Game Review: Portal

Yeah I know, I know. Late to the party right? Well despite hearing the rabid fan praise of Valve's pet project, Portal, I never got around to playing it... until now. Released in 2007, Portal, has aged well... incredibly well. So what is the premise of this game you ask?

Well, Portal is presumably set in the not-too-distant future of the popular Half-Life franchise (many references are made to "Black Mesa", an organization in Half-Life), where you find yourself as a test subject in a strange facility. You never make contact with any other humans the entire game and share the confines of the testing facility with an insane AI that has gone Skynet on the whole place. That's about as much of the plot as I can explain without ruining the story... but the AI promises cake when you finish the tests... okay that's all I can say.

This game is incredibly innovative. It can best be described as a First-Person Shooter/Puzzle/Platformed... not a common combination. Basically you get this gun, right? Well this gun doesn't shoot bullets, oh no no no. This gun shoots portals. You can create an entrance and exit portal on certain types of surfaces (which is meant to make the puzzles more difficult to solve). This mechanic is very refined and very very fun. Not only are the puzzles interesting and challenging, but the gun itself is so fun to play around with.

Here is the launch trailer from four years ago. (The footage looks a bit different than the final game because it was probably done during an early stage of development):

I cannot forget to mention the AI, who's ironically pleasant voice torments you throughout the entire game. Props to Valve for making a fun experience have a good many laughs added. A fun little game that was just a long as it should have been (only took me about a 1 1/2 hours). Portal comes packaged in The Orange Box, a collection of games available on the Xbox 360 and PC, along with Half-Life 2: Episodes 1 and 2, and Team Fortress 2. For $30 new, its a hard deal to beat.

I give the game 4 cakes out of 5. Mmmmm.... what a delicious cake.... >:)