Black Mesa in VR

Uhem!.. Just thought I’d share this bit of awesomeness with you guys. And might I draw your attention to one of the comments below? :wink:

this does not mean that black mesa will support VR
you cant simpely run 2 mods, so if you run black mesa instead of the HL2VR mod then the VR wont work

it does mean that it will be techincly possiable for BM to support it but i doubt its worth the effort

Black Mesa can already be run with the Oculus Rift.

I’m aware of that, if you look at the video ( https://youtu.be/MH3v2VrCZ9Q ) though you’ll notice that the UI has been completely redesigned and weapon animations now follow input from motion devices - the weapon is not locked to your view.

This is new. Additionally their mod is still in beta, and they plan on adding a full body HEV suit for the character model so that you’re not just a pair of floating hands.

The article really is well worth the read, and seeing as WormSlayer states they’d be happy to work with the BM dev team on integrating their mod with BM I thought that was noteworthy and something to get excited about. I wouldn’t bother posting something on this site if I thought it was old news or useless.

So Reverend Kyle recently did a podcast interview with Road to VR’s founder Ben Lang.
To get a better idea of what Nathan Andrews and WormSlayer’s HL2VR 1.2 mod is like listen from 25:21 to 31:20 (the core segment is from 27:41 to 29:22.)

Let me reiterate, this is not a rehashing of Valve’s HL2 Rift support, and the developers are very interested in working with the BM Dev Team.

I’ve been following ths mod recently. I’m super pumped! Once I get my Consumer Rift and STEM, I’m diving right into that bad boy.

I kind of wish they left the HUD in-tact, though. But, people ARE saying it’s better this way.
Hopefully the entirty of Half-Life 2 and BM will be supported by the time I get my VR equipment!

I have one believer yeah! :slight_smile:

Once I get my VR gear the first thing I’m playing is Titans of Space (a promise I need to keep) the very next game will be BM followed by the HL series. I just hope that BM works with the creators of this mod and that Xen comes out before June next year.

Also, this is an awesome channel to watch a playthrough of the mod from the eyes of someone who’s never played Half Life before:

https://youtu.be/mwmu90_lpqQ

I would buy an Oculus Rift and a hydra just to play BM with that VR mod.

Actually, I’ll probably buy it just to play HL2 with it. Being able to lean around corners with your actual body and the capability to inspect the weapons you have with your actual hands seems pretty cool.

In the comments section of the OP’s link, it says BM would have to update to SDK2013 for it to even be possible, so yeah, probably not happening.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVgcbMWoGpU

…The Dev’s internal version already been updated to Source 2013. It was a long time ago.

Some impressions from a hacked VR in Black Mesa:

Nathan Andrews, author of HL2VR mod:

Ralf Ostertag, author of commercial VR driver, vorpX:

Valve is getting pretty serious about VR:
https://www.steamdevdays.com/?p=sessions

Steam Overlay in VR, Steam store changes for VR, VR plan for Steamworks, VR prototype “capable of stunning experiences”.

I wonder if the HL2VR guys will work on BM after they’re finished with HL2? That’d be seriously awesome.

Sadly, I doubt they would based on the new long term plans on how BM is going to be released and the fact that it seems to be shifting from mod to slightly development hellish full game :frowning: Oh well, maybe whenever the full game comes out :slight_smile:

Some of the devs want BM to be open source in some fashion so that modding* can take place. BMVR would be awesome. Add the HUD to the gun or perhaps a popup display on the arm of the HEV suit if you press a button. Who knows!

Modsception - so shall it be. (Hopefully!)

This raises a point about the flashlight though (thank you for posting the video by Nathan Andrews Bloodshot.)
Should it not (ideally) be modeled as a weapon so that you can shine the light irrespective of your view? In other words, aiming with the flashlight.
I’m nit-picking I know and I don’t care about it that much, but the idea just popped into my cranium.

Also! Super optimistic about the possibility of integration with the announcement of the pending commercial release.

Is the gun tied to head movement with VR? Because that sounds like it would be annoying.

In Valve’s native support the gun is only kinda tied to the head movement. Here is a quick example: https://youtu.be/PNcPWeAHAYI?t=1m31s

In Andrew & WormSlayer’s HL2VR mod the weapon tracking is handled by your Hydras (or STEM Controllers in the future): https://youtu.be/FJpg1ficCxI?t=4m36s

emart says that while the Hydras make for a more immersive experience, it is much easier for him to aim and hit targets with the mouse.
Palmer Luckey has talked about the kb&m being “super-human” input devices on numerous occasions - this is what emart is talking about.

It seems like that would be the way to go to me… VR glasses for camera movement, m+kb or maybe like a joystick or something for physical movement.

^ Don’t you mean Virtuix Omni?

Founded in 2004, Leakfree.org became one of the first online communities dedicated to Valve’s Source engine development. It is more famously known for the formation of Black Mesa: Source under the 'Leakfree Modification Team' handle in September 2004.