Multiplayer walkthrough

[Binnatics]

Had my first MP experience today. Just tried to connect to another player (the game recommends you play with friends and that is a good gesture since you really have to coop and communicate to salve the puzzles). This guy had allready some experience with the MP part of the game, which was good because he helped me quite well in there.

First of all you find yourself in a glass cube right next to your partner. That's where the indroduction to MP tactics begins. Basically communicating with eachother. You can make gestures to eachother by pressing the 'q' (on PC) and then when you hold the button choose a gesture with the mouse pointing at the one of your choice. Advancing in the game there are new gestures to learn, which makes the game even more fun!
Then you are introduced to the way of communicating, in case you don't both have a mic set up. You have to press and hold 'f' to open a menu of communicating symbols. First of all actually, point you marker to the spot where you want the symbol to appear. IN the symbol menu you can choose a stopwatch, Portal sign or an eye. The eye is to direct someone to look in the direction of your choice, whyle the portal symbol indicates the other player should make a portal on the desired spot. The stopwatch can be used to visualize a timer, what can be helpful if you both have to press a button or do another sort of action at the same simultaniously.

Once you practiced a little with this, you both go to the first 'chapter'. It is actually a corridor which leads both players to a sort af square where the real game will start. The corridor is used to practice the most basical coop tactics, such as pushing a button in one room so your teammate is able to move to the next room and do the same thing for you. Step by step both players proceed that way.

When you enter the square, you can choose various sub-rooms in which you can choose a number of testing-chambers. Above the door of these sub-rooms is an indicator telling you which levels you allready cleared, and which chambers your friend completed.

I completed the first sub-room with 6 testing-chambers in it with my new friend. It's basically an introduction of teamwork-strategies, in an environment that is not different from the single player mode.
You'll find laserbeams, prisma's to guide them, walls, turrets and more.
The most surprizing I found doing these first chambers was the possibility of using 4 portals. Sometimes you have to guide a laser-beam through 2 walls for example, or transport it to another place twice, so the game gets a lot more complicated with that, making it a real challenge solving these puzzles in MP.

It was great playing with this guy who had allready some experience to this. I will go on with the rest of the available chambers as soon as I have time, but now it is working time again  :-(

...to be continued...

[JRD]

I assume ALL puzzles have to be completed by coordinating actions between you and your mate like he opens a door and you walk into a room where you have to push a button so he can continue and so forth, right?

I cannot even imagine how complicated this will become as you both progress in the game  >:D

They really hit the nail in the head with this MP feature for Portal 2  : 8)

Great read Binnatics, keep it coming!  :-X

[Art Blade]

I think it is better to use headsets and talk to each other rather than fiddling with menus and symbols :)

[Binnatics]

Well done! You must be dying allready to run to the shop and actually buy the game, so I skipped the puzzle in this next test to stop bothering you.

Spoiler

In fact, there is one last thing I want to show you before you go buy it, and that is the multiplayer part.
[smg id=3240 width=500]
Enter this door and you'll move on to the multiplayer part of this introduction...

@ Art: You're absolutely right, we used headsets and without it it would have been harder, and less fun off course. But the pointing ability is quite usefull because you can direct the other person right to the spot where he should do something in stead of explaining to him where, on which wall, how it looks like, stuff like 3 o'clock or south-southwest would be like, damn hard.

@ JRD: Yes, there is a coop need in allmost every action, but there are rooms where you are togehter. You then need to use both portal devices to advance, like redirecting a laserbeam. There are hughe possibilities that way I think, and my teammate, who advanced to higher rounds allready, told me it can be quite complicated... Imagine, the variabilities just increase with a factor... well, anything more then 2  :-D

@ All: I'm affraid my topic start is somewhat poor for a walkthrough,  :-[ but I had quite some trouble with getting started, and thaught it might help. And off course we can all help this to be a good walkthrough. Looking forward to find you guys online and enjoy a good coop game with you.
Never ever experienced a better coop concept so far.

