Not really sure what the point of playing a videogame instead of watching a cutscene is if the only real choice I'm given in that moment is actually an illusion because it has already been made for me.
It's not even a total non choice. Where the portal goes, when you do it, there's still room to mess it up.
The only change in the spiky smash bit is you don't go "Wait. I put a portal. Why did I fall to my death?" repeatedly feeling like an idiot.
The point in this case is that the player still needs situational awareness to complete the (very simple) puzzle. They need to locate a portalable surface. Although they don't need to know why it works (i.e. they might not realize it will bring the funnel effect through to save them), there's really no reason to penalize the player with instant death if they press the wrong button.
Also for the ending:
Even with the interview's contention that GLaDOS completely deleted Caroline, I still say the opera portion is GLaDOS trying to suppress her homicidal instincts (and testing-oriented programming) during Chell's short ride to the surface.
I'm also not sure what more a longer version of the song could accomplish. As beautifully composed and sung that it is, it is very specifically timed with the elevator. Particularly raising Chell up at great speed after "why don't you go away from science?"
Although I think it's very clear by the Coulton song that she is back to her homicidal, test-oriented self by the very end.
Cara bel, cara mia bella / Dear beautiful, my beautiful darling Mia bambina, a tra che la stima che la stima / My little girl - in between respect and assessment O cara mia, addio! / O my dear - farewell!
La mia bambina cara / My dear child perche non passi lontano? / Why not go far away? Sì, lontano da Scienza / Yes, far away from Science
Cara, cara mia bambina / Dear, my dear child Ah, mia bel / Ah, my beauty. Ah, mia cara / Ah, my dear Ah, mia cara / Ah, my dear Ah, mia bambina / Ah, my child O cara, cara mia... / O Dear, my dear...
Alternatively for the second line: Mia bambina, o Chell! / My child, oh Chell [pronounced similar to Italian ciel meaning "heaven"] Che la stima, che la stima / What respect! What an assessment!
I was just about to post about the lyrics...
Although, I don't know if this was Glados (channeling Caroline) or Ratman, I think he might be Chells father, after reading the comic. Both interpretations are very poignant and awesome.
The comic clearly implies that he chose Chell for her stubbornness, it would be odd if he went out of his way to put his daughter first in line to do GLaDOS' ultra dangerous tests.
Yeah, I realized my theory was not very good as I typed it. But!!! I can counter your logic by pointing out that Ratman is crazy!
Sooo... Anybody starting co-op for the first time need a partner? I'll be quiet and let you figure stuff out, because I only remember a couple of the puzzles myself.
Had a good co-op run with Subedii, shame he had to leave in the middle of the last test chamber. Now I just need that last chamber to finish the co-op mode.
The problem is that Valve hasn't given us a new Half-Life game in a while, and Half-Life is entirely about finding out the story on your own through clues/etc because they don't tell you anything directly.
As great as the ending was, I'm a bit disappointed that they switched to pre-rendered video instead of doing everything in-engine. A wonderful Valve tradition is broken.
Maybe it's because so far I've just played on the 360, but I couldn't tell the difference.
It's pretty jarring on PC.
Yeah. Its horribly compressed. I love pretty much everything in the game, but this part blew.
What? The small amount of pre-rendered stuff there is in Portal 2 isn't horribly compressed at all. Try taking a look at the pre-rendered cutscenes in games such as Batman: Arkham Asylum or Darksiders if you want to see horribly compressed.
I just wonder what bearing this has on HL:EP3/HL3/More Aperture Science. It was linked on Steam from Portal 2 in my library.
I havent had a chance to play Portal 2 Coop yet, but I don't see how you can tell the type of story Half-Life uses in multiplayer.
Yeah that scares the shit out of me.
I don't know, considering Alyx Vance was pretty much a co-op partner in ep 1 and 2, and what they've been able to do in lfd 1 and the co-op in portal two concerning characterisation and "telling" a story I think it could work.
Bastable on
Philippe about the tactical deployment of german Kradschützen during the battle of Kursk:
"I think I can comment on this because I used to live above the Baby Doll Lounge, a topless bar that was once frequented by bikers in lower Manhattan."
I think they can still do it, but I always felt part of the Half-Life story (and Portal really) was the isolation. The co-op is awesome, but I still found the SP part to be a much better experience.
I think they can still do it, but I always felt part of the Half-Life story (and Portal really) was the isolation. The co-op is awesome, but I still found the SP part to be a much better experience.
