Portal 2

Portal 2

Developed by: Valve

Released: 2011

Platform: Xbox 360

With a desire to flee the crumbling facility, Wheatley and Chell begin their quest to escape Aperture Science to return to the real world.

Portal 2 invites you (and a friend) to play with the laws of physics in a fantastically original puzzle game. Like it’s predecessor the player solves puzzles by placing portals and teleporting between them.

Source Engine

One of the biggest leaps in the development of in-game physics came with the creation of the Source & Havok engines, both of which are in play within Portal 2. 

The Source engine was actually built from the old engines of previous Valve videogames, using code from as far back as Quake II in 1997. The Source engine debuted in 2004 with Half-Life 2 and Counter Strike: Force. Physics run within the Source’s larger engine via the Havok Physics engine.

Since the Havok physics engine was released in 2000, over 600 games have used it!

Interesting Facts:

• Portal originally started as a student project! A small group from the Digipen Institute of Technology were working on a game concept called ‘Narbacular Drop’ as their senior project. The project was spotted by Valve Software boss Gabe Newell and they were all offered jobs!

• Initially this follow up to wasn’t going to include Chell, GLaDOS or wait for it…portals! It was originally going to be set in the 1980’s and was going to use a mechanic called ‘F-Stop’. This would involve the player using a camera to grab sections of the game’s scenery to solve puzzles!