5/5 ★ – Atlas2102's review of Half-Life: Alyx.

Game was played on an Oculus Quest 2 via AirLink/Virtual Desktop. With that out of the way I want to say that even using quest controllers instead of the index knuckles, this may be one of the best and most engrossing games ever made. If you look at it completely devoid of the VR aspects it is still a very good game, still classic Half Life though perhaps a bit slower and less over the top. You're no longer shooting rockets at Helicopters on a massive dam, not riding a fan boat through canals, or traversing the strange world of Xen. Instead you're playing Alyx Vance with little more than a pistol and shotgun in City 17. But honestly that is more than enough. The gameplay of Alyx is quite fun as is Half Life in general. Shooting head crabs off of enemies or hearing the beeps of the combine dying really never gets old. But what Alyx does utilizing VR is nothing short of incredible. For many VR games or in general games turned into VR the immersion of being in first person and aiming with your hands is often enough. Resident Evil 4 VR for instance has little interactivity but playing in a familiar world in this way really does respark an old classic. Alyx however dials interactivity up to 11 and really makes one hopeful for what the medium can realistically accomplish. Want to smash a bottle against a wall? Go for it. How about shaking it up and watching the liquid move just like real life. Absolutely. Want to to teach math to kids on a whiteboard? Why not. Is any of that necessary for a video game? Not even a little. And yet that is what separates it from the pack. The game integrates all these little details, all these moments of 'I wonder if that's possible', with a classic tight feeling shooter. I've never been one to care about Half Life's story and I'll say even the G man just came across as strange and mysterious but somewhat unpurposeful. Maybe I didn't pay enough attention in the originals but the ending of Alyx has definitely shifted my opinion on that and also clarified the beginning to HL2 which is rare in a prequel in my opinion. VR has always been a niche platform that I never really expected to do much beyond a very short and perhaps gimmicky experience. I do have exceptions to that for games that couldn't exist without it, like Beat Saber. But Alyx shows the real possibilities of VR going forward and to do so in such incredible fidelity is nothing short of incredible either. It's an experience that I won't ever forget and it makes me hopeful for the medium in general. Hopefully one day Valve is able to bring us back to this world because I've never been more excited for this franchise, even after being dormant for so long.