I'm sure I'm the odd man out here, but I never cared for the HL2 gameplay. I would welcome coop as I find going solo through that world rather boring. I do enjoy the creepy isolated feeling of the Portal(2) single player but I think that has run its course and welcome more coop maps.
LittleBoots on
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I just wonder what bearing this has on HL:EP3/HL3/More Aperture Science. It was linked on Steam from Portal 2 in my library.
I havent had a chance to play Portal 2 Coop yet, but I don't see how you can tell the type of story Half-Life uses in multiplayer.
Yeah that scares the shit out of me.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that's just Keighley jumping to conclusions over bits and pieces of his interviews with Valve. Nothing is direct from them, and it sounds like it could be more musings from Gabe rather than a real hint at their future direction.
I just wonder what bearing this has on HL:EP3/HL3/More Aperture Science. It was linked on Steam from Portal 2 in my library.
I havent had a chance to play Portal 2 Coop yet, but I don't see how you can tell the type of story Half-Life uses in multiplayer.
Yeah that scares the shit out of me.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that's just Keighley jumping to conclusions over bits and pieces of his interviews with Valve. Nothing is direct from them, and it sounds like it could be more musings from Gabe rather than a real hint at their future direction.
That said, ya' never know with Valve.
Yeah... even if its a direct quote (which it seems like it is) it could meant several different ways. It could mean that no game of theirs is going to have a single player and co-op that are different (i.e. if they do have co-op you'll be playing the same maps/story as single player) but if they don't have co-op you'll just be having the regular old single player.
I think this is the most logical way to interpret it. I.e. they aren't going to try to add co-op to a single player game that doesn't need it, but if they do add co-op i'll essentially be the same game as the single player, just with co-op. (like, for example l4d)
I don't think there's much chance of co-op in future Half-Life titles. Which is fine with me, some games don't need multiplayer to work. If they did, it would be in the vein of Portal's and not, for example, player 1 as Gordan and player 2 as Alex. Two other characters in their own little side story. I think that would be fun.
I don't think there's much chance of co-op in future Half-Life titles. Which is fine with me, some games don't need multiplayer to work. If they did, it would be in the vein of Portal's and not, for example, player 1 as Gordan and player 2 as Alex. Two other characters in their own little side story. I think that would be fun.
I don't think there's much chance of co-op in future Half-Life titles. Which is fine with me, some games don't need multiplayer to work. If they did, it would be in the vein of Portal's and not, for example, player 1 as Gordan and player 2 as Alex. Two other characters in their own little side story. I think that would be fun.
Actually, I can see exactly that happening.
I don't really think that'll happen. The whole way the characters are set up and interact doesn't really lend itself to coop.
MY nice interpretation of the ending and what happens to glados
glados from the original portal was quite insane because of all of the personalty cores driving her up a wall wanting to kill and destroy and test but also kill.
in portal 2 she is just mad at chell for the attempt on her life the previous game it feels like she does not seem deranged and insane like the first game.
she seems to be picking herself up and regaining stability when she discovers the caroline persona in her mind it seems to grant her a newfound stability and sanity and even some endearing to chell possibly just from caroline or perhaps also from freeing her from her previous insanity. i have not played co,op yet but from the ending (i peeked and from some gameplay i saw) she seems much less insane then the first game or even the beginning of the second game she seems put together. she just wants to test not to outright murder anymore although she does have fun with the bots she created
thats a nice interpretation im sure someone else could come up with something alot meaner and crueler for themselves also the song and dance and giving you your cube seemed far to nice for glados to merely do it on a whim.
No offense, but I don't think that that would be at all a good idea.
I didn't say it was a good idea, I just said I could definitely see it happening, considering how often the characters work together and the statements made concerning Valve possibly being done with single-player games.
But Stabbity is probably right, in that Gordon is set up as this ubermensch in power armor whereas Alyx is, at the end of the day, just some resistance leader. It'd be weird for them to run-and-gun side by side.
No offense, but I don't think that that would be at all a good idea.
I didn't say it was a good idea, I just said I could definitely see it happening, considering how often the characters work together and the statements made concerning Valve possibly being done with single-player games.
But Stabbity is probably right, in that Gordon is set up as this ubermensch in power armor whereas Alyx is, at the end of the day, just some resistance leader. It'd be weird for them to run-and-gun side by side.
