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Off-Topic Discussion => Gaming Discussion => Topic started by: BloodEagle on September 17, 2008, 10:48:12 pm

Title: Portal: Prelude
Post by: BloodEagle on September 17, 2008, 10:48:12 pm
http://www.portalprelude.com/

A user-made prequel to Portal. Now, I've never (and I mean never.) played a good mod for any Valve game, but I'm giving this one the benefit of the doubt. So if anyone already knows whether this sucks, please let me know before I finish downloading and installing it.

---

P.S.
In case you were wondering, I read Kotaku today.

:EDIT:

Upon further inspection, there isn't a download link up (in spite of the article leading me to believe that it was available to download).

:EDIT:

Direct link to trailer:
http://vimeo.com/1739740
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Mefustae on September 18, 2008, 05:53:51 am
Now, I've never (and I mean never.) played a good mod for any Valve game, but I'm giving this one the benefit of the doubt.
Wow. Either you have insanely high standards, or you don't get out a whole lot.

What about Dystopia? Hidden: Source? Minerva? The upcoming Black Mesa? Insurgency? Garry's Mod? Not to mention that CS and DoD started their lives as mods.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: BloodEagle on September 18, 2008, 08:03:39 am
Now, I've never (and I mean never.) played a good mod for any Valve game, but I'm giving this one the benefit of the doubt.
Wow. Either you have insanely high standards, or you don't get out a whole lot.

What about Dystopia? Hidden: Source? Minerva? The upcoming Black Mesa? Insurgency? Garry's Mod? Not to mention that CS and DoD started their lives as mods.

I went through a few mod lists about five months ago, and was thoroughly disappointed. I don't know if the engine/editor is hard to work with, or if people just don't test their work.

I've never tried Garry's mod, because, to my knowledge, it's merely (though not quite so mere, in this case) a sandbox mod. When I download a mod, I'm expecting either a storyline of some type or some gameplay, so I didn't see the point in getting it

I'll check the other stuff that you listed. To be honest, there was one other mod that I was excited about, Mario Kart. It seems to have gone the way of the Dodo, sadly.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Colonol Dekker on September 18, 2008, 08:10:52 am
Minerva is like the derelict of half-life 2. It must be played without question. . . Get it now :yes:
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: MP-Ryan on September 18, 2008, 12:58:18 pm
Minerva is like the derelict of half-life 2. It must be played without question. . . Get it now :yes:

Seconded.

Rock24, Riot Act, and Awakening are all decent too.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: colecampbell666 on September 20, 2008, 06:39:37 pm
Rock 24, Riot Act, Minerva is THE mod, GMod is worth the 10$, there are a few.

Also, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHxyZaZlaOs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8yHguvYYyQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8g2oyxYENb8&feature=related
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: BloodEagle on September 20, 2008, 09:38:20 pm
Also, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHxyZaZlaOs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8yHguvYYyQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8g2oyxYENb8&feature=related

That's nothing compared to this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqJ2vBIv130). I mean, that just screams 'win'.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Agent_Koopa on September 21, 2008, 01:36:59 am
Huh. Looks interesting, a decent amount of work put into it, and a clever solution to the "oh **** we can't replicate the GLaDOS voice" problem.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Dough with Fish on September 21, 2008, 12:52:45 pm
BloodEagle, if you're still looking to check out some Half-Life mods, I recommend They Hunger (http://www.moddb.com/mods/they-hunger) and Heart of Evil (http://www.moddb.com/mods/heart-of-evil). Their both HL1 mods, so the graphics are going to be dated, but the gameplay holds up extremely well. If you have Half-Life: Source, though, there is a Heart of Evil port for it. (http://www.moddb.com/mods/heart-of-evil-napalm-editon)

EDIT: And, BloodEagle, if the fact that Minerva got it's author a job at Valve (http://www.moddb.com/mods/minerva/news/adam-foster-joins-valve) doesn't say that its a worthwhile mod to you, then man, sorry, but you're lost.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Colonol Dekker on September 21, 2008, 12:56:16 pm
They Hunger is also available in Co-Op flavour, i remember playing that first time around. Really freaky headcrabs  :shaking:
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Bobboau on September 21, 2008, 03:22:39 pm
if I don't hear any dialog how am I supposed to judge it as portal's successor?
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Al Tarket on September 22, 2008, 06:05:30 am
portal 2 is coming?? i might have to consult wiki for more info if this is true. i wonder if that psychotic machine is going to share some cake with that woman or try to kill her again :lol:.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Agent_Koopa on October 07, 2008, 08:47:05 pm
portal 2 is coming?? i might have to consult wiki for more info if this is true. i wonder if that psychotic machine is going to share some cake with that woman or try to kill her again :lol:.

