Portal 2

"Aha!" that is the word you will be saying most to yourself as you progress through Portal 2's nine chapters in the single player campaign. These test chambers or individual puzzles you progress through are so cleverly designed, that once your about to give up you find the perfect piece of information you were missing in order to solve the puzzle.

The game starts off as you awake from suspended animation, several hundred years after the events of the first game. You play as the same silent protagonist "Chell", and are broken out of containment from an artificial personality core named "Wheatley" in an attempt to escape the Aperture Science facility while accidentally awaking GLaDOS (Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System), the chief antagonist of the franchise in the process. Eventually your put through another series of test chambers but things take an interesting turn in the second act which I won't spoil.

The gameplay from the first installment remains mostly the same with developer Valve adding several new elements to freshen things up. First off, the art style has changed with the setting of the Aperture Science Facility having been dilapidated for so many years. Overgrown vegetation and ruined architecture freshen up the scene as well. Tools such as Repulsion and Propulsion gels, Excursion funnels, Aerial Faith Plates, Thermal Discouragement Beams add a new level of complexity to the puzzles, but the development team does a really great job of introducing you to these new elements, allowing you to master them before they hand you a new thing to play with. It's all great fun!

Graphics wise, the eleven year old source engine that the game is powered on continues to be updated with some great lighting effects and animations with a mostly steady frame rate, but the loading zones should definitely be trimmed, especially for a game this late into the console life cycle. The audio work is fantastic helped by the hilarious dialogue voiced by Stephen Merchant, Ellen McLain and J.K. Simmons. This is truly the funniest game I've ever played!

The game is well worth its sixty dollar retail price with an equally long two player Co-operative mode (which wasn't available at the time of this review due to PlayStation Network being down) and developer commentary throughout the single player story mode. The PlayStation 3 version (which I recommend over the Xbox 360 version) comes with Valve's SteamWorks support, a popular service on computers which allows for cloud saving and automatic updates not previously available on consoles. Two people are able to play with each other cross-platform from the PS3 over to PC or Mac, which is a fun bonus.

The take away from this experience is the atmosphere of the world you are re-introduced to. The game trains you in solving puzzles based on the physics of forward momentum allowing you to walk away from this game feeling smarter than before. The themes of isolation and science as a main priority above all else, are minor messages scrolled into the background, similar to the environmental storytelling you will find written on the wall of the game world, in one of the best games of this year.

Rating: A

I never expected a sequel to the first-person puzzle-game Portal to be any good, but they actually managed to create a very well-produced game that relies on great voice-acting and creative level-design. Its clear that Valve is pushing their aging Source-engine to the limits with Portal 2, but they still manage to create some of the best looking levels I've seen in a good while. The game involves a more active story-line then in the first game, but it never distracts too much from the brain-twisting puzzles. And yes, the puzzles are harder then in the first game in my opinion, although they are never near impossible if you know where to look and pay attention to the level. It also features more levels then the original I think. The first Portal took me only a few hours to beat, while Portal 2 took me two days.

A couple of new elements are introduced this time around, to keep the game refreshing and preventing the levels of getting too predictable. This is done in the form of different gels (liquid substances that either make you jump high, or run fast on contact). There's also a white gel that allows you to shoot portals on whatever surface it is spilled on. Regular water allows you to wash either one of the gels off. Besides that, there are also light-bridges that allows you to portal a walkable bridge to otherwise unreachable places, and some kind of anti-gravity beam that propels either you or objects like turrets and boxes into the direction it faces (which can sometimes be altered by pressing a button in the room).

Last thing I have to mention is the music. The music ingame, as well as the ending-music (which was particularly popular in the first game) called 'Want You Gone' by Jonathan Coulton are great. It all fits the game's robotic atmosphere perfectly as well as the ingame glitch-beats that you can hear mostly when the action intensifies.

As you can already make out, Portal 2 allows for some very diverse puzzle-elements, and this together with the already established portal-gun makes it a lot of fun and challenge to play. The story isn't too exciting, but the witty humour and overall superb voice-acting makes it worth while (kudos to Stephen Merchant for providing his voice-talent for such a funny villain). Its a bit early to say with such a long time ahead of us, but I wouldn't be surprised if Portal 2 would end up on many people's lists of best games of 2011. Go play it, you won't be disappointed!

Now, if Valve Software would only get some information out the door regarding Half-Life 3, I would be their number one fan!

Portal 2 is the much anticipated follow-up to 2007's Portal which Valve released as an extra game on their Orange Box compilation. Although short, Portal's innovative game-play and memorable cast captivated players and made it a runaway hit. Calling Portal 2 a sequel would only be partially correct since the first game was more of an appetizer with Portal 2 being the main course. Does Portal 2 live up to the expectations? Let's take a closer look and find out.

