The Orange Box

[Ravana]

It's been delayed more times than the sydney railway system (it sux horribly) but it's finally come. Half Life 2: The Orange Box, is finally coming out on the 18th of October, 2007.

Features Half Life 2, Episode 1 , 2 , Team Fortress 2, and the mysterious PORTAL, a game that seems absolutely freakish and assures to give people headaches and screw with their heads. TF2 looks like more fun then a barrel of monkeys on crack, and Half Life + 1 and 2 means even newcomers to Half Life can get into it. (personally i think they might as well have stuck Half Life 1 in as well to complete an entire series and help people who are new to the Half Life universe get into it)

One of the most anticipated games of the year. Not since Call of Duty 2 has their been such anticipation for a FPS.

Though i think the constant delaying is a nasty sales tactic of Valve. They do it alot with their games, probably to increase the suspense and hype (or just piss people off). Who knows what goes on inside the twisted mind of people who have a red valve for an eye.


Amazingly, the system requirements for Portal are no greater then they are for Half Life 2. Being the nice guy I am, i'll posted up the sys req here.

HALF LIFE 2 PORTAL

Minimum system requirements:

Windows 98/98se/2000/Me/XP
1.2GHz level CPU(E.G, Pentium III/Pentium 4, T-Bird/Athlon XP processors)
256MB of RAM
32MB-64MB VRAM Direct-X 7 level graphics card(E.G, GeForce 1/2/4 MX series, Radeon 7xxx series)
~3 GB free HDD space
Mouse and Keyboard
Internet Connection

Recommended system requirements:

Windows 2000/XP
2.4 GHz level CPU(I.E, Pentium 4/Prescott, Athlon XP/64 processors)
512MB of RAM
128MB-256MB VRAM DX9 compatible video card(I.E, Radeon 9800/X800 series, GeForce 6/6800 series)
4 GB free HDD space
Mouse and Keyboard
Internet Connection


These are direct from the official half life portal site, so they ARE the real deal.

[Rabbit Slayer]

I got mine preloaded and playing the hell out of TF2 man that is just a truelly great game. The animation is amazing, honestly I didn't know you could get such detailed animation in a game like this. For example if you watch a heavy gunner fire he starts off with a angry face and as time goes on and he gets more kills he slowly starts to smile until his face is wide eyed and laughing. Not to mention the details in the level are great.

[Ravana]

Eh. I'm not pre-ordering or downloading; i'll just buy it when it comes out.

[Mo0rbid]

I have it.

I already had hl2 and ep1 but I wanted tf2


oh yes tf2 is very well made

[GrimmJaw]

/drool.

"There's a hole in the... Sky... through which things can... fly!"

Portal FTW!!

[Ravana]

Portal looks to be one of the most interesting games ever.

[Snuggans]

the orange box sucks for people who already own one or more of the titles in the game. i cant imagine how it must be for people who already have HL2 and the two episodes. i only have HL2 myself..

[Elge]

I just want Portal. Since I first saw the trailer so many months ago, I've fallen in love with its dual simplistic and complex nature.

IT'S A PARADOX OF WIN.

[Snuggans]

IT'S A PARADOX OF WIN.
the best type of paradox, my dear watson

[Garthilk]

So far I'm loving every minute of TF2!

[Ravana]

TF2 looks friggin unreal. People from the testing beta have only good things to say about it, and it looks SOOOOOO much fun, not all serious and stuff.

It's unbelievable that the amount of detail and quality of these games are able to be played on relatively medium-end systems. You would think that a game like portal, with such an engine, would require a supercomputer with something like 1 gig of ram, 512 mb video card, 8 gig of spare hard drive space, and a pentium 3.2 GHz.


Instead, it uses the same engine as HL2 with a few tweaks. Those guys at Valve might be frikin annoying as hell when it comes to marketing and release dates, but they're absolute geniuses at designing their games and the engine to run them.

[Rabbit Slayer]

the orange box sucks for people who already own one or more of the titles in the game. i cant imagine how it must be for people who already have HL2 and the two episodes. i only have HL2 myself..
its still a deal and a half since you can give hl2 to a friend if you already have it. Plus I would easly pay $40 just for TF2 or Portal the fact that it also includes Episode 1 and 2 is just a huge bonus

[Ravana]

its still a deal and a half since you can give hl2 to a friend if you already have it. Plus I would easly pay $40 just for TF2 or Portal the fact that it also includes Episode 1 and 2 is just a huge bonus

True. It's still $100 AUS (which is about $80 US).

