Why is Portal considered one of the best games of all time

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WhiteTiger225

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X-D3M0NiK-X said:
Im very curious why Portal is considered one of the best games of all time, i played it on ps3 for about 4 hours and got really bored really fast lol. I don't mean to offend anyone, is it just becasue of the physics engine or something??? help lol
Maybe because most people can enjoy a game without the need of corpses being flung around the screen to enjoy em.
 

WhiteTiger225

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harhol said:
It's a clever idea and quite funny, but nothing more. A pleasant distraction.
This is another problem here

"It's nothing more then a pleasent distraction" "It will amuse you for a few hours but after that gets boring"

I have to wonder when I hear stuff like that... if people as of late actually have a job.. or a social life.. or sex.
 

sumanoskae

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WhiteTiger225 said:
X-D3M0NiK-X said:
Im very curious why Portal is considered one of the best games of all time, i played it on ps3 for about 4 hours and got really bored really fast lol. I don't mean to offend anyone, is it just becasue of the physics engine or something??? help lol
Maybe because most people can enjoy a game without the need of corpses being flung around the screen to enjoy em.
he didn't say anything about it not having enough action, you just assumed that
 

Iron Mal

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Portal was no means the best game ever, it wasn't even an excellent or great game.

It was ok, a pleasent change of pace and a nice break from virtual genocide but nothing more.

Some people like to think that because it's a puzzle game and 'makes you think' for a couple of hours that it somehow automatically makes it better but I don't buy this (in fact, I appologise if I offend anyone but this train of thought is usually connected to the iPod obsessed, pop culture devoted indie bastards in college who I used to refer to as 'twats').

If games that make you think are automatically good then I think that a majority of us need to extract our heads from our backsides, a game that is deep, insightful and thought provoking is good and all but if it fails as a game then we still have a very big problem.

Portal was a pleasently twisted trip into dark comedy and abstract one liners but at the end of the day it was a game based around physics puzzles, something valve seems to have an unhealthy obsession with. It had little in the way of replayability as a result and spewed forth more than it's fair share of obnoxiously unavoidable internet memes.

Appologies for the rant, it's late.
 

cainstwin

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Iron Mal said:
Portal was no means the best game ever, it wasn't even an excellent or great game.

It was ok, a pleasent change of pace and a nice break from virtual genocide but nothing more.

Some people like to think that because it's a puzzle game and 'makes you think' for a couple of hours that it somehow automatically makes it better but I don't buy this (in fact, I appologise if I offend anyone but this train of thought is usually connected to the iPod obsessed, pop culture devoted indie bastards in college who I used to refer to as 'twats').

If games that make you think are automatically good then I think that a majority of us need to extract our heads from our backsides, a game that is deep, insightful and thought provoking is good and all but if it fails as a game then we still have a very big problem.

Portal was a pleasently twisted trip into dark comedy and abstract one liners but at the end of the day it was a game based around physics puzzles, something valve seems to have an unhealthy obsession with. It had little in the way of replayability as a result and spewed forth more than it's fair share of obnoxiously unavoidable internet memes.

Appologies for the rant, it's late.
nt sure wat ur on about with replayability, iv replayed it more times than any other becos its short enuf 4 me 2 get hold of my bearings agen and then complete it in 1 sitting. Its a gd system and has wrked well 4 valve
 

Phoenix Arrow

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Because you played it on the PS3, quite frankly. The console ports don't hold a candle to a original.

tellmeimaninja said:
Also, judging by your speech and use of lol as every other word, I'm guessing you didn't get a single joke GLaDOS made...
GlaDOS didn't make a single joke throughout the entire game. The humour came from the disjointed attempts to normal human contact that she tried to make. Cake is used at celebrations so therefore cake = success. If you take away the cake then the success is invalid. Being honest and trustworthy but then trying to murder you. But she didn't make any threats and probably didn't know consider cooking something to be a bad thing, it's just how she was programmed.

I overanalyse things. Such a faaag, quite clearly. It's not the best game of all time. Top 10? Yeah, I could get on board with that. It's funny, it has good gameplay and makes you think which I admire in a game. I'll accept making you think without taking it to stage Silent Hill 3 did at one stage ie knowing in which order Shakespeares works were written. Google saved me on that one though so it remains my top game ever.
 

whaleswiththumbs

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X-D3M0NiK-X said:
Im very curious why Portal is considered one of the best games of all time, i played it on ps3 for about 4 hours and got really bored really fast lol. I don't mean to offend anyone, is it just becasue of the physics engine or something??? help lol
The important question here is why did you get bored? I know Portal does not take 4 hours to finish, i think I did it 2 hours over like 2 days.

I think it's considered a great game because of it's polish, the leveks are probably the best puzzle game levels you could find, it's got the right amount of funny-to- emotional ratio, think the cake and the cube. Combined with amazing setting, and The sort-of self-contained enviroment, you don't have to have played this to get this, it's like a mid-core puzzle game, hardcore enough for all the "gamers" and easy enough for the casuals to hop on, and we can all groove to the same station, if you catch my drift.

