Valve Corporation, also known as Valve Software, is an American video game developer, publisher, and digital distribution company headquartered in Bellevue, Washington. It is the developer of the software distribution platform Steam and the game franchises Half-Life, Counter-Strike, Portal, Day of Defeat, Team Fortress, Left 4 Dead and Dota.
Portal is a 2007 puzzle-platform game developed and published by Valve. It was released in a bundle, The Orange Box, for Windows, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, and has been since ported to other systems, including Mac OS X, Linux, Android, and Nintendo Switch.
Portal 2 is a 2011 puzzle-platform game developed by Valve for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360. The digital PC version is distributed online by Valve's Steam service, while all retail editions were distributed by Electronic Arts. A port for the Nintendo Switch was included as part of Portal: Companion Collection.
Portal is a series of first-person puzzle-platform video games developed by Valve. Set in the Half-Life universe, the two main games in the series, Portal (2007) and Portal 2 (2011), center on a woman, Chell, forced to undergo a series of tests within the Aperture Science Enrichment Center by a malicious artificial intelligence, GLaDOS, that controls the facility. Most of the tests involve using the "Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device" – nicknamed the portal gun – that creates a human-sized wormhole-like connection between two flat surfaces. The player-character or objects in the game world may move through portals while conserving their momentum. This allows complex "flinging" maneuvers to be used to cross wide gaps or perform other feats to reach the exit for each test chamber. A number of other mechanics, such as lasers, light bridges, high energy pellets, buttons, cubes, tractor funnels and turrets, exist to aid or hinder the player's goal to reach the exit.
Leap Motion, Inc. was an American company, active from 2010 to 2019, that manufactured and marketed a computer hardware sensor device. The device supports hand and finger motions as input, analogous to a mouse, but requires no hand contact or touching. In 2016, the company released new software designed for hand tracking in virtual reality. The company was sold to the British company Ultrahaptics in 2019, which rebranded the two companies under the new name Ultraleap.
Aperture Tag: The Paint Gun Testing Initiative is a 2014 puzzle-platform game developed and published by the Aperture Tag Team for Windows and OS X. Unlike the official Portal series, the gameplay revolves around a paint gun rather than a portal gun, that fires two kinds of gel, one of which gives the player a jump boost and the other a speed boost. It also introduces other new mechanisms such as the paint fizzler and Pneumatic Diversity Vents that transport the player. The game takes place after Portal 2 and the player is guided by a personality core Nigel to complete puzzles in the Aperture Science Enrichment Center.
HTC Vive is a line of virtual and mixed reality headsets produced by HTC Corporation. The brand currently encompasses headsets designed for use with personal computers as well as standalone headsets such as the Vive Focus line, Vive Flow glasses, and the Vive Elite XR mixed reality headset.
Portal Stories: Mel is a 2015 puzzle-platform modification for Portal 2 developed and published by Prism Studios. Set in the Portal universe, the player controls Mel, a test subject with a prototype of the portal gun who must escape an underground facility after spending decades in artificial hibernation by completing puzzles. The player is guided by maintenance core named Virgil. The game includes custom voice acting, a soundtrack, and texture assets.
The Lab is a virtual reality (VR) video game developed by Valve and released for Windows on April 5, 2016. It uses VR technology to showcase a series of play experiences accessed through a hub room. The game is set in the Portal universe and offers eight different game types that involve short demo experiences that use different aspects of the VR capabilities. Variety is also offered beyond the experiences themselves by the amount of interactability with objects in the environment that is included. During the 20th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards, the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences nominated The Lab for "Immersive Reality Game of the Year".
Virtual Desktop is remote control software for Android-based virtual reality headsets. It allows users to control a PC over a wireless LAN from the headset, including the ability to stream VR games and software.
Job Simulator: The 2050 Archives, commonly referred to as simply Job Simulator, is a virtual reality simulation video game developed and published by Owlchemy Labs for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Apple Vision Pro, Oculus Quest, Oculus Quest 2 and Meta Quest 3, in which players participate in comical approximations of real-world jobs. A sequel, Vacation Simulator, was released in 2019 and has a completely different premise.
GameFace Labs is an American technology company that develops hardware and software for the consumer virtual reality market, and was founded in 2013 by Edward Mason. The company's headquarters are in San Francisco, with international offices in London, United Kingdom.
A virtual reality game or VR game is a video game played on virtual reality (VR) hardware. Most VR games are based on player immersion, typically through a head-mounted display unit or headset with stereoscopic displays and one or more controllers.
The first-generation Oculus Quest is a discontinued virtual reality headset developed by Oculus, a brand of Facebook Inc., and released on May 21, 2019. Similar to its predecessor, Oculus Go, it is a standalone device, that can run games and software wirelessly under an Android-based operating system. It supports positional tracking with six degrees of freedom, using internal sensors and an array of cameras in the front of the headset rather than external sensors. The cameras are also used as part of the safety feature "Passthrough", which shows a view from the cameras when the user exits their designated boundary area known as "Guardian". A later software update added "Oculus Link", a feature that allows the Quest to be connected to a computer via USB, enabling use with Oculus Rift-compatible software and games.
The Valve Index is a consumer virtual reality headset created and manufactured by Valve. Announced on April 30, 2019, the headset was released on June 28 of the same year. The Index is a second-generation headset and the first to be fully manufactured by Valve. Half-Life: Alyx is bundled with the headset.
Half-Life: Alyx is a 2020 virtual reality (VR) first-person shooter game developed and published by Valve. It was released for Windows and Linux, with support for most PC-compatible VR headsets. Set five years before Half-Life 2 (2004), players control Alyx Vance on a mission to seize a superweapon belonging to the alien Combine. Like previous Half-Life games, Alyx incorporates combat, puzzles and exploration. Players use VR to interact with the environment and fight enemies, using "gravity gloves" to snatch objects from a distance, similarly to the gravity gun from Half-Life 2.
NeosVR is a free-to-play, massively multiplayer online, virtual reality application created by Frooxius and operated by Solirax. It was released for free on Microsoft Windows via Steam on May 4, 2018, with support for several VR headsets.
Aperture Desk Job is a 2022 action game by Valve. A spin-off of the Portal series, it was released concurrently with the Steam Deck as a tech demo showcasing the platform's controller functions.
The PlayStation VR2 is a virtual reality headset for the PlayStation 5 and PC, developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment released on February 22, 2023.
