Half-Life: Alyx (2020) has been in the wild for a little under two years now, and modders have been busy using it to make cool stuff—just like they did with the original Half-Life (1998). Enter ‘Gunman Contracts’, a multi-chapter mod that scores some serious style points while smartly leveraging Valve’s Source 2 for some John Wick-style action.
Gunman Contracts is set of free mods for Half-Life: Alyx created by Germany-based graphics designer ‘ANB_Seth’.
Here’s a look at some of the action from Chapter 2 to whet your appetite, gameplay courtesy Virtual Insider:
Both chapters focus entirely on human enemies (re: not shambolic monsters), and include custom sounds, assets, original score, and voice acting. Enemies can be taken down with either one headshot or two body shots, however its four difficulty levels are determined by the amount of damage the player can take.
To play Gunman Contracts, make sure to have a copy of Half-Life: Alyx and subscribe to both chapters through Steam Workshop. Open the game and that’s it!
Gunman Contracts is free, however creator ANB_Seth has a Patreon page for users looking to support future chapters. They say they’re hoping to make Gunman Contracts a long-lasting series with more chapters yet to come. Check out the Patreon here.
What are you favorite Half-Life: Alyx mods? Let us know in the comments below!
Pistol Whip developers recently offered a deep dive look at the upcoming “Style System” overhaul of its modifiers with an up close look at new melee weapons, including “The Freaking Pencil”.
Pistol Whip debuted in 2019 and, since launch, its pretty much been the virtual embodiment of the John Wick franchise. Spoiler alert I guess, but the big screen assassin played by Keanu Reeves is known for his ability to kill someone with nothing more than a pencil and, soon, you’ll be able to do the same in Pistol Whip.
“We had to do it, as soon as we started talking about putting in melee weapons,” Project Lead Joel Green said. “You can customize it however you want it to look.”
Check it out around the 13:40 mark in the hour-long preview we livestreamed this week:
The new system promises to remake Pistol Whip in pretty fundamental ways by allowing players to choose from a wide range of play styles. There’s a knife, hammer, brass knuckles and, yes, a pencil included in the update alongside other new weapons. The new weapons can be combined with level difficulty selection and new modifiers to play the game — and compete for a spot on the leaderboards — in a huge combination of ways ranging from hyper-intense bullet hell to a laid back dancing mode.
The new Style System will debut alongside the Smoke & Thunder campaign that developer Cloudhead Games teased back in April. We can’t wait to dive in with the new styles and figure out our new favorite way to play one of VR’s best games.
Designers at Canada-based Cloudhead waste no time in their latest game. Pistol Whip basically points a gun at your head and says “dodge this.” You better move, or you’re going down like just another agent in The Matrix.
The VR game debuts Nov. 7 across most major headsets including Quest, Index, Rift and Vive (with a PSVR version in the works), and the software wears its inspirations on stylish sleeves. If you’ve played Superhot, you can see that game the moment you hear the words “Pistol…Whip” at scene selection. Beat Saber’s influence is obvious, too, but so are the fantasies of generations who grew up watching action movies like James Bond, Die Hard, Kingsman and John Wick.
That’s the level upon which Pistol Whip’s foundation is laid firmest. It is a VR game made for people who like movies where heroes get things done with a gun. Put another way, it should appeal to almost anyone who thinks Keanu Reeves looks good in a suit.
Symphony Of Bullets
I’ve spent nearly 40 hours with early versions of Pistol Whip on Valve Index and I see no end in sight to my time with the game. As I type this, my hand aches from gripping the controller too tightly, and for too long, replaying a single hard level in “Deadeye” mode.
The game launches with 10 levels, or “scenes” as Cloudhead calls them. Each scene — a catchy song licensed from Kannibalen Records — is mapped to a continuous three-to-five minute path through colorful glowing stages. Each scene amounts to a dreamy re-imagining of chase or gun-battle scenes from action movies. There are easy, medium and hard difficulties for each scene and they are all built around an auto-aim system tuned to help a wide selection of players slip into this power fantasy.
Auto-aim
The auto-aim ensures everyone playing Pistol Whip is a highly skilled marksman relentlessly pulled forward through each level. Enemies sprint into place and align themselves at a series of predefined moments along the path. When they fire you’ve got some time to move your head out of the way. There are really only three main enemy types and they differ visually just enough to tell you they need one, two or four bullets to go down. There are, of course, more of the harder to break baddies on higher difficulties.
I put most of my time with the game into this auto-aim mode. Players are likely to find different play styles depending what you want to do. Going for a high score? Maybe start moving to the beat to help you place your bullets at the right moment. I found a satisfying flow state playing this way — a kind of dance with my heart thumping in my chest and shots colliding perfectly in sync with the music. I haven’t felt anything like it since, maybe, Mirror’s Edge.
