The Orange Box... what can I say? Sheer value for money...
If you've purchased this bundle I'm sure you will agree that it is outstanding value for money. If you haven't purchased it (for one reason or another) then hopefully I can sway you either way. The Orange Box certainly doesn't bring anything new to the table, but what it does do is bring together some fantastic games into a bundle that's value far exceeds that of which it actually costs.
Starting with the Half Life 2 games (including episodes 1 and 2), these alone are worth the £30 - £40 the bundle costs. Half Life 2, in it's time, was one of the greatest games to date, but how does it hold up in today's gaming market? The graphics, needless to say, are somewhat dated; but they still look clean and crisp when running them through some decent hardware. The visuals in this game achieve what they set out to and they are flawless. There are a few frame rate dips but this is probably because the game is some 3 years old now. Despite this age the graphics hold up well against a large portion of today's games (except some obvious exceptions i.e. Crysis!). When I say this, what I really mean is "This game has as good a graphics as could be expected from a 3 year old game; which, to be honest, is fairly decent."
As for the games sound; it's not bad. That doesn't mean it's good though. The audio in The Orange Box is generally rather good, but some of the games can get repetitive. Personally I would like to see a few more tracks in Portal as the few tracks it does have do get rather repetitive! The rest of the package is generally good as far as sound goes, and the voice acting in the Half Life 2 games really does make the game feel complete and, at the end of the day, more realistic. The weapons sound effects really do make it feel as though the guns you are firing are really tearing through the enemies and causing some serious damage (much like the chainsaw tearing through the locust hoard in Gears of War). The musical score that accompanies these games really does do it's best to create a fantastic atmosphere. The music from this game really is best experienced when you are locked gun first in the game from which it came as it is less a musical score, more a development of the ever changing mood from within the game itself. What the sound track does, is take you from your chair and plunge you head first in to an emotional torrent of puzzles and action, completing what can only be described (in the case of Half Life 2) as an amazing game. The songs within the Half Life games total up to little over an hour altogether; as each individual snippet of music is around 2 minutes long.
Now for what most players but games for: the single player story mode. Within The Orange Box the gamer has 4 games to choose from:
1. Half Life 2
2. Half Life 2 : Episode 1
3. Half Life 2 : Episode 2
4. Portal
I'll start with Portal. As I'm sure most gamers would agree, most FPS games have enemies and the like, and most straight up puzzlers don't involve shooting a gun. Well if you take a puzzler and an FPS game and combine them; you get Portal. On the surface, this game is just solving puzzles by shooting portals in walls to either let yourself travel through them, or let something else travel through them; but Portal is so much more than that. Portal is a game that takes elements of first person shooters, puzzlers and combines them with unique humour and some very interesting game mechanics. An example of these mechanics is the way they have implemented gravity into the games, using a manoeuvre called the fling. This move works by placing a portal up high, and one on the floor, walking into the floor portal, and gaining speed as you descend from the higher portal, re-entering the floor portal. This action results in being flung out of the portal at speed, taking the gravitational speed and translating it into forward momentum; thus creating a new game play mechanic that is used to full effect in some of the puzzle chambers. This move is often used to enter new parts of the chamber that cannot be reached by placing a portal at that specific point. This brings a new dimension to the game play and keeps things new and interesting. This game really doesn't require the newest hardware to perform well, which makes this package enticing to the average computer user.
The Half Life 2 games are all very much the same, and that's one of the good things about it. You would expect a series of games under the same name to continue the story in much the same way as the previous game and this is exactly what these games do. The newest instalment to the Half Life 2 series is Episode 2. This game takes the game play of the previous games, doubles it in quality, and dumps it out into a PC friendly game. Gordon Freeman's mysterious persona is continued in Episode 2, as he still does not speak; will we see him speak in Episode 3? I for one hope so!! The newly modified vehicle in Episode 2 is used to full effect as you take a ride with Alyx, enjoying brilliant surroundings and quality enemies. The game itself is much the same as its 2 predecessors, solving various small puzzles to continue through the fairly standard FPS game type.
The AI in the half life games is one of the quality elements within the game, especially when set to a high level of difficulty. The enemies will actually find and use cover in their (some what feeble!) attempt to kill you where you stand. If you're familiar with the first person shooter archetype then you really should have no problems with taking down these enemies, even on the hardest settings. Despite this, they still provide a small challenge in an other wise fantastic game.
They multiplayer portion of The Orange Box is delivered in the form of Team Fortress 2. This game is in many ways a (what appears to be) cell shaded successor to Counter Strike; except that it's not. The game itself has an almost cartoon appearance, but it is not cell shaded in the way of Zelda: the Windwaker. This cartoon appearance gives the game a more relaxed feel, while taking away nothing from the game play itself. As the game is exclusively online, you may wish to find one or two servers that you like a lot, add them to your favourites, and then play with those players more often. This is a useful thing to do as the game is very tactical and team based, every player class has its own job to do; if you try to play as a rogue hero... you will lose, no two ways about it. On both the consoles and the PC version, there is the option to use team speak. Connecting a microphone up and discussing tactics is a great way to win a game in Team Fortress 2, and will certainly improve your skills when playing with better gamers than yourself.
This package is really good for those who don't have a mammoth tower of gaming power, and it requires very little to make it run smoothly (although obviously it will run better with better hardware). When run on a nice system, this package will take your breathe away with some of the graphics and sound that are included for such a phenomenal price (5 games for the price of 1!!!!!)
This package is something that you will rarely find in gaming. Essentially what it does is give you some games, and then stacks more on top. To be honest, this is one of the best games of 2007, if only for its sheer value and quality of a few of the games. I highly recommend this game for anyone that doesn't have the ultimate gaming machine.