Portal 2

[Norellicus]

I would suggest just play HL2. I went back and completed HL1 thinking I would find out more about the story. It's not worth it unless youre die-hard. The game is called Half Life for a reason that's all you need to know. You will only live in that game for a few seconds before dying to new arbitary trap #493839 and having to re-load a saved game.

Theres only a little bit of story going on there. And no real characters to speak of except Gordan, the scientist who just looks like every other scientest, and then the G-man at the end. Black Mesa has some dimensional experiment go awry, shit goes bad, then you play the whole long game with nothing happening. At the end you go to the alien dimension and battle a thing for some reason. Then the G-man offers you a choice. That's all that is involved in HL1 right there.

lol, so much wrong with this post

[Pyro]

If you never play the original Half Life, the only person you'll be hurting is yourself.

[Eanae]

lol @ the Caroline meaning. That's awesome.

[roflman]

i could listen to stephen merchant babble on about anything for hours, it never gets old

[Antithesis]

It's not that great. I'd honestly suggest you just give HL1 a try too though, 2 isn't better, so you might aswell play both.

I just finished Half-Life 1 and I felt it was more or less an above-average game. I can't honestly tell you why, I just thought it was OK for the most part. It was an interesting game (and pretty fun) but perhaps it is just showing it's age. Once I finish Portal 2 I'm starting up on Half-Life 2.

HL1 is a solid game in its own right, and possibly worth playing. What I would say though is that quite a lot of the praise heaped on HL1 has to do with what it did when it was released. Expectations have to be...adjusted. Same as you wouldn't expect, say, DOOM to be Halo, even though both are also highly influential games in the genre. If you're interested in the progression of the genre/etc, then definitely play through it. It doesn't really have a narrative worth playing the game for like, say, Deus Ex or System Shock 2 do though.

HL2 will still give you the flavor of the Half Life series, but expanded and polished. The episodes aren't very long, but HL2 + Ep1/Ep2 will be longer than most FPS games. You honestly won't miss much story-wise from not playing HL1.

Lost Coast is a tech demo for HDR (primarily), so no real need to play it.

It more than likely has to do with nostalgia. Because I will tell you now, I feel like I had more fun and can go back and play Perfect Dark hundreds of times and have a shit ton of fun with it. Granted, I played Perfect Dark in my youth so nostalgia might be a factor involved but I did buy the re-release on Xbox Live and had a blast with it.

[Elcura]

i could listen to stephen merchant babble on about anything for hours, it never gets old

Hell yeah. The SP ending was kinda epic and tense. A lot harder than the original in regards to the final boss (but only because the original was reaaaally easy).

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Holy shit did I just shoot a portal on the moon? I didn't think it would work, but I just tried it anyway and BOOM. PORTAL ON THE MOON!"

[Saga]

In regards to someone disbelieving the ending:

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It is silly to question the whole "can Chell seriously breathe in space? come on!" thing, but I pretty much took it as the portal on the moon was sucking all the atmosphere, oxygen, basically all of the surrounding environment from the one on Earth, so Chell could breathe at least temporarily. But it wasn't anything I thought about that much, again, silly thing to question in this kind of game.

[Kiarax]

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There's a few holes throughout. But as was said, you wouldn't just die instantly were you to be instantly warped in to space. A bigger hole is probably it clearly being night time during the battle and then, upon being released mere minutes later, it's daytime.

[Elcura]

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There's a few holes throughout. But as was said, you wouldn't just die instantly were you to be instantly warped in to space. A bigger hole is probably it clearly being night time during the battle and then, upon being released mere minutes later, it's daytime.

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In regards to that, after GLaDOS brings you back through the portal, you black out. I assume the change in time happens then. Since you can assume you were out for a while by GLaDOS's reaction.

[Corrderio]

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There's a few holes throughout. But as was said, you wouldn't just die instantly were you to be instantly warped in to space. A bigger hole is probably it clearly being night time during the battle and then, upon being released mere minutes later, it's daytime.

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Unless she passed out, after all she got hit pretty hard by the trap Wheatley put in the stalemate chamber, then the space then.

