The Black Box will ship for the PC, and includes Half-Life 2: Episode Two, Portal and Team Fortress 2. The Orange Box will ship for the PC, PLAYSTATION 3 computer entertainment system, and Xbox 360  videogame and entertainment system, and includes all the content of The Black Box, plus the original Half-Life 2 and Half-Life 2: Episode One.

Innovative games included in The Black Box and The Orange Box include:

- Half-Life 2: Episode Two -- the second installment in Valve's episodic trilogy advances the award-winning story, leading the player to new locations outside of City 17.
- Portal -- a pioneering type of single player action game that rewrites the rules for how players approach and manipulate their environment - much like how Half-Life 2's Gravity Gun reinvented the way gamers interact with objects in the game.
- Team Fortress 2 -- an all-new version of the legendary title that spawned team based multiplayer action games. The game's daring new art style features the most advanced graphics of any Source-based game released to date.