The Orange Box

"I have a new favorite color"

It's amazing when you can play a game from last generation and have it be so good that you'd be able to trick someone into thinking it was from the current generation. Half-Life 2, despite being built in last-gen technology, looks absolutely gorgeous and has gameplay mechanics that many popular games use to this day that Half-Life 2 more or less created. Portal, while it could be better, is indeed a nice tech demo of sorts of what that little portal gun is capable of, and despite its shortcomings, Team Fortress 2 is a worthy multiplayer addition to your library and can butt heads with the likes of Gears of War and Halo with no problem. You'd be hell bent to find a deal even a fraction this good anywhere else. The Orange Box is really a no brainer. Go out and buy this now. But if you want to know exactly why, read on.

Firstly, let's take a step into Valve's flagship franchise and one of the best first-person shooters video games will ever know, Half-Life 2. The reason Half-Life 2 is so kick ass is that it is constantly changing things up and it is constantly throwing new and interesting gameplay mechanics your way so you never really know what's coming next. Yeah, at its heart it's a run-and-gun FPS and you will be doing lots of running and gunning, but there are moments where it is a breathtaking platformer, a brain teasing puzzler, a bone chilling survival-horror, and an adrenaline pumping stealth title that will make you drop the controller in awe.

No, it's really that good. You will find yourself balancing on tiny little walkways akin to certain moments in Max Payne, and you will have to make some pretty big leaps. The way it transforms the seemingly normal environment to a spectacle platforming land is really amazing, and I applaud Valve for their skill in developing a game that embraces all different types of genres into something this great.

Other parts of the game utilize puzzle elements to slow the pace down a little and to provide for some pretty unique puzzles. Are they a tad archaic in today's gaming world? A little, but still, the physics based puzzles are just as fun to solve today as they were a few years ago, and they are all pretty damn clever to boot.

There are even segments in the game that are very much like a survival-horror title. You see, some enemies are very strange zombie-like creatures that stagger towards you and try to, obviously, kill you, and when they are first introduced your best bet is to simply run away from them, just like in any good survival-horror game. However, once you get your hands on a nice and powerful shotgun, you will be blasting these guys to hell without batting an eye.

What makes the survival-horror segments even more fun, and actually every part of the game, is the game's sweetest weapon, the gravity gun. What is the gravity gun? Well, it is essentially Half-Life's way of letting you use telekinesis, and it works out brilliantly well. You can throw pretty much anything at enemies and it's just fun finding new objects to bombard your foes with instead of being limited just to bullets and explosives.

Stealth is used sparingly throughout the game to complement the puzzles as sometimes it is just better to hide from the enemies as you will be limited in ammunition. Turret guns can absolutely slaughter you if you aren't careful enough, and staying out of their sights dashes the game with another helping of stealth.

These are all common gameplay mechanics, though. What makes Half-Life 2 special is that you are constantly playing the game a different way. You may be controlling an army of insects and watching them rip apart your enemies or you may be speeding down a tunnel with a helicopter relentlessly firing at you.

The interactivity that Half-Life 2 provides is also exceptional. You can interact with the environment and with the game's characters in so many different ways that you'll actually feel like playing through the game a couple more times just to see what would happen if you did something a little different.

Two expansion packs, Half-Life 2: Episode One and Half-Life 2: Episode Two, are also available to help continue the storyline of Half-Life 2, and they both sort of add some new gameplay elements to keep things interesting. Both of the expansions do suffer from some pretty hefty gameplay inflation in certain areas that bog them down a little, but they're still pretty fun and they both stand out simply for having the Half-Life 2 gameplay that just kicks so much ass.

A lot of people have talked Portal up like it's the next coming of Jesus, but I can tell you right now that while Portal is definitely a fun and original puzzler, it really isn't all that awe-inspiring. Using the portal gun to create portals and experiment with the environment is a blast, but I found the puzzles to be just a little too easy, with most of the problems coming from the poorly executed platforming segments that I think are only placed there to make things frustrating.

The advanced maps are a little more interesting though. After you beat Portal, you unlock the “advanced maps” which are extremely challenging and actually focus a little more on the puzzle side of Portal, not the weak platforming side. Is it worth playing? You bet, but it's just not as great as everyone thinks, and it even gets a little dull at times, despite being so short.

Team Fortress 2 is a very interesting online-only multiplayer game that is very addictive. All of the different classes manage to be useful in some area and they are all just so damn cool! The maps could use some work as they can be a little on the annoying side and setting up online matches can be a little on the annoying side, but for the most part, Team Fortress 2 can hold its own against the multiplayer juggernauts that usually hold the top spot on everyone's play list.