[Kiarax]

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Hm, just rewatched the ending and it's certainly a possibility since you do black out. But GLaDOS' dialogue really makes out that you only blacked out for a moment. Either way, it's probably not worth thinking too deeply about a few of the plot points.

[Isiolia]

It more than likely has to do with nostalgia. Because I will tell you now, I feel like I had more fun and can go back and play Perfect Dark hundreds of times and have a shit ton of fun with it. Granted, I played Perfect Dark in my youth so nostalgia might be a factor involved but I did buy the re-release on Xbox Live and had a blast with it.

I wouldn't label it nostalgia so much as perspective. Someone who is, say, 13 years old this year (yeah, M rated games, etc) would have a very different viewpoint on FPS games in general than those of us who were gaming before the genre even existed. A lot of what stood out about the game in 1998 is now relatively common, even taken for granted. It's an even bigger landmark if you factor in how influential Counter-Strike has been for online multiplayer.

[Qeomash]

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Unless she passed out, after all she got hit pretty hard by the trap Wheatley put in the stalemate chamber, then the space then.

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It's not the time change that bugs me...you see the sky and the moon, shoot a portal at it, win. Then, after waking up again, you go up 20 stories to ground level through dancing turrets. How could you see the moon from that far underground?

[Elcura]

You guys are thinking about this too hard.

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It can be reasoned away with black out. The change in time, and the change in location. You can assume that you aren't in the same place, at a different time.

[xopher]

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It's not the time change that bugs me...you see the sky and the moon, shoot a portal at it, win. Then, after waking up again, you go up 20 stories to ground level through dancing turrets. How could you see the moon from that far underground?

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where is your evidence she wasn't moved after the fight with Wheatley? It's very likely GLaDOS moved her to an area with more readily available medical supplies. Also, no hole in the ceiling or signs of battle in the room in which you wake up

The only plot hole I see is that it's night time when you shoot the portal, but when you get to the moon and look back at earth, it's daytime on earth. Should have been a night shot of earth, but that would have given away whether or not society was still around, lights and all that.

[sruon]

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Unless she passed out, after all she got hit pretty hard by the trap Wheatley put in the stalemate chamber, then the space then.

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PART FIVE: Booby-trap the stalemate button! Seriously, I couldn't stop laughing. And right after he goes "Well I'm still in control AND I HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO FIX THIS PLACE" priceless

[Boyiee]

So a friend was in vent with a bunch of us and we were all playing or had finished portal2, and this friend asks "What is the game about, like what do you do, what is it".

After the initial facepalm of not knowing what portal was, one person who happens to be an antenna engineer and is hugely elitist tells him very seriously that it is a physics or science game.

Its a fucking puzzle door game. You solve puzzles by putting doors places. It is not a fucking science game. His answer completely deterred the guy asking what portal was from wanting to check it out cause obviously that kind of game would be stupid to some people.

[Burningthought]

Since I refuse to pay $50 for this game, I watched someone play through it on youtube, and I have to say Wheatley is my favorite character so far. I think they did a really good job with the story, it wasn't perfect, but it was good enough.

My biggest disappointment was that there wasn't really any HL references. I was really excited to find out how portal 2 would fit in the HL universe, but they really don't want to have the stories crossover so it was wishful thinking at best.

Valve better get working on Ep3/HL3 soon.

Oh yeah, whoever said they cannot stand watching other people play portal, JESUS FUCKING CHRIST I agree with you so much, I went through like 2-3 different portal 2 walkthroughs to find someone who wasn't a dumbass.

[Souj]

My biggest disappointment was that there wasn't really any HL references. I was really excited to find out how portal 2 would fit in the HL universe, but they really don't want to have the stories crossover so it was wishful thinking at best.

well, there's this, as posted earlier;

And I must say, I'm really disappointed in that there is no level select nor challenge mode.




and as for the ending...

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I didn't realize that you setting off the booby-trapped switch was supposed to happen. Explosion happened, and I fell to the floor, thought I died so turned away to my computer. Then I noticed the screen didn't change to a loading screen.

[Drunkenmonk]

theres chapter select after you beat it