I couldn't be more genuine. As many others who have played through the game and actually know what they're talking about.
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Half Life Alyx non-VR mod is shaping up nicely
- Thread starter texhnolyze
- Start date
I couldn't be more genuine. As many others who have played through the game and actually know what they're talking about.
Like ultimately why do people think people think Alyx is great? It's fundamentally cause of all these VR specific interactions and how a campaign is designed around it. It's not gate-keeping or taste policing to point this out. People can do whatever they want and I will probably check this mod out myself as well. But when the three options are: 1. Play in VR, 2. Play this mod, 3. See what the game is like in VR as a spectator then it's fair to make an argument for why 3 is also not a terrible choice and might be better than 2. Cause the mod takes out almost everything that makes Alyx exceptional. Except maybe the graphics look better in 2D cause VR sets are crappy LCDs a lot of the time now. But that's the only thing I can grant in its favour really (I have a Quest 2 fwiw)
I would only recommend this mod to someone if they get motion sickness watching someone else play and they have limitations preventing the 'real' vr experience (which again I'm totally sympathetic too cause there's a bunch of VR stuff I can't play like Beat Saber. It triggers shooting nerve pain for me). Cause then it becomes the only option and they should do it that way. But given how the game even has a bunch of configurations to tailor the experience for the 'spectator' it's even 'canonised' within the game as a viable way of seeing what it's all about. Please don't interpret this as people being exclusive about HL Alyx, it's actually the opposite. It's about trying to share some semblance of what the experience is like so more people will understand where people are coming from when sharing their excitement of it
Again, people should do what they want, but this is just some recommendations. Alternatively, play this mod but maybe also check out some lets plays.
I would only recommend this mod to someone if they get motion sickness watching someone else play and they have limitations preventing the 'real' vr experience (which again I'm totally sympathetic too cause there's a bunch of VR stuff I can't play like Beat Saber. It triggers shooting nerve pain for me). Cause then it becomes the only option and they should do it that way. But given how the game even has a bunch of configurations to tailor the experience for the 'spectator' it's even 'canonised' within the game as a viable way of seeing what it's all about. Please don't interpret this as people being exclusive about HL Alyx, it's actually the opposite. It's about trying to share some semblance of what the experience is like so more people will understand where people are coming from when sharing their excitement of it
Again, people should do what they want, but this is just some recommendations. Alternatively, play this mod but maybe also check out some lets plays.
Watching the first 2 hours of the game on youtube is what made me bite the bullet, not delete my FB account and shell out for an Oculus.
Might be one of the best experiences ive ever had with a video game, in particular is an experience I shall never forget.
Im pretty sure it will be a pretty simplistic FPS although I look forward to playing this mod to compare the 2 experiences myself. when people say just watch a youtube vid they dont mean it dismissively, they're being completely sincere because the experience of half life alyx is greater than the mechanics alone.
I haven't played Alyx specifically, but that rings true for pretty much every VR game that is specifically designed for the medium. Nothing hilarious about it.
I'm a fan of extreme downports. Taking a game from one format to another where it just can't work for some reason or another, and then making it work anyway. Maybe not in the same way as it did originally, but good in its own way. And you'll never make a VR-less Alyx as compelling as VR Alyx if you make a straight port. But taking the setting, the story beats, and the assets and making a classic Half-Life game around that? THAT can be done. It will obviously not be the same, but it could be good on its own merits instead.
As for me playing the original, no. I have everything I'd need to play it, decent PC, VR headset, all I'd need to do is buy it and launch it and I could be playing within the hour, but... no. Hell no. I do NOT play horror or horror adjacent VR games. I have no interest whatsoever to see what a headcrab, (poison or otherwise) or headcrab zombie looks like in VR, nor meeting this "Jeff" people keep talking about. No way, no how. No VR horror, ever. But I could play the mod. Poison headcrabs are still terrifying in Half-Life 2, but... at least they stay inside the screen.
