Same score as the base game. Sounds like the extra content didn't end up making much of a difference to EdgeHow come Street Fighter V with all the content 'only' got a 7?
OK that Hunt Showdown score?! I thought it was another survival/BR clone thing WTF?!?
lol I can't believe what I just read.And that's fantastic. But it's like giving Unreal Engine 10 because it was used for Mass Effect. It depends on the selections of games you're going to play. It's a harder recommendation and not really much "game" from the developer.
this is IMO the weirdest review score I've ever seen from Edge. LBP3 is a shadow of the prior two.
They also gave Astrobot a 9/10. So imo its the highest score they've given to a any VR game.How does HL:A's score stack up against other VR games they've reviewed?
Hunt Showdown is masterful, glad to see it score high. Completely original gameplay loop that provides some of the most authentically emergent and tense PvP you'll find in a multiplayer game. Also probably the best sounding game out there right now..
Every Half-Life game has had its defining tool. Half-Life: Alyx has the Gravity Gloves. Here is what the Gloves actually do: they extend out the range of your arms in VR, enabling you to reach any item you can see. So the Gloves don't revolutionise interactivity in quite the way their forebears did — they're arguably more solution than invention. But that's all in service of the larger leap in interaction, as Alyx removes the keyboard-and-mouse-shaped barrier between you and Half-Life's world, and lets you get your hands dirty. The hole the Gravity Gun was patching over, we start to realise, was that tapping E to grab a crate and hold it in your hands never quite felt satisfying — so instead HL2 gave you a superpower, the ability to blast objects around as if they were weightless. Alyx goes the other way: you don't need to fling objects because, not only can you pick them up and hold them, you can sweep them aside dramatically or prod with one outstretched finger to see if it'll cause them to topple. These are the nuances of motion Alyx is interested in — letting you express yourself in the way you open a door or handle a rag-dolled body. Every action comes with added physicality.
The action has a very different rhythm to what you're likely used to as Gordon Freeman. Cover is a much bigger factor, and — if you use the default teleport-based movement system — evasion is a matter of blinking instantly from spot to spot rather than strafing and back-pedalling. In every other way, though, this is unmistakably a Half-Life game.
By the time head-crabs start launching themselves at your face, you should be proficient enough to pick them out of the air, or at least know how to sidestep. Not that this makes encountering them for the first time any less horrifying. Head-crabs are, after all, essentially a fleshy VR headset so the threat of them enveloping your skull is uncomfortably real. VR is great at scares, and Alyx, frequently dials up the horror elements, a couple of sections that are seemingly waiting to be branded 'the new Ravenholm'.
Like the other Half-Life games before it, the campaign is built out of this kind of set-piece, each introducing a new spin on the formula then riffling on it for half an hour, before dropping it entirely and moving onto the next idea. The whole thing is strung together into a story, but for the most part it just feels like an excuse to move you between set-pieces.
This is, by far, the chattiest Half-Life game you've ever played. Unlike her predecessor, Alyx Vance is a far from silent protagonist, and she has almost constant company from a voice in her ear — provided by Russell, a would-be Black Mesa scientist and inventor of the Gravity Gloves. There's a large helping of Portal in Alyx's script — no surprise, given the game shares two-thirds of its writing staff with Portal 2. Russell, played by Rhys 'Murray from Flight Of The Conchords' Darby, recalls Stephen Merchant's role as Wheatley in that game.
For a shooter, the pacing is relatively contemplative, with gunfights portioned out sparingly. It's a long while before you go head-to-head with your first Combine soldier. But once those battles do arrive, they're some of the most thrilling we've ever experienced. What the game asks of you might be fairly standard shooter stuff, but the act of playing it out with your own hands lends it a fresh magic. The Gloves aren't the new crowbar or Gravity Gun, the defining tool of Half-Life: Alyx. Your own hands are.
Provided you are able to play the game at room-scale, it's clearly the best option. The freedom of movement opens up so much of what makes Half-Life: Alyx great, letting you duck and dive and occasionally lose all sense of your position in the real world. And with that in mind, here's the ugly truth: your enjoyment of this game is going to be directly proportional to the amount of space you have to play it in. With VR, physical space becomes an extra system requirement to take into consideration — and even those of us who find the allure of Alyx enough to drop a grand on an Index are unlikely to also shell out for a new living room. And even that might not be enough. We play in optimal conditions — a spacious room, all but cleared of obstacles — and still frequently find ourselves brushing up against the translucent boundary wall in-game.
The simple fact of simultaneously existing in two overlapping spaces means you're playing not just playing the game itself but often a second metagame, as you try to reason where you are outside of the headset and whether you're about to bump into something. Occasionally, even with the presence of that gridded wall, we manage to let go of that second layer. The game envelops us entirely, and it's a magical moment - until we bump shin-first into a chair, or punch a wall. Honestly, the experience of playing Alyx is worth these minor battle scars, but VR more broadly? We're not sure whether it ever will be.
Meh there are worse titles in gaming tbh, like Metal Gear SolidWell looks like I'm buying Hunt Showdown (worst name ever btw. Save at least $5 for your marketing team guys)
Meh there are worse titles in gaming tbh, like Metal Gear Solid
I'll never get to play Half-Life: Alyx unless Valve decide to do a non-VR version 😥
Well looks like I'm buying Hunt Showdown (worst name ever btw. Save at least $5 for your marketing team guys)
MK11 got a 5.How come Street Fighter V with all the content 'only' got a 7?
That's what I'm planning on doing, just hoping someone does one without feeling the need to commentate on it.
I thought a 7 was pretty fair after reading the review - what makes you think it's generous?
Well, as a visual novel, the story is kinda weak and the murders are not polished enough. The picross part is fine but it doesn't mix well with the VN pacing. Felt very underwhelming to compare MbN with Ace Attorney.I thought a 7 was pretty fair after reading the review - what makes you think it's generous?