First Impressions: The Orange Box

October 11, 2007

I’ve been waiting for Portal since I first heard of the concept and the inclusion of Team Fortress 2 almost makes the deal that valve is making available seem downright stupid. Stupid in the sense that you’d have to be a flaming idiot not to see how bad you need this.

Upon throwing the game in, you are presented with 5 game choices, which makes this post a bit skewed. To properly give you an impression of the whole disc I’d have to play portions of 5 whole games, of which I most definitely didn’t have time for. Instead I shot straight over to Portal and what I was greeted with is probably the most wholly refreshing game I’ve played in a long time. It’s no wonder that the kids who thought this up were snagged by valve as quickly as possible. These kids were thinking outside the box, something that I wish could be said about more in our industry. In a world of sequels and trilogys and franchises that won’t die, The Orange Box and more specifically Portal is a breathe of fresh air that I hope everyone tries at least once.

I’m not naive enough to believe that everyone will enjoy it or even see the value in The Orange Box, but those of us that missed Half-Life 2 on the PC will no doubt feel like we were blessed with some sort of Willy Wonka like golden ticket instead of feeling like we signed away the rights to our first born in exchange for a lackluster game that we won’t play more than twice.

I’m evangelizing now so I’ll stop, but the fact that I am so excited for something should speak volumes about how good I think this game is. This is without even touching the remaining 4 portions of gaming goodness that valve has served up. One of which I’m sure will eat into Halo 3’s MP action, Team Fortress 2.