There are plenty of fan-made films based on videogame franchises, but few better than this pair based off the Half-Life universe. Above is a seven minute piece of awesome, Dan Trachtenberg’s Portal: No Escape. I’m a big fan of the Portal series and it’s great to see filmmakers creating such wonderful work based on that source material.

The second film is David and Ian Purchase’s Escape from City 17: Part 2, which I’ve been waiting for since 2009 when the first half blew me away. That awaits you after the break. Enjoy!

It’s too bad feature-length films based on games aren’t this amazing. Imagine what these guys could do with an actual budget, compared to what we see in theaters every now and again. Every new Paul W.S. Anderson Resident Evil film is like a stab in the chest.

Deploying Surprise in 3….2….1…

If you’ve yet to purchase a copy of Portal 2, Valve has sweetened the deal to make pulling the trigger that much easier. The company has dropped the price of the PC and Mac versions of the game to the attractive price of $30. For an additional fiver you can pick up a bundled copy with the original Portal, if you’re the only person on earth that hasn’t played it yet.

Not good enough for you? Well then, here are your test results: You are a horrible person. 

[Source: Steam]

Earlier today, Valve head honcho Gabe Newell spoke at the Games for Change conference. There, he announced that since its launch in April Portal 2 has managed to sell a paltry 3 million copies worldwide. He used the number as “evidence” that games can be both educational and commercially successful. Apparently, educators have used the game to explain incredibly difficult physics concepts such as “speedy thing goes in, speedy thing comes out.”

Anyway, who care’s about that education stuff? That’s only there to distract us from the pitiful fact that Portal 2 only managed to sell 3 million copies. That’s barely a million per month. Utterly pathetic. No wonder why we here at Gamer Limit gave Portal 2 the lowest score possible: 8 out of 10. What an utterly crap game. DJ Hero is a way better educational game because it’s about music, which is way more fun than smelly physics, which I somehow know even though I haven’t played it. Also, it has sold more copies, sort of. Take that Valve, Activision is still #1 — with a bullet — something portal guns can’t even shoot.

Source: Gamasutra

Fearing a tepid reception as a full standalone title, Valve first released Portal with the Orange Box alongside a host of well-established titles at a bargain price. Little did they know that just few short years later that little three-hour long bonus game would be one of the most critically acclaimed and beloved titles in recent history.

Now that they’re back to deliver a full blown sequel, one large question is raised. Does Portal 2 live up to the original, or will we need cake and grief counseling at the conclusion of this review?

After having been dragged away at the conclusion of Portal, we reassume the role of Chell in a dingy motel room. After some hilarious cognitive testing, players are introduced to Wheatley – a likable, yet dimwitted, personality core. In an attempt to escape from the decaying facility, the two accidentally re-activate the previous dormant GLaDOS. While, obviously still angry about you “murdering” her years ago, she’s willing to put differences aside – “for science”. Commence testing!

Visually, the game isn’t terribly impressive until you consider the architecture its running on. Portal 2 still uses the Source engine, which was first seen in Half-Life 2. Portal 2 may catch some flak from those obsessed with pristine graphics, but it’s still a far cry from ugly. On a more aesthetic note, the Aperture Laboratories have fallen into a state of disrepair. Centuries without maintenance have caused the labs to fall apart and become overgrown with vegetation. This gives Portal 2’s environments a much darker aesthetic – leaving the sterile feel of the original behind.

Though it isn’t without a few new mechanics, Portal 2’s core gameplay remains essentially unchanged from the original Portal. Once again you will be using the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device or “portal gun” for short. The portal gun allows players to create a pair of portals in order to solve puzzles which would normally be physically impossible.

As was the case in Portal, a great deal of the puzzle solving is focusing around the magnitude of linear momentum at which you travel through a portal, or as GLaDOS puts it “speedy thing goes in, speedy thing comes out”. As fun as the classic portal gameplay still is, the gimmick is no longer new and doesn’t feel quite so unique. Luckily, Valve has a few new tricks up their sleeves.

There are a few new devices that will be integral in Portal 2’s puzzle chambers. Aerial faith plates essentially catapult players and objects a set distance through the air. Weighted cubes make a return, including a new reflective one that can divert lasers. Tractor beams will assist you in trapping and transport objects. Finally, the hard light bridge allows you to cross chasms and doubles as a shield to protect you from turrets. These new toys are a lot of fun to play with, but unfortunately aren’t used all that frequently. Perhaps, this is because of the additional gimmicks Valve has added into the equation.

