Portal Review

One of the most enjoyable and thought provoking experiences you will encounter in 2007.

Genre:Puzzle
Available for 360, PC and at some point in the future PS3

Portal places you into a linear world where you'll find yourself rewarded for thinking outside the box. Portal structures itself as a series of levels that progressively ramp up in difficulty. Portal is also one of the few games that successfully uses dialogue to make you laugh. Using the same engine as Half-Life 2 you'll find the controls and graphics familiar; however, this is not a first person shooter. As much as Half-Life and its sequels have innovated the FPS genre, Portal is a step in a completely new direction.

The premise for gameplay in portal is simple. You can fire blue and orange portals. One portal by itself serves no purpose and cannot be entered, however, in combination a blue portal will move the player to an orange portal or visa versa. Portals can only materialize on flat pale colored surfaces. When you fire your portal gun a blue or orange circle of energy will move to the target surface that you were aiming at and unless an obstruction blocks your path a portal of the appropriate color will materialize. A quick example of how it works for those who are still lost: You fire a blue portal at a ceiling far above you. You then fire an orange portal aimed at the floor just in front of your feet. Enter the orange portal and you will fall out of the ceiling where you shot your blue portal.

The graphics are impressive for a puzzle game. Presented from the first person perspective, you may actually find yourself immersed in a genre that most people consider by today's standards as casual gaming. You may even start to try and find practical applications for a portal gun in real life (blue portal at the top of a slide, orange portal at the bottom). All humor aside, in a genre where the greatest competition for graphics usually boasts a series of colorful circles presented in a square grid, Portal reigns supreme.

The audio is inventive. It's not often that you'll hear someone describe the audio of a game as inventive but the creators of Portal definitely fill that bill here.

First, everything the droid turrets (which you encounter about midway through the game) say is sung in what I refer to as tonal patterns. Think of the TV network NBC and replace those notes with "I see you" and then you might understand what I'm talking about when I say tonal patterns. Regardless of whether that went over your head or not, these little turrets are not only an interesting part of the gameplay, they're also inventive and fairly comical.

Second, the computer monitoring system is hilarious. You're constantly passing cameras through Portal's many halls and rooms. These cameras are part of the computer monitoring system. Occasionally in the beginning the computer's voice will aid you with tips on how to proceed through the puzzles and even in this environment the voice will throw in a joke or two. As you get to the 4th or 5th area the computer will start to say such things as, "This room is impossible, don't even bother trying to solve it" and in general will be a source of humor rather than serve as a guide.

Finally, the music in Portal, although occurring only once in a while, is memorable and suits the general atmosphere of the game. The ending theme song is a variation on the main theme and is worth beating the game several times simply for another listen. You might not notice the general lack of music in your first play through, as the computer monitoring system and droids help to fill the silence.

I should mention Portal isn't as long as games tend to run these days and it leaves you craving for more. Portal will probably take the average person 4 or 5 hours to complete. This doesn't sound like much when you compare most games today averaging at least 15 hours of gameplay. The length of Portal is actually more than worth the cost though. If you get it as part of The Orange Box you can consider it as 1/5 of your 60 dollar purchase. Essentially, for little more than the price of admission to your average movie theatre you get Portal. Certainly you get your money's worth, as Portal doesn't attempt to drag out any gaming conventions in order to add more gameplay time. Every puzzle, every moment, every line of dialogue is worth your time. Portal does what almost every other game doesn't in this department, it makes the entire experience worthwhile and highly enjoyable.

Rating
PC version:Buy
360 version:If the only game you would consider playing in The Orange Box is Portal then rent it, otherwise, Buy.