this post was submitted on 23 Mar 2025
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Plenty of people do that to play a single game.
Given how different it is to other, normal 3d games, I don't think the comparison is fair. Additionally there are a lot of other, really great games in VR too.
Regardless, I don't think the problem is financial anymore. Rather that VR requires a sort of "commitment to inconvenience" where you feel cut off from the outside world (among other things) that I don't think a lot of people are comfortable with.
Are "plenty of people" enough to make a game commercially viable? And not in an indie way.
I zone out, completely cut off from others, while playing games all the time. What I don't want to do is fork over more cash for things that will collect dust (like a headset for a single game).
Given how different it is to other, normal 3D games, I think it's a bit much to stake your franchise on something most people will never have. It's obvious Valve knew that, they're not idiots and have put out good hardware that didn't see mass adoption in the past (Steam Controller, Steam Link, etc.); it's clear they wanted to try out something new even if it wasn't a huge blockbuster. They have lots of revenue from other sources to fall back on.
They probably hoped that some people would take a chance and get the hardware to play the game, and some people did. But to expect that most would do that? Lol. They're not that dumb.
"The idea" was to do something no one had done before with a beloved franchise. Not to sell headsets.
I don't think they particularly cared if you bought their headset, but they had the premium offering if you were interested. I think they wanted Alyx to be the Mario 64 of VR.
It's both financial (huge investment for a single game) and not. Playing with a thing strapped to your face does not sound fun. Especially with glasses. Or in the summertime. Plus I'm a Linux gamer, so I'd probably run into a lot of issues before I could run it.
I also run on Linux exclusively and I could play Half-Life Alex almost flawlessy on the Steam Index. And other VR games as well, including Beatsaber, Gorn, Walkabout Golf and many others. I'm really grateful to Valve and their Proton.
Thanks, that's nice to know in case I decide to get a VR headset in the future.
Its $500 today but at the time it was $1500 and required cable and beacons.
True in regards to the index kit but WMR has been around for a long time as well and that was a fraction of the price without base stations.
Also nobody has missed out on playing it yet! There's still time before half life 3! 😅
True
it's doomed now, but I love my Reverb G2, I got it for the same price as a Quest 2 (before the q3 released) and, having used both, its a lot better.