Christopher here. I know there hasn’t been any recent news or posts. We might have to do something Wednesday-ish when there isn’t any Valve or Orange Box related news.
Anyways three out of five mods this time are total conversions, and they take up a lot of hard drive space. In fact NeoTokyo at the bottom there alone is almost two gigabytes of memory. This is normal for them as they have tons much more new content then just the map packs that I’ve been posting.
Get used to it because the long awaited Goldsource remakes will take up even more space. I mean more space then Counter Strike: Source. (You should know what they are by now, ask if you don’t) Finally most if not all total conversions of the Source Engine will either use the Source SDK base(episode 1 engine) or the Orange Box SDK base. In fact three out of the five mods this week will require one or both.

Now that I’ve cleared that up here is the weekend list.



The Lighthouse:

The Lighthouse is a two part map pack by Viktor Lundberg. The owner’s website is defunct so I had to do a Google search just to find this one. Anyways the objective of the nameless protagonist here is to get to the Combine controlled Lighthouse.

First thing, even though the default responses are still intact here and still call the player “Freemen”, the new voice acting only refers to the player character as “you”. So it is just a nameless person with another HEV suit.(This is common for single player maps)
Leading me to my next observation as the voice acting itself ranges from bad to good. Errors of the old Source Engine are also prevalent such as the movement glitch after the reload when an objective is failed.
However that does not take away from a good map pack, as the mapping is very professional, the prison area isn’t a just a rehash of Nova Prospekt either. However you will need to lead your allies to cover under a watch so they won’t get killed by the Combine drop ship. After you complete the first chapter the player is treated to an awesome train attack sequence.

Starting weaponless isn’t fun but after some walking you won’t be without firearms for long. The next area is very easy because the infinite rockets, and after taking down a gunship the player is finally directed to get the lighthouse were a stolen helicopter is lurking. The final map is hardest of all, because the Combine owns the area around the lighthouse, hopefully you saved some explosives to make it easier.

When you finally see the titular structure you know have to face two Combine Gunships one after another, but in a unique twist the second one is fighting against that stolen Combine Helicopter, and you have to help your new ally take down the Gunship. The Lighthouse is one of the better packs for Half Life 2, and not map many packs are worth playing, but this hard to find gem is better then most.


[link]


Holo Reality:
HoloReality was meant to be a proof of concept. The intent was to create the largest Half Life 2 single player mod ever. Each map or section had a transition room, which supposedly is a Combine virtual reality simulator. The story wasn’t well is paper then because it is just a bunch of maps strung together. Your basically a guinea pig for the Combine’s new toy, the player character is stated to be helping the Combine because he’s been told that their family will receive extra rations and they’ll kill him anyways if they don’t participate.

The mapping because of the nature of the project will range from bad to good each map with the exclusion of the transition room had its own objectives, themes and environments. I’d only recommend this if you have some time to kill, as most of the gameplay isn’t that much different then what is seen in Half Life 2.





[link]








Flipside:
Flipside is a two dimensional platformer with a bit of a twist. The player character is an escaped mental patient, its tag-line is “ Play FLIPSIDE and see the world
through the eyes of a madman”. Flipside has a gameplay a uniqe gameplay element, at the push of a button the environment “flips” from happy to gloomy and back again, each “side” gives the player different abilities to get though the level so to reach the end, mastering these skills will allow you to finish the level.

Flipside can be very hard to complete , as I had to use console cheats just to beat it. This doesn’t mean however that Flipside is bad, it’s just very hard even for veteran gamers. The landscape is well crafted even if it looks like it’s made out of cardboard. The gameplay may seem simple but it will take time to learn how to use each “side” to your advantage. Flipside is just the tip of what’s possible for the Source Engine, I highly recommend playing it.




[link]


BlockStorm
BlockStorm is a remake of the old arcade game Arkanoid, and pong. The mod was created by using the input/outputs of Hammer in the Source SDK base. The SDK project went out of their way to show how this was possible, and they have some interesting projects coming in the near future.