[mmosu]

I played through the tutorial part of co-op last night using two controlers and a split-screen.  All I kept thinking was "I'm gonna need a headset"  :D

[fragger]

I would have thought a headset would be a must, as timing can play a crucial role in completing a section (in SP it does, anyway) and communicating with a keyboard would be cumbersome for that.

It didn't occur to me that 2 players with portal guns equals 4 portals! Interesting possibilities...

[Art Blade]

Usually I play using 5.1 speakers but if I really need communication I put on my headset.

Good thing you might want to try: right-click on the speaker symbol on the task bar and select "playback devices" and make your headset your default communication device. Like that, voicecom will be routed to your headphones while the sounds of the game itself will continue playing through your 5.1 speakers. Like that you can put your headset aside if you don't need it and keep playing 5.1 and if you're using your headset you can focus on the communication while the game is "outside" in the background. I was very successful with that setup when playing bulletstorm coop with Binnatics. :)

[mmosu]

I think that's the default setup with a Bluetooth headset on the PS3

[Art Blade]

Ah OK.. I use one with a cord and USB plug on my PC.

[mmosu]

I would imagine that they have those too, but the official Sony endorsed ones are all wireless

[fragger]

I hate to tell you this mmosu, but GLaDOS has invaded your profile. Watch out mate, she's on to you... :-\\





(Love that quote!)

[Art Blade]

I only just read your and mmosu's new signature. Hehe  :-X ;D

[mmosu]

Cheers guys  :-X

Yeah Art, there's this banter that evolves in the second half of P2 between GLaDOS and Wheatley (another AI) where she keeps calling him a moron in order to provoke him.  You eventually find out that Wheatley was designed as an "intelligence dampening sphere" that was attached to GLaDOS in order to restrain her growing intelligence by generating an endless stream of bad ideas.  That's where the quote comes from.  She later follows it up with He's not just any moron, he's the product of the greatest minds in the world coming together with the expressed intent of creating the dumbest moron on earth . . . and you just put him in charge of the entire facility (clap, clap, clap).

[Art Blade]

sounds like a mirror of real world society..  :-D

[spaceboy]

very true Art - I just finished the SP story how power corrupts is the overriding theme.

[Art Blade]

Binnatics and I just finished MP together. One puzzle gave us something to think about before we managed to solve it, the rest was more or less a quick walk in the industrial park  :) There are 5 parts, let's call them chapters, and each of those consists of perhaps 8 or so chambers. More or less large chambers. I think it's a bit too much to compose a walkthrough for all of the stuff.. however, we had a good time  :-X

[smg id=3272 type=link align=center width=400 caption="Portal2 MP 006"]

[PZ]

I wish I could do MP - the descriptions make it sound like another completely different experience.

[Art Blade]

Oh, you were quick, PZ -- I think you posted before I finished editing  ;)

Indeed it is. You always need the help of your partner. You cannot proceed without him. There is not one puzzle you could solve alone. Sometimes you need to time your actions to get things done so communication is always present, headsets are a must if you want to enjoy the experience and someone you can rely on. We always coordinate our efforts and keep each other informed about our actions. :)

[smg id=3273 type=link align=center width=400 caption="Portal2 MP 007"]

[mmosu]

Looks like fun gentlemen, and congrats on putting MP to rest.  Maybe you can school the rest of us when we are able to get back in . . . I'm gonna need a headset . . .

[Art Blade]

Cheers, sure do :)

I'm gonna need a headset . . .

I was expecting something related to that PSN outage and instead of headset, I read "headshot."  :-[ ^+-+

[mmosu]

That's Ok, whenever I see a topic including the term "PS3 outage", my brain keeps reading "PS3 outrage"! 
^+-+ . . .  :'( . . . >:(( . . .  :D

[Art Blade]

 ^+-+

Seriously, it's really crap what Sony are delivering there. :(

[mmosu]

We'll be ending week two of the "outrage" in a couple of days and still no word on a timeline.

[JRD]

Let's start to imagine how Sony's gonna make up for it for 77.000.000 users left offline?  ????

[Art Blade]

That's simple:

They'll tell you they're sorry :)