I was a little skeptical given the darker parts of the game. However, it truly wasn't an issue and I adapted to how the game worked. Now I just glide through the water and do my fishing and dredging. Such relaxation.
I'm not thrilled by that developer, "unity is terrible, I'm de-listing my game on new years day" is now "that was a joke tweet". I never had a problem with unity trying to monotize their problem, but the knee jerk reaction from the gaming community was reactionary and showed immaturity, that some developers (cult of the Lamb included) jumped onboard, and now are trying to play the "it was a joke" card, is pathetic and has made me decide to remove their product from my wish list, when I should be buying it. (Discovered this today when checking out the discussion board, apparently they're planning dlc which has been delayed to next year, which is aftwr they were supposed to be de-listing)
I mean, it was also reactionary by Unity and they've since walked back their executable fee plan for legacy applications. If that didn't happen I have no doubt Cult would have been pulled, because what indie can afford to pay PER INSTALL?
I fully blame unity for the debacle and fall out, and don't think it's right to blame devs for backtracking after unity put new conditions on the table.
Oooh congrats, there's so many phenomenal VR games. I have to recommend Pistol Whip, it's essentially a John Wick music simulator. Shoot to the beat (or not) going down a hallway where enemies shoot at where you are. Move a bit, the bullet flies right by you. There are 38 official tracks after 4 years of completely free updates. They also have released a modding toolkit which has some pretty sick maps people have made - any song you want you can make!
I prefer it to Beat Saber quite a bit, but it's really a preference thing. Synth Riders and Audio Surfers are also fun, there's also Audio Shield and Electronauts - all basically variations on the same premise. Music and actions coordinated to rhythm. As I said, my favorite of them all is Pistol Whip, it always keeps me coming back.
I have so, soooo many more recommendations so I'll just list a couple by genre.
Creative hobby: there's a number of VR-space hobbies that work really well. First is Open Brush, which is an open sourced free version of the depreciated Tilt Brush by Google. It's quite literally VR painting and there's scenes you can enter made by other people. For regular painting in VR, there's Vermillion which is super awesome all around. There's SculptrVR for all your clay working desires. There's also art-like experiences, Chroma Lab, DMT, Ayahuasca. They're ok but worth looking at and deciding for yourself, Chroma Lab is my fav of those 3.
Music wise there's SynthVR, which can be a full VR synth-rack that you build - much cheaper than buying them! There's Paradiddle for VR drumming which has a lot of great features and pretty much full hardware support all around. Seriously great software. And finally, Vinyl Reality which is VR DJIng! It uses all your music files you have, I recommend using a software to get BPM data. I just used a plugin from my audio player Foobar2000 and it took about 30-40 minutes on 20k tracks so not bad.
I love the creative hobby programs because sometimes painting or sculpting can just be too much setup/cleanup and these make it so simple. No, they're not real life but man do they come close enough. Since they're much more relaxed, I also recommend VR tools - XS Overlay (or OVR Toolkit). They are overlay programs to bring panels from your computer into VR. Basically, you can have a floating panel for you desktop open, or a floating panel for Firefox or your media player. XS Overlay uses a newer standard, OVR Toolkit is good too but with more tools. There is also OVR Advanced Settings for adjusting some VR space - if your playspace is too tall or too short or too far back/Forward/left/right or rotated incorrectly then this program lets you adjust and fix that. Very necessary when you need it. Both of these programs can run in the background during your VR session with minimal performance loss. Anyway, I recommend XS Overlay (or OVR Toolkit) because if you have an android you can use SCRCPY (not on Steam) to bring your phone in VR. It works exceedingly well, it's insane. SCRCPY mirrors your phone as a window, and you can set specific bitrates and FPS values to match the refresh rate of your VR headset. Once the window is open - XS Overlay to bring your phone screen in VR... It's freaking awesome.
Okay, so all of that is just basically VR simulating real life but getting around some of the inconveniences of real life. Cleaning, not having access to your phone when gaming in VR or being able to have a video playing floating next to you. But how about actual games?
Simulators are popular and definitely check out the ones people have recommended already. In addition to those - Elite Dangerous and Star Wars Squadrons (on sale) if you have a HOTAS. There's also the car simulators, although tbh I tried these and most of them were more effort to set up than most and the experience with a race wheel in VR didn't seem as worthwhile as the HOTAS does. Personally I've been happy with flat-screen race wheel games. Other than these, I feel like seated sims are hit or miss.
