Portal 2

[Kolzig]

I think the free summer DLC will bring the advanced maps into play.

[toblix]

Isn't that confirmed, that they'll add challenge rooms? Wouldn't make sense for (all of) them to be so simple.

I hope Valve will be as generous with continuous updating and new stuff in Portal 2 as they've been with their pure multiplayer games, but I guess that would still be in the form of challenge rooms and things like that. That's awesome, but it would be even awersome if they added new single-player content with more single content. I'm sure they could come up with some excuse to add more dialogue and story.

[sLiPdIsCo]

Physicists talking about Portal 2. Kind of long but some good time travel talk and a great analogy using audio feed back too explain a theory of why wormholes would collapse or explode starting at 4:57.

[Sully907]

Illeria, a good buddy of mine just picked up the game so I actually think I'm going to do the coop with him instead. Sorry man. JUst wanted to give you a heads up though so you don't wait on me.

[toblix]

If anyone wants a Portal 2 partner, I still haven't done any of the challenges. I'm in Norway though, so that rules out almost everyone.

[a purple future]

i haven't played the co-op yet and i'm unemployed so i'm good with pretty much any timeframe should someone need a partner.

[illeria]

Illeria, a good buddy of mine just picked up the game so I actually think I'm going to do the coop with him instead. Sorry man. JUst wanted to give you a heads up though so you don't wait on me.

you sonofabitch

[Roderick]

Just finished Portal 2 and would like to give my opinion on it before reading everything here and discovering that everything has already be thoroughly discussed thus embarrassing me.

Portal 2: it was wholesome and good. It felt like a genuine full length game and more importantly, it didn't outstay its welcome as was the fear emanating from the realization that Portal was so perfect with its 4 hour length. Portal 2 pads that with a lot more story, 'characters' and variation in -if not types of gameplay- at least diversity of props and surroundings.

There are some lesser points, though. One of which is that it's fairly easy overall, in my experience a lot easier than the original. Especially the first six chapters are easily blown through, and only in the last two were there some delicious head-scratchy moments. I wouldn't have minded a lot more insidious plottings, but I think the sting has been removed from most of the game for fear of not everyone being able to finish it. You know, I can live with that.

Even the final encounter with Wheatley was a little easier than GlaDOS, which I didn't really mind actually, as a higher difficulty under time pressure would've become pretty frustrating fast.

I like that Valve managed to build on the Portal world in interesting ways without diminishing the original, deliberately scarce, lore.

The Cave Johnson stuff, and Caroline, was especially cool. It was funny to learn all these details about Aperture Science's background, and that it all took place in an enormous salt mine. The game clearly steers away from explaining anything about the player, though, or what happened to the outside world. As far as anyone is concerned, Aperture Science might as well still exist in some weird vacuum.

I will now read what everyone else has already said, and be humbled.

[Roderick]

Having read the thread now:

I liked Stephen Merchant. I think he's funny, but then I'm not bombarded by his schtick, only knowing him from Extras and the podcast with Ricky Gervais. Even so, I really love his patter and was delighted when I heard him performing in the game (I knew nothing of voice actors before playing).

The loading screens were very disappointing and broke up the game world. It felt less coherent, which diminishes the effort the team put into making the facility 'believable' (as spoken about in the developer's commentary).

I've started doing a developer's commentary run, rushing through the game, and I can already say it's extremely fun to do it a second time, full speed.

The fucking moon. Holy shit. Jake gives an excellent analysis with his statement that the game continuously builds up craziness and finally explodes in that final battle. Brilliant.

[illeria]

i haven't played the co-op yet and i'm unemployed so i'm good with pretty much any timeframe should someone need a partner.

Would you be up for a marathon on Sunday?

[a purple future]

Sunday is Mother's Day.

[illeria]

Sunday is Mother's Day.

