Today, Valve announced that with Half-Life: Alyx coming in March, they’ve decided to celebrate early by “making all games in the Half-Life Series FREE to play for Steam users, from now until the day it launches!” The Half-Life series is comprised of Half-Life, Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2: Episode One, and Half-Life 2: Episode Two.
The developers behind the next game said: “Half-Life: Alyx is set before the events of Half-Life 2 and the episodes, but the games share characters and story elements. The Half-Life: Alyx team believes that the best way to enjoy the new game is to play through the old ones, especially “Half-Life 2 and the episodes, so we want to make that as easy as possible.”
The Half-Life series is regarded as some of the best FPS games of all time and helped create games such as Team Fortress and Counterstrike. Everyone has been waiting to see if there would ever be another game in the series, which is why Half-Life: Alyx took the gaming world by surprise when it was announced.
The game will follow Alyx Vance and her father Eli as they try to fight back against the alien Combine’s occupation of Earth. Valve says that despite it being a VR game, it is a full game around the same length as Half-Life 2. If you would like to learn more information about the game, Valve announced that they will be holding a Reddit AMA tomorrow.
To say that there are a lot of people looking forward to the next game in the Half-Life series would be an understatement as the announcement of Half-Life: Alyx led to Valve’s VR headset selling out several days after the game was announced.
Half-Life: Alyx releases in March and will be available for the Valve Index, Oculus Rift, Oculus Quest, HTC Vive, and Windows Mixed Reality. The developers recommend taking the time to play through the previous games, especially Half-Life 2: Episode Two “for reasons that will become clear as you progress.” With the series being free for a limited time, there isn’t a better time to experience the game many players adore for the first time or to get ready for Half-Life: Alyx.