First of all, where in this topic has anyone said anything about Portal 2? Second of all, Portal 2 has been confirmed. Thirdly, there's some rumours going around that
Spoiler:
Cave Johnson, founder and CEO of Aperture Science
will
Spoiler:
take GLaDOS' place as test overseer.
This would seem to indicate that Portal 2 will
Spoiler:
follow Portal's test-chamber sequence, which is a tad disappointing but not entirely surprising, considering that Portal is a puzzle game first and foremost. Anyway, the alleged leak is in the form of a casting call for Cave Johnson. Although it is not entirely reliable, due mainly to the volume of information contained within a simple casting call, it features a portrait of the man himself and some interestingly well-written monologue samples.



...can we please get the type of spoiler tag that doesn't automatically make a line break?
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Goober5000 on October 08, 2008, 12:15:02 am
...can we please get the type of spoiler tag that doesn't automatically make a line break?
If you provide the PHP code for it. :p
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: BloodEagle on October 08, 2008, 07:47:35 pm
It's up.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: colecampbell666 on October 08, 2008, 08:31:11 pm
portal 2 is coming?? i might have to consult wiki for more info if this is true. i wonder if that psychotic machine is going to share some cake with that woman or try to kill her again :lol:.

First of all, where in this topic has anyone said anything about Portal 2? Second of all, Portal 2 has been confirmed. Thirdly, there's some rumours going around that
Spoiler:
Cave Johnson, founder and CEO of Aperture Science
will
Spoiler:
take GLaDOS' place as test overseer.
This would seem to indicate that Portal 2 will
Spoiler:
follow Portal's test-chamber sequence, which is a tad disappointing but not entirely surprising, considering that Portal is a puzzle game first and foremost. Anyway, the alleged leak is in the form of a casting call for Cave Johnson. Although it is not entirely reliable, due mainly to the volume of information contained within a simple casting call, it features a portrait of the man himself and some interestingly well-written monologue samples.



...can we please get the type of spoiler tag that doesn't automatically make a line break?
Portal 2 is supposed to be, in essence, the canon Portal: Prelude. It follows what happened before GLaDOS warmed up her neurotoxin emitters.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: BloodEagle on October 08, 2008, 08:55:03 pm
*snip*

*uber-snip*
Portal 2 is supposed to be, in essence, the canon Portal: Prelude. It follows what happened before GLaDOS warmed up her neurotoxin emitters.

I've got to get me a set of those.  :D
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: redsniper on October 08, 2008, 09:46:24 pm
I downloaded it, but when I tried to play it I found out that I had uninstalled Portal, so now I'm redownloading it. FFFFFFFFFFFF-
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: redsniper on October 09, 2008, 01:22:12 am
Okay, I've gotten to room 15 of 19, so far this is a lot harder than Portal.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: BloodEagle on October 09, 2008, 12:59:20 pm
Okay, I've gotten to room 15 of 19, so far this is a lot harder than Portal.

I'm at room nine.

The only reason it's hard is because you have to fight the controls in order to pull off that ridiculous crap.

::EDIT::

I hereby declare that this mod sucks.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Agent_Koopa on October 09, 2008, 11:11:47 pm
Portal 2 is supposed to be, in essence, the canon Portal: Prelude. It follows what happened before GLaDOS warmed up her neurotoxin emitters.

Where'd you hear that? Er...
Spoiler:
Cave Johnson is dead in that casting call. He's been digitized. This could place it anywhere in the timeline.

It's up.

Do you mean the other type of spoiler tag?
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: BloodEagle on October 10, 2008, 12:30:24 am
It's up.

Do you mean the other type of spoiler tag?

No. The mod is up.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Agent_Koopa on October 10, 2008, 12:40:11 am

No. The mod is up.

 :blah:

Actually the spoiler tags rank higher on my list of desires for the moment, since for some reason Portal's become extremely slow on my computer.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Backslash on October 10, 2008, 01:47:46 am
I'm at room nine.

The only reason it's hard is because you have to fight the controls in order to pull off that ridiculous crap.
::EDIT::
I hereby declare that this mod sucks.
No kidding.

I wanted to like it, really I did... Portal The Flash Version's Map Pack (http://portalmaps.wecreatestuff.com/) was sooo good, surprisingly so.  This one, from the trailer and previews looked like it could have blown TFVMP out of the water...

But then I get to room 2.  Heck, room 1 was a bad sign -- a puzzle should not be only solvable by quickloading many times.  Shoving the player into a 'surprise you're dead' situation that quickly is just bad design.  Upon further scrutiny, ok, the turrets were vaguely visible through the frosted glass... but even then it's quite a trick to survive, and seriously, on the FIRST level?

