The Orange Box (Xbox 360)
If you’ve played a video game in the past ten years or so, you probably have heard of Half-Life. It revolutionized first person shooters, yadda yadda yadda. If you’ve played a video game in the past year, you’ve probably heard of The Orange Box. It collects five games produced by Valve: Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2: Episodes 1 and 2, Team Fortress 2, and Portal. It’s sequel mania!
I’m going to skip TF2, since I don’t play online, and get right to the Half-Lives. At its core, Half-Life 2 is an excellent, exciting FPS with tight controls. The only problem is its length. In an attempt to make the game last longer, though, Valve felt the need to put in segments of the game that are more frustrating than enjoyable. Vehicle sections, which are the work of the devil, pop up twice in HL2 and again in HL2E2. All of the games involve multiple instances of shooting down helicopters or stalkers (spindly War of the Worlds robot things) with rocket launchers that require you to stare at them so the rockets can be guided via laser to their targets. While the enemy has free rein to shoot at you. Yeah, fun. And then of course there’s the “avoid the helicopter/stalker shooting at you as you run around blindly trying to figure out where to go next” parts in HL2 and HL2E1. These are all parts of the game that repeatedly caused death followed by much swearing from me. Plus, Valve has to show off their physics engine with the same damn physics puzzle in every game: put heavy objects on one end of an inclined plane to raise the other end so you can continue. Exciting.
I’m also a bit disappointed that Valve recruited some great voice talent, namely Robert Guillaume and Michelle Forbes, and barely used them. Pretty much the only character that shows up for extended periods of time is your friend Alyx Vance. (Oh, by the way, if you were wondering about the story, it’s basically: aliens took over Earth so humans are fighting back in dystopic Eastern Europe.) And, this being a FPS, your character is mute, so nobody ever asks you if you want to do something ridiculously dangerous, you just get ordered around. Being Gordon Freeman is really a pain. Oh yeah, and where does he keep all those guns? He totes around a pistol, revolver, machine gun, shotgun, rocket launcher, pulse rife, gravity gun, crossbow, grenades, and that damn crowbar. Seriously, he must have some major back problems by now.
Anyway, this is not to say the games are bad. I really enjoyed running through the streets of City 17, blasting away Combine soldiers. And HL2 features a foray into survival horror as you creep through the zombie-infested Ravenholm. It’s just annoying when you get tripped up by these parts of the game, especially when they take up precious time in the very short HL2E1 and E2, which took me 3 ½ and 4 ½ hours to complete, respectively. (HL2, incidentally, required about 15 hours of play.)
3 out of 5 (Half-Life 2)
2 out of 5 (Half-Life 2: Episode 1)
2 out of 5 (Half-Life 2: Episode 2)
Let’s move on to Portal. There’s been a lot of nerdlove slathered on this game, particularly stuff like the Weighted Companion Cube, “The Cake Is A Lie”, and “Still Alive”. If you can manage to ignore the irritating memes spread by Internet geeks, you will find that Portal is a clever, innovative puzzle game. It’s set up as a FPS, except instead of shooting things, you get a gun that shoots portals: one blue, one orange. This magic technology, on loan from the Road Runner, I think, allows you to travel from one place to another by stepping through said portal. What ensues is a series of puzzle challenges, as you’re “guided” by the often-hilariously-deadpan computer GLaDOS. It’s a short game, one that you can finish in an afternoon (I think it took me 3 hours), but there are a number of challenges that are unlocked after you finish it, if you’re a competitive sort or a completist. Or just addicted to gaining gamerscore. My only complaint with Portal is that the pacing is really thrown off in the last third of the game. It goes from a series of challenges that last around 3-5 minutes to one long, unbroken section. But aside from that, Portal is well worth playing.
4 out of 5 (Portal)
Well, there you have it. Five games for the price of one, although considering the length of three of them, it’s more like three for one. It’s certainly a good value for Valve/Half-Life devotees, but the rest of us would do well to tread with caution.