I was talking more about how their interactions are set up. Gordon is sort of a shell for the player to use and Alyx is this dynamic character that provides a counterpoint to Gordon. It would go against their setup to have either someone play Alyx as the dynamic character or change Alyx to a shell for the player.
Just did some of the co-op levels with Lazy, good times were had.
The pointer and buddy cam made things much easier.
I'd just like to point out that even though the game was giving Luigi more coordination points, I'm obviously smarter cause I figured out the Mashy Spike Plate hallway puzzle first. He does have that sexy accent though, so we'll call it a tie. Fair nuff?
No offense, but I don't think that that would be at all a good idea.
I didn't say it was a good idea, I just said I could definitely see it happening, considering how often the characters work together and the statements made concerning Valve possibly being done with single-player games.
But Stabbity is probably right, in that Gordon is set up as this ubermensch in power armor whereas Alyx is, at the end of the day, just some resistance leader. It'd be weird for them to run-and-gun side by side.
I would seriously doubt that co-op would be the HL standard (i.e. it would be designed for singleplayer). But quite a few games create co-op experiences (that are often non-canon or unrelated to the core singleplayer experience).
Look at Halo, for instance. The game flat out tells you that Master Chief is supposedly the last Spartan (as retconned as that may have been later); yet if you boot up some co-op they still only acknowledge one last Spartan.
Also HL and HL2 both have multiplayer deathmatch components. So the comparison to Bioshock and Bioshock 2 is already pretty spotty. There's no reason a game can't have compelling single player and multiplayer.
I've always liked to believe that in Halo co-op it's the Master Chief and his imaginary friend. I just don't see it working with two Gordon Freemans, or one person playing a different returning character like Alex. Maybe some new characters in the Resistance made specifically for co-op.
I just wonder what bearing this has on HL:EP3/HL3/More Aperture Science. It was linked on Steam from Portal 2 in my library.
I havent had a chance to play Portal 2 Coop yet, but I don't see how you can tell the type of story Half-Life uses in multiplayer.
Yeah that scares the shit out of me.
I don't know, considering Alyx Vance was pretty much a co-op partner in ep 1 and 2, and what they've been able to do in lfd 1 and the co-op in portal two concerning characterisation and "telling" a story I think it could work.
I'm a little tired of Alyx and long for solo sequences again. All my favorite bits from HL2 were when I felt lost in the world and atmosphere, like the opening and boat sequences. Having Alyx always around to guide you kind of changes that.
I've always liked to believe that in Halo co-op it's the Master Chief and his imaginary friend. I just don't see it working with two Gordon Freemans, or one person playing a different returning character like Alex. Maybe some new characters in the Resistance made specifically for co-op.
Halo 3 at least introduced distinct characters for each player to play as.
I just wonder what bearing this has on HL:EP3/HL3/More Aperture Science. It was linked on Steam from Portal 2 in my library.
I havent had a chance to play Portal 2 Coop yet, but I don't see how you can tell the type of story Half-Life uses in multiplayer.
Yeah that scares the shit out of me.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that's just Keighley jumping to conclusions over bits and pieces of his interviews with Valve. Nothing is direct from them, and it sounds like it could be more musings from Gabe rather than a real hint at their future direction.
That said, ya' never know with Valve.
Yeah... even if its a direct quote (which it seems like it is) it could meant several different ways. It could mean that no game of theirs is going to have a single player and co-op that are different (i.e. if they do have co-op you'll be playing the same maps/story as single player) but if they don't have co-op you'll just be having the regular old single player.
I think this is the most logical way to interpret it. I.e. they aren't going to try to add co-op to a single player game that doesn't need it, but if they do add co-op i'll essentially be the same game as the single player, just with co-op. (like, for example l4d)
I'll just repeat what I said in the comments there:
Note that he states that Portal 2 will be the last game with an “ISOLATED single-player experience”. It DOES have a multiplayer mode, so that would imply that they’re going to introduce some sort of community in to every single-player game.
It could be as simple as letting people see what their friends are doing, or something even more interesting like letting people leave their own commentary nodes. DOTA 2, although it is a multiplayer game, is planned to have a mentoring system to allow more experienced players to teach the less experienced, which could theoretically be applied to Valve’s other games (although I doubt it would be).
My point is that this doesn’t necessarily imply that valve won’t be making any more games or campaigns intended for only one person.
Valve has a good track record, I figure they know what they're doing.
It could be as simple as letting people see what their friends are doing, or something even more interesting like letting people leave their own commentary nodes. DOTA 2, although it is a multiplayer game, is planned to have a mentoring system to allow more experienced players to teach the less experienced, which could theoretically be applied to Valve’s other games (although I doubt it would be).