Portal introduced us to our silent protagonist Chell and her fight to escape the deserted Aperture Science facility controlled by the insane AI GLaDOS armed only with her portal gun. Portal 2 picks up roughly 300 years after the first game where Chell has been recaptured and placed in cryo-storage and is woken up by Personality Core Wheatly so that they can escape the run-down facility before the reactor core melts down. Chell is once again forced to use her portal gun to navigate the ruins of the facility and deal with the resurrected GLaDOS. The story takes some very interesting twists and turns along the way and the terrific dark humor of the first game remains intact. The voice acting in the game remains top-notch. Ellen McLain returns as the voice of GLaDOS and as the voice of the polite and cheerful attack turrets. Joining the cast are Stephen Merchant who gives hilarious life to Wheatley and the always entertaining J. K. Simmons features as the voice of Cave Johnson, the eccentric founder of Aperture Science.

The game-play from the original game returns in all of its mind-bending glory. Players use the portal gun to shoot blue and orange colored portal holes onto walls to traverse over deadly pits, transport Weighted Storage Cubes to switches to open doors and lower elevators and redirect lasers (or Thermal Discouragement Beams if you prefer). Additions to the game-play include the propulsion and repulsion gels (in keeping with the Portal color motif they are orange and blue respectively) which do pretty much as they describe either sliding the player off at great speed or sending them bouncing high into the air. In addition, players must redirect light bridges and conveyor beams with portals as well. Perhaps one of the most exciting new features in Portal 2 however is the inclusion of co-op game-play. Co-op game-play gets its own storyline and characters, Aperture Science robots ATLAS and P-Body, each armed with their own portal gun and even more challenging puzzles for the gamers to solve. You can either play with a friend (split-screen or online) or team up with a random player. Good communication is vital to success however, and the co-op interface has several helpful tools to communicate with your partner including a small pop-up window to see their viewpoint though you may want to use a microphone as well. Portal 2 even features a commentary mode (a returning feature from the first game) where you can play through the game with speech bubbles placed throughout the levels which, when activated, trigger audio files of various production members discussing the creation of the game often relative to where the player happens to be at the time. This feature really shows off the amount of effort that went into creating this game.

In general the game-play is challenging, but never really frustrating. The game does a good enough job of teaching players the basic mechanics as new elements are introduced that even newcomers will be able to pick up the nuances of the game fairly quickly but has enough challenge to it that even veteran Portal players won't be able to just breeze through it. Some of the achievements/trophies are centered around players having to solver certain puzzles either in quick fashion or in different ways then they normally would. Exploration and experimentation is highly encouraged in game. In short, there is plenty of content to keep veteran Portal players on their heels and dazzle newcomers with all the possibilities.

Visually Portal 2 holds up pretty well considering it's running on Valve's somewhat dated Source engine. The environments are much more expansive and dynamic than in the first Portal and the visuals are much sharper. Some may lament the change from the cold and sterile look of the test chambers from the first game, the change in style suit's the story well. While it may not quite hold up to some contemporary major releases, it is by no stretch of the imagination ugly. The background score does a good job of reinforcing the tension and isolation of the game's story. All this really comes together to bring an enjoyable experience to the player. Portal 2 delivers in all aspects. Fun and challenging game-play, engaging characters, and the ability to play with friends make this a can't miss title, unless your only system is the Wii, in which case you're out of luck.

Years ago, when Valve launched Portal as a fun Half-Life 2 mod, everybody was thrilled with the concept of the game. Portal 2 didn't just live up to the expectations I had, it slammed them harder into the ground, than I could have ever imagined. If this is no game of the year, I don't know what is... Portal 2's plot reaches much deeper into the history of Aperture Science, revealing new characters and shining a light on the events of Portal 1. Of course the humor most certainly made it to Portal 2 and I want to say, this game is even funnier than its predecessor. The new characters and the deeper plot make this game a must-buy, but that's not good enough for Aperture Science, I mean Valve: A co-op mode was the only thing missing from Portal 1, and they included it in this gem of video games. Challenging test chambers and hours of brain explosions await you and your partner in the Aperture Science Co-Operative Testing Initiative. If you liked Portal, you'll love Portal 2. And if you've never played Portal... do it now!

This game is truly magnificent. The game's atmosphere is amazing. Valve really nailed the mysterious abandoned laboratory feel this time around. They knew they couldn't just rehash Portal, so they tried something new and it really paid off. The puzzles are fun and challenging, but not infuriating, and the way that the game chooses not to have any cut scenes breaking up the game play makes the game much more immersive. It's easy to get lost in this game for hours. The story is wonderful, and the ending is powerful. I would highly recommend this game to anybody who likes puzzle games, story telling in games, or games in general.