No Cake, No Problem
By Cody Newill
Portal was a surprising experience for a lot of gamers, myself included. Valve made an incredible acquisition when they hired the student team behind Narbacular Drop to make a game expanding upon the core concepts of their graduating project. The product was subtle narrative, solid puzzle design, and meme-producing humor all fit together in a perfect three-hour package. From the tone of the pre-release hype, it seemed that it would fly in under the radar, while its Orange Box companions Half Life 2 and Team Fortress 2 soaked in all the glory. But after Portal had its say, I had a new favorite Valve game.
With that all in mind, Portal 2 can NEVER bring back the experience of the first game. The very nature of being a sequel bars it from achieving the same novelty as the first game, but it is the best sequel fans could’ve hoped for. What is here is a much more traditional presentation to compliment some truly excellent puzzles, and some hysterical one-liners.
Despite GLaDOS’s destruction at the climax of the first game, Aperture Science still has agents working tirelessly in the name of experimental science. Chell, who was unwillingly dragged back in the facility, has been in hyperbaric sleep for an incredible amount of time and awakens to find the robotic caretaker, Wheatley, planning an escape for her. Aperture is being slowly overtaken by plant life due to the absence of GLaDOS’s control, and most of the old test chambers are broken, rusty, and covered with vines. Through a moronic, yet hilarious plan, Wheatley manages to awaken GLaDOS again, and the testing resumes despite the vegetative decay of the testing chambers.
The shift in narrative style from the subtlety of the first game is noticeable from the start. Scale and exposition, not implication and minimalism, permeates much of the setting and story. Tiny glimpses into back-story are a thing of the past; a full-blown history tour through Aperture takes Chell through a deep figurative, and literal, rabbit hole, and gives a greater sense of how Aperture formed its unhinged, sadistic culture. The inclusion of more than one character adds even more dark, situational humor to the game, and the one-liners are some of the best in any game to date. Some fans will most likely cry blasphemy, but I think it was the right choice to add more humor, characters, and back-story. The writing is still top notch, and the voice acting is some of the best in the business. Ellen McLain is still devilishly sarcastic as GLaDOS, while Stephen Merchant and JK Simmons bring great humor and believability to Wheatley and Cave Johnson (the founder of Aperture). Nolan North even makes an appearance, showing off in a great bit part.
Although subtlety doesn’t reside in the setting, it does find refuge in the music of Portal 2. The style is sort of a cross between 8-bit and Tron, and only fades into the mix when you connect a part of a puzzle solution or outright solve a puzzle. Lasers make small melodies when connected to their sockets, and electronic tones ring as you fly across chasms. It is a perfect layer on top of an already great feeling of accomplishment.
It is a good thing the music doesn’t grow bombastic, because there are some pretty complex test chambers in this game. Although the presentation is more important to Portal 2, there are still some incredibly well designed tests. Along with the standard weighted cube puzzles and portal only tests, there are now lasers, light bridges, gravity funnels, and gels. All the new test components fit well with the already established methods, but the gels are particularly noteworthy. Often it is up to you to coat the floor, walls, and ceiling with the Nickelodeon Gak-like goop to reach seemingly impossible areas. One such test chamber—which takes place during the Aperture Science history tour—has you coating the ground with speed gel, dripping a small patch of jumping gel at the end of the runway, and then blasting across a jump that Evel Knievel wouldn’t dare attempt.
All the new tools at your disposal are a simply a joy to play around with, and the difficulty curve is pretty much perfect. The single player is about twice as long as Portal, but I never found myself stuck on any puzzles for too long. There is a visual vocabulary to the game that always lends a helping hand. Light sources usually illuminate a crucial portal point; checkerboard patterns do the same. It’s a sophisticated way to key players into solutions, even if it isn’t being consciously digested. As nice as it is to have these slight hints in single player, it’s even nicer in co-op, where puzzles can get nearly paradoxical. Since both players control their own set of portals, it can get incredibly confusing very quickly. The difficulty is kept in check by on screen markers that you can use to highlight potential portal points. And communication is absolutely necessary for success. Players who are up for a real challenge will be satisfied with Portal 2’s co-op.
Portal 2’s narrative and fully featured single and multi player modes make it one of the best games of the year so far. It is rare that a game is deft in both humor and game design, and you shouldn’t miss out on one of the few examples of it.
