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Good News and Bad News about The Orange Box preorder

Not to be outdone by Fortress Forever's announcement of their mod being released next Monday, Valve have turned around and made their own announcement:

The Orange Box is up on Steam right now.

Good News: If you pre-order it now, you save $5 and get to play the Team Fortress 2 beta starting (you guessed it) next Monday.

Bad News: Despite the fact that it would be incredibly easy for the lovely guys at Valve to make HL2:E2, TF2 and Portals separate items available for individual purchase, or even if they just put them up as a pack that had just those three games, they didn't. So just like some of us feared, we get to all re-buy Half-Life 2 and Episode 1.

Oh, but look at this, at the bottom of the page they give us our consolation prize:

"Already own Half-Life 2 or Half-Life 2: Episode One?
Give your extra game as a gift to a friend when you purchase The Orange Box."

Thanks, Valve, but I don't actually know of anyone who hasn't bought HL2 and Episode 1 yet.

So, who wants a free copy of Half-Life 2? First person to claim it on the forums gets it later tonight.

Discuss this article on the forums.