Portal 2 Screens Feature Return of a Cubic Companion

Aeshi

New member
Dec 22, 2009
2,640
0
0
Guess it was too much to ask for for Valve to actually make good on it's promise to bury these memes.

(eh who am I kidding? It's Portal, memes are all it has.)
 

AmrasCalmacil

New member
Jul 19, 2008
2,421
0
0
SirBryghtside said:
AmrasCalmacil said:
What is this?
Blatant pandering to the people who talk about portal five times a day?
No. It's like putting Nuka Cola in Fallout, Metroids in Metroid, the Crowbar in Half-Life - just part of the series.
What series?
They made a two hour long experimental game that people were unable to shut up about.

It included a box that some people formed a relationship with and a joke about cake.

For the record, I enjoyed Portal and have nothing against it, except my skepticism about the sequel and the aforementioned box and cake joke.
 

A Pious Cultist

New member
Jul 4, 2009
1,103
0
0
HentMas said:
ok, it looks more shiny and the shading seems to have improoved, also the particle effects are preety enough...
Worth noting that alot of those screenshots are heavily painted over (you can see clear brush strokes over the backgrounds of stuff and wierd geometry shading, also the portal gun is cut out in a few of them). I don't know why they're releasing concept art at this stage, seems counter-productive.
 

Baresark

New member
Dec 19, 2010
3,908
0
0
No one should be surprised by this... no one at all. They made a fuckin' stuffed version of that for people..... Of course it's back.

MelasZepheos said:
...and I'm almost looking forward to the fanboy rage when they realise that it will never live up to their expectations.
You and me both. The first game was fun for the 70 minutes it took me to beat it. But beyond that, it wasn't as epic as everyone makes it out to be. I was hoping this one would have an actual story, and when I voiced that, everyone jumps down my throat insisting that it does, haha. Meh, I'll play it when it's nice and cheap. I managed to get the first one for free when they were giving it away to celebrate the release of the Steam Mac platform. Maybe some other cool thing will happen.
 

Casual Shinji

Should've gone before we left.
Legacy
Jul 18, 2009
19,570
4,374
118
This probably means that the most horrendously overplayed joke in the gaming scene will make a return as well.

I loved Portal, I really did. But the fanbase that took every single aspect of the game and turned it into something it wasn't made me want to fucking vommit. Hurray for the meaningless iron cube with a heart on it.
 

Palademon

New member
Mar 20, 2010
4,167
0
0
To all the people thinking too seriously about the cube with the idea of "I don't get it":
There's nothing to get. It's a joke. There isn't some emotional attachment the game gives you to it apart from being forced to use it as a tool to get through the level.

People love it as a joke, because in Portal you are all alone and the companion cube had been personified, and given individual character despite lacking speech or even life.

And after all I've just said which is pointless overthinking, I still say you people are thinking about this too much. ITS A JOKE.
 

Randomorific

New member
Feb 24, 2011
48
0
0
AmrasCalmacil said:
SirBryghtside said:
AmrasCalmacil said:
What is this?
Blatant pandering to the people who talk about portal five times a day?
No. It's like putting Nuka Cola in Fallout, Metroids in Metroid, the Crowbar in Half-Life - just part of the series.
What series?
They made a two hour long experimental game that people were unable to shut up about.

It included a box that some people formed a relationship with and a joke about cake.

For the record, I enjoyed Portal and have nothing against it, except my skepticism about the sequel and the aforementioned box and cake joke.
YES FINALLY someone who has a similar opinion as me (I'm talking about Amras btw).
Portal was a good game, well made and fun and it was funny in places but seriously stop prattling on about it, I know Portal2 will bring all the original portal references back but really? Its been years, it really annoys me how people still go on about THAT BLOODY CAKE and that BLOODY END SONG. I mean the song was good, but after people quote it and quote it and say it all wrong and put on a crappy voice, it just kills the song. Sorry about the rant.

