The Orange Box (PC/PS3/360)

[angelx]

AH I finished portal earlier today, really good fun! great looking too, shame its so short...

[Commander Marklar]

Bonus stages, advanced? There's plenty more

[MattyD]

Isn't the 'splodging' caused by compression? If it's what I think you're referring to, it looks similar to the artefacting you get in MPEG video for example. I'd imagine that being a PC game, Valve have had to trim things down to fit the RAM now they can't always rely on having a HDD.

[TommyG]

Yes I do m8 I phyiscally throw up with certain games due to illness as I get it so bad. 360 is the very first console that I can play FPS fine (Ive always been hit and miss with PC stuff until last 2yrs as frame rate settles down).

I suffered with HL2 with motion sickness pretty bad in small bouts on PC but Im happy to say that on the 360 so far Ive been fine with it on 360 apart from one tiny area puzzle due to turning around walls which quickly went away. I think for me its due to the camera moving slower for panning with joypad than uber frame rate fest of ninja pc lol

I would suggest if you play it though from my experience to either have lights on or off and pitch black room or lit up (it depends on the person) I like a room dark personally and I try to make the sensativity of the controller lower and if any FPS have bob to disable it.

I also take anti sea sickness tablets (shove em under your gums) to help hehe

Thanks for the reply Dazzyman, i was weary of getting it because of this problem, but will rest at easy now thanks matey

[Ciaran]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29RE0blCV84

[Brats]

Completed Half Life 2 last night and it's one of the best games I've played and, compared to Halo 3, is so much larger, classier, and more intelligent with better design, scale and pacing and truly an incredible experience.

Horses for courses and all, but I'd only agree with the 'larger' part of the argument there. HL2 is excellent in places, but it's also bloated, buggy, incredibly linear and restricted in a lot of other parts.

Finished Portal and I really do think now it is a little gem, but the whole end 'level' was easily the best. The nice thing about portal is it is fantastically compact.

If HL2 is Iron Butterfly's In-a Gadda-de-Vidda then Portal is Wire's 12XU.

[rmoxon]

It looks nice, no doubt. I just think compared to the PC version (and this was hardly on cutting edge hardware, a 7800GTX 256Mb card) it suffers. I thought, for example, the flooring in the station looked terrible, some of the translucency effects were grainier, and I've also noticed some problems with "splodging" (technical term) on darker textures.

I think if you'd never played the PC version you'd never know, but I'm finding it a little irritating.

Also, it's clearly designed for mouse control. All the doorways are just a leeeeetle too small for comfortable pad navigation.

Good game though. And I far prefer playing it on the 360, due to the sofa/achievement factor.

Are you playing playing it in SD?, becuase in HD it looks quite a bit better than the PC version to me.

[Ciaran]

Are you playing playing it in SD?, becuase in HD it looks quite a bit better than the PC version to me.

It will look worse on the 360 than it will with everything turned up on the PC.

[cavalcade]

Are you playing playing it in SD?, becuase in HD it looks quite a bit better than the PC version to me.

720p on a medium sized HD screen. I am comparing this to it running at a higher resolution on the PC version (1680 by 1050), but even taking that into account I don't think the 360 version looks as good. It does have HDR, but it's subtle, and didn't make much of a difference, I just thought the PC version was a lot better looking in most areas.

EDIT: And this was with everything maxxed out on the PC.

Still it's incremental differences, I wouldn't lose any sleep over it, and after a while it stopped bugging me.

[rmoxon]

It will look worse on the 360 than it will with everything turned up on the PC.

No, it dosnet, it has a few more jaggies but is also has the graphical quality of EP 1 in other areas, where as the PC original dosent.

[rmoxon]

720p on a medium sized HD screen. I am comparing this to it running at a higher resolution on the PC version (1680 by 1050), but even taking that into account I don't think the 360 version looks as good. It does have HDR, but it's subtle, and didn't make much of a difference, I just thought the PC version was a lot better looking in most areas.

EDIT: And this was with everything maxxed out on the PC.

Still it's incremental differences, I wouldn't lose any sleep over it, and after a while it stopped bugging me.

Well if It was so minute maybe I missed it and just let the advancements in technology over the PC version make me "belive" it was a better looking game then, heh.

[Ish]

Horses for courses and all, but I'd only agree with the 'larger' part of the argument there. HL2 is excellent in places, but it's also bloated, buggy, incredibly linear and restricted in a lot of other parts.

Agreed. I loved it at the time - thought it was amazing. Its still a great game and I love the narrative side of things but playing through Episode 1 I'm repeatedly struck with how "old" it seems. It just feels incredibly dated to me - mainly because the combat feels woolly and kind of flat and the art style seems really drab.

[mr_woo]

Horses for courses and all, but I'd only agree with the 'larger' part of the argument there. HL2 is excellent in places, but it's also bloated, buggy, incredibly linear and restricted in a lot of other parts.

Linearity is one of the things that benefits Valves games, they design puzzles/setpieces around set paths and it helps them create the great atmosphere that they do. Some games suit the more open world setting but it wouldn't work with Valves games.

I've started playing HL2 again for the 6th time, I have an unnatural love for this game I think, just grabs me by the balls each time and has yet to be bettered IMO (though saying that when Virtua Fighter 5 and Metroid Prime 3 come out this weekend I think I may end up actually turning it off )

[rmoxon]

Agreed. I loved it at the time - thought it was amazing. Its still a great game and I love the narrative side of things but playing through Episode 1 I'm repeatedly struck with how "old" it seems. It just feels incredibly dated to me - mainly because the combat feels woolly and kind of flat and the art style seems really drab.

The level design of Ep1 is actualy what makes it the worst of the lot, the combat is part of the level design though I suppose seeing as how Half-Life games are just constant set peices.

The first two chpaters are like a lame repeat of the last chapter of Half-Life 2 and then the third chapter is just completely in darkness which is incredably annoying with a flash light that keeps running out. With the last two chapters the game does pick up slightly, but there is still nothing intresting about the level design at all really.

The fact that you can complete it easily by using just one shotgun round and no other bullets (as in the achievment) kind of proves how unispired and lathargic it is even more.

Still has great story telling for a FPS though, which helps alot.

[cavalcade]

Just finished Portal. Very enjoyable.

For Portal 2. Multiplayer.

2 modes:

One where everyone has their own Portal Gun (deathmatch). No direct combat. Cubes, turrets and other hazards can be exploited. Maybe some sort of power up, or tech to change somebody's exit portal. Each person would have a different colour entry and exit portal to make it easy to track what was going on.

Other variation, team deathmatch where half the team carry blue portal only guns, and the other half of each team carry the exit portals.

I want this made now. NOW.