That's still pretty good considering how much is in it.

[Heno]

*Puts on his soldier hat*

"If god had wanted you to live, he wouldn't have created me!"

I love TF2, and some of the less obvious ideas are great, like the way the characters automatically thank you for healing them, or some of the comments they come out with when your doing well.

Plus hearing a heavy come in laughing manically is always a little bit worrying >.>

[Mo0rbid]

the orange box sucks for people who already own one or more of the titles in the game. i cant imagine how it must be for people who already have HL2 and the two episodes. i only have HL2 myself..


You cant have hl2 and both episodes before buying the orange box since the orange box contains ep2

I had hl2 and ep1 but I bought the orange box anyway. Going to give hl2 and ep1 away to a friend.

[Snuggans]

You cant have hl2 and both episodes before buying the orange box since the orange box contains ep2

ooo thats right. they're probably going to sell portal, TF2, and each episode for around $20 each anyway. might as well buy it now..

[Gaazruk]

Team Fortress 2 looks good.

[miber]

ooo thats right. they're probably going to sell portal, TF2, and each episode for around $20 each anyway. might as well buy it now..Actually, they're going to sell Episode 2 for $30, Portal for $20, and TF2 for $30 (source (http://www.steampowered.com/v/index.php?area=package&SubId=469&cc=US)).

If you bought everything the Orange Box offers, individually, it would cost you $130. If you already had HL2 and Episode 1, it would still cost you $80. $50 (or $45 if you prepurchase, which also gets you TF2 beta*) is a steal.

I'm absolutely loving TF2, and I'm definitely looking forward to playing through Episode 2 and Portal.

*TF2 beta isn't that big of a deal now, since the game releases in 4 days, but considering it started September 17th/18th, that's a very large amount of time to play before it was even released.

[Kridak]

i'm gonna grab me one of these, it seems pretty cool.

[Kazek Ironfist]

the orange box sucks for people who already own one or more of the titles in the game. i cant imagine how it must be for people who already have HL2 and the two episodes. i only have HL2 myself..

No it isn't, you can give games you already have as gifts to people who don't have them.

TF2 is amazing though, definitely worth getting.

130 dollars, for 45? So worth it.

[Elge]

No it isn't, you can give games you already have as gifts to people who don't have them.

TF2 is amazing though, definitely worth getting.

130 dollars, for 45? So worth it.

That's only if you're generous. Snuggans is greedy. :eek:

[Snuggans]

That's only if you're generous. Snuggans is greedy. :eek:

changing my steam password now!

[Elge]

>( Wait till I finish HL2. That damn turret part put me into a depression.

[Profound]

Really looking at TF2. I've been hearing great things about it, most likely buying it 2morro! We should get an official Warhammer Alliance match going on TF2 some day.

[Nerissa]

Wish I had the cash for it. For a serious bargain hunter like me this looks like an in-frickin-credible deal.



And I'm not even a fan of FPS games!

[CrusherDestroyer]

I'm a pretty big Half life fanboy, and I was very satisfied with Episode 2.

The "little rocket man" achievement was a and a half to get though...

http://hosting.idiotsavantguild.net/images/rocketman.swf

[Grimfell Gromgear]

I doubt I have to reccomend anyone who already has Half Life 2 to get it. But if you've never picked up Half Life 2... then the ammount of gaming you recieve in that single package is mindblowing and simply cannot be missed.

[Heno]

It's a deal, it's a steal it's the sale of the frog king century.

Well worth the wait!

[abr4]

I doubt I have to reccomend anyone who already has Half Life 2 to get it. But if you've never picked up Half Life 2... then the ammount of gaming you recieve in that single package is mindblowing and simply cannot be missed.

Half Life 2 was ok, but definitely not as good as HL 1. In the end it got annoying with those squads coming along with you in the city and the super gravity gun at the very end in the citadel (god I hate the gravity gun).

I guess I put some spoilers in while ranting about it, so don't read the next paragraph unless you've finished Episode 1, or you just don't care.