Anyway I'm looking forward to the new game, hopefully it will be just as good if not better than the first and you never know maybe this will stop all the cake references. He said hopefully.
 

lacktheknack

Je suis joined jewels.
Jan 19, 2009
19,316
0
0
-Zen- said:
manythings said:
I've never gotten the big deal about the companion cube. I had it for about 6 minutes before the end of that section.
This. It's a box with a heart on it. Big whoop.
It's like Candlejack. The internet rises to the occasion to continue one minor gag until it becomes hilari
 

HentMas

The Loneliest Jedi
Apr 17, 2009
2,650
0
0
A Pious Cultist said:
HentMas said:
ok, it looks more shiny and the shading seems to have improoved, also the particle effects are preety enough...
Worth noting that alot of those screenshots are heavily painted over (you can see clear brush strokes over the backgrounds of stuff and wierd geometry shading, also the portal gun is cut out in a few of them). I don't know why they're releasing concept art at this stage, seems counter-productive.
perhaps, to baffle people like me that think "ok! that looks cool!!" and stop there, but i didnt analized every bit of the immages, although thank you for pointing it out, i would have being slithly anoyed that i didnt noticed before gameplay.
 

subject_87

New member
Jul 2, 2010
1,426
0
0
These do indeed look very pretty, now it's taunting me even more with its 'pre-order' status in my Steam library... Just a month and a half to go...
 

ryo02

New member
Oct 8, 2007
819
0
0
Korten12 said:
-Zen- said:
manythings said:
I've never gotten the big deal about the companion cube. I had it for about 6 minutes before the end of that section.
This. It's a box with a heart on it. Big whoop.
agrreed to both of you.
its not a big deal no one really thinks its the best character or their true friend or anything pretending it is though is all a big joke get it?.
 

sparg

New member
Sep 27, 2010
17
0
0
actually you dont need to worry about the cake
the developers really said that they were not going to focuss on old things
i tink we will see the cube anew
 

Rutskarn

New member
Feb 20, 2010
243
0
0
AmrasCalmacil said:
SirBryghtside said:
AmrasCalmacil said:
What is this?
Blatant pandering to the people who talk about portal five times a day?
No. It's like putting Nuka Cola in Fallout, Metroids in Metroid, the Crowbar in Half-Life - just part of the series.
What series?
They made a two hour long experimental game that people were unable to shut up about.

It included a box that some people formed a relationship with and a joke about cake.

For the record, I enjoyed Portal and have nothing against it, except my skepticism about the sequel and the aforementioned box and cake joke.
In the commentary to Portal, the developers explain that the companion cube was not created to be a joke, or a character the player becomes attached to--it was just a gameplay mechanic. They wanted a level where a player had to keep a box with them so they could use it for more than one puzzle. To communicate to the player that the box was special, they put a heart on it. Players responded well to this, and I don't mean in the internet-meme-plushie-squee-fanart sense. More importantly, they responded well during playtesting. Putting a heart on a box is a good way to say, "This box is important. Hold on to it."

So, putting a companion cube in the sequel doesn't have to mean, "We're beating our jokes into the ground." In fact, having played Valve's games and read the interviews where they talk about how tired they are of the memes by now, I'd reject that interpretation outright. I'd instead take it to mean, "We want more puzzles where you have to bring a cube along with you, and we've already established the companion cube mechanic, so we'll go with that."
 

JokerCrowe

New member
Nov 12, 2009
1,430
0
0
GAAAHHHA!! PORTAL 2 *orgasm face*
Just kidding. But it really looks amazing, I'll try not to get my hopes up too much, that way it'll be even more AWESOMELY AMAZING!!!
[sub][sub]may have failed at not getting my hopes up...[/sub][/sub]

EDIT: This was about something? Oh yeah... Companion Cube... back. Yay...
 

WonderWillard

New member
Feb 4, 2010
195
0
0
You know, the first time I played Portal I didn't care about the companion cube much, it was just another cube, so I had no qualms about dropping it in the incinerator. But it was what GlaDOS said before and after I committed the act that, I can't remember exactly what she says but she calls you a horrible, heartless person and stuff lol, "you managed to incinerate your companion faster than anyone else before. Congratulations." She succeeded in making me feel guilty about incinerating a hunk of metal.

But is anyone else amused/frustrated that Valve has come out with a sequel for Left 4 Dead and now Portal, but not Half-Life?... They will run out of other games to make sequels to eventually, and then they will be forced to come out with the next HL, mwahahahaha.
 

AgentNein

New member
Jun 14, 2008
1,476
0
0
Aeshi said:
Guess it was too much to ask for for Valve to actually make good on it's promise to bury these memes.

(eh who am I kidding? It's Portal, memes are all it has.)
Yeah, remember all of those reviews? None of them mentioned the superb puzzle design based around a fresh new gameplay mechanic. Or the clever script. It aced it cuz of the memes, right?