I guess I'm thankful that the first few rooms were so bad, instead of me investing my time and getting all the way to, say, 15 before hitting a horrible unforgiving puzzle.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Vasudan Admiral on October 11, 2008, 09:45:08 am
Wow, the ending sequence is pretty impressive. :D

Overall, I enjoyed the mod. Not as much as the original portal, but the difficulty in some of the latest levels makes the original portal look like childs play solution wise.

My biggest problem with it was test chamber 19 - the last of the test chambers. The ending of that level requires you to climb a chimney using the portal jumping technique first seen in portal. There it was quite fun - a leisurely bouncing up and down from platform to platform through portals. In prelude however the chimney tunnel thing is so high you could fit the Combine citadel in it as a greeble. You look up from the bottom and you see nothing but platforms you're supposed to do the relatively easy bouncing technique between.

It sounds a bit long but not terribly difficult right? Well there are two other aspects to it that make it stupidly impossible. The first is that many of the platforms are moving - they periodically shift from position to position, which would of course remove your portal that might be on it. Highly annoying, but still not insurmountable really.

The killing blow is that you have to lug the companion cube up with you the entire way. :p

(http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y184/VA--Twisted_Infinities/MachoPortalMan.jpg)

Upon seeing this I just went 'Uh, no.' and noclipped the entire way up. First time I've ever had to cheat in a portal map, which was very annoying.

The other issue is that some of the puzzles rely too heavily on your acrobatic technique midair, as opposed to figuring out the actual puzzle you're presented with.

Overall though - as long as you cheat through the test chamber 19, it certainly is all doable and I reckon worth the play. :)
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: BloodEagle on October 11, 2008, 12:21:24 pm
The other issue is that some most of the puzzles rely too heavily on your acrobatic technique midair, as opposed to figuring out the actual puzzle you're presented with.

In a puzzle game (especially one with a first person perspective), that counts as bad design.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: karajorma on October 12, 2008, 12:52:08 pm
Yep. That was about the only annoyance I ever had with Portal and it only really manifested itself in the challenge games anyway so it didn't bother me much.

If this mod requires it heavily then I'm not going to bother with it.

Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Colonol Dekker on October 13, 2008, 10:07:37 am
I see it as a FPS with puzzle elements not the other way around. SO i'll get it regardless. (It's gotta be less hassle than spore was)
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: redsniper on October 13, 2008, 11:20:33 pm
The killing blow is that you have to lug the companion cube up with you the entire way. :p
Spoiler:
You can just leave it at the bottom, shoot a portal when you get to the top, then go back and get it. :p
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Vasudan Admiral on October 18, 2008, 01:24:18 am
I was wondering if someone would point that out. ;)
Yes I'd worked that out while in game, but saying that somewhat detracts from the percieved difficulty, which I thought nicely tipped it from 'stupidly over-frustrating' to 'impossible'. :p
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: karajorma on October 18, 2008, 02:57:52 am
The killing blow is that you have to lug the companion cube up with you the entire way. :p
Spoiler:
You can just leave it at the bottom, shoot a portal when you get to the top, then go back and get it. :p

Is that obvious when the mission starts though?
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Vasudan Admiral on October 18, 2008, 07:29:04 pm
Spoiler:
No - you might be able to guess as to how to do it, but if you don't know for sure you risk not bringing it up with you and finding no place to put a portal up the top.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Bobboau on October 19, 2008, 02:46:48 am
well that's why it's called a puzzle game, you need to try all sorts of solutions out to get through. that was the first thing that came to my mind when the situation was described.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: Vasudan Admiral on October 19, 2008, 07:56:59 am
Well that's kinda the point that's been made - the original portal was almost entirely strategic puzzle based. You had to work out what to do in order to achieve the objective, and then do it. In prelude though, the puzzle part is only the first little bit of the solution - the rest is technique, and repetition of that technique (and by that I mean quicksave and quickload because it is just about the least forgiving game I've ever seen) until you succeed.

Considering the difficulty in a lot of the jumping portals techniques needed, that gets real old real fast.

If you like that kind of game, then prelude does do it pretty well and overall I did enjoy it. If you're after more portal style play with good strategic puzzles, then it might be better to look elsewhere.
Title: Re: Portal: Prelude
Post by: karajorma on October 19, 2008, 11:57:25 am
Yep. That basically sums up my problem with it. Portal was mostly about using your brains rather than your reaction times. If Prelude has turned that on its head then it's of little interest to me.