Right lol, I forgot. well I work 4-10 so we can definitely play during the day. Do I have u on my steam list? If not just add "greenduki"

[Irishjohn]

I liked Stephen Merchant. I think he's funny, but then I'm not bombarded by his schtick, only knowing him from Extras and the podcast with Ricky Gervais. Even so, I really love his patter and was delighted when I heard him performing in the game (I knew nothing of voice actors before playing).

Regardless of whether or not it's his schtick, I loved Merchant in the game. To be fair, I think he did a great job. He's definitely acting a part, even if he's using his usual comedy accent, intonation and so on.

[yeah]

Portal 2 was the best single player thing I've played in years and years.

I loved all that stuff as well. I just didn't like that

Cave

's narration turned into a personal audio diary without any narrative reason is all. You didn't end up

in his personal office

to hear that stuff, nor did you flip a switch on the PA system to change over the broadcast to start emitting his private files or anything -- no story reason explains the change -- but somehow you still end up

hearing his dying wishes

broadcast publicly, and presumably on loop, to any test subject wandering the halls of Aperture. Again, not the end of the world. It was super entertaining through and through, but that stood out for me.

I started to think that when I played, but ultimately

I feel like they handled it well. They started off introducing Cave's predilection for recording himself no matter what, and in the last narration you mentioned, he ends it with something along the lines of "I'm recording this and will make every employee listen to it every damn day so that it's not forgotten: put Caroline in charge when I'm gone."

That one line gave his more personal memoirs context for appearing where they did, to me.

[Scrobbs]

Anyone else freaked out/kind of disgusted by

Wheatley's sentry/cube abomination? It's always looking right at you squirming around and making weird sounds. It's unnerving.

Yes. Very much so.

[Roderick]

I'm playing through P2 again for the developer's commentary, and it's every bit as fun a second time. I'm also trying to get the singleplayer achievements. It's good. I'm already discovering way more secrets than I did the first time.

[CaptainFish]

Really interesting excerpts from an Erik Wolpaw interview.

On the topic of Chell not speaking...

We always assumed she could talk[.] She just chooses not to, what with the robots all being dicks. Why give them the satisfaction?

[Scrobbs]

He's definitely acting a part, even if he's using his usual comedy accent, intonation and so on.

That's not a comedy accent, that's his voice: he's from Bristol. It's a pretty mild accent compared to some from down there, but it's definitely his own.

[Roderick]

Portal 2 gets better the more I play it. I'm on my 2,5 run through now and the characters keep growing on me. It's great stuff. Cave Johnson, we're done here.

[Roderick]

,,I punch those numbers into my calculator, it makes a happy face."

[ThunderPeel2001]

,,I punch those numbers into my calculator, it makes a happy face."

Haha. I remember that. So many great quotes.

[Forbin]

Ending spoilers

http://bit.ly/k2v5RF

also from the same guy:

http://rain.nxe7.com/

[Kolzig]

Oh man, I had so much fun this weekend. I was reading my friend basically liveblogging his first playthrough of Portal 2.

After every stage he was basically blogging to me on ICQ what he was thinking and what happened.

In a true IGN fashion he said

he was blown away by the Moon ending

[twmac]

I haven't played the game at all but a co-worker on AR just put up an article that is about attempting to play the game on Xbox LIVE with randoms, I thought it was ironic fun:

http://www.arcadianrhythms.com/2011/05/for-science-an-experiment-in-random-portal-2-co-op/

[Patters]

I haven't played the game at all but a co-worker on AR just put up an article that is about attempting to play the game on Xbox LIVE with randoms, I thought it was ironic fun:

http://www.arcadianrhythms.com/2011/05/for-science-an-experiment-in-random-portal-2-co-op/

Gamertag: REMOVED

Country: Russia

Gamerscore: 11,820g

Using microphone/headset: Negative

Additional Notes: Majority of gamerscore achieved through playing each major Halo release. Few other games played except brief flirtations with either AAA titles, games aimed at children or entries in the Assassin’s Creed franchise, in which the subject has consistently high gamerscore.

Huh? http://live.xbox.com/en-GB/GameCenter?compareTo=

Edited May 13, 2011 by Patters