Deadeye Modifier
I recently turned on the “Deadeye” modifier and, spoiler alert, turning auto-aim off is like that arc in a comic book hero’s journey where they lose their powers. I can’t yet beat a level on hard difficulty in this mode and I haven’t found that relaxing/exhilarating flow state I did in the main game. Honing my aim, though, also feels like an incredible challenge to undertake as well and one that’s likely to draw me back again and again. It also offers a 20% score bonus.
Pistol Whip Scoring
With auto-aim I’d memorized the spawn beats of enemies to such a degree, and became so aligned with the assistance, that I’d learned to take my shots fast and move my head so little that it didn’t take much energy anymore to dodge the occasional bullet and stay in command of a hard level. There are 200 points possible per shot summed from a combination of accuracy and on-beat shooting. “Deadeye” mode, then, is there for players who want “training accuracy or as a high-level challenge,” according to Cloudhead.
What About Custom Songs?
Some VR players may turn Deadeye on way quicker than I did — it wasn’t in earlier builds I tried — and I’m far from what anyone would call “good” at shooter games. So many players will probably exhaust the game’s levels way faster than me. Cloudhead’s official comment on “custom” music is that “because Pistol Whip levels are complete scenes rather than ‘voids’ like in traditional rhythm games, custom tracks are a more complicated process. However, we have solutions in mind that we are excited to address after launch.”
The studio is also planning “more free and paid songs/scenes for after launch.”
Hype Train Pulling Into The Station
Game reviews are embargoed by Cloudhead until release of the game at 10 am Pacific on Nov. 7. In all my time with the game I’ve only played five of the 10 completed songs. We should have our hands on a finished build of the game with plenty of time to develop a full review, but for now Cloudhead’s lifted the embargo on initial impressions.
So, here it is then. Pistol Whip’s consumed me for much of 2019. Cloudhead announced the game as part of our E3VR showcase this summer and when I went on vacation I took the Valve Index and its base stations with me because I expected Cloudhead to send me a build during the trip. They did, and my family is still mad at me for playing it in the other room so much instead of visiting with them. I was so impressed by what I played I got a passport and booked the multi-flight journey out to visit their office in Canada and interview the development team face-to-face so I could understand their journey toward this game.
For roughly seven years now I’ve obsessed over the promises of VR technology and I’ve been a fair bit skeptical the entire time. I wish VR would allow more people to work from home while empowering more folks to spend meaningful time with their families. Maybe that’s the future of VR — I hope it is — but the fun I’ve found in Pistol Whip tells me something Cloudhead seemed to realize in its journey from two Myst-like VR games and Aperture Hand Labs to this one.
First, we’ll need guns. Lots of guns.
You can wish list Pistol Whip at the following links:
Shooting John Wick movies no doubt takes months of physical training, stunt coordination and dedication. But did you know John Wick 3 also had a little help from VR?
Artist Alex Nice recently shared his work on the new movie. Specifically, Nice shared the below video in which VR was used to visualize one of its biggest set pieces. In the movie, Keanu (we just call him Keanu now) faces off with a pair of knife-wielding martial artists that send him flying through a glass trophy case or two.
Nice used Unreal Engine to bring this Glass House to virtual life before the enormous physical set was constructed. This was just a fly-through camera, though; his work allowed users to embody a character and push minions around with a pair of virtual hands. Minions use real-time performance capture for stunt visualization, too. It’s even possible to summon a virtual camera to help frame shots before you’re shooting in real life.
It’s a pretty cool example of how VR has been put to work in the movie industry. Headsets aren’t just for watching new types of movies but helping make classic ones too. Other blockbusters like Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and, fittingly, Ready Player One, used VR to similar means.
This isn’t John Wick’s first brush with VR. There was actually a tie-in game released a few years back, though it wasn’t all that. Cloudhead Games is also taking inspiration from the slick action series for its new game, Pistol Whip.
In the wake of the Parkland, Florida mass shooting, Republican congressman Brian Mast and Republican Kentucky Governor Matt Bevin have both criticized violent video games for their alleged role.
The Hitman video game series will be adapted into a TV series by Fox 21 and Hulu, with John Wick writer and creator Derek Kolstad attached to write the pilot. Previously, Hitman has been adapted into two feature films.
Most gamers of any age will likely know that videogame movie tie-ins are ropy at best. Whether it’s a film created from a game or the other way around, there’s been a constant struggle to get the two entertainment worlds to successfully coalesce. The world of virtual reality (VR) is no different with this month seeing the release of John Wick Chronicles, coinciding with Keanu Reeves’ John Wick: Chapter 2 in cinemas. So has this been a successful partnership, well yes and no.
