Gameplay
Fml. It had been a while since playing the original mod for the first Portal, so my memories of it were a bit iffy, but after the absolute pain and torture that was Chamber 19 I can agree with all the other comments I've seen of this. This mod focuses very much on precision platforming and physics than it does on puzzles; and even if that's your thing, it's so incredibly infuriating that it's beyond just having a skill issue. I tried to use the developer console but for some reason it wouldn't work, I kept dying due to the heaps of stuff GLaDOS throws at you. I called it a day. After spending so long on Chamber 19 I had had enough. The game suggesting you to turn off Portal Funneling is a red flag in itself. You really need lots of momentum to achieve anything in some segments.
Oh and the placement of so many Turrets was just taking the p*ss.

Visuals
The RTX is nice, my Nvidia card ran the game at 40-60fps on Performance mode. Still pretty, and I prefer the Portal 1 aesthetic to 2's. I'm afraid that won't redeem this game for me at all.

Music
I guess there was music. Helped the Portal ambience. I'll give credit to the ominous music that played at the second section of Chamber 19, really hammered in my despair. Oh and they changed the GLaDOS boss music, it's alright. There was something a little quirky about the original's choices but I understand the change to non-copyright music, if that was the reason for the change.

Voice Acting
It's fine. At least they're real voices now instead of the TTS voices from the original, but the dialogue is still a nothingburger. It's not funny nor that entertaining.

Story
I feel that when I first encountered this mod years and years ago, it was the prospect of a game taking place before the activation of GLaDOS that really intrigued me and made me enjoy the original mod so much. I still love the idea today, and seeing the behind-the-scenes of Aperture filled with actual people is such a strange thing. Sadly ofc this is all attached to poorly designed gameplay.

Conclusion
If you want to put yourself through this gauntlet that's physics oriented and not puzzle then go ahead. But if you want a game that's actually similar to Portal then perhaps this isn't it. Best watch a playthrough or have the developer console at the ready if you want to have an easier time.

Reviewed on Jan 21, 2024


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