Black Mesa’s impressively complete remake of Half-Life is now playable in full VR thanks to a new mod based on the recent VR port of Half-Life 2 Episode 2. If you haven’t already tried the Steam-inspired FPS on Valve, or if you want to experience the original Half-Life in a more modern way, you can get the VR-enabled version of Black Mesa for free right now. .
Created by modder Ashok, Black mesa Source VR uses the framework provided by recent VR ports of Half-Life 2 and its associated episodes. It lets you play a shooter that was originally released in 2012 and has been constantly updated ever since using a VR headset and motion controls.
While the integration is going quite well, Ashok outlines some of the challenges of integrating VR capabilities into the Black Mesa code base. Basically, instead of using Black Mesa as the base for the mod, the Black Mesa maps are recreated in Half-Life 2 and then VR support is added. You still need the commercial version of Black Mesa to play, but there are some issues at the moment.
For example, the NPCs will use the AI systems from Half-Life 2 instead of Black Mesa, which are slightly less complex. The only weapons supported for motion control are those from Half-Life 2, and there are some AI bugs and enemy spawns; for example, when you enter the Xen alien world, you might notice that the alien portal effects don’t work. , and instead of materializing during the game, all Xen creatures are simply present on the map from the time it was first loaded.
However, Ashok provides easy installation instructions and will hopefully update Black Mesa VR in the future. For now, you can find it here.
If you’re a huge Half-Life fan, you might want to check out some of the other great old games that you can still run on your PC. You can also find out what happened to Half-Life 3, or maybe try some of the other best VR games you can play right now.
Source : PC Gamesn