Prior to the development of Portal 2, Valve hired the team of students behind 2009’s Tag: the Power of Paint. The concepts behind this game were used for new puzzle elements in Portal 2. These elements manifest themselves in the three gels that are revealed in the latter half of the game. When jumping on blue gel, Chell will be launched into the air, bouncing uncharacteristically high, whereas running over orange gel will speed up her movement considerably. Finally, covering a surface with white gel allows you to create portals on that surface. These gel are considerable game changers as well, but aren’t quite as fun to use as the aforementioned devices.

Unfortunately, the clever physics-based puzzle solving is less present in Portal 2. While that still exists, there is a large portion of the game where puzzling takes a back seat to exploration of Aperture Science’s underbelly. While from a narrative perspective this portion of the game is incredibly interesting, from a gameplay standpoint it is an exercise in frustration.

Much of the gameplay in the exploration portion of the game comes down to finding the one place where you can place a portal in order to progress. While it serves to provide a break between the challenging test chambers, playing Valve’s three dimensional, monochromatic take on Where’s Waldo quickly becomes frustrating. Rather than the usual rewarding sense of achievement, moving on from these areas comes with a sense of relief that a painful step of the journey is over.

The writing in Portal was fantastic.  While things no longer feel so new and exciting, Portal 2 does wonders for fleshing out the underbelly of the Half-Life universe and telling the sordid history of Aperture Science. The dialog and characterization of GLaDOS and Wheatley is particularly interesting and hilarious. Fantastic voice acting and a wonderful script make Portal 2 one of the most genuinely funny titles on the market.

Unfortunately, the narrative in Portal 2 is handicapped by an interesting design choice. Frequent loading screens make the experience feel incredibly disjointed, which is disappointing because the original Portal tackled this problem in a way that made the experience virtually seamless. Players flowed from one level to the next in an elevator – similar to those of Mirror’s Edge or the door sequences in Resident Evil. Going back to loading screens with a progress bar feels like a definite step back for the series.

After you’ve completed the campaign, the story continues in the co-operative mode with a pair of charming robotic protagonists: P-Body and Atlas. If you think the co-operative mode is just a rehash of the single player campaign that you can play with a friend you’d be sorely mistaken. In typical Valve style, the co-op mode has been designed from the ground up to offer players a brilliant multiplayer experience. Sharing those “aha moments” with a friend in your mutual discovery of puzzle solutions, and the fun you can have with four portals showcases the brilliance of the series and its seminal concept.

While Valve has boasted interconnectivity with Steam, the PlayStation Network is currently experiencing technical difficulties (read: hackers). Luckily, Valve has included split-screen multiplayer. Additionally, PlayStation 3 copies generously come bundled with a code for the PC version of the game.

Does Portal 2 outshine its predecessor? That’s a difficult question to answer. It is a longer, fuller experience to be certain, but having previously seen and experienced what made Portal so interesting and unique, Portal 2 doesn’t quite feel so new or exciting. Some frustrating decisions and an underwhelming second act aside, the central premise is as brilliant as ever and Valve has enough tricks up their sleeves to keep it challenging, interesting, and hilarious as always.

Today marks the start of another Humble Indie Bundle, this time brought to you by the good folks over at Frozenbyte, a Finnish game studio.

In the past Gamer Limit has posted news items about the two previous Humble Indie Bundles, but in case you missed those let me break it down for you. Basically, you can pay what you want for (in this case) five indie games you may have missed otherwise. The cool thing is, you get to choose where you money goes. You can split it evenly among the developers and charities, give it all to charity, or send it all to the developer. The charities involved are Electronic Frontier Foundation and Child’s Play Charity.
The games included in this bundle are: Trine, Shadowgrounds: Survivor, Shadowgrounds, Splot and Jack Claw. What’s real cool about this deal is that all of these games are DRM free and can be activated on Steam if you choose.

To jump on this deal head over to the Humble Indie Bundle site.

what do you guys think  about these kinds of deals? Are you going to purchase this bundle? If so, where are you sending your money? Let us know by leaving a comment below.

You guys all know what a big Valve fan boy I am, right? I mean, I’m currently drinking coffee out of my Black Mesa mug with a headcrab hat on in a room covered in Left 4 Dead posters. I love Valve.

