Half-Life: Alyx Reviews

Half-Life: Alyx is ranked in the 100th percentile of games scored on OpenCritic.
8 / 10.0
Apr 3, 2020

Half-Life: Alyx is a tremendous VR experience that should absolutely set the standard of quality for all VR games to come. But the lack of replayability value, and the scale factor of enjoyment dependent on your hardware and room size, holds Alyx back from being a truly astonishing game. Is it worth it alone to buy a headset for? I'm not sure, that depends on how big of a Half-Life fan you are. But I can say that there are tonnes of other VR games available that are worth buying a headset for already, and Half-Life Alyx will still be a significant entry in that list of games.

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GBAtemp
Top Critic
9 / 10.0
Mar 27, 2020

If you were waiting for that one "killer game" before you wanted to dip into the VR scene, this is it. If you already have a PC VR headset, you absolutely must own this game. Half-Life: Alyx is easily one of the best VR games I've ever played, easily beating out my previous favorite Beat Saber, and every Half-Life fan should experience the game in one way or another.

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Mar 23, 2020

As someone who’s already sold on VR, I think Alyx is a hell of a good time. I put in four or five hours straight on Saturday (thanks to Dramamine) and few VR games manage to hold my attention that long. But I don’t think it’s the revolutionary new experience that people might expect, particularly people who owned a Vive or a Rift and have been living in this future for a while.

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4.5 / 5.0
Apr 15, 2020

Alyx is a trooper throughout the entire adventure, and while she can get freaked out by the places she needs to go, she never stops moving forward.

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6 / 10.0
Apr 1, 2020

The <b>Combine</b> structures contrast against the old-<b>Europe</b> buildings to showcase the alien occupation without ever needing to say it out loud.

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9.5 / 10.0
Mar 29, 2020

Half-Life: Alyx has shown the great potential of VR and set a very high standard for the whole industry. It's definitely a must-buy game for VR gamers.

Review in Chinese | Read full review

8.5 / 10.0
Mar 28, 2020

Half-life: Alyx falls short on accounts of length and issues with the platform, but manages it strengths well enough to be a game that can push the platform further and set a new standard.

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9 / 10.0
Mar 28, 2020

Half-Life: Alyx is a true Half-Life, a real game that lives inside our VR system and expands the dimension made by a videogame.

Review in Italian | Read full review

10 / 10.0
Mar 25, 2020

Genre-bending and hauntingly mesmerizing, Half-Life Alyx brings the series as it should have always been experienced while doing the impossible: surpassing Half Life 2.

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9 / 10.0
Mar 24, 2020

Half-Life: Alyx is a triumph for VR games and sets the benchmark for other developers to follow suit.

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9 / 10
Mar 26, 2020

Half-Life: Alyx is the perfect example of the best Virtual Reality can be. After years of what felt like nothing more than tech demos or ports, this game has arrived to show everyone how it’s done.

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9.5 / 10.0
Mar 27, 2020

With Half-Life: Alyx, Valve has proved once again that they are the best. After a few underwhelming projects like Artifact or Dota Underlords, the developers went back to their roots and created a superb single-player game. Alyx has a great storyline with fun characters and offers unique gameplay utilizing a technology capable of delivering a new experience. This VR title is a true revelation.

Review in Polish | Read full review

9.5 / 10.0
Mar 29, 2020

I'd declare Half-Life: Alyx the new age of the first-person shooter, if the uptake of virtual reality had been a little more promising so far. It is a cut above everything I've ever played within a headset and it's a brave, risky step for a long-dormant series to take. It takes a special team to withhold for thirteen years and deliver on an impossible hype and yet Half-Life: Alyx was worth every one of those 4,548 days.

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The Outerhaven Productions
Conner B
Top Critic
Mar 26, 2020

Prepare for the experience of your life in the best VR game yet from legendary Developers Valve. Valve have taken all their innovative ideas that they've kept bottle up for years and finally unleashed them unto the world.

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May 15, 2020

Although they're mainly known for maintaining the video game distribution network Steam these days, it's important to remember how instrumental Valve's games have been in moving the video game industry forward. With the recent release of Half-Life: Alyx, Valve's most impressive title yet, it's hard not to think that a new era for virtual reality has either just ended, or just begun. Either way, the game is a step forward for new, more immersive ways to engage with the interactive storytelling medium, and once a larger number of players get a chance to experience Half-Life: Alyx for themselves it's likely many, many more people will be inspired to go out and buy their own virtual reality headsets.

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Unscored
Apr 3, 2020

“Half-Life’s” ties to survival-horror shine in “Alyx.” One enemy that most who have played “Half-Life” will remember are the Barnacles — monstrosities that attach themselves to the ceiling and dangle their long, thin, dark tongues close to the ground. VR makes their presence more unnerving. A random moment I loved happened when I pulled an object toward me that a Barnacle caught then with its tongue and devoured. I moved into place underneath it while carefully avoiding its grotesque appendage and fired a few shots, killing it and causing it to spit up my item. In that moment, and several others, I felt noticeably transported to one of the most vivid science fiction worlds I’ve experienced.

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9.3 / 10.0
Mar 25, 2020

Half-Life: Alyx is the new benchmark for future VR products. More generally, it is a magnificent game, the worthy heir of an immortal saga: an adventure that has nothing to envy to those episodes that have contributed to mark the history of gaming.

Review in Italian | Read full review

Gameblog
VRSinge
Top Critic
10 / 10
Mar 28, 2020

Half-Life: Alyx is truly the new standard bearer for virtual reality. This is a major, not to say revolutionary, title, as was Half-Life and Half-Life 2 in their time. For more than 10 hours of play, we live the horrifying, supernatural and science fiction adventures of Alyx, as if we were there. A Masterpiece !

Review in French | Read full review

Mar 23, 2020

Valve has surpassed impossible expectations with Half-Life: Alyx, bringing a series long thought buried back into the limelight with extraordinary impact. While some might find it unfortunate that such an experience is housed inside virtual reality, I feel it's an innovative step forward for the series. If you have the means to play it, Half-Life: Alyx is absolutely essential.

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ACG
Top Critic
Buy
Mar 23, 2020
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