Valve has revealed Half-Life: Alyx and announced that the VR game is coming to PC in March.
This will be the first new title in the Half-Life series since the release of Half-Life 2: Episode II in 2007. Alyx will take place between the events of Half-Life and Half-Life 2, and Alyx Vance will star as the player character for the first time in the franchise. It will also feature gravity gloves, a new take on the popular gravity gun from Half-Life 2.
“Everyone at Valve is excited to be returning to the world of Half-Life,” said Valve founder Gabe Newell in a press release sent to GamesBeat. “VR has energized us. We’ve invested a lot of ourselves in the technology. But we’re also game developers at heart, and to be devoting ourselves to a VR game this ambitious is just as exciting. For that to come in the form of Half-Life feels like the culmination of a lot things we care a lot about: truly great games, cutting edge technology, and open platforms. We can’t wait for people to experience this.”
The title will be available through Steam and will work with all PC-based VR headsets. Valve has its own high-end headset, the Valve Index.
Valve’s past VR projects have been small in scope, like The Lab, but the company notes that Alyx will be a “full-length” game and cost $60 (although it’ll be free for Valve Index owners). But since Alyx take place between Half-Life and Half-Life 2, we still won’t be getting any closure for Half-Life 2: Episode 2’s cliffhanger. However, now that Half-Life is no longer a franchise in suspended animation, there is more hope than ever for (dare I say it) Half-Life 3.