Update One Hundred and Thirty-Seven: 7 March 2018
Portal 2
15.4 hours, 47 of 51 achievements
7.5/10
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
Remember when Valve made video games? Pepperidge Farm remembers.
They were good, those Valve games. Real good. Incredible level design, sharp, punchy writing, interesting as hell. 2011 was a nicer time, a simpler time. A time where I cut out of my high school prom after an hour to bring my date back to my place so we could play Portal 2.
2018 is a very different time, though. It feels both closer and further away than its seven year difference to 2011. And in that difference, Portal 2 has become something like an incredibly well-made shoe gone soft and worn from so many days of use. The shine is dimmed, the stitching pulling in places, spots worn shabby and matte from being rubbed over and over again. Jokes aren’t as funny, because they’d been quoted so much. Wheatley is way more fucking annoying and way less endearing than I remember him being, but that could be because I have a much lower tolerance for male characters than I used to, so I’ll chalk that up to a me thing.
There were things I’m very glad I got to revisit, and things I wished I let fade away in my memories. I had listened to the developer’s commentary so much in the past that I remembered a lot of which ones went where as a replayed, and I was attuned to the developers’ deft touch molding everything, which is good for the artistic eye but bad for the heart that used to be awed into silence.
If nothing else, my girlfriend enjoyed the hell out of replaying these puzzles (she is SO much better than I am), and it prodded me into rereading some excellent fanfictions that I very much enjoyed, like Blue Sky (I don’t think there is sex in this one) and the Punishment (definitely sex in this one, also each chapter has great accompanying art).
I want to give a shoutout to my girlfriend, for doing all the difficult bits in the game and also helping me get some achievements I never thought I’d get, like some speedrunning ones and, funnily enough, ‘Smash TV’ which I remember earmarking to get on 360 but never actually doing. Another shoutout to BLAEO user Blue Lightning, who was good 4 huggings and a quick run through the initiation course, and for BLAEO user VitoStippkow, who agreed to be the student to my professor and also provided a nice hug.
Oh! And! Life update! Ya girl got a job! A part time job walking dogs, but, fuck, it’s steady work and I can sleep in strangers’ homes and get paid to hang out with their animals and not talk to humans, so. Yay!
Next up: The girlfriend speaks: we’re going cute.
See you soon!
I was JUST talking to my boyfriend about how I would love to have a dog walking/dog sitting job. I decided not to though because staying at strangers houses freaks me out to much. Congrats on the job though! I hope you meet many great doggies :)
I still like Wheatley, but Glados is by far better in my opinion. I’m currently playing Half Life 2 for the first time, so I know how it feels to play the classics. I hope you have fun with Slime Ranchers!
I’d be leery, too, if I weren’t alone in the house. I also get to pick, so if there house doesn’t look safe I can turn it down (that’s happened in the past, with other walkers). Since dog walking/dog sitting is a luxury service, most of the clients have beaucoup money, so they live in literal mansions. I’d sleep in various mansions to play with dogs!
Oh yes, GLaDOS is the best, one of my favorite, most iconic characters of all time. She was the part of the game that aged the best, with her variations of lines and her delivery. Oh, impeccable. I love her.
I hope so, too! Thank you c:
Congrats on the job, that’s wonderful news! I hope you enjoy yourself, it sounds like the ideal human to animal contact ratio :D
I’ve started quite a few games that I’ve previously completed on console but are now languishing in the backlog with just a couple of achievements unlocked. Nostalgia plays cruel tricks on me sometimes but I can’t resist the lure of replaying my old favourites as I never know when I’ll have an Okami moment and love it as much as the first time.
I hope you enjoy Slime Rancher. I’m halfway through and need to get back into it, especially with the two large updates since then. It’s a charming and very cute experience :D
Thank you very much! Yes, I was even told specifically that the three women who run the joint are the ones to handle the humans, I just concern myself with the dogs. When I heard that I was like yesssss.
Oh, I know! It’s a gamble every time. On the whole, though, I find that I’ve been more lucky than I have been unlucky, and even if it’s not the same, it’s still a net positive.
That’s good to hear! I’m excited, too c: It does look very cute, and I’m glad its still being worked on even now. I think I first got it when it was still an early access game.
Wheatley was always annoying, IMO. GLaDOS, on the other hand…brilliant.
I’d love to do the Portal co-op thing someday…I wonder how old my kids have to be for that? ;-)
And…congrats on the job! Sounds enjoyable and a nice way to make a few bucks while doing something you like.
GLaDOS is chef kiss the character. Between her and Norma Desmond from Sunset Boulevard I’ve defined the ‘unhinged murderous special interest lady who has a peculiar way of speaking’ type I have, which is one I’d love to see more of.
Your oldest is six, right? Hmm… maybe around eight? nine? You can always bring them in to let them noodle around, that’s always fun. Like Minecraft, but with Portals!
Thank you very much c: I hope to put as much money away as I can.
Congratulations on getting a job!
That’s a bit weird though :P
I get what you say about the game (btw I also like HOW you say it a lot, probably one of the reasons I tend to answer to a lot of your posts). It’s always dangerous to replay classics. And I think it’s not only the game itself, that’s to “blame” for that. For one, memories are deceptive. Also most people seem to forget how much a person can change in 10 years. We just like different things than 10 years ago, we are at a different place in our life etc etc. All that makes it hard to recreate the same fun we had (or think we had) playing a game 10-15 years ago. We are simply not that person anymore. Sometimes it still works, but sometimes it doesn’t.
Btw you made me want to replay ‘Portal 2’ as well and go for my missing SP achievements. Let’s see how that turns out :D
Ha! I could have phrased THAT part better - if people are away on vacation sometimes they want someone to dogsit overnight. The added bonus is someone’s in their house to keep an eye on it, too. And I get paid to hang out on my computer!
Being a different person is a big part of it, but I think there’s another aspect to it, too. Maybe something like ‘too much of a good thing’ syndrome? Like, I’m trying to pin down why, after replaying two games I loved a lot when they first came out, why do I love Okami just as much now but Portal 2 didn’t give me the same experience? I’ll have to mull this over, give it some thinky-thoughts.
Yes! Give it a shot! I’m so proud, I’ve gotten all single player achievements, which is nice c:
Haha okay, now I get what you mean by sleeping in other people’s houses :)
Sure, it’s a multivariate question, why game X is still great, but game Y is not. I’m not even sure if it can be fully answered.
I wanted to finish my current game first, but I’m kinda stuck, so maybe I’ll do ‘Portal 2’ on the weekend…