Start of spoilering rant

*********************

Ep 1 sucked big time imo. It starts as as HL2 left off. With the super gravity gun -.-
Only this time you get Alyx to go along with you. Yey - not. Once you get out of the citadel again you find yourself in a dark corridor with alot of zombies, good thing you have Alyx with you who has unlimited ammunition and is surprisingly more durable than you are, even though you're the one wearing a hazard suit.
So your running around with a viewing range of probably one tenth of your screen, because all you can see is what your flashlight shines uppon (which is also miracously linked to how long you can sprint, thank god they fixed this in Ep 2) until you come to a seemingly dead end whith a electrically locked door.
However there's a ventilation shaft through which Alyx sends you (she can't be bothered since she did all the shooting already) to find a way to unlock the door. Shortly after the journey in the dark can continue and by now you even got a gun, but it's still more convinient to let Alyx do all the shooting while you direct your flashlight at the foes.
The next hurdle you encounter is a locked glass door. There's a zombie behind it, only this one looks slightly different. Suddenly he's holding a grenade in his hand and runs towards you (blocked by the glass door), grenade explodes, glass door breaks. Upon further investigation you realize it's a combine soldier infested with a head crab.
To quote Alyx:
"This, what is this? It... it's like a Zombine.

Loooooong pause

I was thinking to myself, oh you did not just say that...

Hehe, get it, she said, a Zombine?

At which point I lost it, turned around and emptied a full pistol magazine into her.
Sadly she wouldn't die :(

The game then continues the way it's been the first half hour or so with the same puzzles over and over again in a very dark setting and loads of zombies (no Valve, dark and zombies don't make it scary, HL zombies are probably the easiest to beat of them all) for another hour and a half round about. This is until the most retarted scene ever in this game.

You have to reactivate an elevator (same puzzle as activating the 5 or so electrical doors before). Once activated you have to wait for it to come down. Now, you're in this absolutely black room without any lights but your flashlight so you can see, as mentioned before approximately 1/10 of your actual screen and you have defend yourself from zombies.
This wouldn't be a problem, but they're sending those suicidal grenade carrying combine zombies at you as well; from 180° directions.
This is not scary, this is not hard, this is just pure coincidence if you look the right way to spot the zombie before it stands next to you and explodes...

Anyway afterwards you're out in the open again (open meaning City 17 here) and have to fight your way to the train station. In the city you have to fight combine soldiers and those insect thingies, then there's a hospital with more zombies, city fight again until you reach the train station with some neat (well not really neat, but better than the rest of the game nonetheless) end event and afterwards you leave the city in a train.

***************************

End of spoilering rant

Now Ep 2 is better as Alyx gets lifethreatening injured within the first 10 minutes of the game or so and you don't have to put up with her. However instead you get to babysit one of those friendly aliens. The tasks you have to do are amazingly similar (you go first and find me an easier route to follow -.- ), there's even another "We'll have to hold out until the elevator reaches our level" fight, only this time (thankfully) not in the dark.

Ep 2 is better than Ep 1 in my opinion, but that might just be because I don't have to see Alyx for quite some time and because the texture changed from a city to a wood (I always prefer wood over city settings) and the underground of a city to a mine.
I am at the moment at the beginning of chapter 3 I think and while I don't think Ep 2 is as bad as Ep 1 I don't really understand why so many people get excited over it.

[Grimfell Gromgear]

Half Life 2 was ok, but definitely not as good as HL 1. In the end it got annoying with those squads coming along with you and the super gravity gun at the very end (god I hate the gravity gun).

I suppose there's always room for someone to dislike everything.

But I still find it hard to believe anyone could hate the gravity gun... it's just so much fun.

[abr4]

The range is too short and when you've picked something up that might actually damage the enemy it's usually so big that it blocks you're whole view making it hard to aim.
The fun part is the novelty of being able to pick almost anything up and use it as a weapon, but this wore off off me rather fast as I quickly realized how impractical the weapon is.

The super gravity gun is not fun because it's just stupidly overpowered.

[Obby]

I would gladly pay $40+ for each of these individual games, so I am extremely happy that I got all three for $45.

[Heno]

The range is too short and when you've picked something up that might actually damage the enemy it's usually so big that it blocks you're whole view making it hard to aim..

Can't you just remember where they are?

The gravity gun is great, best way to use it is tossing a grenade at your feet, then using it as a grenade launcher. Or catching the combine soldiers AR2 balls and firing them back :D

[abr4]

Try hitting a moving enemy with an empty oil barrel...