Funny enough, I've learned that I have a steel gut for VR when it comes to movement, thanks Elite SRV physics, but I cannot do horror even in flat games. And that's a different kind of intensity issue.
I'd be all over Portal VR, though. That'd be fun.
As for me playing the original, no. I have everything I'd need to play it, decent PC, VR headset, all I'd need to do is buy it and launch it and I could be playing within the hour, but... no. Hell no. I do NOT play horror or horror adjacent VR games. I have no interest whatsoever to see what a headcrab, (poison or otherwise) or headcrab zombie looks like in VR, nor meeting this "Jeff" people keep talking about. No way, no how. No VR horror, ever. But I could play the mod. Poison headcrabs are still terrifying in Half-Life 2, but... at least they stay inside the screen.
Funny enough, I've learned that I have a steel gut for VR when it comes to movement, thanks Elite SRV physics, but I cannot do horror even in flat games. And that's a different kind of intensity issue.
I'd be all over Portal VR, though. That'd be fun.
I think that you... don't quite understand what a strawman is. It's when you misrepresent someone else's argument in a way that is easier to defeat.
These are hypotheticals used to attempt to provide more immediately recognizable examples of what it's like to just rip core elements out of the game. They paint a picture in an attempt to convey the result, because there's no other way to convey it to people who haven't experienced the game in VR and consider VR to be "just another input system". For many people, it's easier to understand the physicality of something like football than it is VR, because VR is new and foreign.
In other words, they're absolutely constructive if you're just willing to think about it instead of immediately dismiss. I wish that you were willing. /:
The folks saying it's better to watch a playthrough on YouTube are trying to warn you that you're going to be really disappointed playing this mod, when the game is not made to play this way at all and is in no way going to end up being near as good as Half-Life 1 or 2. The game is simply not designed like that. There's fewer enemies, dumber AI, smaller levels. All of these things work perfectly for playing the game in VR, but I can't see many sections of the game being anything other than a total mess without VR. You can see some of that in the trailer for this mod, such as shooting the bar out of the train door, trying to toss the supply box in the air multiple times to break it (this is just a one-handed motion in VR). There's some parts later on that are in extremely small spaces that would effectively lose all impact being changed to a "Press E to do action" control scheme. In one specific part, I'm not even sure how that's going to be possible with this mod without something like "your arm just reaches further" in this particular part. People that have played it can probably guess which part I am talking about.
A good comparison would be like playing a mod for Half-Life 2 that made it work on an Atari 2600 joystick.
I saw McNum mention it, but if they redesigned the entire game to be played without VR, that would be fine. This mod is clearly not doing that. Doing that would require all the levels, puzzles, enemy encounters, and everything to completely be redesigned to even be fun without VR.
People suggesting watching it on YouTube aren't trying to be elitist, gatekeeping, or anything like that. They're giving suggestions to help you enjoy the game experience as much as you can. Even Valve themselves put out tips for streaming or recording the game since they KNEW a lot of people would experience it by watching playthroughs on YouTube or Twitch: https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=1367-QDNM-8600
You can do whatever you want, and buy the game to play it with this mod, we're just trying to tell you that you'll be sorely disappointed.
"I strongly recommend putting pasta sauce on your spaghetti so you're not just eating dry noodles."
I think the concern is that people only get one first impression, and the non-VR experience might be pretty meh. And then they'll think the game is meh. Which would convince them not to pursue the VR experience. Which would be a shame.
Stop gatekeeping spaghetti. Just leave people be and let them eat spaghetti if they want to. It's still spaghetti at the end of the day. The sauce is just a seasoning any way, you're not losing much. Bunch of elitist pasta snobs in this thread tbh, it's really weird.
That's still my recommendation. You're better off watching someone play the full game with the proper gear than playing a version of the game where most of the interactivity has been dumbed down or stripped out.
Still, if you want to buy Half-Life: Alyx, mod it and play it in that state, be my guest. Just be aware that I'm probably not going to take your impressions of the game seriously.