VR FPS: Arizona Sunshine, The Walking Dead: Saints and Sinners, ARK-ADE, Naked Sun, Pavlov VR are all very well done. Into the radius is pretty good too. I also recommend Duck Season, it's VR Duck Hunt..! And of course, Half Life Alyx.
VR Action: Boneworks and then Bonelab, made by the same people who did Duck Season. Blade & Sorcery, GORN, Budget Cuts, Phasmophobia, and SuperhotVR are all worth looking into as well. There's also Deadly Hunter which is worth a look.
VR Game: I dunno how else to categorize these other than legit game/mini game games? Hyper Psychic Gauntlets, Catlateral Damage, Chupa Chupa VR, King Kaiju, REZ, Moose Life, VR Noid, Holoball, Vertical Shift, Panoptic & Keep taking and nobody explodes. Finally, Accounting and The Cubicle which are free experiences.
I really recommend that last batch, they are very fun.
Get the mods for Half Life 2 + episodes as well. It's almost as advanced as Alyx but with more challenge, which you may want after you get a handle on Alyx (and you get back the crowbar).
If you're a gun enthusiast or just would like to mess around with some of the most detailed weapons VR has to offer, I strongly recommend trying out H3VR (Hotdogs, Horseshoes and Hand Grenades is the full name I believe). Yes, it has never been on sale since it came out, but it's 100% worth the 20 bucks they're asking for. There's also an awesome multi-player mod for it called H3MP, as well as heaps of other content mods.
I just got a Steam Deck and will be using it as a console with my wife & kids - in that light I've bought a lot of smaller co-op and local multiplayer games:
Stick Fight: The Game
Stikbold! A Dodgeball Adventure
Moving Out
Broforce
Cook, Serve, Delicious
Portal 2
Rubber Bandits
HOT WHEELS UNLEASHED
Horizon Chase Turbo
Ultimate Chicken Horse
Human Fall Flat
CarX Drift Racing Online
Nidhogg
Sonic and All-Stars Racing Transformed Collection
We'll see what else we'll go for, but that should help us get started :)
I highly recommend Death Must Die. It is early access, as a fair warning. But it successfully mixes up Hades with Vampire Survivors and a few others. Runs great on Deck as well. The dialog can be cringe and the story is clearly under development. But if you want a fun gameplay loop--this is the game.
I went into The Forgotten City completely blind and found it to be very compelling and creative experience that I didn't want to stop playing. I hope you enjoy it if you decide to buy it!
Dave the diver is a blast. The premise is simple and fun but it's constantly evolving and building on what's there with a charming cast of characters and events. Id highly recommend it.
Nothing! I'm going with a Sega Dreamcast/Gamecube classic, and jumping into Phantasy Star Online BB for the holiday weekend. Apparently private server even has a guide for getting it running on Steam Deck (or any Linux distro), but I'll just be playing on PC.
Black Mesa, The Master Chief collection, Ori bundle and Sonic Superstars.
70€ ;_; (because that fucking new Sonic game is too expensive, even on 30% sale)
Is the coop system in monster hunter rise like it is in monster hunter world? Bc me and my so both enjoyed the game but the coop for world was so strange. Almost not even coop
Age of empires 2, clandun returns (both on my wishlist forever, I use m+kb for 4x games), sorted by "great on deck" top rated and added "stacklands" out for 15$, on top of songs of conquest for another 15, and my humble bundle subscription for 10... And my GeForce now founders subscription for 5$, and Xbox game pass for 15... Damn I spend too much on games
Onirism maybe. It's been on my wishlist for almost 5 years now but never worked on Linux. It does now but I'm also not in highschool anymore so not sure if I'll like it.
Just check all the games on any deal sites before you buy anything there are a lot of better price most of the time. Ofk always check if they are steam key code.
I grabbed Yakuza: Like a Dragon and Sleeping Dogs Definitive Editon, both of these are supposed to be great on the deck! Still stuck in Packaged purgatory though, so it's going to be a while before I actually get the chance to play them. There were some other games I was considering, but I gotta stop spending so much money right after buying a new piece of hardware... One day Sekiro will be at 70+% off, and that is the day I'll buy it.
So far the only thing I've picked up is Xenotilt, and it's pretty fun. I'm tempted to get Diablo 4 (my friends have been playing it and they tell me the new season is a lot better than the last one), but I hate the always online requirement and how they've implemented it.