A year later, Gabe Newell feels “good” about Half-Life: Alyx

We learned a bit more about the Steam Deck yesterday via Gabe Newell’s chat with IGN, but that wasn’t all that was discussed. IGN also asked Newell what he thought of Half-Life: Alyx a year later – and (spoiler-free), what he thought of the end of the game.

You can find the quotes on Half-Life: Alyx around 11:45 p.m. in the video below.

“I feel great a year later,” Newell says. “I think it’s been very helpful in terms of what we do next. How do we continue to advance VR, what are the opportunities in space? In that sense, it’s been a huge success.”

About his sales performance, Newell was vague, saying only that “Everything we’ve seen in terms of virtual reality adoption – it’s had a positive impact there.”

He was quick to tie the conversation back to the Steam Deck, expanding on what the team learned while shipping the Valve Index. Specifically, they received good feedback on the importance of controllers, but there were broader benefits as well. “In terms of giving us that confidence, that’s been extremely helpful with Deck, hasn’t it? Newell said. “This idea that working on these tightly coupled hardware / software designs can actually have big payoffs. You don’t end up with, “Well, why did we do this? Or the game developers saying, “That’s great, but you haven’t influenced my thinking about the space of opportunity at all. “But yes, I’m super happy with Alyx and everything the team has done and the implications it has for our business in the long run.”

IGN then asked about Newell’s feelings about the end of Half-Life: Alyx. Newell chose his words very carefully, with lots of false starts, but ultimately came down to, “Endings are tough. But to us, that sounds like the right progression for the direction we’re taking with Half-Life. . ”

I’m not going to spoil anything, but Half-Life: Alyx’s End is a big deal. If you haven’t played the game yet and can afford it, you should. I loved it and said it in my Half-Life: Alyx review and in our roundup of the best VR games. This is absolutely the Half-Life game that I wanted as a huge Half-Life fan, and it’s just a shame that more people can’t play it.