You should rather watch a let's play than playing this game in non vr. It is losing its core mechanic without vr and will be a below average shooter tbh. I guess it's not fun at all without vr.
I mean it's great and all that people without vr headsets will be able to play it but it will be a really bad way to play it.
It seems there are a fair amount of disingenuous arguments in this thread, but overall it should be abundantly obvious that VR is a unique medium able to convey far more than "television" and even further more when comparing gaming between the two.
Therefore most rational people who have played the game have highlighted that as the video shows, the mod is an extremely compromised experience and ultimately the only way you could do the VR game and all it conveys justice, you'd need to completely change aspects of the game and add content to convey what is lost for both gameplay and narrative, much like any conversion of film to radio isn't just audio of the film.
Personally I'm with you, I'd rather watch a let's play than play this mod if that is the only experience of the game I could ever have, since at least a players actions and commentary can provide context.
HLA is the best game experience I've ever had over decades of gaming. Knowing that, why the fuck people can't even entertain the notion of waiting for prices of VR hardware / mod remake / ports to more lower cost hardware as they would in any other circumstance/hardware/tech or simply choosing not to buy, is absolutely peak Gamer
i think i might literally die if i played portal in vr
and not in a good way
User Threadbanned: Inflammatory accusations.
Glad we are all thinking of people with disabilities or needing accessibilities that might benefit from a non VR mod
I dont like to teleport. Looks "cheap" and "point and click" to me, its also a bit disorienting. I want to be able to move normally through the 3D environment.
I love Half Life, dont have a VR because of the dizziness and/or dislike of the workarounds (teleport and the like).
Watching the gameplay on video was great. I want to actually support Valve and buy the game and play it eventually, hopefully without VR. I understand it will NOT be the same experience, but even on video form it was great, so I dont care, just want to play it.
I know of no one using VR that feels this way about teleport, since "blink" doesn't feel at all jarring or look weird within VR to the extent you proclaim. This is very much the argument from people that don't use VR from what I can tell, looking a videos of it on a tradition screen. HLA also has my preferred option of "dash", where there is no "blank" transition, and you speed quickly along to the destination. It feels awesome and isn't nauseating unlike stick movement for those of us with more sensitive to vestibular function
An average-okay experience you get to... well, experience yourself is more impactful than hearing/seeing someone else having a great time. I dont get what's so hard to understand on this.
It's like me wanting to watch a 3D movie on a netflix-esque app on my phone instead of going to the cinema and people going all "pfffffl NO! thats not the OPTIMUM way! watch RandomCritic on youtube watch the movie instead, it's far better!". It doesn't matter. I want to watch the movie myself, not someone watching it and commenting about how great the 3D effects are. I don't care i'm getting "less" if its still enjoyable enough, i knew that from the start but weighting my options the convenience was more important than the most optimal experience.
Accessibility is important but people with particular needs deserve the attention and resources for something made to accommodate those needs rather than jury rigging accommodations into things that are unfortunately incompatible by design which VR gaming unfortunately is. I mean, it's better than nothing I guess. In the case of Half-Life: Alyx and VR, I think making it a flat screen game with mouse/stick aiming actually makes it more inaccessible because there are a lot of control options and movements that are being stripped out that could be utilized with a number of accessibility devices and needs. I think the mod solves a big one though which is combining multiple actions/motions into a single press, such as reloading. I don't think strictly making the game a flat screen game solves many accessibility issues on its own since you're just making it as inaccessible as those games are but maybe its a start? Who knows.
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i personally have no interest in hot water, so what's the harm in eating spaghetti straight from the packet? don't tell me how to eat my food
Why are we still equating VR and 3D as if depth perception is the only thing that VR offers?
What you're getting with this mod is going to be so far off from a normal experience that it would be better watching someone else having a great time. This is VASTLY worse than your comparison because when watching a movie on a phone, you can still use headphones and get an overall appreciation of a movie's pacing, cinematography, story, and characters. This would be like watching a 4k movie on a broken original black and white Gameboy where sometimes the speaker audio dips in and out.
