Rated: 100% (1 votes)
Loading ...Portal:Prelude (Review)
Big_Adam
As it stands there is one big Portal mod going, that is the Portal Flash map pack. A very nice and well rounded map pack with ties in nicely with Portal but is run as an alternative story to Portal.
IF YOU HAVE NOT PLAYED PORTAL, THEN THERE BE SPOILERS IN HERE.
Portal:Prelude is a new modification which aims to give an early before story to the now much loved Portal (I have a thing for GLaDOS, okay!). If this sounds slightly familiar to you then it may be because Valve are planning something similar but they are going much earlier (if you ever looked up the Aperture Science web site, there was a biography of the man who made the Portal technology as he though his life was going backwards). Portal:Prelude is set say five to ten years before the current Portal game. Based in a time when Aperture Science labs are doing some testing and haven’t yet bought GLaDOS online.
This is where you step in.
You play Abby (you start off as “test subject” but the two guys running the test have an argument and call you by name from there out) who is pretty much Chell (from Portal) with blonde hair. You wake up in the chamber and hear (not GLaDOS) two guys, Mike and Erik. They tell you about well, the Portal gun (with some offbeat and slightly sick humour) and generally either moan or argue during the tests (i.e. “Is she still alive? I’m here for dead people”). So the scene is fairly set, you run test and listen to Mike and Erik until Erik gets replaced by Peter.
Enough with the story for a bit, on to game play (I’m coming back to the story later, I like a good story). The challenges in the game itself are FAR harder than that of the original Portal game. I had one problem later on in Portal with a challenge but I really had to scratch my head at some of the ones in Portal:Prelude. The main problem with mine is that some of them you have to be VERY quick on the draw with the portal gun, which with all the flipping about isn’t easy (I’m sure I read a console line to fix that). Mid way through the game the levels seem to become super simple but they soon ram up again for the final (test chamber) parts of the game.
I have to admit though; I did mostly “noclip” through some challenges to get to the end. I just wanted to know what was going to happen in the end!
So the game play, while tricky is pretty good. If you found Portal a little too easy then it’s really worth a try. Although, I think sometimes turrets are added for the hell of it to make it harder.
Back to the story, you get out of the test chamber (as the tester bugger off to sort out GLaDOS) and you get to walk around Aperture Science! By Aperture Science staff no less (reskinned Half Life NPC’s)! You even get a cake … almost. As you might have guessed when it gets nice and comfy in Portal then something bad is about to happen but it had a nice long build up in Portal:Prelude.
/!\ SPOILER /!\
As you might have guessed GLaDOS come online and the poop hit the fan.
/!\ SPOILER /!\
So you then have to run about sorting the whole situation out, beat the boss and have a good (if rather upsetting) ending, which then nicely ties the Portal universe and the Half Life universe together.
Portal:Prelude is a really good mod. It has good animation, sets, story and lots of reskinned items so they fit in the world of Portal (Portal Manhacks FTW!). It does never the less have one or two problems.
The biggest problem with Portal:Prelude is the voice work in it. The voice work in Portal: Prelude is all done via a computer so the voices have this nastily non-human sound. This works lovely for GLaDOS (has a few lines done) but for the people talking (like the tester) it just sounds off, couple with one or two times when the lip synching just goes AWOL and leaves disembodied voices.
Still, the game overall for a small group is rather good. The story work, the script works; the puzzles are a bugger to solve. It’s a really good bit of work that covers all the bases of a good game. I would even go as far as to rate it better than the Portal Flash Map mod as Portal:Prelude uses all Portal stuff where as Portal Flash Map mod makes a few of it’s own (the boss in particular stands out).
So, Portal:Prelude. It’s fun and tricky. What more could you want.
Score : 
8/10 – Damn good but the voice work kills it.
Links to everything:
^^ That room, right there. Messed - up.
I agree with you on the voiceover, using text-to-speeech for GLaDOS worked but it completely wrong for Mike, Erik and Peter [the names of the TTS voices IIRC].
TBH i ‘noclip’ through most of it too… I don’t quite have the red bull fuelled lightning-quick reflexes that some of the puzzles require…
I tired to only ‘noclip’ the super shooting quick draw bits, then I just became lazy near the end of the puzzle rooms.
Damn you laziness!
It’s FAR harder than the original! i find myself saving after most successful portals, rather than levels!