You have a couple options. You can download it from Steam online for about $20 I think to play on your PC. Or you could find someone who owns the Orange Box for the PC and could loan it to you. I own it, but for the Xbox 360 and so you could only play it if you came over and played through the whole game over the course of about 3 hours, which people have done, but you would probably prefer to play it at your leisure.
I think Alec owns it for the PC. I'll bug him about it at Video Game Club to see if he can part with it for a day or two.
Haha, my poor neglected PS2. Are they even making games for it anymore??
It's just kind of a random desire, so don't go hunting too far for a version I can play. My brother actually has a 360, so when I go home for Xmas I'll either be able to rent it or he'll already own it (I've been thinking of getting him the Orange Box, but he's played part of it already and I don't know how much he wants it).
What is up with the current obsession, though? I hunt around online and all I can hear is cryptic Portal references.
They still make games for the PS2, but most of them are crappy half-assed ports of games on the PS3.
Fair enough. I'll ask Alec though, since I'll be seeing him anyhow.
And the obsession is over the fact that it is a brilliant game.
It revolves around the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device, or just the Portal Gun. It is capable of generating two portals: One orange, one blue. They can be generated on most flat surfaces. Basically, if you go into the orange portal, you'll come out of the blue one. The reverse is also true in that you can go in the blue one and come out of the orange one. Another thing about the portals is that your momentum is conserved when you go through them, so if you make a portal on the ground and another one on a wall and jump into the one on the ground, you'll come out of the one on the wall at the same speed you were falling.
So basically, you're this character named Chell and you're in the Aperture Science Enrichment Center and a computer named GLaDOS (Genetic Lifeform and Disc Operating System) starts guiding you through test chambers where you use the portals and eventually the portal device to solve a series of puzzles and tests. GLaDOS talks throughout the game often in order to... help you (i.e. "In dangerous testing environments, the Enrichment Center promises to always provide useful advice. For instance, the floor here will kill you. Try to avoid it.") and to promise you cake at the end of the tests.
The game resembles a first-person shooter, but it's more of a first-person puzzle comedy. You do fight things occasionally, but it's never intense and you never beat them by shooting AT them. For example, if there's a robot shooting at you, you can make a portal on the ceiling above it and another portal below a nearby Aperture Science Weighted Storage Cube and the cube will fall on it, incapacitating it as it mumbles in a cute voice, "I don't hate you..."
Another great thing about the game are the little hidden things like areas that former test subjects took up residence in and apparently went crazy, scrawling things on the walls like, "The cake is a lie" over and over again.
The best thing of all in the game, however, is the ending, which to spoil would be all too cruel.
Haha, okay, I think I'm definitely going to check it out. I do like puzzle games. Plus this one just sounds so weird. I keep seeing the cube around and the "cake is a lie" phrase.
What about the other games on the Orange Box? I've kind of wanted to check out the Half-Life series for awhile now...
The Orange Box also has Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2: Episode 1, Half-Life 2: Episode 2, and Team Fortress 2, a class-based online multiplayer first-person shooter (it's very fun if you like shooters at all, whether or not you're very good at them).
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2007-11-27 06:25 pm (UTC)I think Alec owns it for the PC. I'll bug him about it at Video Game Club to see if he can part with it for a day or two.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 09:23 pm (UTC)It's just kind of a random desire, so don't go hunting too far for a version I can play. My brother actually has a 360, so when I go home for Xmas I'll either be able to rent it or he'll already own it (I've been thinking of getting him the Orange Box, but he's played part of it already and I don't know how much he wants it).
What is up with the current obsession, though? I hunt around online and all I can hear is cryptic Portal references.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 09:56 pm (UTC)Fair enough. I'll ask Alec though, since I'll be seeing him anyhow.
And the obsession is over the fact that it is a brilliant game.
It revolves around the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device, or just the Portal Gun. It is capable of generating two portals: One orange, one blue. They can be generated on most flat surfaces. Basically, if you go into the orange portal, you'll come out of the blue one. The reverse is also true in that you can go in the blue one and come out of the orange one. Another thing about the portals is that your momentum is conserved when you go through them, so if you make a portal on the ground and another one on a wall and jump into the one on the ground, you'll come out of the one on the wall at the same speed you were falling.
So basically, you're this character named Chell and you're in the Aperture Science Enrichment Center and a computer named GLaDOS (Genetic Lifeform and Disc Operating System) starts guiding you through test chambers where you use the portals and eventually the portal device to solve a series of puzzles and tests. GLaDOS talks throughout the game often in order to... help you (i.e. "In dangerous testing environments, the Enrichment Center promises to always provide useful advice. For instance, the floor here will kill you. Try to avoid it.") and to promise you cake at the end of the tests.
The game resembles a first-person shooter, but it's more of a first-person puzzle comedy. You do fight things occasionally, but it's never intense and you never beat them by shooting AT them. For example, if there's a robot shooting at you, you can make a portal on the ceiling above it and another portal below a nearby Aperture Science Weighted Storage Cube and the cube will fall on it, incapacitating it as it mumbles in a cute voice, "I don't hate you..."
Another great thing about the game are the little hidden things like areas that former test subjects took up residence in and apparently went crazy, scrawling things on the walls like, "The cake is a lie" over and over again.
The best thing of all in the game, however, is the ending, which to spoil would be all too cruel.
So yes, you should give the game a go.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-28 07:05 am (UTC)What about the other games on the Orange Box? I've kind of wanted to check out the Half-Life series for awhile now...
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Date: 2007-11-28 07:09 am (UTC)