Half Life Alyx and Boneworks - The two VR games that dare to be different. Okay maybe just one, but still. AKA Floop’s shill thread.

[Hammerstein]

Do you guys not have VR headsets?

 

[c-no]

"Why aren't you CONSOOMING products like I DID?"

I like Valve and all, but this sort of shillery just makes me suspect that it'd be nothing more than an "okay" gimmick that'd be forgotten within the decade.

EDIT: Also, >I get it's expensive but so is the rest of gaming


Okay, sperg. I'll just enjoy all this bargain-bin games I got for $5 while you waste your benjamins on these thousand dollars VR shit.

Considering people that sperg about how great VR is, I'll just say this as someone that tried VR: it is fun but it's the kind of fun that has its moments. There might be some that look worth playing such as Blade & Sorcery but a small handful isn't really enough to justify paying out $600 dollars for a VR headset that offers full motion. There may be cheaper variants but even then, I still stand by what said earlier in that spending 100 bucks or more is something one won't do often, not when they may be more towards upgrading PC components to get a smoother experience and the like.

One might be more for buying a VR headset if there are other games besides the kind that has you shooting at things. I wouldn't mind playing a VR game that gave one actual movement rather than teleporting but I ain't gonna spend a whole lotta money just for one game because it requries a much more expensive headset.

 

[{o}P II]

Any game that requires me to do anything but sit on my ass with a contoller or mouse & keyboard can go fuck itself

 

[Marissa Moira]

Both Half life and Dragon's Lair get revived within the same week, holy shit.

I dunno are we out of Unicorns to chase in games? Shenmue 3 is coming, Final Fantasy 7 is getting a remake, everything is coming.

Maybe a new Lunar game is the next grail to strive for? Breath of Fire?

 

[Opiophile]

Honestly guys, while yes this announcement is exciting, it still pales in comparison to how fun BoneWorks is going to be imo. That shit looks like truly the next step in the future of gaming.

I am excited new Half-Life shit is coming out, but I haven't been interested in any of the DLCs or whatever shit they released after HL2. I see this as a gimmicky excuse to not take the time to develop Half-Life 3, which would probably cost a fortune to make.

 

[OmnipotentStupidity]

Both Half life and Dragon's Lair get revived within the same week, holy shit.

I dunno are we out of Unicorns to chase in games? Shenmue 3 is coming, Final Fantasy 7 is getting a remake, everything is coming.

Maybe a new Lunar game is the next grail to strive for? Breath of Fire?

Honestly, none that I can think of. Especially not to the magnitude/cliffhanger of something like Half-Life.

Baldur's Gate III's happening, Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines is getting a sequel, Kingdom Hearts 3 came and went, Beyond Good and Evil 2's entered development, Age of Empires IV got announced, fuckin' Microsoft Flight Simulator of all things is getting revived...the fuck else is there?

 

[ZMOT]

Of course I'm not part of their creative staff. So if they wan't to make a whole new game with the intention of VR they can go ahead. My expectations on it being any good won't be high if that's going to be the case.

considering all the old guard left long ago or is in cushy management positions the creative staff will basically be campo santo. get ready for another vr walking sim.

Considering people that sperg about how great VR is, I'll just say this as someone that tried VR: it is fun but it's the kind of fun that has its moments. There might be some that look worth playing such as Blade & Sorcery but a small handful isn't really enough to justify paying out $600 dollars for a VR headset that offers full motion. There may be cheaper variants but even then, I still stand by what said earlier in that spending 100 bucks or more is something one won't do often, not when they may be more towards upgrading PC components to get a smoother experience and the like.

One might be more for buying a VR headset if there are other games besides the kind that has you shooting at things. I wouldn't mind playing a VR game that gave one actual movement rather than teleporting but I ain't gonna spend a whole lotta money just for one game because it requries a much more expensive headset.

once your hardware is good enough there really is no reason to upgrade for years, least not till a console hardware change since that's what the target platforms are. if you buy into high fps or 4k get ready for shoddy ports that only use that hardware half the time or scale like absolute shit. and if you drop that kind of money might as well grab a cheap headset on black friday.

movement is down to several factors: motion sensitivity still hasn't been figured out properly and more options to make it work best for everybody cost extra time, and since most vr games are indies, maybe AA, extensive options are very low on their list, if not outright their competence half the time.
then there's valve retarded decisions to forgo sticks (and at lot of people still have vives) so input becomes another issue again where devs try to make movement working for it, no to mention trying to make it work with several systems at once.

