Have to say, that game more than lived up to the first. I was a little turned off by the very Bioshock middle section in the old testing area, but the bookends were great.

Loved Wheatley, PotAtOs, and the ending...(SUPER SPOILER!!!!!!!!!!)

When Companion Cube gets chucked out too was just perfect. I almost cried.

For all the bitching people do about valve, they sure know how to make a kickass narrative with characters you care about. After reading their employee handbook, and feeling a little forlorn over not having a chance of working for them, I understand why. Great game, 9.5/10.

I just recently played it too. This game was a perfect sequel in every aspect.

Old aperture felt like steampunk and glados vs wheatley dialogues where pure art;)

"the gratest minds of human race creating the biggest moron" - i cried from laughter.

One of the best games in years, and portal 1 feels like a mere prologue;)

I loved the interactions with GlaDos in potato form. Also, the final boss fight was clever. In fact, everything was great...but i did find the Andrew Ryan-esque themes a bit unneccasary.

But but Cave Johnson.

I must add, the team that translated the game into french for Valve did an amazing job. The managed to put so many hilarious french-only cultural references in Wheatley and Glados dialogues it was merely unbelievable.

And all that without ruining the atmsophere at all! Plus the voice acting was just perfect.

So, yes, long ago I dismissed the Portal series as a "puzzle game" series and thus not likely to fit my gaming style. Boy was I wrong and I'm happy I finally played them!!

That's amazing thing with Portals - they are pure puzzle games. 99% of time you're solving puzzles:)

But everything around puzzles is simply amazing. And the feel you get after doing every step forward......it feels at least like amazing discovery;)

Well maybe except puzzle designed by Wheatley - but even that was amazing in it's own way;)

I laughed probably a bit too loud when the gigantic circular vault door rose, accompanied by blaring horns and strobe lights, only to reveal a regular door and a janitor's seat. And some of those famous Aperture mugs, if I recall correctly.

It's a brilliant game, and I urge you to try out co-op as well.

The co-ops really cool. I'm not sure I would attempt working with someone without voice chat but the extra communication tools are a nice touch and really helpful.

You have those ingame. Sadly if both of you are good, it can be completed in few hours. I played w/ my brother, and even though we were stuck on one level ~45 minutes, we've stil beaten it in under 4 hours.

Also, am I the only one that endlessly hated those gels?

I'll second that. If you have the option, play the co-op campaign with a friend where none of you have played it before, and use voice chat to communicate. It's an absolutely amazing experience. I did it with one of my co-workers. The original campaign took us about 6 hours to complete, and the extra free DLC chapter took about 3 hours, so that's 9 hours of fantastic gameplay right there, provided you can do it like that. I imagine that it's not nearly as fun without voice chat, or if one of the participants has already played the co-op campaign.

Don't know but I liked them, thought they where a nice addition to the puzzle mechanics. Well that and the lasers the brought in to replace those orbs.

I'd love to do that, unfortunately all my rela-life friends hate Steam with such a passion they simply refuse to buy any game that needs Steam to work... Even when there's an amazing promo and they would just risk a few euros...

So, no co-op campaign for me...

I liked the gels in the later acts where you are back in standard test chambers. Their application in the "Old Timey/Bioshock" levels got stale for me.

I did cry a little. Not too much...but a little. Just finished the game for the first time; did this in two days. The end battle was perfect. The ending cinematic was perfect. The end credits were perfect: thus I shed a tear of happiness. The ending is even more emotional, if you gathered that GLaDOS was probably Chell's mom (when she was Caroline, of course), as it was implied. Also, the characters and their personalities were perfect, their wise-cracking and jokes were perfect, the puzzles were perfect, the graphics...well, not perfect, but still damn good. Pretty much everything was perfect. Except two things: like the OP, I didn't care so much about the Old Aperture Testing Area either (the one narrated by Cave Johnson and the short part after where you have no-one to talk to you) - also, it was these parts where I had the most trouble physically seeing where a portal surface would be, so often times I just fired the gun in every direction to see if a portal opened. But beside those two things, I really liked the game and it really glued me to my seat (thus I finished the game in two days like I already said). Recommended wholeheartedly for anyone who hasn't played the game yet, my score: 9.7 / 10.