After the release of Half-Life 2, fans thought that they might never see another instalment in Valve's wildly popular series again. There were many calls to see Half-Life 3 tie up some of the loose ends gamers were craving the answers to. And for a really long time, Valve gave them nothing. A third instalment became such a meme and a gaming community joke because it seemed like it would never be developed, but then in 2019, we got the reveal of Half-Life Alyx.
In a complete and utter surprise to everyone, Valve suddenly announce Half-Life: Alyx - a fantastic VR game that pushed the boundaries of what people thought was possible with both the technology and the game series. Now, new leaks suggest that Alyx wasn't the last we'll see of the Half-Life world and we'll be getting at least two new games to follow up on the story.
The new information comes from a well-known Valve leaker Tyler McVicker who has taken to Twitter and Patreon to announce Valve's future plans. The insider claims that there are two titles on the way, one known as Citadel and another codenamed currently as HLX. The former has had rumours circulating the internet for a while now, but HLX is new and seems like it could well be an evolution of Half-Life: Alyx.
Advert
Citadel seems to be a multiplayer RTS-type game. Deploying units, primary and secondary ammunition sources, tile-based maps, and also perhaps an asymmetrical gameplay style are all expected from the game whenever Valve decides to release it. According to McVicker, these details are hidden in a mix of files like the CS: GO Overwatch update that came to Dota 2 fairly recently, and Valve has likely hidden them in there for fans to discuss.
What's new, is HLX. A new code name scattered in some code that avid fans don't recognise. This codename has appeared in updates to the Half-Life VR system. Updates have been seen for HLVR but they don't currently seem to have a purpose for Alyx, they're instead connected to another project name. This has led to speculation that HLX is the next evolution of Half-Life Alyx in that it'll be a new VR game making improvements to the system Alyx already had in place.
Both of these projects are exciting prospects, although knowing Valve, we're not going to know anything solid about the games until the developers want us to. It's an intriguing thought to see an evolution of the fantastic Alyx, and what further development could bring to one of the most advanced VR games out there, as well as what a VR versus Mouse and Keyboard asymmetrical game might look like too. If you want to delve deeper into the information fans have learned about Valve's upcoming work, you can go look at Tyler's YouTube or his Twitter account for more.
