"You must really love to test."
Despite its modest running time, 2007's 'Portal' was one of the best games of the last decade. The ingenious blend of 3D puzzle solving, dark humour and a mysterious back story only takes a few hours at most to complete, but the game was a unique experience and once again highlighted the developer Valve as one of the most important in the industry today. Now we have Portal 2, a full-length sequel which beautifully follows and builds on the previous game to craft one of the most exciting experiences video games can offer.
One of the oddest things about Portal 2 is how it works as an interactive criticism of the first Portal, highlighting every weakness of the last game and replacing them with new strengths. For such a short game, Portal noticeably drags at times, even to the point of boredom. This wasn't as clear until Valve demonstrated this through removing the cause of that boredom almost entirely from Portal 2: waiting. In Portal, you wait for slow moving platforms, or for a slow moving energy ball, only to find you misplaced your portals and now have to wait again to see if you've got it this time. You may miss the brief window of opportunity for one of these elements, or for an opened door or tilted panel that moves on a timer; in which case you now have to wait to reset the machine and try again. Speaking of trying again, Portal placed emphasis on first-person platforming that developers understood was a broken idea 15 years ago. Mix this with an unforgiving collision detection on portal rims and a tendency to build areas un-traversable without momentum jumps from great height and you have a recipe for failure and frustration.
Valve have obviously come to understand this, and it is so refreshing to have a developer who can glimpse behind the mountains of praise they receive and still see where they can improve. Slow moving energy balls? Try laser beams! Slow moving platforms? Give me light bridges! These new elements work in two ways; first - they're instant, second - they're entirely player controlled. Now the player can see immediately if they've made a mistake and take action to correct it without any down time. They can see the results of their action right away, which keeps the brain process of solving the puzzle fast, furious and fun instead of lethargic and painfully slow. Combined with new algorithms to be more forgiving when jumping into portals (explained on the wonderful interactive developer commentary, a Valve staple and as good as ever) as well as less emphasis on platforming in general and the missteps of the first game are successfully avoided.
Portal 2 is a much more streamlined game to play, but visually it has exploded in complexity. The sterile and claustrophobic test chambers from Portal have decayed and become over-grown in the time that has passed since then, and now you'll even be venturing past them into new environments that create good contrast and variety during the middle of the game. While I do have some issues with the design of the second act (due to reasons that would be spoilers, so I'll have to leave that for another blog), I can't fault the work that has gone into the game on a technical and artistic level. The lighting and textures are solid and of course the level design is the same great standard you can expect from Valve – but it is the character design that really shines through. Your guide during the early parts of the game is Wheatley, a vivid redesign of the personality cores seen at the end of the first game. His animation is some of the best character work I've ever seen in a game, and works with the fantastic performance of Stephen Merchant, excellent sound design and the ever-funny script to create an animated character who is of Pixar standards in every way. This is just as good as the robotic work done for Wall-E (2008), and is consistent through every character in the game.
I've not even mentioned the co-op campaign which is a large experience on its own and stars two more awesome character designs - P-Body and Atlas. You've likely seen them in trailers and posters instead of the fairly mysterious main character Chell, and if there is any justice in the world their designs will become video game icons. The co-op campaign is more of the same high quality found in the single player, puzzles now more dynamic, requiring twice as many portals to solve and teamwork to tie them all together. The task of making a co-op 3D puzzle game is pretty daunting, but Valve succeed in terrific form. Small adjustments in controls such as the addition of team-building gestures, a natural feeling ping-tool and the ability to bring up your partner's screen on your own makes the experience fluid where it could have been frustrating. The designs are tough enough to need two brains sharing ideas and trying solutions, but not so challenging that they inspire heated arguments.
The option for both online and split-screen co-op is always very welcome. With so many games abandoning the local element of multi-player titles these days, it feels like Valve are in the minority for understanding that some of us still have friends we want to play games with in the same room. Their Left 4 Dead series offered arguably the best local multi-player experience on the 360, and Portal 2 shows all the same insight into multi-player gaming. I can see why Valve have said they're going to be putting an emphasis on these games over their single-player campaigns in the future, even if I'd like to see more packages as robust as balanced as the one they've presented here.
One without the other would have been great, but together the single and multi-player experiences make Portal 2 one of the most exciting titles of this generation. It might not be a lengthy game, but the consistent high quality of every element ensures you'll be playing it again, even if just for the developer commentary. I haven't even mentioned much of what makes this game stand out, from the fantastic music to the performance of JK Simmons, but these are some things you should just experience for yourself. I sincerely hope Valve will one day revisit this series with the same fresh insight they've shown between this and it's predecessor. Most game sequels are made for money, but Portal 2 feels like the fruition of all the ideas and work that went into the original Portal, and on the scale they deserve. I still think there are good reasons to return to this world and the ideas involved one more time, but until then we can enjoy a classic experience that embodies much of what makes gaming fun and unique.
*****
As soon as you said 'and if there is any justice in the world' I read the rest in a Sean Connery accent in my head. I would say that the first time you play Portal (first game) that it isn't dull, frustrating or tiresome - it's ominous and exciting. But I would agree the second or third time and especially after playing Portal 2 it does become those things..
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