So, like, are we all just too busy playing it right now, or what? :P

Bought it today, beat it today, loved every second of it. Thoughts?

pre-ordered
got it the second it released, played for 10 hours

beat campaign and co-op




<3

Thought it was to short for fifty bucks honestly.

Getting to see the history of Aperture science evoked a lot of emotional response to the game as well as that awesome reference to Half-Life 2, the empty drydock of the Borealis. I was amazed at how well they captured emotion in the characters through excellent voice acting, realistic motion, and expressions. The musical accompaniment of the game was top notch, with the interactive environment altering the music heard to increase ambiance and intensity. Starting out in similar test chambers to the original (albeit potato-plant overgrown) was a really nice touch as it gave you a sense of nostalgia as well as an anchor to estimate the passage of time between the first game and this one. Overall, I think valve did an excellent job and am now excitedly anticipating the release of Half-Life 2 Episode 3. I need more Aperture dammit! Give me my Borealis!

Just beat Portal 2 campaign, and to be honest, I want to see what the world is like outside, at the end of the game. Besides mentioning Aparture science in Half Life, and Black Mesa in Portal, do you think they'll ever actually cross the stories over? What happened between Portal 1 and Portal 2, with Chell in her deep sleep? How did the world come to and end, and what year are these games even set in?

Edit:

Are these sources reliable? http://members.shaw.ca/halflifestory/timeline.htm
http://half-life.wikia.com/wiki/Timeline_o...f-Life_universe

The wikia is probably somewhat reliable, considering it's a wikia written by the avid fans of the game series. I'm not sure about the other one, though.

So Valve picked me along with 40 other mappers to be a beta tester for the upcoming level editor! I've had a chance to mess around with it, and I must say that I am very impressed with the interface and overall design. Mapping tools like Hammer look like the most complicated thing in the world next to this new editor, but don't be fooled. I was able to produce pretty complex and aesthetically pleasing chambers with the current limitations it has. Being a Beta, it's obviously incomplete, so I can't really finalize any ratings.

Basically, if you like designing levels, and love Portal, you will absolutely love this new editor! Even if you're an experienced mapper, you can still utilize it to produce basic templates of your maps, and then export them to Hammer for adding in all the extra details. This saves a lot of time and effort.

In conclusion, if you have any questions, I'll try my best to answer without breaking the NDA.

Are you allowed to reveal when it's coming out? If so can you tell us the date?

Is it more like Hammer (it's roots I'm sure), UDK, or CryEdit?

Edit: Just saw it's in-game. More like Cube2 then?

Don't know when it's coming out. It's still incomplete, and they're adding in new features for us to use over time.

If you want an idea of what the editor looks like, these are some publicly released "teasers" that Valve made:




These are very close to what the actual editor looks like, but not quite.
Everything is represented pretty much the same way as the screenshots. The view is entirely 3D though, and uses the same effect as the Sims, where the obstructing walls are made invisible depending on your angle.

So it's not actually "In-game", but rather a click and drag thing?

No, it is an in-game thing. That is the map editing screen, but you can hop into test mode at any time you like and test out your map.

So like Cryengine then? Haha.

So Valve has personally invited me to come visit their headquarters. They want me to meet their teams and specialists (especially level design and audio).

I am so excited!

Edit: Anything you guys would like me to inquire about?

Ask them if they know how to count to three.

If they still want you to come tomorrow?

Oh I'll be going sometime in late April. They told me to email them when I was ready.

Do some infiltration work, find anything with a 3 on it and watch out for Gabe and his knives.

You mean gabe and his cake?

My first map (should be simple): *removed due to breakage and bad editor*
My second map (a challenge): http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/file...ls/?id=68680145
My third map (simple solution, if not obvious): http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/file...ls/?id=68680145

Edit: Absolute smallest portal-less test possible in the editor: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/file...ls/?id=68689263

Your second map is the same one as the third.

These are my chambers:

Paint Manipulator: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/file...ls/?id=68464450
De-Fizzler: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/file...ls/?id=68464764
Tri-pendent: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/file...ls/?id=68465081

All three of these maps were used in the official trailer :D

Bah, here is the proper 2nd one: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/file...ls/?id=68674330

To Zurginator: Yeah, first one I found a loophole to beating it quicker, where I just ignored all the items and velocitated my way to the finish, which is why you probably took down the level. Second one (The Life of a Cube) I liked, but every time I died I had to redo the cube segment again, instead of it saving where I left off. When I finally got to the button, I was confused, because some of the tractor beam things turned orange, and others blue, and I wasn't expecting that, so I died. I got bored eventually and tried your third map, the lasers one, and that one was a bit cryptic and awkward. I had to direct three lasers into one hole. Solved it pretty quick though. Finally, the smallest test chamber was kind of stupid. You have to drop the cube against the button to make the laser shoot up. Awkwardness at it's finest.
For some reason, I wasn't allowed to comment on any of your test chambers, probably because you only let your friends comment. You think you could enable that?

Thanks,

Icarus

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/file...ls/?id=71208421

Here's my first real map! (Second if you count a shitty tiny one that Umbre broke to pieces in seconds.)

AFAIK you can't place save points, unfortunately. Otherwise I definitely would have a save there. My original goal was to make ALL the paths change color to blue, and you go through it in reverse.... however there is a limit to how many things you can add to a button, so I had to be careful on which ones I chose.

Smallest test chamber is awkward..... no stopping that. I just felt like seeing what I could do in the smallest possible space.

As for comments..... no clue how to do that.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/file...ls/?id=71538919

Maybe this one's less crappy. :D

If you use Hammer to edit the maps I think there'd be a way. With the in-game editor though, probably not.

I made a new chamber!

It's an experimental race map, with slight parkour (to the extent of Portal's capabillities anyway) where you race against a timer to reach the exit by using a pre-painted "track"

I got the idea from Raidix's Gelocity maps, and wanted to see if the Puzzle Maker could actually handle a race map.

Well it can, but I had to use a ton of paint splat entities. Due to limitations, I could only create a rather short map. According to Valve though, they're working on a solution to using multiple splats, where you simply stretch the splats like you do with glass and other items.

Anyway, here it is!

Paint Parkour: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/file...ls/?id=72216704

PS: There seems to be a nasty issue with the workshop. Every map I upload seems to have the same thumbnail...

This is the actual thumbnail: