Half-Life: Alyx has been updated to include Steam Workshop support. This includes a beta release of community development tools, as well as support for Linux and the Vulkan rendering API, and a few small quality of life updates.
Workshop and Editor Tools Beta Release
Half-Life Alyx's level editing tools are now open to the community. You can create new levels, models, textures, and animations for Half-Life: Alyx, and using Steam Workshop you can browse and play everything the community has uploaded.
Want to make your own VR physics sandbox or a giant Rube Goldberg machine? Design a new combat encounter featuring a dozen Combine soldiers at once? What about creating the world's longest Multitool puzzle, or imagining a whole new district of City 17? Crack open the tools yourself and make it happen. If you just want to play what the community's been making, browse the Half-Life Alyx Steam Workshop page to try out the latest and most popular addons.
This is the first Beta release of the Alyx Workshop tools suite, and tool devs intend to add to and improve them in the coming weeks. Included in this release are new or updated versions of:
- Hammer, the latest version of the Source 2 level editor.
- Material Editor, the tool for creating and tuning materials in Source 2.
- ModelDoc, a tool for viewing, editing, and compiling models with animation, collision, and other gameplay attributes.
- AnimGraph, our animation tool used to create complicated animation setups with blends and transitions.
- Particle Editor, for making new particle effects.
- Subrect Editor, for creating smart texture sheets known as "hotspots."
- Source Filmmaker, the Source 2 cinematic renderer and animation tool.
In addition to these tools, the update includes several sample maps. These were included to demonstrate and explain how developers authored enemy encounters in the game, as well as showcase some new features of the Half-Life: Alyx level art pipeline including tile meshes, static and dynamic cables, and texture hotspotting. The entire set of Half-Life: Alyx maps is also included as editable source for reference - this includes a large collection of interactive objects and prefabs.
Alyx Workshop Tools Documentation
Valve also started writing Half-Life: Alyx Workshop Tools documentation. If you're looking to start your first addon, this is a good place to start. However, you should note that this is only a beta release of the development suite and documentation is still incomplete.
Linux and Vulkan
The Half Life: Alyx Workshop update adds a native Linux version of the game using the Vulkan rendering API, as well as optional support for using Vulkan on Windows.
Depending on your system, you may experience better performance using Vulkan, especially if your system is closer to minimum spec. To try Vulkan on Windows, open the Half-Life: Alyx main menu and choose Options > Performance > Advanced (Gear icon) > Rendering API. (You must restart the game for the Rendering API choice to take effect.)
On Linux, AMD graphics and the Mesa RADV driver are recommended for best results.
Source (and more info): Store.steampowered.com
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