters have lost in the pursuit of a mass audience – the need to think and notice. If now they literally lead you by the handle and color the places where you need to jump and the objects that need to be picked up, then in Half-Life: Alyx the levels look natural, and key objects, if they hint at the need to interact with them, do not stand out. You may even need knowledge of game symbols to solve some problems. Interesting, but not always good – especially if you’re a beginner. For example, take the same valve from the floor and think about whether it can be used where – and you can!

In addition, as you progress, more and more different opponents are encountered. If earlier there were only headcrabs and zombies, now an armored headcrab has been added to them and, accordingly, a person captured by it. The method of dealing with the latter is different: to kill them, you need to hit them in the very heart. This is not always done simply and quickly. You need not only accuracy, but also a good reaction.

And just as fast as the game takes you out of the dark, it brings you back there again. Perhaps Valve liked to play with limited lighting, making the player feel anxious. I will not say that such levels are devoid of their charm. In addition, the developer adds additional conditions to them: each cartridge counts, and a miss on the enemy is more likely to cost you your life – after all, the bullet will fall into a flammable tank. I wouldn’t be surprised if Valve has spent a fair amount of time testing the duration of the tense sections, because they end when they need to.

And in addition to interesting, but still familiar situations, the game continues to delight with new ones. Half-Life: Alyx features full-fledged gun battles with the Alliance people! On normal difficulty, they are perfectly balanced. You need to hide, take cover and look around the corner in order to survive and repel the villains. A good workout for the body is provided. It was then that the collimator sight on the pistol came in handy, because it is safer to firefight from a distance. You get even more pleasure from such battles when dozens of grenades fall into your hands.

Half-Life: Alyx uses a roller coaster formula of dark and light; sometimes puzzles, then enemies, and sometimes all together; sometimes a lot of ammunition, then every round counts. And she does it in a very skillful way. Valve balances calmness and tension, pleasing places and nasty cellars, safe zones and arenas with enemies. And in places, to distract you, includes a dialogue between Alix and her new friend, Technician Russell, shows an entertaining scene with floating boxes, flickering walls or disturbing incidents.

When you see all this with your own eyes, the involvement is much stronger than watching a game on TV or monitor. The virtual reality headset continues to amaze with its ability to trick the brain, giving the player a stronger experience than usual. Fear of heights, reaction to cover in front of you, trying to throw the headcrab off your face. Even the reflex use of teleportation to move. All this is so familiar and natural that I perfectly understand Valve to make Half-Life: Alyx exclusive