…system initializing…
…loading…
…system online….
A fanatical scream. That’s what it would be. One, long, open mouthed scream. Probably with a lot of head-shaking and hair pulling. That’s what I would ‘say’ if I had to sum up my review of Portal 2 in one word. The screams of Bieber fans would pale in comparison.
Let’s get to it, shall we?
SINGLE PLAYER: Here’s the equation. Pick a number between 1 and 100 that describes how amused you were by the storyline and concepts of Portal 1; We'll call that number A. Pick another number between 1 and 10 that describes how frustrated you were in Portal 1 by puzzles and the difficulty of aligning portals so as not to botch your free-fall; We’ll call that number B.
Now, subtract B from A.
A-B = C.
C = your Portal 1 happiness factor. (If C is a negative number, stop now, the amazingness of Portal is beyond you.)
Now, multiply C by 2.5 to get D.
D = your projected Portal 2 happiness factor.
The Portal 2 storyline continues from the first into a well-written, humorous revenge story. Lining up shots and placing portals is much smoother. There is the creative addition of gels (blue- it makes you and things covered in it bounce/orange- velocity, makes you run like sonic the hedgehog/white- allows you to turn non-portal surfaces into glory holes). There are also light bridges which can be used as shields or walkways, and vortexes which can float you and other objects across the room. Laser beams and reflective cubes… (see crappy pic below) ….I don’t need to go on. It’s the old stuff we loved with a huge layer of new ideas slathered on top, served on a platter of humorous story-telling that will keep a smile plastered on your face.
CO-OP: While the single-player game revolves around the theme of revenge, the co-op version is all about trust!
Your buddy wouldn’t swap portals on you while you’re hovering over an abyss, would he? He wouldn’t step on a button that would cause a platform to crush you into dust, just because of how hilarious it looks …..and the way it sounds when you scream… right? I mean, certainly, hugs CANT be used for sabotage!
Its rare that I play a game anymore and consciously think: Wow- this is really FUN. My boyfriend and I just beat the co-op and we said it least 5 times. It’s a blast and its pretty nice to bump noggins with a friend and come out victorious (or dismantled.) I think whoever initiates the game plays as Atlas (the fat one). There’s probably a way to choose but I didn’t pay attention- I was too excited to try it out.
Between you and your partner, you’ll have 4 portals to work with plus all the elements of the single-player mode (minus the white gel; 2 Portal Devices is enough you greedy S&^%). The comments from GLaDOS urge you to be the better test subject, and lead me to believe the Co-op storyline takes place as a continuation from the single-player.
You can interact with your partner in a number of ways by pinging locations, taunting, hugging (:3), playing rock, papers, scissors to see who gets crushed… There’s even a 3,2,1 timer so you can’t blame your friend if he doesn’t pull a lever at the same time as you. The game makes it easy to point things out to one another and even share views. Any problems in communication while playing are due to User Error (ie: Your own dumb @$$).
My only gripe with the co-op is that it wasn’t long enough. There’s a store (The Robot Enrichment Center) where you can buy special paints and phatz for your robots, but unless I’ve got more gaming to do, I won’t drop money into it like I do for Team Fortress. If VALVe starts dropping free testing sets then I might pimp out P-body in some nice ninja-drag. Some competitions on map making and who can blitz through them the fastest would help up the ante. Here’s to hoping there will be MOAR!
...and here's to hoping for Episode 3
