What changed in Half-Life: Alyx in 2020

Added an honorary achievement for Gnome Chompski's journey into space on Rocket Lab's 'Return To Sender' mission.

Corrected numbering of Commentary points of interest in Processing Plant map

Fixed a case where developer commentary would appear to turn off when continuing from an autosave generated at the start of a map

Correctly display commentary panel on primary hand in single-controller mode

Introduced a new convar that requires players to reach the top of a ladder before being teleported automatically.

Over three hours of audio commentary covering various aspects of development, accessible by enabling commentary mode.

Added localization support for Bulgarian, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Greek, Norwegian, Romanian, Swedish, Thai, and Turkish.

Fixed recent problem preventing creating or updating new Workshop items.

Several other crash fixes implemented.

"New Game" preferences are no longer reset when returning to main menu from in game.

The in-game Addon menu no longer lists templates and non-playable addons.

Fixed a regression where attempting to hack a tripmine could crash.

Demonstrated use of more complex shaders and dynamic expressions.

Allows placing hacking plugs that do not play a hologram intro animation.

Resolved an issue that could result in corrupt save games.

Resolved a bug causing transitions between Valve maps to disable loaded addons.

Added fixes and clarifications to the hacking_example map.

Fixed bug where map extensions could spawn multiple times or not at all with multiple addons active.

New preference option added to turn off Valve Index pre-order weapon skins.

Optimized memory usage for compiling maps, with 32GB RAM recommended.

Included sources to many of Half-Life: Alyx's AnimGraphs as example content.

Resolved a crash issue in maps with a very large number of handposes.

Resolved shadow artifacts with projected lights in Source Filmmaker.

Introduced a data-driven weapon entity for workshop customization.

Implemented various fixes to address crashes.

Added point, directional, spot, and ortho lights support.

Introduced an example addon for audio content along with workflow improvements and fixes.

Fixed wine bottle labels that had been regressed by the liquids update, along with several issues with the liquid shader.

Fixed case where some explicitly specified meshes became hulls.

Added checks for users loading a savegame with missing addons (e.g., unsubscribed or deleted).

Subtitles added for Brazilian Portuguese, Czech, Hungarian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, Ukrainian, and Vietnamese.

Fixed missing map models (mostly combine stations) in SFM.

Added example maps for Blind Zombie, Hacking and Toner Puzzles, Parked Vehicles, and other Interactive Prefabs.

Made SFM UI less Dota-specific in a few places.

Fixed bug where exiting the game by closing SteamVR could generate bad save files.

Added error message if a game fails to load due to a missing map requested by an addon.

Improvements to addon management UI.

Added some meshes that were missing from parked vehicle prefabs.

Added 'Custom Character' example addon for workshop.

Various crash fixes implemented.

Fixed Import Sequence in SFM to work correctly on sequences with animated root orientation.

Added documentation for Postprocessing Volumes.

Added documentation for the Visibility System.

UI appears quicker when returning to Main Menu.

Enabled live bone constraints in SFM, which can be baked/enabled as procedural bones.

Bottles now appear to have liquid inside them that sloshes around as you shake them.

Enabled the Postprocessing Editor for workshop content.

Added core functionality required for Lua scripting and Alyx-specific script bindings.

Resolved an issue that prevented 'Start Game with Addons' from working with 'Original Maps'.

Implemented various crash fixes and other minor fixes.

Resolved issues with Hammer's 'entity-only' compile mode not functioning properly.

Corrected a bug that prevented interactive prefabs and other physics entities from compiling correctly.

Corrected a bug where loading a mis-configured addon could result in getting stuck at the loading screen.

Included associated assets for lighting preview environments.

Resolved a bug that could cause point_worldtext rendering to be corrupted.

Added a native Linux version of the game using the Vulkan rendering API, with optional Vulkan support on Windows.

The level editing tools are now open to the community for creating new levels, models, textures, and animations.

Optimizations for rendering fog and CPU performance for NPCs.

Resolved issues causing the player's in-game hands to shake.

Several sample maps included to demonstrate enemy encounters and new features of the level art pipeline.

Spectator view now supports two zoom levels and full screen mode, with HUD options in SteamVR.

Launch of Chapter 1 of the Half-Life: Alyx Soundtrack, featuring 9 tracks in MP3 and FLAC formats.

Ensures proper fallback to English subtitles when unsupported language is selected.

Addresses issues with carrying objects in crates.

Addresses a regression that rendered an empty subtitle panel in spectator mode.

Transition from a rigid nav mesh system to an A*-based teleport pathing approach for better player movement.

Half-Life: Alyx supports Blink teleport, Shift teleport, and Continuous locomotion for player movement.

Players can see their feet at the target location to select orientation and visualize body space.

Visual representation of player movement paths to help players navigate around obstacles.

Implemented audio cues to enhance the realism of player movement and teleportation.

Adjusted teleport path validation based on player height to prevent teleportation issues.

Players can be moved partially along their desired path to maintain focus during combat.

Teleportation system prioritizes movement along the floor to enhance combat experience.

Fixed inability to use Quick Back, Shift-Dash-Jump, and teleport feet rotation when Controller Turning was off.

Fixed savegames where the SMG was missing parts of its model.

Added support for independent left/right hand movement controls and weapon bindings.

Added an option to draw subtitles and captions to the spectator window only.

Resolved an issue where graphics settings would appear to drop from Medium to Low.

Resolved an issue where loading a left-handed savegame could cause the player to lose ammo.

Improved defaults for various controllers regarding Height Adjust accessibility options.

Introduced a Performance Tips Page to assist players with performance settings.

Added 'Continuous Turn', renamed 'Quick turn' to 'Snap Turn', and added option to disable controller turning.

Resolved an issue where some sounds didn't play as intended.

Addressed an issue where the main menu could become less responsive with many save games.

Enhanced detection for some machine configurations.

Enhanced usability for Windows MR controllers.

Half-Life: Alyx, Valve's long-awaited return to the Half-Life series, is now available to play.

The Valve Index VR system will be available for purchase again starting March 9th at 10:00 AM Pacific.

Two preview locations from Half-Life: Alyx are now accessible via Steam VR Home for Valve Index owners.

All games in the Half-Life Collection are free to play for Steam users until the launch of Half-Life: Alyx.