5/5 because it's what I expected and I genuinely can't think of any major flaws.

With this being short and free, I'm assuming this is some sort of testing game for new hires or something, and if that's the case they all deserve raises. It was just incredibly fun messing up a house as a cute dog and fulfilling objectives. Granted, I do own a German Spitz (basically larger poms, we thought he was one for like ten years) and yeah it's exactly like this. (little shit woke me up at 4:45 to be let out and fed this morning)

But anyway, play this. It's a fun time waster and it's hard to argue with the low price of nothing but 330mbs of hardware space.

Okay, actual review time.

If you've been following the excellent saga that is 'random Irish guy writes shitty one-liners about video games' the beloved spinoff to 'random Irish guy writes shitty webnovels inspired mostly by video game plots as well as whatever was in the Spotify playlist that day' you'll know I wrote an actual review of Portal , and thought it was just okay. A decent demo of new tech with a fun enough plot even if the momentum based puzzles were a bit jank in areas. But everyone said Portal 2 was the great one and god damn they were right.

Right from the beginning when Wheatley wakes you up and the world starts crumbling around you as Glados notices your presence, in psychics showcases that to this day are extremely impressive looking, with dialogue that's genuinely funny as you talk to two parties who absolutely hate each other, going through more fun puzzles that feel more tightly designed than in one.

Then the big halfway twist happens.

I'm not gonna go too in detail on how you end up in the abandoned part of aperture, because I knew what the twist was and was still shocked at it. But the second half leads to the game's greatest strength.

atmosphere.

Every part of this game oozes atmosphere thanks to the more varied settings, getting to traverse with portals outside of the first games testing environments for longer periods of time. The prerecorded messages as funny as they are deeply unsettling. I do have a personal phobia of both abandoned places and the whole 'upload your brain into a machine' concept so maybe this whole thing spoke to me on a deeper level, but god damn if I wasn't creeped out the whole time. This has scared me more than basically any horror movie I've ever watched, and the plot and premise probably wouldn't be that hard to rewrite into a dreamworks film, which adds to the game's artistic qualities.

So in general, it's a masterpiece. You didn't need me to say that. Only flaw is some of the later puzzles last a tad too long, and the orange gel kept sliding me just besides my portal instead of into them (or maybe that's just me getting filtered by first person gaming again)

Hey bro check out this game I found, it's like a point and click adventure or something. No I don't think the grey aliens are from some other thing, must be something else you're thinking of, anyway check it out, it's decent.

Aw dude, you beat it? Nice one. Anyway I found some kinda prequel to it, it's a visual novel with a few interactive things on it, it's pretty cool. Needs a separate launcher tho, lemme download it real quick.

ssshhh...you missed the signs. The grey face paint and early tumblr discourse is flooding into you now. Don't fight it. You can't fight it.

You can't fight the Homestuck.

So...portal.

It's pretty good, I guess.

I went in knowing about portal based puzzles, a funny robot lady, and cubes. Not confectionery though, because the confectionery is a falsehood or however that line goes.

First off, the puzzles. Mostly pretty good, with all being interesting takes on the portal mechanics that make you think until you figure out a task that looks daunting at first. What I didn't like were the momentum based puzzles, because I swear the portals are smaller than they seem, as I was pretty consistently falling just short of the portal and having to redo a section of the puzzle. That one puzzle at the end of chapter 18 where you had to chain portals onto platforms in particular I hated doing. Like its a reaction test that barely qualifies as a puzzle, just put some damn stairs there. Granted, I don't play a lot of first person games so maybe it's a me thing? But anyway, all the puzzles that didn't require quick movement or reaction times were great, the ones that did were ehhhhhhh.

Next up, glados. Funny robot girlboss. And yeah, the humour was also pretty good. I get that I exist in a world of internet humour that portal played a big part in establishing when it came out that probably would have been the funniest game ever in 2007, so most of the lines early on were just me thinking 'yeah, that was funny' with a few audible chuckles later on at lines like android hell and near the end where you break everything and she keeps panicking over what's going on.

And I might as well mention the ending. Pretty good as well. Final sequence had the same frustrations I mentioned in the puzzle part but the general vibe of the broken facility and connection to half-life (which probably would have blown my mind if I had played half-life) was great.

Also yeah, the cubes were cool. Top tier cubes in gaming, just under the square Tetris block.

So overall... it's pretty good. All I have to say. I can imagine it being pretty mind blowing for what was basically meant to be a small side project for the half-life team that became a global phenomenon, but this game turns 17 this year, so I guess it passed me by? But 2 is the one everyone hypes up, so I guess I'll be trying that next.