VR Mod

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Valve Hires Creator Behind Popular ‘Half-Life: Alyx’ Mod

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Like many of Valve’s best titles, Half-Life: Alyx (2020) is a lot more moddable than your average game, which for PC VR headset owners means hundreds of new modes, missions, and mini-games. Now one of the HLA’s most talented modders announced they’ve been snapped up by Valve.

Nate Grove was responsible for two of the best HLA campaign-style mods, Incursion and Re-Education—both of which are uncannily Valve-like in pacing, setting… everything.

Grove says in a tweet that “a HUGE contributing factor to my hire was my work on my Workshop items Re-Education and Incursion. It was a dream for me (and many others) to work at Valve and I think this highlights the importance of supporting integration of community work into any game. It only makes the product (and the industry) stronger.”

While clearly a capable modder of one of the best VR games to date, Grove is no gaming industry neophyte. Now a level designer and artist at Valve, Grove comes to the company from Annapurna Interactive, which is known for publishing award-winning titles such as Outer Wilds, Stray, and What Remains of Edith Finch. Grove also created custom assets for both HLA mods, which is probably par for the course for someone who’s already spent nearly a decade as a professional digital artist and environmental designer.

What does this mean for Valve, VR and everything? It’s too early to speculate, since the company is by nature a black box that only occasionally sneaks possible hints about upcoming headsets in SteamVR updates. In fact, Grove says the announcement above was their “last post here” on X, formerly Twitter.

If it makes you feel better though, you can always comment “Half-Life 3 confirmed” in the comments.

Valve Hires Creator Behind Popular ‘Half-Life: Alyx’ Mod Read More »

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This ‘Portal 2’ Mod Brings Full VR Support to Valve’s Award-winning Puzzler

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Flat2VR, the modding team known for bringing unofficial VR support to games such as Final Fantasy XIV, Half-Life 2, Jedi Outcast, and Left 4 Dead 2, recently released a mod for Portal 2 which finally brings SteamVR support to the iconic puzzle game.

The mod is free, and posted to Giovanni ‘Gistix’ Correia’s Github, a contributing member of Flat2VR. If you need help installing, there are instructions on the mod’s Github page, howevrr you can also head over to the Flat2VR Discord (invite link) for help.

Another pretty handy coincidence: Valve has again put both Portal and Portal 2 on sale for just $1 a piece, or in the Portal bundle for just $1.50 total, giving you basically no excuse not to play this mod—provided you have a VR-ready PC and a headset such as a Valve Index or Quest 2 (with Link).

Check out this 20-minute playthrough showcasing just how fluid the VR mod is:

This ‘Portal 2’ Mod Brings Full VR Support to Valve’s Award-winning Puzzler Read More »

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‘Half-Life 2: RTX’ Remaster Could Mean Big Upgrades for ‘Half-Life 2’ VR

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NVIDIA this week announced Half-Life 2: RTX, a community-made remaster of the legendary game featuring all-new assets, textures, and lighting. Pieces of the remaster are likely to make their way to the already existing Half-Life 2: VR Mod.

When it rains, it pours, as they say.

After years of delays, Half-Life and VR fans have been treated over the last 12 months to full VR mods of Half-Life, Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2: Episode One, and Half-Life 2: Episode Two.

And now it seems that fans are in for another treat; the Half-Life 2: VR Mod is likely to get a range of graphical upgrades thanks to the newly announced Half-Life 2: RTX remaster.

Though it already featured improved graphics and lighting over the original Half-Life 2, the Half-Life 2: VR Mod largely focused on touching up the game’s existing assets, and enhancing some key 3D models while building out full support for VR.

Half-Life 2: RTX, on the other hand, is a complete graphical overhaul says Nvidia.

The project is described as being in “early development,” with developers consisting of a range of experienced Half-Life 2 modding teams, including folks from the Half-Life 2: VR Mod team. The teams are working under the banner Orbifold Studios and say they’re seeking more talented people to work on the project.

According to Nvidia, the project will see “every asset reconstructed in high fidelity,” textures built with physically-based rendering techniques, and RTX ray-tracing support.

And while the project will likely mean that high quality 3D assets will make it over to the Half-Life 2: VR Mod, unfortunately RTX ray-tracing probably won’t.

A member of the Half-Life 2: VR Mod team called modding the full Half-Life 2: RTX game to support VR “just a pipe dream at the moment.”

“Currently RTX Remix [the platform used to build Half-Life 2: RTX] is not compatible with Half-Life 2: VR Mod, since they both hook into the rendering pipeline and abuse it in different and incompatible ways,” they said.

But, the member says there are plans to “work with other members of this new super-team [that’s working on Half-Life 2: RTX] on back-porting as much of the shiny new HD content as we can to the old source engine, and putting them into our Half-Life 2: VR Mod graphics update.”

There’s no timeline at the moment for when that might happen, but hey, these things, they take time.

‘Half-Life 2: RTX’ Remaster Could Mean Big Upgrades for ‘Half-Life 2’ VR Read More »

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‘Half-Life 2: Episode One’ VR Support Coming in March from Team Behind ‘HL2 VR Mod’

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Half-Life 2: Episode One is getting VR support soon, brought to you by the same team behind the recently released SteamVR fan mod for Half-Life 2.

Released in 2006, Half-Life 2: Episode One is the first in a series of games to reveal the aftermath of Half-Life 2 and launch a journey beyond City 17.

The standalone title is finally getting VR support on March 17th, courtesy of the SourceVR Mod Team, a group of VR enthusiasts who are unaffiliated with Valve.

Like the team’s Half-Life 2 VR Mod, which released for free on SteamVR headsets in September 2022, the VR mod brings the same possibility of playing Episode One in full room-scale VR with tracked motion controllers, allowing you to physically walk around, shoot weapons, pick up objects, climb ladders, etc.

And as you’d imagine, the Episode One mod is including the rash of VR-specific interactions first released in the HL2 VR, such as intuitive and realistic weapon handling, quick and easy weapon switching via a radial menu, over-the-shoulder ammo inventory, functional iron sights, two-handed weapons, and manual reloading. Like HL2 VR, there’s also set to be optional laser sights and an arcade style ‘quick reload’ option if realism isn’t your thing.

SourceVR Mod Team says on their website that creating mods for both Episode One and Two required a separate build from the one used in the original HL2 VR mod due to “a few major issues that need to be resolved,” the group said in September. Ostensibly, the team has now solved those issues, rendering Episode One fully playable in VR.

In addition to downloading the VR mod on Steam for free, you’ll need to own copy of Half-Life 2: Episode One to play. You’ll be able to find it in a variety of cost-effective bundles on Steam. While you’re at it, make sure to nab Episode Two to get a jumpstart on things before the team releases VR support in the near future.

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