Portal 2 is official, first image insideBy Andrew Webster | Last updated about 2 hours agoValve has been teasing something Portal-related all week, starting with some mysterious updates followed by a brand new ending for the game. And if all of this led you to believe that the puzzle-based shooter would be getting a sequel, well, you'd be right.The news was revealed via Game Informer, which will be featuring the game on its next cover. No real details have been revealed, although the game will be a "full-fledged, standalone sequel," as opposed to the original, which came packaged with The Orange Box. We should have plenty of good information when the magazine hits newsstands though, as it features a full 12-page spread on the game.For now, we can do little but speculate, and revel in the glorious cover image.
Loved Portal. Buying this.I was wondering what the two updates this week for Portal were. The kinda hoops men had tojump through to get to the info eh...Valve hid the info in audio recordings, which had to be translated into images using special apps, and then those cryptic images had to be spliced together to reveal evenyet another piece of the puzzle. I guess the geeks on the Steam forums finally figured it all out.
Doing science: Jonathan Coulton to create music for Portal 2By Anders Bylund | Last updated about 3 hours agoPortal was something of a perfect storm. Game mechanics that felt new, a story that tied into the world of Half-Life, a length that didn't outstay its own welcome, and to really drive the point home the end credits featured the instantly memorable song "Still Alive" by Jonathan Coulton. The song and the game built on the success of one another, creating one of the most memorable moments in modern gaming.In a phone interview last Thursday, I brought up "Still Alive" and asked Coulton whether he'd be interested in doing a follow-up. "I will be doing music for Portal 2 as well, yeah. You know, I think Valve and I were both really happy with how 'Still Alive' turned out, and it was an overwhelmingly popular response to something we thought was maybe gonna be a bit weird and unusual," he explained. "We weren't sure how it was gonna go. And so it's gonna be hard to live up to that success, and it was sort of a surprise to everyone, us included, so ... I don't know, we'll see. The sequel is always a troublesome thing, and sequels are rarely better than the original. Empire Strikes Back is the only exception that I can think of."With such a high bar set by his first entry into the world of video game music, anything else is going to have to be incredible to live up to the promise of the first Portal release. Still, new Coulton is a good thing, and it's great to hear that he'll be back in the sequel.
Portal 2 news: shortest Valve delay ever, destruction of humankindBy Ben Kuchera | Last updated 3 days agoThose of us looking forward to Portal 2—and that is most likely all of us—will have to wait a little longer. Valve has announced that the game has been delayed until April 18 of 2011, and the company assures us that this is both a positive step for the company and the doom of everyone else. I'll let you read the announcement for yourself:Valve today announced that Portal 2— the sequel to the ground-breaking title that won over 30 game of the year awards, despite missing its original ship date—will now be available the week of April 18th, 2011. This two month slip not only marks the shortest delay in Valve's proud tradition of delays, it represents the approaching convergence of Valve Time and Real Time. Though this convergence spells doom for humanity, it will not affect the new Portal 2 release date.So there you go. We've been excited about the game since it was announced. A standalone Portal is a big undertaking, and we look forward to playing the final release whenever it's ready... before we're annihilated in the name of science.
Cross platform multiplayer? NICE!!!It's only co-op, but still...