BlockStorm like the old school game it’s based can be very addicting, infact I think I had to delete it just so I wouldn’t fail my classes. Much time will be wasted trying to break each and every block, or playing pong against a friend or the computer. However, because it doesn’t use a multiplayer game you can’t play it online. Remember if you lose hours and miss appointments playing BlockStorm, I gave you fair warning.


[link]





NeoTokyo:

The long awaited tactical shooter, NeoTokyo. It took me about two hours just to download this last night, and that’s because of slow server downloads. I wrote the introduction then started playing it, but you wouldn’t be able to tell because I purposely waited until late in the day to post this.

NeoTokyo is a tactical shooter with a Japanese Cyberpunk theme, undoubtedly drawing comparisons to Counter Strike. The reasons for combat are typical of the cyberpunk genre but a deep plot isn’t necessary for multiplayer games. Infact I heard some jokes about how it’s basically Counter Strike: Source for weeboos. (Technically that would be Counter Strike Neo, which is only available on that side of the world. At least NeoTokyo doesn’t punish you for camping or sniping) However there are many differences, but I’m not going to bother to make every comparison to CS:S and this mod.

NeoTokyo’s textures and models are highly detailed, even when I set my settings lower to reduce lag. There’s even Tachikomas from Ghost in the Shell. There is no crosshair until you zoom in, so right of the bat, it is much harder then Counter Strike, as I was only able to kill one or two people before dying myself. Recovering the Ghost(a damaged robot) is the main objective, or just frag the other team. Each class, Recon, Assault and Support has different movement speeds and abilities. All classes can sprint but you can’t fire the weapon you’re holding like in Half Life 2. There is cloaking for every class , infrared or motion detectors. I learned to only use those indoors as it can really blinding in certain areas. Picking up the Ghost also gives the player holding special abilities, but it replaces primary weapon. So players will have to stick together.

The only negative’s I can complain about is that it could have used the death camera of Team Fortress 2. Laggy servers, however those plague most multiplayer games and you can’t listen to it’s soundtrack in the current version of the game. Also it could have used bots with full artificial intelligence as well. (if spawned they'll just walk around randomly, or mimic players.)

I’d recommend playing this is if you want a more realistic tactical shooter experience then CS:S. Everyone else who doesn’t enjoy these types of games may want to steer clear, especially if you’re easily frustrated.




[link]




I decided to list some places for people to find mods and weapon skins below the podcasts, so it is possible others can find something I might have missed. However if you want to a see a released mod that I haven’t listed in an update you’ll have send a note. Covering custom model and skins would be rather pointless, as most people have different stuff on their hard drives. At least two websites have more then just Orange Box related content and some images on FPSbanana may not be safe for work or school. I should have also chosen a better color, but I was in a rush and it looked good enough in the preview.

Chris, aka Snydermus Prime signing off.
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Welcome to the Orange-Box Fan Club
Hey welcome to the Orange-Box Fan Club when anything and everything that you are a fan of the five games with in the orange box from Valve. The games from the set is Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2 Ep 1 and 2, Portal and Team Fortress 2. You could be a fan to any of the games or all of them. Anyone is welcome to join the club a fan from Valve or not doesn't matter.

How to join
Simple just sent us a note, DAwatch and put your DA icon on your journal to make sure your joining.

How to Submit
Same way as you join just sent us a note(saying submit) but if you wanted just your work just sent us a note(saying fav) and we will take care of the rest. Fan art, OC, etc is ok.

Also the resolution needs to be 72 or higher.

(We will turn off comments and please fav and comment to the original artist.)

The Team
Owners

Moderators


Members


Affiliates


Intersing links
(Please put the link in the journal then one of us will put it on the new journal updates asap.)

Thinking with Portals---[link]
Half-life Newgrounds section---[link]
Portal Newgrounds section---[link]
Meet the sandvich [link]
Still a Farm [link]

Podcasts
Control Point [link]
Friendly Fire [link]
Podcast17 [link]
KritzKast [link]

Mods,skins,etc
Fpsbanana [link]
ModDb [link]
Planet Half Life [link]
Planet Phillip [link]