A new update is adding developer commentary to Half-Life: Alyx. The VR shooter is the first new game in the Half-Life series in 13 years. It was such a success that it almost singlehandedly revived the VR industry in the minds of a lot of gamers, inspiring nearly a million VR headset purchases after it released to rave reviews.
Half-Life: Alyx had a rather tumultuous development period, which is somewhat emblematic of the series as a whole. The first thing almost every video game fan learns is to be disappointed over the fate of Half-Life 3. After the previous games in the series broke ground with innovative game design, clever physics integration, and an engaging plot about an alien invasion, players eagerly awaited a sequel to resolve the series’ numerous unresolved plot threads. They were left waiting for years before eventually being forced to come to terms with the fact that Half-Life 3 wasn’t coming. Instead, in 2020, they got a prequel in the form of Half-Life: Alyx.
The story of Half-Life: Alyx‘s development is a long and complicated one, but fans finally have a chance to explore it. As Valve has announced on a Steam Community page, the Commentary Update is now live. This update introduces more than three hours’ worth of developer commentary to the game. When a player starts a new game of Half-Life: Alyx, they can choose to play with commentary enabled; but since many pieces of commentary contain major spoilers, it’s recommended that one plays through the game without the commentary first. Once the commentary is enabled, players can listen to it by finding a pair of headphones in the game and simply slipping it over their head.
As mentioned in the Steam Community post, Valve’s original plan was to launch the game with developer commentary and Steam Workshop integration already included. The COVID-19 pandemic changed these plans quite dramatically, forcing the development team, like so many others, to work from home. This new commentary update represents the final piece of that initial vision, as workshop integration is already a well-trod aspect of the game. This much is clearly demonstrated by the numerous mods that have been created for the game, like the city of Rapture from BioShock.
Half-Life: Alyx is a significant game, and a strong contender for best VR game on the market. There’s bound to be a lot of fans out there who are interested in the work that goes into developing a game of this caliber, and thanks to the commentary update, these fans’ curiosity can be well and truly sated. It’s truly an excellent time to dive back into Half-Life: Alyx.