Created by Starbreeze Studios in collaboration with several other developers, John Wick Chronicles is what you’d expect, a gun filled, bullet flying, extravaganza of carnage and action. The infamous Continental hotel serves as the hub for the title, with the lobby and concierge accurately reproduced for that air of authenticity. It’s this attention to detail that can be seen across the entire production, whether its the graphics, gameplay or gun mechanics, John Wick Chronicles has been built to AAA standards.
You’ll be able to start off nice and easy, heading to the training room to get acquainted with shooting unlimited rounds of ammo at targets. This is all standard fare with duel wielding pistols, SMG’s, a shotgun and a sniper rifle with which to hone those aiming skills. After which you’ll want to get straight into the action and begin the first level, pitting you against waves of enemies armed to the teeth with guns, grenades and anything else they can throw at you.
It’s here where all that polish starts to come a little unstuck. That’s because John Wick Chronicles is a wave shooter, nothing wrong with that per se, but with such a high profile title using a gameplay mechanic so widely used in VR its certainly feels somewhat lacklustre that you’re essentially nailed to the spot. Using the HTC Vive’s room scale system does allow for duck and cover mechanics which certainly aid immersion, although this can be somewhat hampered depending on real world floor space.
Each level does its best to switch up the gameplay by having enemies appear all the way around you, at different levels and distances, requiring inventive use of the resources that are available. Do you stick to just pistols and try to take out long range enemies with a very good shot or switch to the sniper and then back again which can cost valuable time and life. This can involve some hectic fraught decisions during the intense gun battles but opponents generally come from one area at a time, so you’re not having to consciously keep track of every area. This is made even easier with the concierge continuously saying ‘check left’, ‘check right’, and so on. While helpful it can get annoying.
But the biggest issue with John Wick Chronicles is that of content. Aside from the training area there are only three levels available, which most players will probably get through in under an hour if they have a good run through – the second level is certainly tricky – making it feel somewhere between a tech demo and a fully fledged experience.
If John Wick Chronicles had been released in the middle of 2016 it could’ve been a showpiece for VR, expertly produced with taught gameplay and beautiful design. Coming out now though its almost having to play catch up, without offering anything new. With the likes of Raw Data on the market – which allows for movement and multiplayer options – for HTC Vive, the experience seems somewhat lacking. You’ll play it and enjoy it the once but that’ll be it, only starting it up again to showcase VR to your mates.
A couple of days ago Starbreeze Studios, Grab Games, GamecoStudios and Big Red Button released movie tie in John Wick Chronicles: An Eye for an Eye for HTC Vive. A first-person shooter (FPS), the videogame features 43 Steam Achievements to unlock which VRFocus has the full run down of below.
Set inside the infamous Continental Hotel from the film, John Wick Chronicles puts you the shoes of titular character John Wick. The virtual reality (VR) shooter lets you explore and interact with the characters and locales of the assassins’ den, tasking you with wiping out an army of deadly crime lords and their vicious henchmen with an arsenal of weapons, from handguns and grenades to sniper rifles and SMGs.
Full Achievement List:
He’ll Live 25 Leg-Shots
Gun Kata
Juggle the gun from one hand to the other
Head Banger
Kill 5 enemies with headshots
Lost my glasses Fire 20 bullets before hitting a grunt.
Juggernaut Take 50 damages before dying
Cougar 9000
Destroy an enemy vehicle
Vaya con Dios
Kill the Boss, while taking no damage from his Minigun
Frugal
Get 4 kills without missing a shot
Nimble hands
Popcorn
10 head shots
I’d like to make a dinner reservation
Kill 200 enemies
Touch the sky
In For Some Chop
Shoot and kill the boss helicopter
Party on dudes!
Complete Arcade Mode
Yeah, I’m thinking I’m Back
100 headshots
Baba Yaga
Kill 500 enemies
Reserved Parking Only
Kill 5 enemies without missing
3 for 1
Kill 3 enemies with 1 grenade
Master Hitman
200 headshots
Free Haircuts
10 Headshots in a row
Almost started
Wrong place, wrong time
360 No-Scope
Kill all enemies without using the sniper rifle
Vehicule not ready yet
Walk in the Clouds
Complete Training Sim in under 3 minutes
Return to Sender
Throw back grenade and kill an enemy
Eagle eyes
Kill all enemies using the assault rifle
Mr. Wick
All kills are either Head or Heart Shots
Grenadier
50 kills from grenade
Hot Potato
Throw back a grenade and kill an enemy
Perfect Game
Chain Reaction
20 Head or Heart-shots in a row
Hiya, fellas
Kill all enemies with Semi-Auto weapon only
Firepower
Point Break
50 Crotch-Shots
Enjoy the Fall
Shoot and kill all enemies fast roping from all the helicopters
