Half-Life: Alyx Now Has Mind-Blowing Liquid Physics

There's just been a new update pushed out for Valve's Half-Life: Alyx. If nothing else, this update has one feature which serves as a pretty good reminder that game developers are literal wizards.

Take a look at the brief clip below from Half-Life: Alyx. As of this new update, you can pick up bottles with liquid inside them, turn the bottle in your hand, and have the liquid within the bottle still bound by gravity. It's actually a lot more mind-blowing than I've just made it sound.

"Spent a good chunk of lock-down doing this important work," writes Matthew Wilde, the Valve visual effects developer who is responsible for the impressive new update. "Boozy liquid shader, now available in the latest update for Half-Life: Alyx[.]"

In a follow-up post, Wilde shows how the liquid within bottles is still bound by gravity when it shifts in Half-Life: Alyx. So if gravity is distorted and literally turned upside down, the physics for the shader simulation will follow suit, pulling the liquid in the corresponding direction.

Honestly, how Wilde ever got this to work, in lockdown no less, is, well, wild. Valve's game has been nothing short of incredible since it launched, and the mod scene is finally off to the races. It almost makes me want to build a PC and try out Half-Life: Alyx for myself, the second urge I've had to get the game after Mat's glowing review back when it first launched.