Hero for the indie masses, Everyday Shooter puts an arty, musical spin on the moldy Asteroids concept. Sony marked it down to $5 during last year's Thanksgiving PSN sale.

Ambitious by almost any definition, The Orange Box offers five games on one disk... Team Fortress 2, Portal, Half-Life 2, and two HL2 expansion episodes. By all accounts, not a stinker in the bunch - although this PS3 edition has become famous for being buggy and abandoned by the publisher. For a game this fully-featured and well-received, it's a little surprising to see it busted down to a Lair price level of $15.

CONCEPT: I think I already described Everyday Shooter's concept. Arthouse Asteroids. It's a dual-stick shooter, meaning you use one to move and one to shoot, Robotron-style. But instead of the usual boring sci-fi theming, Everyday Shooter goes abstract, with blocky, pop art enemy types and level goals. Each board looks entirely different, so one single screenshot does not do the game justice.

But the true star of the game is the acoustic guitar soundtrack, designed to compose itself as you play.5 points.

I have to narrow the focus for Orange Box, because I only played Portal and I will probably only ever play Portal. I guess it's nice to have this waiting in the sidelines should a PS3 drought hit, but even then I'll probably just play MGS4 again.

So, Portal. Portal is proof that the first-person perspective game has atrophied to comatose levels over the past fifteen years. We can do more than just rehash Doom in WWII settings. On paper, Portal sounds like a puzzle game, but it is so well-rooted in the first-person experience that it becomes much more than what you would expect. This isn't just shifting the camera to "inside the puzzle" or rendering a puzzle game in three dimensions like Lode Runner 3D.

Portal plays with your perspective. Once you build the complete portal-creation device, allowing you to walk instantly between doorways you create, you've been handed a mind-bending set of tools to solve each level's problem. Add to that the concept of preserved momentum, and you have a methodology unique in gaming.

Not to mention the convincing environments (sterile lab setting gives way to razor's edge survival), the passive-aggressive guard robots, and the dramatis personae of GLaDOS herself. Brilliant stuff, 9 points.

GAMEPLAY: There's not much to say about the controls, given the limited structure. The level-specific combos and enemy patterns are clever enough to take a couple rounds to dope them out. However, you're (initially) stuck doing the levels in a linear order so if you're balls on one of them, you're out of luck. I felt like I was doing that first round far more times than I wanted to, and I wasn't good enough - or interested in becoming good enough - to see all the game has to offer.

Seems to take a ton of playthroughs to accrue enough points to work up the unlockable ladder, and the game just isn't that compelling in the final analysis. Somebody needs to figure out a way to have this game be playable while the damn PS3 is doing one of those interminable system/game updates, because that's about the only situation that would bring me back to playing it on a regular basis... as a loading screen for something more fun. 4 points.

Portal's strength - the first-person perspective - is also its greatness weakness. You're subject to the usual failings of the FPS. Lousy peripheral vision and camera reaction time, the disconnect in reality that becomes obvious as you adjust to timing your jumps, and general looseness of the console control scheme... not really Portal's fault, per se, but when you're that impressed with everything else, the limitations of the genre become even more glaring.

Portal also takes a little too long to get rolling. But when it does, it's as unique and clever as everyone has been saying. 8 points.

VALUE: $10 is definitely right out for Everyday Shooter, and I wouldn't spend the $5 on it today. Last year, as the PS3 was lurching along in fits and starts, Everyday Shooter could command some attention, but not any longer. Still, there's a pile of replay value, for those of you who would feel so inclined. 4 points.

$15 for Orange Box is pretty amazing. They sell Portal alone for $20! Of course, the troubled PS3 version of Orange Box may never see a proper bug fix update, which means the rest of the package may be stuck with a fair number of issues. So you have to count that against it, even if you do as I did and play naught but Portal. 7 points.

TIMELINESS: One year later, Everyday Shooter just doesn't retain that wow factor. Shmups are everywhere on the various console download networks, and many have received far more care than Everyday Shooter. It was the "It" game for a very brief period. 3 points.

Portal, however, still stands unmatched. You'd think we would have a glut of small-scale first-person puzzle adventures by now, except that being as smart as Portal is not easy. 8 points.

FINAL: Everyday Shooter tallies 16 points, but critical darling Portal scores 32 for the win.