Yesterday the developer released its newest TV commercial, this time its for their upcoming game Portal 2. As you can see above, the commercial features the two playable robots from the newly added co-op mode, Atlas and P-Body, as they learn about portals and the possibilities they open.
I don’t know about you guys, but I loved the commercial. I think it does a wonderful job of introducing the concept of portals to people who may not have played the first game or may not be gamers at all. I would have liked it to be a little bit longer, maybe showcasing the new Propulsion Gel or maybe just some more in game footage. Regardless, I still loved it; but than again, I am a huge Valve fan boy.

What do you guys think about this? Do you think this is a good move for Valve? Does this commercial make you wanna play Portal 2. Do you think it will help pull in gamers and non-gamers alike? Let us know what you think with a comment below.

Source: Shacknews.com

Way back in June Valve co-founder and managing director Gabe Newell gave a little talk where he claimed that the PS3 version of Portal 2 would be the best console version, mainly due to the inclusion of Valve’s Steamworks technology. Despite this claim, Valve has been pretty tight-lipped about what exactly Steamworks on the PS3 would entails, that is until today.

According to Valve, Portal 2 on the PS3 will feature cross-platform multiplayer with both PC and Mac. On top of that, there will be cross-platform chat and cloud-based saved game storage. Also, when you buy the PS3 version of Portal 2, you’ll get a free SteamPlay version of the game for PC and Mac.

According to Gabe Newell, “We made a promise to gamers at E3 that Portal 2 for the PlayStation 3 would be the best console version of the product. Working together with Sony we have identified a set of features we believe are very compelling to gamers. We hope to expand upon the foundation being laid in Portal 2 with more Steam features and functionality in DLC and future content releases.”

Project lead Josh Weier added, “We designed the Portal 2 PS3 experience to be very straightforward for gamers. PS3 gamers will be able to simply drop the Blu-Ray disc in the PS3, link to their Steam account from inside the game, and all their Steam friends (on PC and Mac) will be visible and accessible for chat and game invites.”

I don’t know about you guys, but I’m pretty amped to hear this. One of my best friends, who recently moved from Columbus (my current city) to Washington DC, just ditched his PC in favor of a PS3. I was afraid I wouldn’t get to game with him as much as I used to because of this switch plus the move. Thanks to Valve, my buddy and I will be solving puzzles together when the game is released on April 20.

Source: Shacknews.com

You know I hate to admit it but every now and then Twitter comes in handy. Take today for instance: had I continued to resist signing up for Twitter (like I had for the longest time) I wouldn’t have known about Tripwire Interactive’s upcoming event for Killing Floor (one of my favorite games).

According to Tripwire’s tweet, the developer will be hosting a special Christmas themed event for its Horde Mode shooter. Dubbed “The Killing Floor Twisted Christmas” this special event will feature Christmas themed monsters, a new “Santa’s Evil Lair” map, thirteen new achievements and an unlockable “the Baddest Santa” character.

On top of all that Tripwire is also including some TF2 love in the event. “Everyone who owns both Killing Floor and Team Fortress 2 will now get a playable red or blue ‘The Pyro’ character from TF2 recreated in the Killing Floor art style! But wait there’s is more – everyone that owns TF2 and either already owns or purchases Killing Floor before the event ends will receive a special item in Team Fortress 2: Mr Fosters Gas mask and Tie equip-able on the Pyro!”

It is important to note that this event is only running from December 14 through January 4. After that, you won’t be able to unlock any of the new items.

I don’t know about you guys, but I absolutely love these kinds of events. The last one I can think of was the TF2 Halloween event, which saw the Yue brothers team up to farm for the special unloackable weapon. As soon as I read this story I had to call my brother and make plans to spend all holiday break blasting specimens.

Enough of my excitement though. What about you guys? Are there any other Killing Floor fans out there? If not, you guys should really do yourselves a favor and pick this game up. I’m sure if you wait until the Steam holiday sale you can get it for around $5.

Source.

Halloween is just a few days away and, of course,  Valve has release a game update to Team Fortress 2 celebrating this spooky season. Dubbed the “Second Annu-Hell Scream Fortress Hauntedead Halloween Special,” the update brings a whole slew of new content including a new map, masks, hats, special items, achievements, and an AI controlled Horseless Headless Horseman Boss.