This is why people keep coming in and saying this mod is a bad idea because some of you guys aren't appreciating how much is going to be compromised (and this is an understatement), really butchered, to get this to work.
I fully understand those movement-options/workarounds. A friend does have VR and I have tried it several times.
Teleporting around feels cheap to me inside a 3D environment, and while you are right that it didn't make me dizzy (compared to regular movement within VR), I like the smoothness of being able to control the camera/movement flow.
Again, I understand this would not be the same experience. I still want to play it outside of VR.
Do the people agains this really have a problem with the following scenarios?
- People who have VR and want to experience it in VR: Able. OK
- People who have VR and want to experience it in "2D": Able. OK (Not the same experience, more like an emulation, shouldn't be used as the core measure of the game)
- People who dont have VR and want to experience it in "2D": Able. OK (Not the same experience, more like an emulation, shouldn't be used as the core measure of the game)
You people need to stop trying to babysit other adults. They can take care of their own needs and decide whats better or worse for themselves. If later they try to harp on the game because of playing the mod version you would have a point, but if they play it, have fun with it and leave it like that, yall have nothing to do with it.
It's not "gatekeeping" or "babysitting". We're just making a recommendation.
Feel free to buy Half-Life: Alyx and ignore that recommendation.
I hear the feedback. Perhaps 'hilarious' was an uncharitable way to put things and I can definitely see where some of you are coming from. It's just a hard concept to imagine watching a YouTube video to be a superior experience to playing it yourself, albeit in a compromised state.
It would help if someone who has played it in VR downloads the mod and tries it out in 2D to provide clear impressions on how well it plays.
Hopefully that's from someone who can be neutral and go into the experiment with an open mind.
Finally, I think we've all contributed to a gigantic thread derail. Despite what we think of the compromises to the actual gameplay, it's still a stunning technical achievement to translate a VR game to a flat screen experience. So kudos to the guys working on the mod.
It would help if someone who has played it in VR downloads the mod and tries it out in 2D to provide clear impressions on how well it plays.
Hopefully that's from someone who can be neutral and go into the experiment with an open mind.
Finally, I think we've all contributed to a gigantic thread derail. Despite what we think of the compromises to the actual gameplay, it's still a stunning technical achievement to translate a VR game to a flat screen experience. So kudos to the guys working on the mod.
Imagine going on a gaming forum full of review score OTs and telling people they can decide themselves lol
"we're trying to warn you that youre not APPRECIATING the full experience!" sounds a lot like babysitting to me
I'm not seeing anyone expecting the full experience from the mod. They know that they're losing something. And they don't care. The compromise, to them, is worth not having to use a VR headset to play it. You might feel different, but that's why you're the one who bought a VR set to play it and the others didnt. Don't push your needs and expectations on them, or insist that THEY DONT KNOW WHAT THEYRE LOSING OUT when they say "i don't care".
That probably sounded better in your head seeing how people deciding on getting a mod are not going by review scores anyway.
"Do the people agains this really have a problem with the following scenarios?"
Yes. A million times: YES. Please understand people are REALLY not trying to come from a position of snobbery or elitism or what have you. I know all these crazy analogies are obtuse and come across as crass some times, but it's the only way we can really get the point across if you've never played the game.
It's not "more like an emulation". That's what people here are trying so desperately to convey with these increasingly vague hypotheticals. Thinking this mod as emulation is missing the whole reason why people keep coming back in pleading with people not to do this if they have no other way to experience Half Life Alyx in VR.
It is emulation in the same way looking at Baseball cards is emulating Baseball. It's not comparable at all. Yes, Alyx in VR and Alyx with this mod are both "video games", just like Baseball cards and Baseball the sport are both "Baseball things". If you want something representative of the Baseball experience and truly cannot play Baseball: watch someone else play Baseball.