I can't help but get the feeling this bearded man is very salty at gamers not liking VR.

gee, maybe releasing a 1000 dollar headset for the full package with overpriced gimmicky controllers that fall apart after a month and a sensor system that for some reason got more expensive after using cheaper components, which retards defend with "it's for enthusiasts!!11" isn't the way to go if you want broad adoption. especially not when you can get a WMR headset that does most of it (if not more, since it has sticks) for 1/5 of the price or oculus which has it's own games.

 

[Opiophile]

Both Half life and Dragon's Lair get revived within the same week, holy shit.

I dunno are we out of Unicorns to chase in games? Shenmue 3 is coming, Final Fantasy 7 is getting a remake, everything is coming.

Maybe a new Lunar game is the next grail to strive for? Breath of Fire?

My next Unicorn would be a Mother 3 remake......sigh.

 

[ZMOT]

Honestly guys, while yes this announcement is exciting, it still pales in comparison to how fun BoneWorks is going to be imo. That shit looks like truly the next step in the future of gaming.

I am excited new Half-Life shit is coming out, but I haven't been interested in any of the DLCs or whatever shit they released after HL2. I see this as a gimmicky excuse to not take the time to develop Half-Life 3, which would probably cost a fortune to make.

I don't get the boneworks hype. looks like ever other <insert gimmick> vr game which has an interesting concept but fuck all else. even gorn looks more interesting, and that's just an arena brawler.

HL3 will never happen. the writer left long ago (and has concluded the story on this blog), valve's internal company structure is poison to large game development that takes months or years, and even then the more sane devs probably know they could never measure up to the hype and even if the game is 11/10 people will treat it like daikatana or DNF since it's totally not what they made up in their minds over the years.
and of course you can't sell hats for a singleplayer game.

 

[AnOminous]

Let's not forget that wearing a VR headset for more than an hour hurts you're eyes and can give you a major headache.

Eat the bugs you fucking Nazi. With the soybeard NPC shills coming out in force already I wonder when the first allegations that you're a misogynist goomergorbler if you don't immediately spend $1,000 to get a VR rig for this will be.

 

[⋖ cørdion ⋗]

Why are people expecting an actual game, and not some short VR meme'ry project as per usual? They already made one with Portal.

 

[Opiophile]

I don't get the boneworks hype. looks like ever other <insert gimmick> vr game which has an interesting concept but fuck all else. even gorn looks more interesting, and that's just an arena brawler.

HL3 will never happen. the writer left long ago (and has concluded the story on this blog), valve's internal company structure is poison to large game development that takes months or years, and even then the more sane devs probably know they could never measure up to the hype and even if the game is 11/10 people will treat it like daikatana or DNF since it's totally not what they made up in their minds over the years.
and of course you can't sell hats for a singleplayer game.

The hype is just from the concept itself. Being able to affect the game world with your physical touch is a profound idea. Now how it actually plays is yet to be seen, and I don't trust any game developers anymore until I try it, so maybe it will be a gimmicky mess. It's certainly possible.

You're probably right about HL3, and that's fine. I just don't want them to destroy what's left of that series with more bullshit "games" that barely qualify as a game. It's just sad, but I suppose that's a symptom of a larger problem with gaming in general these days.

I am getting flashbacks to the extreme headache I used to get when playing my friend's Virtual Boy. I don't know how they will get around the inevitable headache from prolonged VR play.

 

[ZMOT]

The hype is just from the concept itself. Being able to affect the game world with your physical touch is a profound idea. Now how it actually plays is yet to be seen, and I don't trust any game developers anymore until I try it, so maybe it will be a gimmicky mess. It's certainly possible.

concept is nice and all, but not if it's all there is. the best gameplay doesn't mean much if it's just an empty room with the same ragdoll to whack. I mean, I get it, to develop the concept is the exciting part, fast and easy. but then spending weeks and months building a story, creating content for the story and make it exciting enough that people want to keep playing it? that takes effort. hence my pessimism.