I do have a complaint about Team Fortress 2 and that is, you guessed it, its lack of split-screen multiplayer. I think that if done correctly, a Team Fortress with some bots or something like that could end up being really entertaining. Another problem with the lack of split-screen is that it makes trying to have LAN matches a real pain in the ass as well.

What's interesting about Half-Life 2 and Portal is that the storylines have little areas where they intertwine, which should make any Valve fan squeal with joy. Still, Half-Life 2's storyline is pretty damn dreadful. You won't have any idea what is going on throughout nearly the entire thing, and by the end of the game, you'll be left with your mouth hanging open and your index finger scratching your head. Everything you see, the set-pieces, the characters, the enemies, they're all awesome, but none of it makes a lick of sense. When you get into Episode One and Episode Two, things start to become a little more clearer and they are a little more confined within the situations they are in so things don't get too confusing, but still, Valve really needs to wrap things up in a nice and neat little bow if they truly want to make the Half-Life storyline to matter. There are some shocking moments and memorable characters though, so it's not too bad. The accident that Gordon Freeman caused in the first game that filled the Black Mesa facility with aliens has spilled into the outside world, and Freeman joins the resistance to stop alien forces from taking over the world. Portal though has a little more interesting plot that's a little more digestible with one of the best new characters this generation: GLaDOS. You play as a woman who is a guinea pig in a science experiment done by a company called Aperture Science, and you have to survive a series of life-threatening exams to get to the bottom of everything.

Gears of War 2 is gorgeous. Mass Effect is gorgeous. Grand Theft Auto IV is gorgeous. And yes, Half-Life 2 is gorgeous, even when placed against those games that were developed for seventh generation technology. The water looks great, the environments are detailed, the characters are animated better than I have seen in any game yet, and the span distance is astonishing. Portal is pretty bland and the fire effects are shameful, but the portal technology is really awesome, even though we saw a very similar system in the early Xbox 360 title Prey. Team Fortress 2 adopts a cel-shaded look that looks really good and it is the best looking game in The Orange Box easily. What's great about all of these games is that glitches are very rare and there is virtually no lagging. You will come across the occasional texture pop-in though, especially during the more fast-paced segments.

Holy crap. Portal has the BEST credits song EVER. Seriously, the song at the end of Portal is so brilliantly written, composed, and performed that it's unreal. You'll probably go download it on iTunes as soon as you hear its magnificence. I wish there was an option to just listen to the song repeatedly. I really can't put into words how good it is. The voice acting in all of the games is done exceptionally well, and the dialogue is awesomely written and often times hilarious. Half-Life 2's soundtrack is also notable for its hard rock areas that really get the blood pumping and even make moments that should be dull and annoying pretty damn exciting. I was so impressed with the audio quality in all of these games that I am really having a hard time trying to think of any FPS with better audio, except maybe for the recently released Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena (which takes more than one cue from Half-Life 2, by the way).

After about ten odd hours, you'll finally be done with your first play-through of Half-Life 2. Combined, the two expansion packs will take about five to six hours, and then Portal will take a little over an hour, if that (which is the game's biggest flaw). You will most definitely be spending a lot of time online with Team Fortress 2, though the lack of any offline multiplayer components is really annoying as it seems like it would work so well with the game considering Valve's talent. It'd be a challenge with the way Team Fortress 2 is played, but I firmly believe that the A.I. can be made and it can be done. There are a whopping 99 achievements (you didn't read that wrong) to unlock in The Orange Box and most of them are pretty damn interesting achievements. Beat Episode One using only one bullet? Can you even comprehend how fun this is? Besides that there are also a bunch of other achievements to encourage you to play the game in a variety of different ways.

Despite Half-Life 2 and one of its expansion packs being sixth-generation games, they still hold up extremely well in today's gaming world. The only problem with The Orange Box really is that you've probably already played the meatiest game in the collection, Half-Life 2, last-gen. After playing The Orange Box though, you will be wondering what Valve can do next. All of the games have a ton of potential and a lot of areas where they can grow. Thinking about a seventh-generation Half-Life makes me drool, and I think they've only hit the tip of the iceberg with Portal. Maybe we need another Orange Box, with a Portal follow up that really shows what that sweet gun can do, and the conclusion to the Half-Life 2 storyline so they can get on making the next true installment in the Half-Life universe. A Team Fortress sequel wouldn't be bad either, with offline multiplayer to really leave a good taste in your mouth. I don't know about you, but after all the awesomeness this box provides I think I have a new favorite color.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 05/11/09

Game Release: The Orange Box (US, 10/10/07)