My point is that this doesn’t necessarily imply that valve won’t be making any more games or campaigns intended for only one person.
It has already been introduced into TF2, probably a bit of a test bed thing.
They should leave Half-Life out of any social connection stuff and just worry about making another great SP experience with HL3, though I don't know how they can make any major improvements from HL2 since that game is for my money the greatest ever made.
I just wonder what bearing this has on HL:EP3/HL3/More Aperture Science. It was linked on Steam from Portal 2 in my library.
I havent had a chance to play Portal 2 Coop yet, but I don't see how you can tell the type of story Half-Life uses in multiplayer.
Yeah that scares the shit out of me.
I don't know, considering Alyx Vance was pretty much a co-op partner in ep 1 and 2, and what they've been able to do in lfd 1 and the co-op in portal two concerning characterisation and "telling" a story I think it could work.
I'm a little tired of Alyx and long for solo sequences again. All my favorite bits from HL2 were when I felt lost in the world and atmosphere, like the opening and boat sequences. Having Alyx always around to guide you kind of changes that.
What about Father Grigori? His interaction with Gordon is a bit less frequent that traditional co-op games, but a game where both players basically play two separate paths that occasionally interlink could be interesting (and provide some replayability).
But I'll agree. Some of the best parts were stopping off at houses along the highway just to check the neat things inside, and that probably wouldn't happen as frequently with co-op partners.
Man people are reading way too much into what was probably a throwaway comment that we haven't even heard directly.
Here's an interview from back in November, where the interviewer was pretty much trying to obliquely tell Erik Johnson that singleplayer campaigns were no longer viable, or that Valve couldn't or wouldn't be doing them in future.
When it comes to longevity of gameplay and long-term monetization of customers, how viable are single-player gaming experiences like this one going to be in the long term?
EJ: I think there is an interesting question in how many projects should be offline products and how long that is going to be viable. Half-Life 1 was a really offline product. I think customers want to find ways to talk about the thing that they are a big fan of with other people, and ideally experience it the same way.
That doesn't mean every game needs to be multiplayer. With single player games that were completely in a box, and there was no way to experience anything else, I think there are things that customers want that those games don't take advantage of.
That could just mean that you want to be able to chat with other people who are playing through the same part of the game as you, or the fans can write commentary nodes in the game and everyone can experience those to take advantage of the fact that there is a huge community of people that want to interact with each other.
I still think the analysis that every product needs to be a competitor in multiplayer, or an MMO, is incorrect; there are a lot of people who want an experience without the stress, so I don't see that changing.
It's interesting to think about -- numbers suggest that the popularity of guided single-player experiences is dwindling. That may mean that the highest-quality studios will no longer be able to invest in the development of those titles, and thus that type of experience won't improve.
EJ: Part of it is thinking through he reasons for making decisions. You brought up piracy being a reason to not do single player, which I think is a pretty crazy analysis on an issue like that; that's making a decision for your customers about the types of products you are going to build without, by definition, including your customers in that at all.
You're saying that because of these pirates, you get no single player experiences, which makes no sense to me. If there are as much players that want single player experiences, you should go build that. I think there are plenty of people that still want to have single player experiences. Look at Mario; those games do really well.
True, but I feel like those experiences, for adults, are already rare, and will continue to become more rare because it's difficult. Can studios like yours survive without making people essentially pay to level up?
EJ: One thing to think about is, when we are building a game like Half-Life 2 or Portal, monetization is a separate thing that, in the context of the game design, doesn't make a huge amount of sense, really.
We are trying to exploit the psychology of the people that play our games all the time. We are trying to change their emotional state, and trying to predict what their emotional state will be based on what we are doing in the game world.
What's compelling for people, like, "Hey, they're getting a huge reward here, they are going to be happy. They are going to be challenged on the skills that we taught them here and that's going to be rewarding them." There is a non-customer-hostile way to think about what we are doing. There are hostile ways too, though. (laughs)
From the way he talks about it, the "online component" sounds more in the region of Facebook wall postings or similar. I mean he literally says that you shouldn't make singleplayer games multiplayer or MMO's because that's not what people are after.
It's a throwaway quote that kotaku took in order to CAUSE PANICS OH NOES!
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Were pretty sure who you think wrote that didn't.
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Where is this at?
Holy fucking shit, good times.
