Portal 2: The Cake Is Still A Lie

[Joran]

Subtitles are bound to spoil any joke.

I think the main problem with that bit was the loud noise wasn't loud enough, I wasn't remotely startled.

Well, you don't want to blow out your players' hearing. I'd have liked the horn to sound before "loud", since I braced myself immediately for a loud noise after I heard that.

[ninja_penguin]

Yahtzee took on Portal 2.

He came in pretty much exactly where I thought he would, and it was similar to how I felt I'd feel about the game.

Don't get me wrong, I love Portal 2, but I felt like it would be literally impossible for it to properly measure up, because so much of Portal's WOW factor was how it wasn't hyped up, and how excellent it was. At it's core, Portal is very simplistic, and there's only so much they can do to improve on that. A lot of the bonus comes from the humor.

Co-op was fantastic, and while the story was nice, I felt it dragged things down a little bit in the overall 'oooh, portal puzzles!' aspect.

[The Linker]

On the train joke: I knew what was coming up even without subtitles, so I wasn't really surprised. I could appreciate the joke for what it was, though.

[Joran]

On the train joke: I knew what was coming up even without subtitles, so I wasn't really surprised. I could appreciate the joke for what it was, though.

GlaDos is one of the most passive aggressive personalities ever. I love how she implies you're fat.

[Qwertystop]

GlaDos is one of the most passive aggressive personalities ever. I love how she implies you're fat.

Agreed.
"This Faith Plate must not be calibrated for someone of your... generosity. I'll tack on a few zeros to the maximum weight."
"You know what? I'll just lower the ceiling."
"Look at you. Flying through the air like an eagle. Piloting a blimp."

[Jahkaivah]

Well, you don't want to blow out your players' hearing.

You do however also want a "loud noise" to actually be louder than the spoken line.

At it's core, Portal is very simplistic, and there's only so much they can do to improve on that.

Like having actual puzzles which couldn't be instinctively solved like they were in Portal 1.

[littlebottom]

Agreed.
"This Faith Plate must not be calibrated for someone of your... generosity. I'll tack on a few zeros to the maximum weight."
"You know what? I'll just lower the ceiling."
"Look at you. Flying through the air like an eagle. Piloting a blimp."

close, it wasnt "generosity" it was "generous...ness"

[Draconi Redfir]

Like having actual puzzles which couldn't be instinctively solved like they were in Portal 1.

So what, hit faith plait, plot portals 1 and 2 down before hitting tilted platform, plot portals 1 and 2 down again on diffrent platforms to keep momentum, plop portal 1 down, hit button, drop portal 2 on ceiling above you so you can catch falling box midair before landing infront of exit door?

[Jahkaivah]

So what, hit faith plait, plot portals 1 and 2 down before hitting tilted platform, plot portals 1 and 2 down again on diffrent platforms to keep momentum, plop portal 1 down, hit button, drop portal 2 on ceiling above you so you can catch falling box midair before landing infront of exit door?

Basically most of the puzzles in Portal 2 which weren't just introducing new elements to the game.

[Worira]

Uh... The single-player puzzles in Portal 2, with maybe one or two exceptions, were all really easy compared to the later puzzles of Portal, and especially compared to the advanced test chambers. In fact, I'd say overly-easy puzzles in the single-player mode was one of my biggest issues with the game.

[Jahkaivah]

later puzzles of Portal

Give an example.

[RPharazon]

I'd enjoy Portal puzzles that had dead ends, or weren't immediately obvious.

An example of this would be that one chamber with 3 lasers, 2 laser blocks, and 3 receptors. The solution that they want you to use involves shooting all three lasers into a single portal.

That wasn't immediately obvious to me, for some reason. I expected more from them. I spent 20 minutes trying to mess around with the laser blocks. Redirecting some lasers into the receptors with the laser blocks, and one or two with the portal. I didn't actually expect them to simply route all the lasers through one portal. It was simplistic, but it made me smack my head with the "Oh! It's so obvious!" moment. I enjoyed that.

I think the ultimate factor about what made that chamber so rewarding is that the entirety of the chamber (with it's fancy "looookin' gooooooood" appearance) was portal-able. Most other chambers had steel unportal-able tiles all over the place, and the puzzles were decided simply on a "There are four spots where I can put Portals, what order do I put them in" basis, instead of a "Where should I place my portals".

I enjoyed the one chamber with all the faith plates (the garbage one with the Rat Den) since there were so many neat ways to solve it. I can think of 6 different ways to get the block onto the button. 4 of which don't even involve touching the block directly. It has a creative thrill akin to Armadillo Run or The Incredible Machine.

