Half-Life 2: Episode 2 interview mentions PC Black Box & console Orange Box

29 November 2006
Ferry

Half-Life 2: Episode 2 interview mentions PC Black Box & console Orange Box

Half-Life 2: Episode 2 is considered one of the biggest upcoming game releases, despite the delay to summer 2007, since it will also include the long awaited Team Fortress 2 and their puzzle shooter Portal. FiringSquad got a chance to chat with Valve’s director of marketing Doug Lombardi to find out more about Episode 2. Here are some of the interesting answers they got, but skip this first question if you haven’t finished Half-Life 2 upto Episode 1.

Question: While Episode 1 seemed like more of the same Half-Life 2 gameplay, it looks like Valve is changing things up for Episode 2. Is that intentional?
Answer: Episode One served as the bridge between Half-Life 2 and this trilogy of new episodes. Picking up exactly where HL2 left off, we needed to spend a bit more time in City 17 to resolve a few things, while extending the AI and other technologies to enable the single player coop experience between you and Alyx. In Episode Two, the Gordon has left City 17 and will spend the rest of this trilogy exploring new locations and interacting with new characters and items.

Question: Will there be classic maps from the original Team Fortress in Team Fortress 2?
Answer: Yes. Dustbowl and 2Fort are among the favorites returning, and there will be a few additionals. While they will all be familiar, the art style has obviously changed to match the look of TF2 and some of the geometry has been enhanced/modified to enable new styles of play.

Question: Portal comes from an outside developer that Valve brought in to develop the game. How did this relationship come about?
Answer: The team members were students at Digipen located in Redmond, Washington, next to the Nintendo campus. As part of their senior year in the program, they created a game called Narbacular Drop, which was an early test of their ideas about portal-based gameplay. Every year Digipen puts on an expo for graduating seniors to show their senior projects to prospective employers. A couple of Valve people attended, and invited those students to come to the offices and show it to some folks here. Gabe [Newell, co-founder of Valve Corporation] saw it and basically hired all of them on the spot.

Question: Since you are adding these two games to Half-Life 2: Episode 2 can you tell us if the price of Episode 2 will remain $19.95?
Answer: Weâ€™re targeting Summer 2007 for release of these games. On the PC, Xbox 360 and PS3, they will come in a package simply known as Half-Life 2 Orange Box. On the PC, there will be a pack that contains just Episode Two, Portal and Team Fortress 2 â€“ this pack will be called Half-Life 2 Black Box. Final pricing has not yet been determined.