Half-Life: Alyx appears to have given VR gaming a serious boost. Road to VR has used historical data and direct Valve data to calculate that Steam users added nearly 950,000 VR headsets in April — a huge spike over March. While the Steam info doesn’t say how many of those were new (it’s possible some were just linked to Steam for the first time), it’s clear Alyx prompted spurred SteamVR adoption on a level not seen before.

The data also provides some insight as to what headsets people were using to play. The biggest beneficiary was apparently the Oculus Quest, whose share doubled in April. The recently added ability to use the Quest as a PC headset may have spurred gamers ahead of Alyx’s March 23rd launch. Valve’s own Index headset did see more adoption, but not by nearly as much. While it’s touted as the ideal headset for Alyx, its high price has frequently been seen as a hurdle. Most gamers are using either Oculus (44.6 percent) or HTC (30.3 percent) headsets.

In an unsurprising turn of events, Valve has announced that it is ending SteamVR support for macOS. Spotted by Apple Insider, the company made a terse announcement on its website, stating that “SteamVR has ended [macOS] support so our team can focus on Windows and Linux.” Legacy builds will remain available, though, so tinkerers can still code VR experiences that run on Apple hardware. SteamVR first came to Apple’s operating system with the 2017 launch of macOS High Sierra. The OS enabled the use of an external GPU (eGPU) over Thunderbolt 3, which could provide the additional processing power needed to run high-end VR applications. Valve didn’t provide explicit reasons for cancelling support, but gaming hasn’t been the Mac’s strong suit for decades, so lack of interest on the part of developers and users could have been a contributor.

There were several signs that the end was nigh. Valve’s own VR headset, the Index, does not support macOS, and Apple even removed photos featuring VR gadgets from its website, as just a few examples. Meanwhile, rumors persist that Apple is developing its own VR and AR glasses. The future of VR on macOS isn’t clear. Apple could turn things around with its own headset, though there’s no guarantee that the company’s AR/VR projects will come to fruition.

Valve had promised to restock the Index ahead of Alyx‘s March 23rd debut. This will help drive sales of both the headset and the game, of course, but there’s also little doubt that the Index will provide one of the better experiences for the game, full stop. In our experience, it offers great image quality and motion tracking in a comfortable design with immersive controllers.

The catch, as usual, is that it’s expensive. You’re looking at $999 for a full kit if you’re starting from scratch, and that’s assuming you have a PC fast enough to handle the Index. You can buy considerably less expensive hardware if you just want a reasonably good experience. Don’t despair if you can’t get an Index, then, as there will be other headsets if your budget (or a shortage) rules out a top-range model like this.

A purportedly leaked Game Awards interview transcript indicated that Alyx would be VR-only and focus on immersion, with the possibility of seeing the player’s “whole body” and the tension of fumbling with reloads as you face off against headcrab zombies. If accurate (this is still far from certain), the title would be ready to play in March 2020. There are plenty of unknowns, though — how much of this is a tech demo versus an honest-to-goodness game, for one thing?

Whatever the answers, this isn’t a surprising move for Valve. It hasn’t been shy about tapping its best-known properties for VR experiences, and it now has a headset of its own (the Index) to show off. Alyx could easily drive sales of the Index and other SteamVR-capable headsets. For that matter, even Half-Life 2 served as much as a tech demo for the Source engine as it did an actual game. Still, it’s easy to understand if you’re at least a little bit excited. This is proof that Valve hasn’t abandoned Half-Life, even if it can’t get over its fear of games with “3” in the name.

“I’m sorry to announce this but Oculus doesn’t want the SteamVR streaming feature in their store,” he wrote on Reddit. Godin said that he’s been developing virtual reality tech for more than five years now and saw an opportunity with his app to give people more access to the games on their PC. According to Godin, he worked on the feature for several months before introducing it days ago. He said that Oculus believed his app was “hurting Quest” and asked for its removal.

When asked about the situation, a spokesperson for Oculus told Engadget, “While we don’t comment on the status of specific apps, our Oculus Store application submission system is designed to help ensure that our devices deliver a consistent, comfortable experience to customers. Apps are evaluated on a number of factors including performance, input, and safety with the goal of creating a quality, high-value experience for all VR consumers.”

The ability to stream SteamVR content may no longer be in the Virtual Desktop app, but it won’t be going away entirely. Godin said on Reddit that he plans to offer the functionality as part of a separate app that can be sideloaded onto Quest and bypass Oculus’ strict requirements for apps that appear in its store.

You’ll need a reasonably powerful Windows PC to handle the Index. You’ll want a dual-core processor with hyperthreading, 8GB of RAM and either a GeForce GTX 970 or a Radeon RX480 for graphics, although Valve really wants you to have a quad-core CPU and GTX 1070-class video.

There are certain reasonably safe expectations for Index beyond what’s shown here. The cameras on the outside indicate that it’ll feature “inside-out” tracking similar to the Oculus Rift S and other recent headsets, giving you position detection that doesn’t explicitly require a base station. The controllers, meanwhile, are straightforward designs with analog sticks and a plethora of buttons. Index isn’t particularly revolutionary on the outside (we’ll find out what else it can do on May 1st), but that’s not necessarily the point — this is a showcase for Valve’s goals for VR, and one that doesn’t depend on a third party like HTC.