Now You're Thinking With Portals

Valve's got a new game in the works, and it's quite the mind-bender. Portal is a puzzle/FPS hybrid that will utilize holes in space to do the impossible. From the Ars Technica post: "That video makes my brain hurt in all the right ways. The set up and voice-over are both hilarious, and at first it seemed rudimentary to me. Then everything goes crazy and you start to realize just how much you can do with this technology. I'm looking forward to seeing fan-made videos hit the 'Net with all the insane stunts and tricks you can pull off. This seems to be one of those games that you'll have as much fun playing with the game as you do simply playing through it." This is a title definitely worth checking out for yourself.

Meep, meep!

[XxtraLarGe]

Reminds me of the ACME portable holes they used to have in the old Road Runner cartoons :-)

Gameplay

[Tester]

its nice to see that some people are still working to improve gameplay with innovative ideas instead of just focusing on technological details (such as how exact and good looking the shadows are).

Its all in the gameplay!

Re:Original...

[XenoRyet]

I was going to contradict you on that point, but Tycho over at Penny-Arcade is more elloquent than I, so I'll just quote him:

"I've heard the ideas it presents dismissed as ripping off Prey, and if there is a more ignorant statement to be made regarding these two games it has yet to be discovered. Prey's portals aren't user created. What's more, they're used in a completely different way: Prey is a first-person shooter, while Portal is clearly... something else."

Re:Original...

[Phu5ion]

Looks to me like they saw Prey do it and wanted to do it too...

Reading the description that was the first thing to pop in my mind too. But after seeing the video and some of the test they will put the player though, I think it will definately be able to set itself apart from Prey, think more puzzle and less FPS.

I'll buy it, but not for Windoze

[metamatic]

Hopefully they'll make a version for some non-Microsoft platform.

Adventure!

[anti-human 1]

Maybe someone can get a working version of the Bridge from Adventure using a similar technique to these portals. I remember the Quake 3 attempt couldn't get it.

I wouldn't care about all these fancy pants graphics if I had that bridge....

Re:Narbacular Drop

[Anonymous Coward]

So I guess I can just announce some crazy technology, and then delay the game for 10 years. Anything in the interim, you know, people who actually made it, are just copying me!

Prey had 10 years to show off their portal tech. They couldn't do it. Narbacular beat them to a release, plain and simple.

Re:Offtopic: Steam

[SanityInAnarchy]

In other words, they broke my copy of HalfLife to try and force me to install their spyware.

No, they decided to stop offering the service you were used to getting for free, and replace it with a different service (also free).

I actually like Steam, because unlike other forms of spyware or DRM (both of which are evil), Steam actually stays 100% out of my way, without significantly changing the model for my owning a game.

Let's compare Steam to other copy protection models:

CD Keys. Don't work, easily broken by "borrowing" a friend's key and denying access to the game's authentication servers.

Requiring the CD to be inserted. This is either ludicrously easy to beat (create another virtual drive in Wine, change some registry values, or put a snigle file on a single Samba share in Windows) or insanely annoying, or both. In any case, it prevents backups, and it shortens the life of the original CD, assuming it works.

Making the game a service (MMO). Great, so I pay $50 or $60 for the game, then you want me to spend $15 a month to keep playing? Not usually worth it, and only works for MMOs.

Steam. Well, it may be a steaming pile of crap technologically (IE all over), but it means that once I pay for a game, I've paid for it. I can then play said game from any computer that I remember my Steam password on, and every time I play it, I get to download and install the software. It also automatically provides me updates in a fairly unobtrusive way (something I've never had another game do), and not only allows me to play the game without a CD, not only allows me to download any number of times, but actually provides me with a tool to back up a copy of any number of Steam games to a CD or DVD, in a way that's account neutral -- which means if my friend buys Half-Life 2, I can burn a CD of the game and give it to him, saving him from waiting for the download.

It's even been good about asking before it sends info in. A hardware survey, for instance. Whereas these other pieces of spyware tend to collect personal info, send it in, silently eat up resources in the background with no explanation as to why, and cannot be shut off effectively.

I mean, yes, by some definition, it's Spyware, but by the same definition, so is Windows. Your copy of Windows would be very, very broken if you didn't get your automatic updates.

Anyway, end of rant, but I really get sick of all the hatred against Steam every time it comes up. You want an argument that distinguishes Steam from these other things? Steam actually adds value. Most spyware generally does nothing for you, steals your resources, pops up messages, and sends spam. Steam does none of these things, but lets you do things (legally!) that no other game or game platform lets you do at all.