Literally never even occured to me to use the roshambo for that purpose. Awesome.
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Think that's just a reused graphic from Portal 1.
EDIT: wow, horrible TOTP
People are starving.
I havent had a chance to play Portal 2 Coop yet, but I don't see how you can tell the type of story Half-Life uses in multiplayer.
What? The small amount of pre-rendered stuff there is in Portal 2 isn't horribly compressed at all. Try taking a look at the pre-rendered cutscenes in games such as Batman: Arkham Asylum or Darksiders if you want to see horribly compressed.
Yeah that scares the shit out of me.
http://steamcommunity.com/id/themarshall is my steam id.
"I think I can comment on this because I used to live above the Baby Doll Lounge, a topless bar that was once frequented by bikers in lower Manhattan."
I'm sure I'm the odd man out here, but I never cared for the HL2 gameplay. I would welcome coop as I find going solo through that world rather boring. I do enjoy the creepy isolated feeling of the Portal(2) single player but I think that has run its course and welcome more coop maps.
Tofu wrote: Here be Littleboots, destroyer of threads and master of drunkposting.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that's just Keighley jumping to conclusions over bits and pieces of his interviews with Valve. Nothing is direct from them, and it sounds like it could be more musings from Gabe rather than a real hint at their future direction.
That said, ya' never know with Valve.
should probably spoiler tag that, bro.
Yeah... even if its a direct quote (which it seems like it is) it could meant several different ways. It could mean that no game of theirs is going to have a single player and co-op that are different (i.e. if they do have co-op you'll be playing the same maps/story as single player) but if they don't have co-op you'll just be having the regular old single player.
I think this is the most logical way to interpret it. I.e. they aren't going to try to add co-op to a single player game that doesn't need it, but if they do add co-op i'll essentially be the same game as the single player, just with co-op. (like, for example l4d)
Actually, I can see exactly that happening.
I don't really think that'll happen. The whole way the characters are set up and interact doesn't really lend itself to coop.
You really should spoiler that.
I didn't say it was a good idea, I just said I could definitely see it happening, considering how often the characters work together and the statements made concerning Valve possibly being done with single-player games.
But Stabbity is probably right, in that Gordon is set up as this ubermensch in power armor whereas Alyx is, at the end of the day, just some resistance leader. It'd be weird for them to run-and-gun side by side.
I was talking more about how their interactions are set up. Gordon is sort of a shell for the player to use and Alyx is this dynamic character that provides a counterpoint to Gordon. It would go against their setup to have either someone play Alyx as the dynamic character or change Alyx to a shell for the player.
Feeling a little, negative, are we?
I would seriously doubt that co-op would be the HL standard (i.e. it would be designed for singleplayer). But quite a few games create co-op experiences (that are often non-canon or unrelated to the core singleplayer experience).
Look at Halo, for instance. The game flat out tells you that Master Chief is supposedly the last Spartan (as retconned as that may have been later); yet if you boot up some co-op they still only acknowledge one last Spartan.
Also HL and HL2 both have multiplayer deathmatch components. So the comparison to Bioshock and Bioshock 2 is already pretty spotty. There's no reason a game can't have compelling single player and multiplayer.
I'm a little tired of Alyx and long for solo sequences again. All my favorite bits from HL2 were when I felt lost in the world and atmosphere, like the opening and boat sequences. Having Alyx always around to guide you kind of changes that.
Halo 3 at least introduced distinct characters for each player to play as.
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I'll just repeat what I said in the comments there:
Valve has a good track record, I figure they know what they're doing.
It has already been introduced into TF2, probably a bit of a test bed thing.
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What about Father Grigori? His interaction with Gordon is a bit less frequent that traditional co-op games, but a game where both players basically play two separate paths that occasionally interlink could be interesting (and provide some replayability).
But I'll agree. Some of the best parts were stopping off at houses along the highway just to check the neat things inside, and that probably wouldn't happen as frequently with co-op partners.
Here's an interview from back in November, where the interviewer was pretty much trying to obliquely tell Erik Johnson that singleplayer campaigns were no longer viable, or that Valve couldn't or wouldn't be doing them in future.
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/6198/rewarding_the_players_valve_on_.php
It's on page 4:
From the way he talks about it, the "online component" sounds more in the region of Facebook wall postings or similar. I mean he literally says that you shouldn't make singleplayer games multiplayer or MMO's because that's not what people are after.
It's a throwaway quote that kotaku took in order to CAUSE PANICS OH NOES!