All this new content revolves around the new map: CP_Mann Manor. This new attack/defend map features exploding pumpkins, spooky decorations, a randomly spawning Haunted Halloween Gift and the aforementioned Horseless Headless Horseman. Apparently, the Horseman will randomly spawn on control points to chase which ever player is closest. If the Horseman is tailing you, just melee an enemy player to pass off the curse. If you successfully defeat the Horseman, you will receive special “Unusual Haunted Metal Scrap” that allows you to craft the Halloween themed items.
Some items that can be crafted include Horseless Headless Horsemann’s Headtaker axe, the Horrific Headsplitter Hat, the Cadaver’s Cranium Hat, the Spine-Chilling Skull hat, and the Voodoo Juju hat. There are also paper-bag masks of all eight classes. Once you collect them all, you will unlock the special Saxton Hale mask.

As usual, Valve is celebrating this update by selling TF2 for $10 (50% off the normal retail price).

What do you guys think about this? Will this rekindle your interest in TF2? Is this an effective way to bring in new players? Let us know what you think with a comment below.

Source: TF2 Blog

Today PC gaming super hero Valve released some details regarding the number of people who use its Steam service. Over the past 12 months, Steam has seen a 178% increase in users. This pushes the grand total of Steam gamers to over 30 million. Out of these 30 million, six million users log onto team each day.

Valve CEO Gabe Newell remarked about this years growth, saying: “Steam is on track to record the biggest year in its six year history. The year has marked major development advances to the platform with the introduction of support for Mac titles, the Steam Wallet and in-game item buying support, and more. We believe the growth in accounts, sales, and player numbers is completely tied to this work and we plan to continue to develop the platform to offer more marketing, sales, and design tools for developers and publishers of games and digital entertainment.”

On top of all these new users, Valve also shared that its Steamworks publishing service has now been implemented in over 200 games. On top of serving as an anti-piracy measure, Steamworks also allows games access to Valve’s cloud-based game saving service, Steam Cloud. Apparently, since Steam Cloud’s launch, more than 100 million files have been saved.

Personally these numbers don’t really surprise me, especially considering the recent influx of Mac gamers. As one of the six million gamers who log into Steam daily, it’s hard for me to imagine why someone wouldn’t want to use Steam. You get great games at great prices, plus all sorts of benefits like friends lists, mod support, and free weekends. If you haven’t checked out Steam yet, do yourself a favor and install it. You won’t be sorry.

Source:  Valve

Who gets tired of shooting zombies?  No one, am I right?  Well to be honest zombie games are starting to become the new World War II setting of this generation in my opinion. Though  if you are still in need of extra zombie action then the best place still has to be the Left 4 Dead series of titles from the people’s developer, Valve.

Valve made us all aware recently that the new “The Sacrifice” DLC would be coming really soon.  Well they’ve gone and elaborated on “real soon”, turning it in to a firm date.  That being the 5th October.

The new DLC will be available for both the  original Left 4 Dead as well the updated sequel, Left 4 Dead 2, when it ships next month.   As well as bringing a new story based campaign mission to both titles it will also allow Left 4 Dead 2 owners to play the original “No Mercy” campaign from Left 4 Dead.

The update will be completely free for those lucky PC owners and come in at a reasonable 560 Microsoft Points for Xbox 360 owners.

UPDATE: The comic has been released and can be found here.

Some of you may remember when I posted a little news item about Left 4 Dead getting a little back story courtesy of a four-part online graphic novel produced by Valve. Well, it just so happens that the first issue is scheduled to arrive today!

While it currently is not up on the Left 4 Dead blog just yet, Valve did post some pretty gnarly wallpapers based on the comic. As soon as the comic goes live, I’ll update this post with a link.

As I’m sure you guys all know, I’m one of the worlds biggest Valve fanboys. It’s the little things like this (giving away a comic) that endears me to this developer so much. I mean, remember when EA did the whole DeadSpace comic/story tie in? They charged money for it (after the first issue). Now I’m not going to hold that against EA, I mean they produced a product and sold it which is cool. It’s just that Valve seems to understand the importance of the long-term returning customer. By giving away these comics for free, they not only expand the Left 4 Dead brand into a new medium, but also allow the community to become more invested into these characters/settings which translated to future purchases if/when more Left 4 Dead games come out.

Anyway, enough of my obviously biased rant. What do you guys think about this? Are you amped for some L4D back story? What about the upcoming DLC? On a side note, which character from L4d (both 1 and 2) is your favorite any why? Personally, I’m a big fan of Rochelle, mainly because she’s from Cleveland (my home town) and I have to represent the 216 whenever I get the chance. Let us know what you think by leaving a comment below.