I really, REALLY want to play Portal and Team Fortress 2, but have little to no interest in Half Life: Episode 2. Call me crazy, but I just never got into the Half Life thing, though I enjoy the mods, Counter-Strike being the biggest.
Is there a way to buy one or both of those games without buying the Orange Box (and therefore, in theory, have it be cheaper)? And furthermore, do I have to have Half-Life 2 already installed? I do own the game, but it’s installed on my old XP system (got at best 1.3 through the game, though used it for lots of CS), and I would want to play this on my sweet new Vista system, since it has much, MUCH better specs. Will I have to install HL2 on my Vista box? I know I’ll need Steam, but can I even install HL2 if I already have the CD key for it registered to the other PC, or does Valve only care that I own a valid CD key, and beyond that I can install it other places, so long as I am just logged in with the username I registered?
If the game is in your “games list” on Steam, you can install it on any machine AFIK.
You can buy Portal and TF2 separate, but if I recall from checking the pricing when I purchased the box (because Hubby only wanted Portal and HL2:E2) it turns out to be more expensive, because they’ve got a mega-mega-mega special on the whole box.
Since you’re interested in two thirds of the package, which only costs $49, seems like it’s more than worth it for you to spring for it. You might end up trying and liking Ep Two.
I really regret not having bought the Orange Box package. I only wanted Ep Two, so it seemed to make sense to just buy that game, but now I’m jonesing for Portal. Buying it separately is gonna cost me more than if I’d just bought the whole thing, dammit. Stupid shortsightedness!
Portal is $20 on Steam; TF2 is $30. The Orange Box is…$50. Also, you could then legally give your original HL2 discs to a friend. (I’m going to buy the Orange Box next week when our home remodeling is done.)
You’d think that…but I just tried and it’s a no go. I installed HL2 from my CDs, and the game only said “pre-load complete.” I thought that since I activated the CD-key with this account already, I could play, but it wouldn’t let me. (I figured I’d give playing through HL2 another shot.) I tried to activate the CD-key again and was told it was a duplicate key registered to another account…but it’s not. It’s registered to the same account I just logged into Steam as!
Oh well. I suppose that since I want to try Portal and TF2 enough to buy The Orange Box, I’ll get another CD key for HL 2 anyway.
Nevermind, I figured it out. I had a different account name registered to HL2. Now I just have to remember what it was…or just wait until Friday when I have time to get Orange Box.
