With Portal Valve didn't know they had a hit on their hands. With Portal 2 Valve was trying to manufacture a hit. Portal 2 is bigger, prettier, and louder then its prequel but it isn't better. For all the new mechanics added and being double the length of Portal 1, Portal 2 isn't harder then 1 nor is it even constantly harder then 1. There is about the same amount of advanced puzzles in both games with Portal 2 being a bot easier due to a lot of the chambers lacking significant white space. Portal 2 instead fills the time with excessive tutorial puzzles, long walkie talky sequences, and times where you just walk around an area looking for the one white space you can portal to. The pace of the game goes like basic movement and portal tutorial from 1, new mechanic tutorials with 2 advanced puzzles to tie it up, three gel tutorials in old aperture with 1 advanced puzzle tying it all together, and then a tractor beam tutorial puzzle set until the game finally lets a few of the mechanics combine.
Portal 2 tries unsuccessfully to ape Portal in other ways. Portal 1 was well known for being a funny a game so valve hired a famous to yuck it all up. Stephen Merchant does a fine stand up style performance but his ad-libbed, naturalistic British delivery does not fit the tone of evil science facility run by a mad AI at all. Frankly they left too much of his voice in leading to a disconnect between Wheatly's human voice and Glados and the core's very robotic ones. Even Glados has shifted from a genuine threat to wise cracking villain who simply wants to call Chel fat and ugly. Cave Johnson's lines reek of mythbusters-Bill Nye wannabe science nerd culture that was popular at the time. All his jokes are variations on "For Science!" with the farcical elements (mantis men) turning Aperture from a genuine threat to an absolute joke. Portal 1 was a game with a serious tone and some dark deadpan jokes that worked because they were in a dangerous context. In contrast Portal 2 is a slapstick farce with almost every line of dialog being another forced laugh.
When Portal 1 got big some of its jokes like the companion cube and cake became memes. In an attempt to replicate this Valve pushed a few jokes hard to force a meme. Before the game even launched they dropped the potato gag ARG before anyone even know about Glados potato. When the player reaches wheatly the phrase "The Part Where He Kills You" is repeated 4 times across dialog and text in the span of a minute. You can't force a meme and you can't force a great game. Certainly Valve was able to make a hit out of Portal 2 they gave gamers what they wanted: more obvious jokes, better graphics, more puzzles, and play tested the hell out of the game so even the most uninterested players could solve every puzzle with ease. In doing so Valve lost the magic of Portal 1. I don't want a Portal 3 its clear the Valve play testing method cannot consistently make good puzzle games, and I'm not if there is anyone on the team left who truly knew what made Portal special.
Portal 2 tries unsuccessfully to ape Portal in other ways. Portal 1 was well known for being a funny a game so valve hired a famous to yuck it all up. Stephen Merchant does a fine stand up style performance but his ad-libbed, naturalistic British delivery does not fit the tone of evil science facility run by a mad AI at all. Frankly they left too much of his voice in leading to a disconnect between Wheatly's human voice and Glados and the core's very robotic ones. Even Glados has shifted from a genuine threat to wise cracking villain who simply wants to call Chel fat and ugly. Cave Johnson's lines reek of mythbusters-Bill Nye wannabe science nerd culture that was popular at the time. All his jokes are variations on "For Science!" with the farcical elements (mantis men) turning Aperture from a genuine threat to an absolute joke. Portal 1 was a game with a serious tone and some dark deadpan jokes that worked because they were in a dangerous context. In contrast Portal 2 is a slapstick farce with almost every line of dialog being another forced laugh.
When Portal 1 got big some of its jokes like the companion cube and cake became memes. In an attempt to replicate this Valve pushed a few jokes hard to force a meme. Before the game even launched they dropped the potato gag ARG before anyone even know about Glados potato. When the player reaches wheatly the phrase "The Part Where He Kills You" is repeated 4 times across dialog and text in the span of a minute. You can't force a meme and you can't force a great game. Certainly Valve was able to make a hit out of Portal 2 they gave gamers what they wanted: more obvious jokes, better graphics, more puzzles, and play tested the hell out of the game so even the most uninterested players could solve every puzzle with ease. In doing so Valve lost the magic of Portal 1. I don't want a Portal 3 its clear the Valve play testing method cannot consistently make good puzzle games, and I'm not if there is anyone on the team left who truly knew what made Portal special.