Oh, and it looks pretty good, too.
The stakes couldn't be higher; TechRadar called Alyx, "a gambit where the very future of VR gaming is at stake." And while that might sound hyperbolic, it might not be wrong, with the announcement of Alyx prompting some VR evangelists to dub this the "killer app" that VR has long been lacking.
But, while some of the gameplay we're seeing will clearly need either Oculus Touch controllers, or the Knuckles controllers that ship with the Valve Index, I'm not convinced that the experience on offer here is different enough to convince skeptical consumers to suddenly jump onto the VR hype train; and I'm not convinced that the Half-Life IP, iconic as it is for the video game industry, is actually broadly popular enough to prompt non-gamers to buy VR headsets just to play it.
I am, shall we say, bearish on VR's prospects, having recently declared VR to be dead and only just still twitching a bit. I'm not the only one that's noticed, either; take this article, written by a VR evangelist and published by Fast Company:
Investments in VR entertainment venues all over the world, VR cinematic experiences, and specialized VR studios such as Google Spotlight and CCP Games have either significantly downsized, closed down, or morphed into new ventures. What is happening?The article then continues with sub-headings like, "Virtual Reality, Literal Headache," and "Killing Creativity," before concluding that it's learn from success stories like Beat Saber and start cranking out killer apps. It even ends with that line which I've come to despise, about how VR's "possibilities are limited only by imagination." It just sounds like vapourware, doesn't it?
But that's not today's topic. Today's question is: has Valve actually crafted a VR "killer app" with Half-Life: Alyx? And, since I'm going to have trouble staying objective about this, let's turn to a somewhat more objective source for commentary on the topic.
A source like the The Verge, perhaps:
Not that VR is somehow dying, but the hype from a few years ago seems to have completely dissipated. We’re to the point where it seems as though VR is no longer the next big thing for a lot of companies, but rather a stepping stone or stopgap on the way to AR. [...] While I don’t think VR headsets are necessarily going to become ubiquitous post-Alyx in the same way as sound and graphics cards, they’ve at least reached an important maturation point where they feel less like aspirational tech. Maybe something as big as a new Half-Life game can keep VR headsets from just being a footnote in the history of gaming. [Emphasis added.]A couple of The Verge's staff were fascinated by the animation of Alyx's hands, which looked really well done in the trailer, and possibly even (very expensively) motion-tracked. Only other take from that same discussion piece discussed whether Half-Life: Alyx would be good for VR, or vice versa:
It’s poorly timed just as VR is struggling, and if I’m being forced to play this through VR, then I really hope the control scheme is perfect. I’ve played a bunch of VR shooters and wasted a lot of money and hours on them, and most of them suck. I just hope, for Half-Life’s sake, that this doesn’t flop and actually does something for VR. But realistically, I think it’s going to be a misstep in the history of Half-Life. I really hope I’m wrong. [Emphasis added.]Hmmm... It would seem that I'm not the only VR skeptic, these days.
The one great thing about this story is that we won't have to wait very long to find out how it ends. Unlike most "game-changing" VR announcements, which are typically still in development, with an unknown number of years of work still to do, Alyx is just about done, with a release date of next March. We're just a few short months away from learning just how good this game actually is, and whether it can move the needle on VR's fortunes overall. At which time, I guess we'll all just see, won't we?