3 out of 5 (The Orange Box)
If you’ve played a video game in the past ten years or so, you probably have heard of Half-Life. It revolutionized first person shooters, yadda yadda yadda. If you’ve played a video game in the past year, you’ve probably heard of The Orange Box. It collects five games produced by Valve: Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2: Episodes 1 and 2, Team Fortress 2, and Portal. It’s sequel mania!
I’m going to skip TF2, since I don’t play online, and get right to the Half-Lives. At its core, Half-Life 2 is an excellent, exciting FPS with tight controls. The only problem is its length. In an attempt to make the game last longer, though, Valve felt the need to put in segments of the game that are more frustrating than enjoyable. Vehicle sections, which are the work of the devil, pop up twice in HL2 and again in HL2E2. All of the games involve multiple instances of shooting down helicopters or stalkers (spindly War of the Worlds robot things) with rocket launchers that require you to stare at them so the rockets can be guided via laser to their targets. While the enemy has free rein to shoot at you. Yeah, fun. And then of course there’s the “avoid the helicopter/stalker shooting at you as you run around blindly trying to figure out where to go next” parts in HL2 and HL2E1. These are all parts of the game that repeatedly caused death followed by much swearing from me. Plus, Valve has to show off their physics engine with the same damn physics puzzle in every game: put heavy objects on one end of an inclined plane to raise the other end so you can continue. Exciting.
I’m also a bit disappointed that Valve recruited some great voice talent, namely Robert Guillaume and Michelle Forbes, and barely used them. Pretty much the only character that shows up for extended periods of time is your friend Alyx Vance. (Oh, by the way, if you were wondering about the story, it’s basically: aliens took over Earth so humans are fighting back in dystopic Eastern Europe.) And, this being a FPS, your character is mute, so nobody ever asks you if you want to do something ridiculously dangerous, you just get ordered around. Being Gordon Freeman is really a pain. Oh yeah, and where does he keep all those guns? He totes around a pistol, revolver, machine gun, shotgun, rocket launcher, pulse rife, gravity gun, crossbow, grenades, and that damn crowbar. Seriously, he must have some major back problems by now.
Anyway, this is not to say the games are bad. I really enjoyed running through the streets of City 17, blasting away Combine soldiers. And HL2 features a foray into survival horror as you creep through the zombie-infested Ravenholm. It’s just annoying when you get tripped up by these parts of the game, especially when they take up precious time in the very short HL2E1 and E2, which took me 3 ½ and 4 ½ hours to complete, respectively. (HL2, incidentally, required about 15 hours of play.)
3 out of 5 (Half-Life 2)
2 out of 5 (Half-Life 2: Episode 1)
2 out of 5 (Half-Life 2: Episode 2)
Let’s move on to Portal. There’s been a lot of nerdlove slathered on this game, particularly stuff like the Weighted Companion Cube, “The Cake Is A Lie”, and “Still Alive”. If you can manage to ignore the irritating memes spread by Internet geeks, you will find that Portal is a clever, innovative puzzle game. It’s set up as a FPS, except instead of shooting things, you get a gun that shoots portals: one blue, one orange. This magic technology, on loan from the Road Runner, I think, allows you to travel from one place to another by stepping through said portal. What ensues is a series of puzzle challenges, as you’re “guided” by the often-hilariously-deadpan computer GLaDOS. It’s a short game, one that you can finish in an afternoon (I think it took me 3 hours), but there are a number of challenges that are unlocked after you finish it, if you’re a competitive sort or a completist. Or just addicted to gaining gamerscore. My only complaint with Portal is that the pacing is really thrown off in the last third of the game. It goes from a series of challenges that last around 3-5 minutes to one long, unbroken section. But aside from that, Portal is well worth playing.
4 out of 5 (Portal)
Well, there you have it. Five games for the price of one, although considering the length of three of them, it’s more like three for one. It’s certainly a good value for Valve/Half-Life devotees, but the rest of us would do well to tread with caution.
3 out of 5 (The Orange Box)
posted by Cole at
8:09 AM
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