The Orange Box - Review

The Orange Box - Valve

There's an Xbox 360 game out there called "The Orange Box." Within that game are five games, "Half Life 2" "Half Life 2: Episode 1" "Half Life 2: Episode 2" "Team Fortress 2" and "Portal."

Portal

I bought the orange box some time ago and started off by playing portal, and officially, it is awesome. You are basically a test subject at this science company called Aperture Science, and your character's name is Chell. However, you don't know how you arrived into the "Relaxation Vault," but all you know is that the relaxation vault has no doors. You go through 19 puzzles, in FPS mode, with a rather special gun as your companion. This is basically a puzzle game in the form of a first person shooter. Your gun creates "portals," which are basically teleporters. (If you put one on one wall and one on the other, when you walk through one you appear instantly out through the other.) If you get the right angle, you can even see yourself walk in and out of portals.
While you go through the puzzles, a computerized female voice encourages you and constantly informs you that there will be "cake" when you reach the end. The female voice is the voice of GLaDos, the resident A.I at Aperture Science Laboratories.
Now not only is the game play awesome, but the innovation is fantastic. Portal leads towards next gen gaming in that it totally revolutionizes the way people think about games. "If only I could portal myself to that lever over there," I constantly here my friends say, despite playing other games.
However, the instant "teleporting" though is not the sole reason which makes portal such an enjoyable, and a lot of the time, frustrating game. The physics are realistic, as it uses valve's own game engine, which is used in the likes of Half Life 2, which has won Game of the Year awards numerous times. The most interesting thing about the physics though is that you can combine it with your portal creating. For example: If you needed to get over a gap to the other side, so as you don't get trapped down a crevice, you could create a portal, (Only two can be in existence at one time; Orange and Blue) on one side of the gap, facing the other. Then you could leap into the crevice, and just before you hit the floor and suffer a realistically bone crunching death, fire the second portal at your feet. As your speed has increased during your free fall, you will exit out of the other portal at the same speed. Therefore, you would rocket straight over the crevice to the other side.
The graphics in portal are sublime, but not realistic. This game isn't based on realism, but that isn't an acceptable reason for dodgy graphics. However, Valve software has surpassed themselves again with futuristic, shining graphics. However the graphics come into their own for the more run down parts of the game. I'm not giving away everything, but there is a part of the game where you experience the grittier back stage side of Aperture Science, rather than the pristine test chambers you're being subjected to.
The Orange Box itself is a collaboration of games, but Portal is brand new, and certainly the most impressive. So impressive that it won "Game of the year 2007" something that Valve software seem to achieve regularly.
The game may sound serious, but Valve isn't without its sense of humour. There's a level in which you must take a "Weighted Companion Cube" throughout it, which is basically a box with a love heart on it. GlaDos is fond of personifying it, which is only slightly creepy.
Anyway, Portal itself is well worth the £35 that The Orange Box costs, and is one of those few games that I have little or no complaints of. After you've completed the campaign, about 3 hours solid game play, there's still other options to keep you interested in the game. From chamber 13 to 18, there are several different options for which you can try. These options make the game infinitely harder and keep even those hardcore gamers frenetically frustrated. For example, the advanced mode changes the maps' layouts to actually make them a lot harder. "They were easy!" I here some people say. Yeah. Try doing them without help from Youtube. I've definitely said too much about Portal, but I would certainly say that this game is worth every penny.
Portal makes for one of the most innovative, humourous, frustrating and challenging games ever. Even if you aren't a fan of puzzle games, or FPS's, you should give it ago just to find out why I say: "The cake is a lie."