I enjoyed the Cave Johnson bits of the game. Not so much because of the aesthetic or the puzzles (depressing and stupidly tedious, respectively) but because of the dialogue and story hidden behind it all. The puzzles themselves were just basic "Here's some gels. Now spend 5 minutes trying to get them in obvious places (while raging at their goop physics not covering everything that they should) to do something immediately obvious" puzzles, or simply just "Cart a block around or zip along some gels to get to the other side" puzzles.

As far as I can tell, Valve, with their admirable quality assessment and play-testing, just railroaded everything if a playtester expressed 10 seconds of confusion. Yahtzee may have said this, but it bears repeating. I was actually absolutely amazed at one of the level commentaries (in the chamber with the laser, and chamber-wide emancipation grill) where they stated that they had to redesign the level lots of times because playtesters were becoming confused, and that playtesters didn't actually know what an emancipation grill did. I wondered to myself. "How stupid can these playtesters be?"

Most of the co-op levels were a great level of difficulty. Everything slowly clicks together, and everything isn't immediately obvious and tedious to carry through. I hope that they model the Summer Map Pack on that design philosophy, not the "Oh no our playtesters are confused if we don't railroad them" philosophy.

[Dienekes]

Uh... The single-player puzzles in Portal 2, with maybe one or two exceptions, were all really easy compared to the later puzzles of Portal, and especially compared to the advanced test chambers. In fact, I'd say overly-easy puzzles in the single-player mode was one of my biggest issues with the game.

Maybe I'm just used to thinking with portals now, but yeah I too felt this game's puzzles were easier. The one time I got stuck on one was getting into the quarantine zone because I couldn't find the first place you're supposed to protal too.

Really, that took embarrassingly long to find.

[Seerow]

Uh... The single-player puzzles in Portal 2, with maybe one or two exceptions, were all really easy compared to the later puzzles of Portal, and especially compared to the advanced test chambers. In fact, I'd say overly-easy puzzles in the single-player mode was one of my biggest issues with the game.

Take off the rose colored glasses. The only remotely hard part in portal 1 was the second to last test chamber where you had to keep shooting portals higher up while falling at terminal velocity. And even that wasn't hard so much as frustrating til you got the timing of it down.

As for advanced test chambers, I was under the impression we were able to look forward to getting some advanced test chambers for portal 2 later on, but I could be mistaken about that.

[Worira]

Give an example.

I'd say 13 and on, where the game really steps out of tutorial mode and starts throwing real puzzles at you.

[BRC]

Concerning Portal 1 vs Portal 2, Portal 2 can't stand up less because of simplicity, and more because of innovation.

Yes portal 1 was a wonderfully straightforward game, slim, short, sweet, and perfect.
But people didn't love it because it was streamlined, they loved it because it was innovative. It was a unique game experience.

Had they been released simultaneously, people would say Portal 2 was the better game. As it is, Portal 2 doesn't get the points Portal 1 did for innovation.
Nobody remembers the second man on the moon.
Okay, plenty of people probably do, but you know what I'm saying.

[Dienekes]

Take off the rose colored glasses. The only remotely hard part in portal 1 was the second to last test chamber where you had to keep shooting portals higher up while falling at terminal velocity. And even that wasn't hard so much as frustrating til you got the timing of it down.

As for advanced test chambers, I was under the impression we were able to look forward to getting some advanced test chambers for portal 2 later on, but I could be mistaken about that.

Really? That's the one that gave you trouble? That was the one I remember being disappointed how easy it was to get through.

But by the same token, jeez there were some levels that took me forever that you claim to be obvious. So, kudos there.

[Seerow]

Really? That's the one that gave you trouble? That was the one I remember being disappointed how easy it was to get through.

But by the same token, jeez there were some levels that took me forever that you claim to be obvious. So, kudos there.

The puzzles themselves never seemed hard in terms of knowing what to do, but I apparently have below average coordination, so anything involving shooting while moving wound up giving me some trouble, and I wasted a lot of time on the part I mentioned.

I guess you could give an honorable mention for the run to GLaDOS, but that was less a puzzle as opposed to "which way am I supposed to go next?"




On the other hand, like I mentioned upthread, I didn't actually play Portal 2, being short on money, and not finding the puzzle aspect of the game worth paying 50 dollars at the moment. I watched the full thing, and I can see the argument that most of the puzzles are very straightforward, but I didn't think it was any worse than Portal 1.

[The Linker]

Really? That's the one that gave you trouble? That was the one I remember being disappointed how easy it was to get through.