Even that is a bad analogy because I know someone is going to say why not play MLB The Show or something - just bear with me and pretend that doesn't exist for the sake of this analogy.
Like... I see a lot of people saying they are huge fans of Half-Life and want to play Alyx this way for the first time. Imagine someone who's never played Half Life 1/2 before coming up to you and asking, "I'm thinking of looking at this poster of Half Life for 12 hours straight while reading a bullet-point breakdown of the plot while listening to the soundtrack. That's almost as good as playing the original game, right? Just with a little bit of compromise, right?"
You'd beg them not to do this. Plead with them, really. It's going to be that level of difference. That's what I think isn't clicking with people. It's not that people don't like Half Life posters, or the artists that make them, or people that enjoy looking at Half Life artwork. It's just that staring at the thing while absorbing spoilers from the game is not even close to a representative experience here. It's not even a fair extrapolation.
I'd respond, "I think you're better off playing the game. But if that's really what you want to do, then go for it. It's one of my favorite games of all time, so I'm an open book if you have questions."
I'm not obligated to guide that other person into decisions that they do or do not want to make.
Agree with everything Green said, but I'll also add that Valve held off making a new Half-Life for so long not because they didn't know where to take the story, but because they weren't inspired enough to make something truly new and groundbreaking. They didn't want HL3 to be just another FPS.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: Alyx feels like a proper Half-Life 3 in every way. It captures that same feel of playing HL1 and 2 for the first time, while delivering an experience that feels truly next-gen.
Forcing the game into a non-VR experience will ruin what makes it feel so special and worth the 12-and-a-half year wait, and it's why we're all insisting people just wait to experience it the way it was meant to be played.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: Alyx feels like a proper Half-Life 3 in every way. It captures that same feel of playing HL1 and 2 for the first time, while delivering an experience that feels truly next-gen.
Forcing the game into a non-VR experience will ruin what makes it feel so special and worth the 12-and-a-half year wait, and it's why we're all insisting people just wait to experience it the way it was meant to be played.
My friend. I just want to play the game in a medium I know wont make me sick (and without the teleport). I'm fully aware that it will not be the same experience, I know how VR works (I WISH I could play it more).
The end product will still look like a Half Life game, a fully functional one, with a beginning, an and end. Even if its just a mediocre experience in 2D, Isn't that better than any new release in the Half Life universe post Episode 2 ? (better than nothing, that's my point).
The best part is that this modded version will NOT replace the core VR experience. That will still be the official-default-real way to experience it. So at the end, more people WIN than LOSE with this ...no?
I'm all for people trying it this way if they don't have the means for VR or simply don't like it. But I wouldn't be able to use their opinions on it really. I had a bad stance before with Waljing Dead Saints & Sinners when I said if it was released the same as it is but without VR that it would be a mediocre game. I was wrong then big time. These games are designed for VR and it's not fair to judge them outside of that. Can't remember who I was talking with on here about that back then, but if you're reading this, you were right 😊
This weird head canon / strawman is working it's way through the thread like a virus. I can't wait to meet this mysterious user that has so many phantom quotes sprinkled throughout the thread.
You are definitely missing the point, and I think people are running out of any way to explain this to you. It isn't "baby sitting" or gatekeeping" to point out that you are factually wrong. People are pointing out that it likely will not be "enjoyable enough" as this mod is presenting. Too much is lost or impossible to convey outside of the VR medium
No one is saying a mod has no value, but this mod, in this state, you will colossally miss what the game even is. Any 2D "faithful" conversion is very much like film to radio. You can't try to just play the audio and expect it to all make sense if the key narrative is visual and you never receive that context. This is the crux of the issue, a mod is awesome if they actually recreate the game or cut out segments that make more sense and produce something else that preserves the intended gameplay and conveyed narrative that are otherwise lost. No mods are currently doing that, especially this one.
