Half-Life: Alyx has been out for two days and so far, it is quite the success. The user reviews average is now labeled as 'Overwhelmingly Positive' with 97% approval and according to SteamDatabase, the game peaked yesterday at almost 43K concurrent players, which is a record for a Virtual Reality only game.
Will the game remain a VR-only title, though? In an official capacity, that is likely. However, given the moddability of the Source 2 engine, many expect a non-VR mod to appear relatively soon.
Valve's Programmer and Designer Robin Walker agreed with that assessment in a statement given to Polygon. He also added that it will only make it clearer to everyone why Valve chose to make Half-Life: Alyx a VR exclusive, though.
The answer to this diverges significantly depending on which members of the team you talk to, so this answer is definitely just from me. There are a set of people on the team that are concerned about that. Personally, I’m not concerned about it at all. It will clearly demonstrate to people why we did Half-Life: Alyx in VR. It will be a very crisp way of seeing all the stuff we got for the move into VR. If people play a modded version on a standard display and say this is is just as good, that will teach me a lot. I will realize I’m wrong, and we didn’t get as much as we thought, and I love to know whenever I’m wrong.
Yes, it’s going to happen. I’m fine with it, for the sake of the other members of the team I don’t want to say I encourage you to do it, but it’s going to happen. I think people will then hopefully have an even greater understanding of why we decided to build Half-Life: Alyx in VR than they do now.
Of course, if and when that ever happens, we'll be sure to let you know. Until then, stay tuned on Wccftech.