But by the same token, jeez there were some levels that took me forever that you claim to be obvious. So, kudos there.

Right. Opinions are opinions are opinions. I'm pretty sure I had much more trouble with Portal 2 puzzles than Portal 1 puzzles. The one in the second game that has you faith plate through an excursion funnel you have to turn off -- that took me a while to figure out. The last one, with the blue gel and the excursion funnel -- another while. The one where Wheatley crams two together and you get a glimpse of P-Body, took me a long time to find that one portable wall way in the back.

The only one I remember giving me a sizable hassle in the first game was 18, I believe. Where you have to whack all the turrets off their platforms with energy balls. Specifically, I couldn't figure out how to get to the cube for quite a while.

But different people solve different puzzles with differing amounts of ease. I don't think we can come to a consensus on which game's puzzles were all glaringly obvious.

I will say, though, that Portal had many reflex puzzles, where the difficulty comes from being fast enough and doing everything right with a limited amount of time. Portal 2 had... approximately none of that. If you figured it out, you could do it. Whereas in the first you could figure it out and then take 5 tries to get it right.

[Jahkaivah]

I'd say 13 and on, where the game really steps out of tutorial mode and starts throwing real puzzles at you.

All very instinctive stuff. The first thing you tried when solving them was often the correct solution, (heck often it was the only option).

In contrast with Portal 2 the first thing you tried would often be hit by unforseen consequences complications, like a vital asset which you no longer have use of because you're already using it for something else and you therefore need to find a viable substitute for it's initial use.

As far as I can tell there are two reasons to think Portal 1 was harder, the first is looking at dexterous difficulty, which doesn't really make the puzzles harder.

The second is, as Dienekes said, unfamiliarity with the portals themselves. Portal 1 does spend alot more time testing your knowledge of how the portals can be used. But the problem is that can be incredibly instinctive for some people.

[scienceguy8]

Nobody remembers the second man on the moon.

Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin

[Gaelbert]

Uh... The single-player puzzles in Portal 2, with maybe one or two exceptions, were all really easy compared to the later puzzles of Portal, and especially compared to the advanced test chambers. In fact, I'd say overly-easy puzzles in the single-player mode was one of my biggest issues with the game.

I feel the same. I didn't have any problems solving any of the puzzles in Portal 2, except for one I though was too obvious and there had to be a different way to solve it. By contrast, I did have difficulty with many of the later stage levels in Portal, which made my enjoyment all the greater when I completed it.

Nobody remembers the second man on the moon.
Okay, plenty of people probably do, but you know what I'm saying.

Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin

Psst. Check the white text.

[Qwertystop]

[QUOTE=BRC;10932370]Nobody remembers the second man on the moon.
Okay, plenty of people probably do, but you know what I'm saying./QUOTE]

A better way to say it would be:
Nobody remembers Einstein's brother.
I mean, look what thread we're in!

[Gaelbert]

A better way to say it would be:
Nobody remembers Einstein's brother.
I mean, look what thread we're in!

Einstein didn't have a brother...

[Qwertystop]

Einstein didn't have a brother...

I'm referencing the co-op mode.
"Just remember, like Albert Einstein and his brother Larry, history will only remember one of you."

[Androgeus]

Einstein didn't have a brother...

You're just proving his point!

[chiasaur11]

Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin

Oh!

The 30 Rock guy!

[Silverraptor]

So, I beat Portal 2 single player. Honestly, I did not see that ending coming. It was pretty awesome, to tell the truth. And some people complain it was too short, for me, it was so long that I had to take 2 quite long breaks because my brain fizzed out from the puzzles.

Anyways, I am now looking for someone to do the Co-op with that has not done any of the Co-op. Meaning, someone who has just, or still is, doing the single player. Anyone who is done or in the process that wants to do Co-op for a first time through with me?

[chiasaur11]

So, I beat Portal 2 single player. Honestly, I did not see that ending coming. It was pretty awesome, to tell the truth. And some people complain it was too short, for me, it was so long that I had to take 2 quite long breaks because my brain fizzed out from the puzzles.

Anyways, I am now looking for someone to do the Co-op with that has not done any of the Co-op. Meaning, someone who has just, or still is, doing the single player. Anyone who is done or in the process that wants to do Co-op for a first time through with me?

Well, if you can't find anyone else, I can play dumb very well. And I've forgotten how to do almost all the puzzles already.

Understand if that's still too much knowledge, of course.

[Fawkes]

Coming this summer…

One’s the product of the greatest minds of a generation working together with the express purpose of building the dumbest moron who ever lived. The other one’s a box with a heart on it. Together, they are…


THE PORTAL PALS