VR conveys far more than "3D" by nature of how it functions at the same level that you perceive reality, ie creating a literal virtual reality. Tricking your brain in that way has knock on effects that HLA fully banks on, that would be full on spoilers to explain so I'll just be more vague to talk on some generic factors. The entire gameplay predicates itself on human behaviour when you are IN a place.
You are excited and interested to explore environments and manipulate items at a macro level, close up, because everything looks and behaves in a tangible believable way that is just naturally compelling and simply not on a traditional monitor. The same is true for gameplay, gun mechanics and how combat scenarios take place and their solutions - which simply can't work in the same way as shown in the vid.
Probably most important is the emotive quality and impact that VR forces thanks to being present in a scene, that the narrative and gameplay in the game counts on. VR triggers all your natural actions for most people - vertigo, reflex actions like sudden dodging, fear from intimidating scale or things in your personal space etc
1:1 Depth and 1:1 scale are lost without VR, so barely anything is intimidating. That head crab encounter in the video is this quick tame as shit thing you wouldn't bat an eyelid at, same as encountering zombies or even static barnacles. Worse still this effects the entire gameplay, since you no longer fumble and panic with weapons, fear, shock, freedom to make really intuitive decisions on how to handle enemies utilising everything around you, since in the mod you have a static hand and the "do thing with E" button. Combat has far less enemies than traditional games because it is already massively engaging and complex within VR. Capping two enemies in 2 seconds vs a minutes long struggle, is very much loss of the game itself.
Then there are the enemies and multiple hours long segments of the game where the sensation of close proximity, being present in a scene, and manipulation of the world to move forward, is pretty much the defining part of the game and critical to the entire end segment of the game. If you take THIS mod (and every available mod), you very literally lose the context of the sequence and any of the effort required because they can't convey any sensation of what actually carrying out these action is like in the context of the scene, enemies, environment etc, with all the scale, clarity and freedom you get in VR.
Again, (and this is to baby sit you) no one is saying you can't play it the way this mod lets you; you do you. But you just do lose everything that this ground up VR game is able to convey that is a detrimental mess for both gameplay and the narrative itself, which loses all its weight, impact and flavour when you can't receive the context VR is providing for all these interactions, and in turn how that effects your approach.
A "faithful" "tv" mod for this game so that it can just barely do convey the game sufficiently, requires new level design, new enemy design and placement including increased and reimagined combat sequences, lots of animations and additional mechanics to recreate the sheer volume of options for combat and interaction such that it is actually as compelling and core to the game as it is in VR and fits with the narrative, probably the same for environment traversal/ exploration, gutting of puzzles as they are with some other system that makes sense in the same way for "tv" m&kb, redesign of the later half of the game and end sequence as well as some weapons, creatures with fitting solutions convey the same situational and combat issues found in VR for the same revelatory moments, emotive moments etc that impact the power of the narrative and game.
Like lots of people have already said countless times, do whatever you want, but ultimately VR is it's own medium and HLA is whole utilising that. You either await a competent mod recreation, cheaper VR hardware (like most people do for anything anyway), or your first experience of the game can be this extremely lacking mod, that effectively takes away from enjoying the game at all, let alone the purpose or reasoning the developers had for the game and its story.
Up to you. But don't cry about people expressing this to you. It's a forum and it's entirely on topic in response to some of the hilarious arguments of this being "like a Wii port without the Wii controllers" when it factually isn't at all similar.
Fair enough.
<3 I truly do hope you find it enjoyable - that is certainly a WIN in my books. I guess I don't think we will find common ground on this, unfortunately. I hope you understand no hard feelings or hate is directed your way. We're all Half Life fans here at the end of the day.
Read my long ass post above for further clarification. Originally we were talking teleporting in VR, now it seems you are taking non-vr even though HLA already has full stick movement anyway so I have no idea what the problem is if you haven't tried the dash style also. As for making HLA a non VR game the issue is it pretty much misses the point of the game, but you can see that in my long post with clarity. As I've said from the start (and you seem to conflate me with others), I am happy themod exists, but it's a terrible option for a first time player, meanwhile an actual faithful recreation kind of mod would be a better option.