You're probably right about HL3, and that's fine. I just don't want them to destroy what's left of that series with more bullshit "games" that barely qualify as a game. It's just sad, but I suppose that's a symptom of a larger problem with gaming in general these days.

not much to destroy since the series is pretty much dead and done. everything they shit out now won't detract from that, even if they go full nuwars. all that's left is the meme-tier name to attract people anyway, so might as well do a HL card game etc, personally I don't really care anymore.

I am getting flashbacks to the extreme headache I used to get when playing my friend's Virtual Boy. I don't know how they will get around the inevitable headache from prolonged VR play.

virtual boy was very low-tech, VR has much improved since then, but it's still not ultimate consumer friendly yet. check your IPD, check your eyes (you can easily get headaches from focusing too hard and causing eyestrain in general, doesn't need VR) and set it up accordingly. I've spend hours in certain games even without breaks, it's possible once you are comfortable and get used to it (and the game has proper support, if it's more of a hack expect your body react to it one way or another till it adapts). bigger issue is there aren't a lot of games that offer that amount of content.

 

[BananaSplit]

I cant tell if Floop is pretending or not to hype a dead franchise that gets an entry based on an overpriced gimmick

Most of the staff that were part of the development for the HL1 and HL2 games is no longer present. Valve has a terrible work ethic, not as in "exhausting, working to the death" thing but the total opposite: anyone can work on a personal project but there is no teamwork cohesion and schedule pressure so nothing gets properly done in the end. Valve has a record of half-finished/dropped projects, between the Steam PC consoles, TF2 animation serie, TF2 comic, etc

 

[Honka Honka Burning Love]

Do you guys not have VR headsets?

No because I don't lick Mark Zucc's lizard nutsack.

 

[AnOminous]

Do you guys not have VR headsets?

I enjoy not having skull-splitting headaches.

 

[MechanicusAdmin]

I am hyped to be honest, not 'preorder at outrageous prices' hyped, but still hyped.
If you've had any playtime with VR, specifically Steam VR, Valve made a little demo game called The Lab. Now that shit is not clunky and its fairly fast. Graphics are amazing and even though its only a demo you can sink hours into it (multiple mini games to get you used to VR in a roundabout way) If they're smart and have used assets from that demo, it will be worth the money.
I'll also add that theres been a few VR games that also have monitor play options, so you can play either through the headset and controllers or just through a monitor with keyboard and mouse. So that may happen, again if they're smart. They'll be cutting off a huge chunk of their interested playerbase if they keep it strictly VR.

 

[Elysian]

I don’t have a computer good enough for VR (it’s not good enough for anything at the moment because it’s a laptop and I dropped and broke it by accident lmao) so this isn’t the best news for me, but I love the half life franchise so I’m still hyped for a new game in it. I can’t wait to play this in like 4 years when I have the tech lol

Also I hope I won’t have to throw stuff in the game because my hand-eye coordination is a bit shit and I’m as bad at motion controls as I am at IRL sports. When I tried VR Superhot at a friend’s place it was cool but I got stuck at the part where you had to throw stuff at the enemies to proceed. Throwing is harder in VR even when you take aiming out of the equation since there’s no weight feedback from the object to help you gauge exactly how hard to throw. Also I got so immersed I lost the ability to orient myself in the IRL room I was in and ended up punching a brick wall (although I’m quite weedy so it hurt but I didn’t do any damage).

 

[AsbestosFlaygon]

I'll also add that theres been a few VR games that also have monitor play options, so you can play either through the headset and controllers or just through a monitor with keyboard and mouse. So that may happen, again if they're smart. They'll be cutting off a huge chunk of their interested playerbase if they keep it strictly VR.

Valve's not the type to care about alienating a part of their player base if they feel they're pushing the industry forward. They launched and made Steam a requirement with Half Life 2, a move that was controversial at the time but ultimately worked out for them in the long run. I have no doubt that they're doing the same thing for Half Life: Alyx and VR, they want this to be the first killer app for VR. Granted someone will definitely mod it to be playable as a regular game, but it's not a thing Valve's going to be doing themselves. They made a one thousand dollar VR headset, they clearly believe it has a future, and Half Life's going to be their way to try and make VR mainstream.

 

[NSJAP]

If what they'll show on Thursday will be less impressionable that boneworks, it will be a total disgrace and loss of all remaining goodwill they had.