Half Life 2

Half Life 2 is one of the most successful and well known video games of all time. If you haven't played it, let alone heard of it, I feel obliged to say....*cough...noob. Anyway, the game has been converted from the original pc state to the Xbox 360, and the game has certainly benefited from it. The graphics have been vastly improved and the addition of achievements has given an extra reason to play it, even if you've already experienced the masterfulness on your pc.
The game play itself is in the FPS mode, and you once again take the role of protagonist Gordon Freeman, who is in the middle of a rebellion between the alien Combine and the human resistance forces. The physics in the game are realistic, even so that I physically wince if I fall from a great height and hear the audible crunch of bones as I die. However, the game, for all its graces, does have some downsides. For example: As there are no cut scenes in this game, (which can make the game feel either extra long or hyper real)when people talk, you have to go up to them and listen. However, if you are next to someone who is talking and you turn your head away, even that slight amount, you can barely hear what they're saying. I actually have to turn up the sound of my television when I meet any Resistance forces. The game is realistic in physics, yet unrealistic in weapons. Over the course of the game you amass over 10 different weapons, all of which you can miraculously carry around with you and summon up at any time. That said, it comes in handy and isn't something that stops you from enjoying the game.
One of the best things about Half Life 2 is the gravity gun. For those that don't know, this is possibly the ultimate "I wish I had one of those" weapons. It's basically an industrial forklift that you hold in your hand. however, you find many alternate uses for it. You can telekinetically pull objects towards you, and fire them fast pace at the enemy. As the physics are realistic, throwing a washing machine at someone will kill them but a tin of paint will only splatter paint over them, making the zombies look like dead KKK members. The gravity gun also zaps objects, which can be used for blasting things out of your way, or smashing up objects like furniture just for the sheer hell of it. Half life 2 is so much of a game that it's more like a world. Valve has created the game so that you wander off the beaten track, in such massive environments, just to find some ammo crates, or some interesting scenery. The game never ceases to disappoint on visuals.
However, until you acquire the gravity gun, the game is somewhat different, and certainly less fun and less serious. Before you acquire the gravity gun you rely on standard weapons and your trusty crowbar, conveniently still stained with blood from the original half life. This part of the game is certainly more suited to hard core gamers, as there are some tricky bit, especially when navigating through the sewers.
The graphics in this game are meant to be realistic, and will have you bowled over at some points with the stunning views from balconies, rooftops etc. The achievements in this game are not necessarily difficult, apart from navigating Ravenholm with only the gravity gun, but the achievements do provide you with that short chuckle, before you get back to the serious business of slaughtering everything that moves. For example, there is an achievement for throwing a bit of rubbish in a combine guard's face, and the achievement for killing a combine with his own grenade is called "Hot PotatOwned."
The only thing lacking in this game is multiplayer, and a better soundtrack. As you play the game, you hear the suspense music, the action music, the calamity music, the general stuff, but nothing really stands out to you. That said though, it wasn't voted "Game of the Year" for nothing. Half life 2 is packed with variation, alternating playing styles and the occasional comic relief that believe me, at that point in the game, is well appreciated. Even if you don't like the idea of the game, check it out just to see Gordon Freeman's new partner, Alyx. For a video game character, she ain't bad...

Half Life 2 episodes 1&2

I'm not going to say much about these two games, except that they are a continuation of the half Life 2 storyline, so you can accept more of the same actions, but with new quirks, and better graphics. All I'll say is that it's pure class, and sheer comic genius in that one achievement is carrying a garden gnome with you the whole way through the game and strapping it to a rocket and sending it into space at the end. I really don't know what they were on when they thought that one up! My hat goes off to all those at Valve.

Team Fortress 2

This is the second installment of a popular multiplayer game developed by Valve. There is no storyline to speak of, except for the various game types, like traditional capture the flag, etcetera. This is a solely online or system link game, so I'm afraid if you have no Xbox live and/or no friends, you won't enjoy playing this game on your own. The game has several different maps and playing types, each type suited to it's particular map, but the thing that makes this game the funnest to play out of all five in The Orange Box, is the character classes and their taunts. There are certain different characters you can be with their own perks and weapons. For example the scout has a shotgun and can move quickly, and double jump. Alternatively you could be the heavy weapons guy who moves slowly, yet has lots of health and a minigun. Each player has their own specific melee weapon too.
The taunts are what makes this game hilarious though. Taunts are literally just that. They've devoted the whole X button to making your player say something humourous just for the sheer hell of it. For example, the the solder variant will salute and make an L shape with his fingers, and the heavy weapons guy will hug his minigun. This has no point in the game other than for laughs, and is a welcome break from the traditional tea bagging. The graphics are cartoon like, but not quite cel shaded, just overly smooth. Controls are quick to master and entertainment is guaranteed as you are playing against real people, there are no bots.
Even if this game doesn't seem to appeal to you, I suggest buying it just to laugh at your opponents when you're a spy variant. Especially when you meet the person you're impersonating

Overall

Overall The Orange Box is perfect value for money, and easily the most worthwhile game out on the market. The game caters for every FPS need, and the humour is light but doesn't distract you from the serious game experience. The navigating menus are simple and all 5 games have unintrusive auto save features, plus the game playing time is immense, this baby will keep you playing for weeks. The achievements are also humourous, and for those "achievement whores" out there, there are 99 of them! That should be enough to keep anyone busy.

The reason why this game is better than its PS3 version is that it has some fantastic achievements to get. It's a reason to replay the game after you've completed it that you don't get with a PS3. "I've done all portal advanced maps, and got the achievement" "Yeah, well I've done all the advanced maps and gave myself a pat on the back!" Who wins there? Seriously.

I rate this game 9.75 out of 10, because it combines several brilliant games into one affordable package, and those games are technical innovations which any gamer should experience to the max before saying he's played a real game. However, Team Fortress 2 doesn't cater for solo gamers, the sheer amount of achievements are daunting and Valve's affinity with the colour orange is slightly weird. That said, this game is a thumbs up from me