While some of the components don't fit as well as they do on the PC, this is hands down, the best game on the 360.
Hslf - Life 2 was released some years ago to PC owners, and suffered a somewhat bunked port to the original Xbox, but now appears on the 360 with almost a full deck of cards. The game takes off where the original Half -Life ended, but for those of you who didnt play this cla.ss.ic, it doesn't matter, you don't need to have to understand the plot.
The game, and it's subsequent episodes, will see you as Gordon Freeman, the silent hero, make your way through City 17, and the uprising of it's citizens against the oppressive combine regime. Although short individually, the total campaign consisting of the 3 games will last you between 10 and 16 hours depending on how you play. Which, considering there is still 2 games left to play, is quite a triumph when most games on the 360 can be finished in an evening.
The transition of Half - Life 2 from PC to Xbox 360 has gone relatively well, graphically, the game has been given a small overhaul, adding HDR and dynamic lighting effects, and other updates such as the new particle system. However, this does not stop the controls from feeling slightly off, you will likely not notice this if you have not played the PC version, but there is still some feeling that the controls are over responsive in some areas, and over responsive in others, giving a somewhat shaky feel to them.
However, this doesn't even come close to spoiling the experience, and you will be happy to hear that this control fiddlyness does not carry over to Portal of Team Fortress 2. They control very smoothly, and very well with the controller.
Portal introduces you to the world of Aperture Science, and is an eerie gaming experience to say the least. Your character awakens with little memory, inside a sealed chamber, and you are then introduced to GLaDOS, the operator who will be guiding you through the testing chambers ahead. As the game progresses, you get the feeling that something is not quite right about the place, from the mechanical malfunctions, to the stream of incoherency from your advisor, to the empty observation windows.
At it's heart, Portal is a traditional puzzle game, you are given an area, and your trusty portal gun, with which you can create portals on particular surfaces. Portal has a huge amount of humor and charm, and is quite honestyl, the greatest gaming experience i've ever had. Highly enjoyable, frustratingly challenging in some places, and downright disorienting in others.
Team Fortress 2, is a highly stylized look at team combat, while it is not a simple game to play, given there are 9 character classes, each having a dramatically different role in combat, and the games reliance on you working as a team. This can make playing with strangers quite frustrating, luckily, the game is not too serious, and is very comical, packed with humor, making sometimes frustrating team mates fade into the background while you enjoy the game.
While there is no single player, and online can be quite laggy at times, and there is only six maps, you will find a huge amount of variety within TF2, as each character class with view each map differently because of their differing roles in combat. That said, some of the components appear to be a little broken, achievements for example quite often either glitch out and are not awarded, or the tracker just resets, this can be quite frustrating when you are on your way to 25 headshots, only to be told you havn't made any. There seems to be a high chance of the game freezing during the menus as well, usually when the game tries to load something, like a game list, or map. However, this is a minor frustration and hopefully will be looked into by way of patching the game via Xbox Live.
Overall, The Orange Box is hands down, the best purchase an Xbox 360 owner can make at the moment, and is an absolute joy to play.