The Orange Box | 
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| From: Electronic Arts
Category: Video Games
List Price: $39.99
Buy New: $25.49
You Save: $14.50 (36%)
New (29) Used (9) from $19.89
Avg. Customer Rating:  15 reviews
Sales Rank: 113
Platforms: Windows Vista, Windows Xp, Windows 2000
ESRB: Mature
Media: DVD-ROM
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Batteries Included: No
Age: 17 - 20 years
Operating System: Windows 2000
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.3 x 1.1
MPN: 9852
UPC: 014633098525
EAN: 0014633098525
ASIN: B000PS2XES
Release Date: October 9, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Condition: INCLUDES GAME, CASE AND KEY CODE. NO MANUAL IN KEEP CASE ONLY
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| Features:
| • | Characters - Advanced facial animation system delivers the most sophisticated in-game characters ever seen. With 40 distinct facial muscles, human characters convey the full array of human emotion, and respond to the player with fluidity and intelligence | | • | Physics - From pebbles to water to 2-ton trucks respond as expected, as they obey the laws of mass, friction, gravity, and buoyancy | | • | Graphics - Source's shader-based renderer, like the one used at Pixar to create movies such as Toy Story and Monster's, Inc., creates the most beautiful and realistic environments ever seen in a video game. | | • | AI - Neither friends nor enemies charge blindly into the fray. They can assess threats, navigate tricky terrain, and fashion weapons from whatever is at hand |
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Product Description
With part 3 of the Half-Life saga in the horizon, this collection brings you from the start so you're ready to take on the third episode of this exciting trilogy. Half Life earns its popularity and reputation at being the first First Person Shooter game to use aq lifelike, realtime plot that pits you in the action as well as behind the trigger. Created by Valve Software, each episode employs advanced technologies for better, more realistic play. In Half-Life, you assume the role of Dr. Gordon Freeman, a recently graduated theoretical physicist who must fight his way out of an underground research facility whose teleportation experimentations have gone awry. The second part of the trilogy of episodic expansions for Half-Life 2, Episode Two picks up where Episode One left off?with Gordon and Alyx traveling out of City 17 and into a vast new environment.
The player again picks up the crowbar of research scientist Gordon Freeman, who finds himself on an alien-infested Earth being picked to the bone, its resources depleted, its populace dwindling. Freeman is thrust into the unenviable role of rescuing the world from the wrong he unleashed back at Black Mesa. And a lot of people people he cares about are counting on him. Intense, real-time gameplay of Half-Life 2 is made possible only by Source, Valve's new proprietary engine technology
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| Customer Reviews: Read 10 more reviews...
Great game, great price September 7, 2008
$30 is all I paid and it was worth evry penny.
Portal is a fun 1st person puzzle game. It's the reason I bought Orange Box. Team Fortress 2 is such an improvment on the 1st one! It's incredible fun. I'm not much in to Half Life 2 single player, but Ep 1 and Ep 2 do add more content to the wonderful Half Life 2 game. I already had Hald Life 2, so I was able to give the extra copy to a friend so they can enjoy the game as well! I really liked that, as I didn't want to waste money on a game I already had.
I don't see any reason not to buy Orange Box. You even get Peggle Extreme which is a HL themed (demo) version of Peggle. I liked it so much that I bought Peggle Deluxe from STEAM.
 fun game September 7, 2008
The game is very fun. But I don't like the Steam program. It has some positves but overall I found Steam to be troublesome and unhelpful. For example I finished the game and no longer want to play it in any way. I am unable to sell or trade it because of its registration process. Additionally Steam runs in the background and has given my unwanted pop-ups.
BEST GAME EVER September 6, 2008
AMAZON RULES THEY SAVED ME 10 BUCKS BECAUSE I BOUGHT IT CHEAPER ON AMAZON THAN ON STEAM PLUS THE GAME GOT TO ME IN 1 WEEK!!!
First-Person Gaming Nirvana September 6, 2008
Just in case you've been living in a cave for the last year, or were somehow (possibly by your own choice) unable to purchase The Orange Box by Valve, do yourself a favor and buy it.
I actually planned to buy the collection of five (six - if you include Peggle from Steam) games when it first arrived last year, but was continually distracted up until two weeks ago, when I finally bought it at a local store. I say this without any pretention: It is, by far, the best gaming purchase I have made in at least 5 years. Bar-none.
The original Half-Life follows the amazingly mute scientist Gordan Freeman as he basically unleashes hell on Earth. Half-Life 2 is set a good while after the initial series, and doesn't disappoint in the least. A few characters are added - old colleagues from Black Mesa, a robot DOG, and Alyx Vance (your very attractive female co-protagonist).
As with the original Half-Life, the game itself is composed of basically two things: Puzzles, and Shoot 'Em Up type battles, but they're done so well that I often found myself staring in admiration after I had figured out what the heck to do or actually feeling an adrenaline rush after some of the more active battles. There are, as always, numerous guides online if you really get stuck, but I was only seriously stuck once or twice and had to consult the darn things (and was never stuck in Episode 1 or Episode 2).
