If I want you to tell me what are the core elements of Half-Life 2, you might list the following: puzzles, pace, shootouts, variants, crowbars, physics, and vehicles.
Although Valve can't make the crowbar work properly, most things still exist and are correct in Half-Life: Alyx. As for vehicles, they have never even considered them, because they are enough to be implemented outside of VR.
Programmer and designer Robin Walker told me: "It's not because we don't think they can work in VR or anything." "Actually, we didn't spend much time thinking about vehicles.
"One reason I want to say is that we have never really taken what we are looking at seriously because everything we have seen tells us that players want a denser world. They will travel through space more slowly , To explore more carefully, and our response to this is to add more details to the world. We put it in front of the game testers and they will pay more attention.
"I remember in" Half-Life 2 ", even at that time, we were still trying to reconcile the density effect of the players in the vehicle. If you still remember the" Half-Life 2 "coastline area and off-road vehicles, then we must Players create a visual language for you to get rid of buggy and explore the land. "
Because Valve ’s world is all handmade, the game testers in Half-Life 2 have been worried about something missing in the vehicle area. When developers drive a few meters, go out to explore, drive a few meters, rinse and repeat, they look at them, which causes frustration.
"They just worry about losing anything, which is natural in a half-life game," Walker explained. "You know in the" Half-Life "game that everything has been considered, designed and placed. It is not just covered by some automatic things, they are full of rocks, trees and nature.
"So, in" Half-Life 2 ", we established this design language, that is, these human structures. Things built by human beings. In fact, we always want to design and construct content areas. Natural things, rocks, Trees, beaches, etc., we wo n’t. Therefore, you can drive along the coast as a player, drive for a while, and then see a house, then stop at the house. Jump out, explore the house, get a unique experience, and then move on , Stop at the next human landmark.
"So, even then, our details in the world are basically an order of magnitude less, you must also establish that kind of rule to help players understand," How do I know when to explore and when not? " To explore? "I think that may be part of all thinking in our heads. "
Read our "Half-Life: Alyx" review to see why you should play even if you don't have a vehicle.
