Wednesday, January 6, 2021

Portal (1&2)

For the Christmas break, I played Portal 1 & 2. I had heard about them since forever, but I never really gave them a lot of thought - I was turned off by the "dark humor" motif, and of course they're not on Nintendo consoles. But Steam works on my laptop and the games were dirt cheap.

They're really fun. For one thing, the computer making fun of your character (who's not a bit fazed by the taunting) is pretty funny. And beyond that, the puzzles are really well designed. They're satisfying, not unreasonable, and they make you feel like an absolute genius whenever you solve one.

The portal gun works exactly like you'd expect - you put a blue portal here, an orange portal there, and they're connected. You can go through them. Other stuff can go through. Momentum is maintained. You can look through and see what you'd expect to see, which is generally the same room but from a different perspective (and maybe yourself, depending on how they're positioned). You can't help but want one. But then, that's how all good sci-fi tech is. Unrealistic, but so clear in its purpose and use that you can easily imagine what you'd do if you had it.

Best quotes: this and this, and my personal favorite.