I won't spoil the storyline. It's good stuff, and often better, with greater depth in writing and plot, than many of the RPG's I've played in the last few years. The acting (both voice and 3D-modeling) are superb, with the tiniest nuances paid attention that I found incredibly immersive (particularly facial expressions). It doesn't take long before you really start to care for the characters involved, and at one point I found myself shouting, "Get your hands off her you damn zombie!" without realizing it was out-loud.
Team Fortress 2 is easily some of the most fun I've had in a multiplayer FPS in a long while. It's very stylistic, doesn't take itself seriously, and the only flaw I can think of with it is the lack of maps currently available (but it is being remedied). The play is excellent, and each class is useful without being absolutely necessary.
I have yet to play Portal, as I've been saving it for the weekend so I can get it all in one go, but it's difficult to imagine it being better than Episode 2. If it is, I may just end up mailing myself to Valve in a Cupid suit.
If you're not convinced yet that buying this is a good thing (perhaps not for your health, but for your soul), I'm not sure what I could say. The Orange Box has been, by far, the most fun I've had on my PC in ages. I'm already contemplating playing through Episode 2 again, despite finishing it at 1:02 AM this morning.
The only thing stopping me, is knowing that we probably won't have Episode 3 (and the final one in this story arc) until Q1 2009, and that knowledge is now palpably painful from the suspense.
Enjoy!
 THIS IS THE REVIEW Valve DOES NOT WANT YOU TO SEE September 5, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
HL2 was one of THE BEST games ever created - and I am not an easy customer (feel free to browse through my other reviews, including the one on HL2, you will see what I mean).
Nevertheless, the whole STEAM disaster taught me the lesson TO NEVER, EVER again get suckered by a game whose publisher:
(a) considers me a criminal - although has pocketed my $50,
(b) wants me to ask for permission EVERY BLOODY time I want to play even a single player game,
(c) installs an auto-updating, commercial-reporting and in-contact-with-the-mothership utility that retains backdoor access to my computer,
(d) lets greed dissolve any shred of shame and envision a world where gamers will be charged by the hour to play games they have already bought, and
(e) does not concede to the proven fact every "security system" eventually gets cracked and every "OnLine activation requirement" eventually gets bypassed. So, utilizing an overly inconvenient security scheme only serves in penalizing the people who actually paid good money for their product - and manage to shoot their sales in the foot at the same time.
It may seem unbelievable, yet it is True: "STEAM-secured" HL2 barely sold HALF the units that unprotected HL1 did! (Source: The Washington Post).
You would think some bright MBA (who could not tell the difference between a FPS game and an RPG) was sent home with no bonus? Guess again. Here come the Episodes!
After underselling HL2, VALVE then tried to catch up with short Episodes sold as...expansions. Well, a couple of hours of gameplay and some polished surfaces an expansion do not make. So, when Episode1 sales missed their projections by far, the geniuses accountants jettisoned the BLACK BOX release (which were to contain just the NEW games) and came up with this...ORANGE BOX idea.
This release contains, of course, Episode2 and - in order to sweeten the deal - the original HL2, Episode1 as well as a short maze game and a multiplayer platform (all based on the HL2 engine). I do remember Episode1 being so short that, even back then, I was sure it was only PART of the expansion under developement: these parts were eventually to be sold as separate...Episodes 1 & 2 (& maybe 3).
Now, let's see how good a deal the ORANGE BOX actually is. This is what it contains: HL2 (an excellent 2004 game not really showing its age), Episode1 (a very short expansion), Episode2 (the rest of the expansion, also short), PORTAL (a 2-hour First Person maze runner) and the multiplayer game TEAM FORTRESS 2.
So, are the accountants actually doing us a favor when pricing all these games for 50$? Not unless this is your first experience with HL2.
If you do NOT own either HL2 or Episode1 and new to the series, then, YES, this is a GOOD DEAL. If, however, you already own HL2 and Episode1, I would suggest waiting for the individually sold components. When was the last time we paid 50$ for another short expansion?
Now, since I do have to connect to a server in order to play a multiplayer game, it makes no difference to me whether that be STEAM or any other server. Validate away my genuine copy to your hearts content!
However, I REFUSE to ask permission every time I wish to play a Single Player or LAN game FOR A TITLE I HAVE ALREADY PAID AND BOUGHT!
I REFUSE to ever again submit to the whims of STEAM - only to fall victim to busy, unstable and fickle servers!
VALVE has to learn eventually that respect is a two-way street. The intrusiveness and inconvenience of STEAM created a huge debt with its original HL2 customers - and, since the market correction of the affect of STEAM failed to sink in, the ORANGE BOX will now inevitably pay that debt - with interest.
Episode2 may be a fine expansion and TEAM FORTRESS the new CS. Nevertheless, they are still STEAMed up by accountants posing as game designers. They fooled my once...
I am NOT going through that again!
PS:
WESTWOOD was once a mighty company riding the cutting edge of creativity (the COMMAND & CONQUER series was their innovative idea, starting with the classic DUNE that introduced the RTS genre). In 1997 they released an online RTS game named COMMAND & CONQUER: SOLE SURVIVOR. In 2003 (just 6 years later) WESTWOOD was bought by EA GAMES which (true to its mega-corporation mentality) pulled the plug on the existing servers. Whoever had bought SOLE SURVIVOR now had a piece of worthless reflective plastic.
Now, what makes you think this cannot happen to VALVE?
(and what will the value of all these STEAMed games be then?)
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