Really the Orange box brought me "into" gaming, before it i was a gamer and didn't know it, i used to think of a gamer as a twig-boy cheeto-eater, who liked to watch stupid videos and play Halo(incase nobody has told you, I think Halo is a decent game, but so was Pong, get over it) in their mom's basement, and now I'm a proud gamer, I'd stand on the corner and scream it, but I wouldn't cause I'm too busy eatin cheetos in a basement(not my mom's either, oooohhh)

EDIT: I don't think i stayed to much on-topic...
 

Booze Zombie

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X-D3M0NiK-X said:
Im very curious why Portal is considered one of the best games of all time, i played it on ps3 for about 4 hours and got really bored really fast lol. I don't mean to offend anyone, is it just becasue of the physics engine or something??? help lol
It's a thinking game, not to insult you.

It's about stopping, looking and thinking, not action and guns.
 

Aedwynn

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Sounds like the OP just had a case of Hype Aversion to me. When people go on and on about how *awesome* something is, and then you watch,read or play it and it's OK at best. Happened to me a few times and I know how perplexing it is that everyone loves this thing and you don't really see why.

Don't worry about it, as one poster above me said - just get on with your life. There's bound to be all kinds of things that you adore and other people just don't get.

More to the point - I liked Portal. I don't think it's the 'b3st g4me EVAR!!111 thecakeisalieLOLZ!1 or anything, but I saw it as an excellent 'coffee table game' with a pretty unique concept. GlaDOS was funny, I kinda saw her as sort of an affectionate parody of all the great insane AI villains like Shodan, 'Mother', HAL, Ship (Obscure?;-) etc. Not too hard or long, but when you've got a job, wife, commitments to juggle I didn't mind. At least it doesn't just give you A WINNER IS YOU! at the end and you get treated to a song for your efforts.(Even though I admit it's more of an extended continuity gag than a proper song I still loved it.)

Also, for the price, I thought you could do a LOT worse for entertainment.

Ok, I've gone on far too long here. That's just my 2p.
 

Void(null)

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Phoenix Arrow said:
I'll accept making you think without taking it to stage Silent Hill 3 did at one stage ie knowing in which order Shakespeares works were written. Google saved me on that one though so it remains my top game ever.
Q:

"In here is a tragedy---
art thou player or audience?
Be as it may, the end doth remain:
all go on only toward death.

The first words at thy left hand:
a false lunacy, a madly dancing man.
Hearing unhearable words, drawn
to a beloved's grave---and there,
mayhap, true madness at last.

As did this one, playing at death,
find true death at the last.
Killing a nameless lover, she
pierced a heart rent by sorrow.

Doth lie invite truth?
Doth verity but wear the
mask of falsehood?
Ah, thou pitiful, thou
miserable ones!

Still amidst lies, though the end
cometh not, wherefore yearn
for death?
Wilt thou attend to thy beloved?
Truth and lies, life and death:
a game of turning white to black
and black to white.

Is not a silence brimming with
love more precious than flattery?
A peaceful slumber preferred to
a throne besmirched with blood.

One vengeful man
spilled blood for two;
Two youths shed tears for three;
Three witches disappeared thusly;
And only the four keys remain.

Ah, but verily...
In here is a tragedy---
art thou player or audience?
There is nothing which cannot
become a puppet of fate or an
onlooker, peering into the cage."

A: King Lear, MacBeth, Hamlet, Othello



VS

Q: "THE CAKE IS A LIE"

A: Push Button receive bacon! [http://knowyourmeme.com/i/9403/original/PushButtonReceiveBacon.jpg]


I will take my Silent Hill Puzzles any day thank you.
 

Treblaine

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I suppose next you're going to ask what is the big deal with Citizen Kane, Shakespeare's plays or Casablanca?

If you have played the game and don't realise how great it is... maybe it's just YOU.

Perhaps you are just not mature enough to appreciate the nuances of the game. People who have been gaming for a while (like me and most other people on these forums) can get pretty jaded by games and really want something deeper, fresh and new. Portal offered that.

PS: as an indicator of whether it is worth explaining why Portal is so good, answer me this question:

Did you think Transformers 2 was a good movie?

If No, please reply and I will take the time to explain it to you.

If yes, you did think Transformers 2 was a good movie... then just go away.

I'm not going to waste my time with mindless puissant. Your rights to start new threads should be revoked.
 

Iron Mal

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cainstwin said:
nt sure wat ur on about with replayability, iv replayed it more times than any other becos its short enuf 4 me 3 get hold of my bearings agen and then complete it in 1 sitting. Its a gd system and has wrked well 4 valve
Portal lacked replayability simply because it was a puzzle game (once you've done the puzzle once you know the solution, which somewhat defeats the point of playing it again) and most of the comedy in it was reliant on one liners (which are only funny so many times).

The game was short, while this prevented the game from dragging on it also meant there was less there in the first place (giving me less reason to revisit it after playing it once), in my opinion it's a method that has it's advantages and drawbacks.
 

GenHellspawn

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Treblaine said:
I'm not going to waste my time with mindless puissant. Your rights to start new threads should be revoked.
I fail to see why people can adapt such an elitist attitude towards a goddamned video game. Come on, man, are you so high and mighty that you can't for one minute overlook the fact that somebody disagreed with you to treat them like a person? Your taste in games is not the gold standard, and people that differ from it are not a failed attempt at being you. Get your head out of your ass, and try explaining your opinions next time.