My personal preference would be to either wait for lower price VR and PC/console hardware to play as it was intended, or watch someone else play it with their commentary for context. Otherwise I'd simply choose not to play ever or lastly, wait for an actual recreation mod, rather than these kind of mods as they currently stand
Factually wrong about what? That i might enjoy the game even if its gutted to its most basic so it can work outside VR? You say it wont be enjoyable enough to me. You don't know that. That's the whole premise, and yes, a whole lot of babysitting and pretentiously assuming you know better than others about their own enjoyment. The entire rest of your post goes on that premise and is disposable - as long as someone enjoys the mod as gutted as it is, it doesn't matter. Specially not to you.
Your rant at the end is hilarious too. This entire thread is people getting upset people want to play a VR game outside VR disguised as "recommendation". Get off your high horse.
Lmao, then you've read none of my posts and not even your own hilarious commentary. I fully support the mods as I said at the start, and particularly those actually venturing into recreating aspects so they convey close to the VR game using mechanics that may not be suitable for VR but superior for traditional games. This current mod, isn't good enough. I definitely remain glad it's a VR game for all that brings, but you can continue to believe this version is going to be good as is, without having even played the game to know the context I'm trying to avoid spoiling
and yes, you are factually wrong, in that VR is a higher fidelity medium. Somethings are impossible to convey within "TV" without an entire rethink of how that design should be for "TV and traditional controller inputs
As if the only thing Alyx loses outside of a VR environment is the visuals. I never understood your dislike of Alyx compared to shit like Boneworks but I do now. Valve made a game knowing it would be many people's first experience in VR and if they added all the insane shit Boneworks has it would be unplayable for many of those people. I still can't play Boneworks after owning my headset for months because it makes me incredibly sick. Also, there hasn't been a game in VR I've played that got melee not feeling terrible. Walking Dead is the best attempt at it and it yet still feels awkward as hell.
If you are a big Half-Life fan and love Valve's game design don't play this game without VR. Even if that means waiting years it will be worth it, in the end, to play it as Valve designed it to be played. The game outside of VR would be a terrible, boring game and I don't need to play the mod to know that for certain.
This to me is the part why I dont care about VR " explore environments and manipulate items at a macro level, close up, because everything looks and behaves in a tangible believable way that is just naturally compelling and simply not on a traditional monitor" to me that is just busy work so you telling me that I dont have to do that in this mod is actually a plus.
I've played Boneworks and Walking Dead and I think the melee still sucks in both of them. I don't know how you fix that problem, but if I'm swinging something I need a sense of feedback. Anyway that's the one interaction I can't stand in VR anyway, it hurts me so I don't care too much about it.
It's a fair assessment, but in context of the game it's very compelling and fun. However lots of players do this to varying degrees and it isn't necessary, though it is something you are forced to experience anyway just due to environmental design too. Alien things and weapons are just interesting and since you are handling them, you just happen to hold them closer than game cameras usually convey. Same is true if an enemy is within personal space, which is not a similar thing in traditional games. I'm typing this out while travelling, so probably not explaining half as welI anyway
Edit - also yes, it may be that HLA is basically a walking sim for you - in which case the mod can be a far better game than what Valve made
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Only as long as we're ignoring that Half Life: Alyx was made to appeal to as many people as possible by including a wealth of accessibility options that can see the game playable with just a single controller and fewer enemy encounters.
It's not quite like that, there's definitely something else in having to reload with your hands during an encounter, as well as crouching to avoid getting hit and so on. It's a different experience. That said, I do understand what you say about melee combat in VR, though Alyx doesn't have Melee in fact.
Having played the game, I wouldn't describe it as busywork. The combat wouldn't really work well as regular FPS. That said, if you really want to play the game then perhaps this mod is better than nothing, but I doubt the game translates well to flat screen play.