New Games, New Year

It took me a while longer to get to posting here than I would have liked, but I take comfort in the fact that the reason it took so long was that I had/have many games to play as I enter the New Year. As any gamer knows there can be no better reason to be late with something.

I will not be giving my opinion on all the games I have been playing right away but I will break them up into separate posts for better flow.

Let's start with a game (if this word can encompass all that this truly is) that is known as the Orange Box. This game is digital gold for your money there is no game that can rival the value of this disc. The game comes with Half Life 2, Half life two episodes 1 and 2, Portal, and Team Fortress 2.

Half Life 2 was one of the most innovative video games of it's time. This game is a titan among it's peers and still stands as a beacon of what a good shooter can and should be. With the clever use of physics and various other detail oriented effects the game has many nuances that make the game even more impressive. Whether its being able to use the gravity gun to pick up a giant circular saw blade and hurl it at a horde of incoming zombies (not in the traditional sense of the word zombies) or a magnifying glass that allows you to look through it at a particular section of a map the game is oozing with sexiness. The two expansions episode 1 and 2 follow suit.

Ah Portal, I love this mini game and I am not lying to you that I would spend almost the full $59.99 on this mini game alone...almost all only because the game is fairly short. This game is one of the best mini games I have played to date. The premise is you are in a testing facility for a new weapon which allows the user to create portals that bend the laws of space and allow for some inventive uses of the physics engine. The game will surprise many with the twist in the game and that is all I will say for fear of spoilers ruining it for you.

Now we come to the obligatory multi player that all games seem to have now a days. Fortunately instead of cooking up some half baked game the people at valve have given the player a stand mp game as a "substitute". TF2 as this game is referred to is highly entertaining and easy to learn. The original TF is almost single handedly responsible for popularizing the class system used in many multi player shooters on the market today. I am happy to say that it's successor continues the tradition with style. The only problem with this portion of the title is the lack of maps leading to repetitive game play in terms of location. Other than that minor fault TF2 is everything that fans could have hoped for. And as for the map situation as stated here under the maps section valve has plans to release more maps in early 2008.

With that said my tentative obligatory numerical score is a 9.5 on the standard 10pt scale. If valve follows through on the more maps...thus making TF2 even better I will be changing my score up accordingly. Have a great new year and stay "tuned".