I'm not saying the grav gun is generally a bad thing. It's just my opinion as I never could quite acclimate myself with it.

[Grimfell Gromgear]

Try hitting a moving enemy with an empty oil barrel...

That's why I keep a sawblade nearby, or just use stuff that's too heavy to pick up but easy to shoot like cars. Nothing like removing a baracade and at the same time crushing a bunch of enemies.

[abr4]

Hardly any sawblades lying around at the end of HL2 or Ep 1 :P

It has it's uses, yes, but most of the time I can't even be bothered to switch weapons.

[Bork]

Top game (http://img42.imagevenue.com/view.php?image=57521_cp_granary0006_122_697lo.jpg) , Played it near constantly since the pre-order beta thingy, worth the price alone.
The rest of the box was pretty tasty too.

[Ruinx]

Whilst I love the grav gun, I think it's extremely hard to deny that HL2 would be a noticeably better game if, whilst something was "held" by the GG in front of you, it was transparent. Same goes for the telekinesis implant in BioShock.

[Gaazruk]

The Orange Box was amazing.

Portal = Brilliant, Song in Credits was great
TF2 = Amazingly Addictive
Half-Life 2, Episode One, Episode 2 = It was good

[AlienOverlord]

I couldn't believe when I saw this review *Warning : Mature Language!*

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/zeropunctuation/2541-Zero-Punctuation-The-Orange-Box

Yahtzee usually trashes *everything*. I'm really glad I ordered this, now if it would just SHOW UP!

[Gaazruk]

Yeah he loved Portal.

[abr4]

I pretty much knew he would.

No one that likes Thief can have a bad taste in games.

[Dragu]

The Orange Box was a perfect deal for me since I didn't even have HL2. I don't know why I've never been that interested about Half-Life, because I just played through HL2 and Portal in the last two days :D . I just love the humor combined with problem solving in Portal, it's absolutely beautiful ;) .

[Ruinx]

Yahtzee usually trashes *everything*. I'm really glad I ordered this, now if it would just SHOW UP!

L2Steam!

Yahtzee kinda did trash it as much as possible, though, which was a not insignificant amount with HL2:EP2.

It's hard to find much bad to say about TF2 or Portal, though, as reviewers are finding.

[Eltair Shadowblade]

im so close to buying my new pc(which is needed, because my current pc has 1.7 ghz, and a nvidia 5700) so i wont be buying it yet.

after that though...i really want tf2

[Pugslah]

Im glad I waited until the Orange Box to play Half-life 2.
Even though it was hard as hell.(playing it on hard). Im so glad the zombies are stupid. I don't think i would of ever gotten out of Ravenholm if they were was smart as the Resident Evil 4 ones.

also the first part of episode 1 having your flashlight go dead surrounded by zombies is a bad thing.:D

Episodes are waay to short.:( Episode 1 went by in a blur i dont even remember much of what happened.
At the end of Episode 2 I didn't even pay attention to what was happening i was to busy being pissed about the episode being over.:mad:

Episode 3 better be as long as Half-life 2. I don't care how long it takes them to make it.
and let me kill G-Man..I want revenge for what happened to me at the end of Half-life 1.;)

[Scarzar]

i beat episode 2 in under 3 hours lol it was fun and i liked the ending


*SPOILER dont read if u dont want to be Spoiled!!!!*









What do u think the boriales (or whatever) is carrying i cant figure it out the only thing i can think of is the words *it will be like anouther Black Messiah?????* so what a telaporter or somthing more sinister!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !

ive been looking for info on episode 3 or even a HL3 witch i think would be more apropriate then anouther episode to be quite honist LOL but ya i got the Orange box Portal was fun im not good at puzzles so ya but i really enjoy playing TF 2 :)





Edit: my steam name is meat_head88

[Heno]

i beat episode 2 in under 3 hours lol it was fun and i liked the ending

What do u think the boriales (or whatever) is carrying i cant figure it out the only thing i can think of is the words *it will be like anouther Black Messiah?????* so what a telaporter or somthing more sinister!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !


A portal generator clearly (And some cake)! I've got bets it leads to the combine home world in the end what we do there though is anyones guess.

[Profound]

Love all the Orange Box games. Already had HL2 so I gave it away as a gift to someone in our guild.

[Okrot]

The song "still alive" from the end of portal:

http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=RthZgszykLs

[Laser]

we need a steam group!!!