Portal 2 PC Review

Single PlayerThe game starts very much like the first ,at least for a brief moment when Wheatley decides to help you break out.

Wheatley who is a singular core is of fantastic assistance in the beginning, at least until things go bad but we’ll look at that a little further on.

For those who have played the original Portal, will be familiar with the design, gameplay and more importantly controls. This is all down to Valve wanting to make the game appealing to the mass market, and therefore continued to use the Source engine to give the same aspect and feel of other titles they develop including Half Life 2.

As with the original Portal it’s a set of tests that need completing to feed the satisfaction of GLaDOS, our friend from the first Portal. Tests involve solving them by using the Portal gun to teleport Chell from one area to another. This includes creating portals to gain momentum to propel yourself into certain areas that would normally be unobtainable.

As the game progresses and GLaDOS creates more test chambers for you, Wheatley is in the background planning and scheming how to get rid of GLaDOS. With the help of yourself (Chell) you are able to exchange cores between GLaDOS and Wheatley, but things don’t go completely according to plan, and you find yourself gaining GLaDOS as an ally whilst Wheatley becomes drunk with power much like your new found friend used to be. Wheatley uses his new found friend to store GLaDOS into a potato battery which sits comfortably on the top of your gun. Once you and GLaDOS are together, you will find yourself in a very much deralict area of the testing facility that will have you using your mind and logic to find a way out and back to Wheatley.

Throughout the game, you and GLaDOS become somewhat of friends and she can’t apologise enough for her mistakes, even though you tried to “kill” her in the previous instalment. After destroying Wheatley, much in the same way you did with GLaDOS in the original, the game will finish and you will finally be free to the outside world.

A couple of added extras to this second instalment, and probably the most anticipated features of the game, barring the Multi Player element is the “gels”. Portal 2 incorporates two new fantastic features in the form of propulsion gel and repulsion.

Repulsion gel does exactly what it says on the tin and when making contact it repels you and forms a pretty unique trampoline from any surface that it’s covered. Handy to get to those hard to reach platforms that you wouldn’t normally be able to get to. Propulsion gel once again does what it’s name suggests and upon contact will propel you to whichever direction you are going to. This is handy if you need to propel yourself over spaces by shooting over ramps.

Now that we’ve taken a look at the new features and game play, let’s take a look at the most highly anticipated feature of Portal 2; the Multi Player mode, so grab your partner and let’s go.