Portal Review

I'm not sure if it's possible for Valve to release anything awful, but I must say I was rather stoked for the release of the Orange Box. The main reason I was so excited about it was Team Fortress 2. I enjoy multiplayer FPS's more so than single player adventures, and TF2 certainly seemed to fit that genre (seeing as how there is no single player mode).

I was also rather curious about Portal. I wasn't really sure what to expect, but watching the teaser trailer got me excited about this game as well. I wondered how well they would be able to pull it off.

As it turns out, they did a really good job. It probably helps that it was based on another game, Narbacular Drop, which served as the prototype to Portal. I was instantly hooked on this game until I got trapped in chamber 17. Eventually I was able to beat it, but I left the game sitting for awhile.

Then one night, we had a couple of friends over who had never heard of Portal. I decided to show them a little bit, and since I had already played through all the chambers, I was breezing my way through the initial stages. Somehow I ended up playing all the way through, and beating GLaDOS.

Little did I know that Portal can actually be completed in roughly 3 to 6 hours of gameplay. Having listened to some of the commentary, it's rather apparent that they spent a lot of time making the game accessible to all players. They took the time to introduce you to the idea of portals, and how they can be used to overcome "insurmountable obstacles" so you wouldn't get stuck later on in the game.

All in all, it was a really enjoyable experience and I'm excited for future developments. Do you think they might bring portals over to the Half-Life world? I can't help but think they have something up their sleeve.