Portal 2 - PC, PS3 (Version Reviewed) Xbox 360 9.5/10
Having not played the original Portal, i was quite unsure what to expect from Portal 2.A game based on shooting portals to traverse and figure out challenging puzzles and situations intrigued me enough to take the $60 plunge.
Portal 2 starts out with you, a character named Chell, standing in what looks to be an apartment, Chell cannot speak so there is no way to get a sense of what she`s thinking, or how it feels to wake up in that situation.A simple, oddly archaic choice of starting with a "tutorial" of sorts.Suggesting You look up, look side to side and, gasp, look down.Not the most interesting way to start a game.Aside from that, things quickly escalate and become interesting as you meet a quirky robot named Wheatley.This sarcastic little sidekick, sets in motion the events that make up the game as he busts you out of your chamber,
The story spans multiple test chambers, each offering you unique puzzles to solve with your one, and only weapon.The portal gun.A wonderful device that allows you to shoot one blue portal, and one orange portal, that act as a entrance & an exit.This, naturally, allows for some very mind numbing effects such as firing a portal on a ceiling and firing one below it, thereby creating an infinite loop of falling.Other eerie things such as firing a blue portal on one end of the room, and the other portal behind you, allowing you to see yourself moving around though your own eyes, in an out-of-body perspective.
As far as storylines go, it's pretty straightforward.You try to escape, awaken the original Portals Antagonist, Glados,the robot in Charge of Aperature Science testing facility, where you are trapped.Glados, voiced by Ellen Mclain (Who does a fantastic job) Has a very dry, sarcastic sense of humor as she insults you constantly, all the while forcing you to complete test after test in the name of science.There is some excellent character progression as the game goes on, friends become enemies, and enemies become friends.All the while, you learn rich, detailed backstory on Aperature science, Glados, the founder of the facility and how it all came to be.
The story spans multiple test chambers, each offering you unique puzzles to solve with your one, and only weapon.The portal gun.A wonderful device that allows you to shoot one blue portal, and one orange portal, that act as a entrance & an exit.This, naturally, allows for some very mind numbing effects such as firing a portal on a ceiling and firing one below it, thereby creating an infinite loop of falling.Other eerie things such as firing a blue portal on one end of the room, and the other portal behind you, allowing you to see yourself moving around though your own eyes, in an out-of-body perspective.
As far as storylines go, it's pretty straightforward.You try to escape, awaken the original Portals Antagonist, Glados,the robot in Charge of Aperature Science testing facility, where you are trapped.Glados, voiced by Ellen Mclain (Who does a fantastic job) Has a very dry, sarcastic sense of humor as she insults you constantly, all the while forcing you to complete test after test in the name of science.There is some excellent character progression as the game goes on, friends become enemies, and enemies become friends.All the while, you learn rich, detailed backstory on Aperature science, Glados, the founder of the facility and how it all came to be.
Gameplay consists of mainly, well, shooting portals to traverse through the tests and get to the exit.As the game goes on however, the difficulty ramps up when you must use cubes to activate pressure points to open the doors.Other times, you have to use portals to guide lasers to specific laser activated panels, or, a combination of lasers, cubes altering laser trajectory and cubes to use on pressure points.Not to mention the occasional stationary turrets with high firepower thrown into the mix.My favorite tests consisted of a new element to Portal, Paints.Blue paint allows you to jump to great heights, white paint allows you to to create a surface to shoot Portals.(You cant just shoot portals anywhere!)
And the always fun, orange paint which, when run on, or bounced off of, gives you a massive burst in speed.
There`s quite a bit of exploring to do as well, hidden rooms within some chambers with creepy drawings on the walls, bean cans on the floor and just an overall sense that there`s more to this facility then the clean walls, bottomless chasms, and the ever watchful eyes of Glados let on.Towards the later levels, you get a lot more freedom, which in turn, means more freedom to explore.Grand areas open up with little, if any, explaining where to go or what to do forcing you to try different things, a trial and error of sorts.Mostly just shooting portals everywhere until you find a place that sticks, and you can make your way over there.There`s quite a bit i left out of this review, story wise, because i don`t want to spoil the aspects of the game i found made it so wonderful.
As for the multiplayer, i can`t get into that at the moment.Literally, since PSN has been down for almost a month now.Tho it does feature an interesting coop campaign based on the two characters revealed at the end of game.The PS3 version come with a free PC & Mac version of Portal 2 you can redeem with the provided voucher, which is an incredible deal.PS3 version also comes with some Steam functionality.
All in all, Portal 2 is a fantastic game with memorable characters, who somehow, bring such life and comedy in a way you could not imagine
a game based on solving tests could. I give Portal 2 a solid 9.5 out of 10
