Steam Autumn sale is live: Orcs Must Die, Portal 2, Mass Effect, Renegade Ops super cheap
Do you hear that faint wailing in the background? That’s the sound of a thousand bank accounts going “noooo!” at the appearance of the Autumn Steam Sale. Thankfully for our wallets, it only lasts until Sunday, with dozens of new deals every day. Consider it a warm up for the monolithic Steam Christmas sale next month.
The sale kicked off yesterday, but you’ve still got six hours to grab some of the fantastic day one deals. The marvellous Orcs Must Die is just £2.99 / $3.74 (we gave it a score of 90 in our Orcs Must Die review). Portal 2 is selling for just £6.79 / $10.19. If you haven’t played Mass Effect yet, the first game is £2.49 / $4.99, and Mass Effect 2 is 75% off at £4.99 / $12.49.
Let the scheming begin:Valve releases first screenshots of Portal 2 puzzle creator
Oh. Oh my. The new Portal 2 puzzle creator looks quite manageable – even for those of us who aren’t sentient AIs gone genocidally mad. I mean, I’m sure we’ve all wanted to murder every squishy, inferior lifeform around us through a series of devious (and oftentimes hilarious) tests at some point in our lives, but it just sounded so… hard. Well, no more! Check out two new screens for proof. Also, after I’ve single-handedly turned the world into a series of horrific death puzzles, someone at Valve’s probably getting spared for this one:
“We’re also building a community site to host all of these player-created puzzles. The site will allow players to quickly find new puzzles and add them to their game, ready to play, with a single click. Players will then be able to rate the puzzles they’ve played, leave comments for puzzle creators, and follow creators they like.”
Valve announces second Portal 2 DLC, officially confirms level editor
So it was sort-of-rumored, so shall it be. Valve’s officially announced the second dollop of Portal 2 DLC (via Joystiq), and it includes “an easy-to-use in-game map editor that will let users design, build and share their own single-player and co-op test chambers with the community.” It’s coming out early next year.
Beyond that, the only tidbit Valve’s allowing to seep out – in much the same way one would utilize a deadly neurotoxin – is a vague mention of voting for your favorite levels. Community features, then, are probably a no-brainer – which is roughly the state one would find themselves in after being exposed to a deadly neurotoxin.
What about a GLaDOS-powered “spellcheck,” though? Valve’s said nothing, but fingers crossed, obviously. As a rule, Valve’s notoriously tight-lipped, but I’ve asked for more details just in case.
PC cleans up at the Golden Joystick Awards
Whoa. When did PC gaming become so damn… award-winning?
PC has cleaned up at the Golden Joystick awards with a wealth of exclusives. And the non PC exclusive games that took an award? We get to play most of those too, only more anti aliased, and in a better resolution.
The best bit? Gamers voted for these. Real-life gamers with strong opinons. A record-breaking 2.06 million of them in fact. Well done PC gaming community – you rose to the challenge and pwned.
Click through for the full results. Don’t agree with some of the winners? It’s time for a furious debate. See you in the comments.
Valve working on Portal 2 level editor, GLaDOS possibly coming along for the ride
Portal’s been begging for its own level-creation tool since GLaDOS first began turning frowns upside-down – physically, that is, by snapping people’s necks. Fortunately, it’s finally in the cards – with a pretty awesome twist, to boot.
According to an update to journalist Geoff Keighley’s “The Final Hours of Portal 2″ app (via Kotaku), Valve’s currently putting together a “a Photoshop for test chambers” that’ll allow players to create and access content without ever having to leave the game. And who will be presiding over your devious machinations? Why, the nigh-immortal master of tests herself, GLaDOS.
“The writers are even discussing the idea of adding a personality to the editor,” explained Keighley. “[I]magine what it would be like to have GLaDOS berate you every time you spell something incorrectly in Microsoft Word and you’ll have a sense of where this can go.”
Valve writers talk silent protagonists and bringing the LOLs
As reported on Gamasutra, a bunch of Valve’s writers have been taking part in a roundtable question and answer session at GDC Online.
Read on for some insight from some of the most talented writers in the industry.
Portal 2: Peer Review DLC released
If you notice Portal 2 updating today, don’t be alarmed: it’s only because you’re getting the new Portal 2: Peer Review DLC for free. If you don’t have a copy of Portal 2 to update, Valve have that covered as well: it’s on sale for 50% off through the 6th.
Peer Review adds a new multiplayer test track for robo-buddies P-body and Atlas, and features a single-player and co-op Challenge mode.
Portal 2 DLC out Wednesday, adds new co-op missions, challenge mode and leaderboards
Wednesday October 5. That will be the day in which the Portal 2 Peer Review DLC will be released. The free mission pack will extend Atlas and Peabody’s co-op adventure and add a new challenge mode for single player and co-op maps.
Back when Valve announced first DLC pack, they also mentioned leaderboards so all your friends and a bunch of strangers will all know how exactly how smart you are (or aren’t), which explains the ‘Peer Review’ handle. That means your performance will be graded by both Glados AND the conglomerate hivemind of the The Internet. NO PRESSURE.
In more ‘free stuff from Valve’ news, the third volume of the Portal 2 soundtrack, Songs to Test By, is available now on the Portal 2 site, featuring such classic hits as Some Assembly Required, Your Precious Moon and Robots FTW.
This is what Portal 3 should be
If the portals in Portal could take you back in time, a) your mind would break, and b) it would look like this.
It’s a video of a prototype made by game designer Arthur Lee, in which you can create portals by taking screenshots. Whatever you snapped is what you’ll see through the portal. Where it gets braintingling, though, is that the portal will take you back to the time when you took that screenshot. In other words, the portals don’t just fold space, they fold time as well. So that’s nice.
As Mike Rose over at IndieGames.com points out, there’s your Portal 3 right there.
Portal is free if you grab it before September 20
A lovely bit of news from RPS this morning. If you don’t already own it, you can download Portal for nothing on Steam. It’s being made free to download until September 20. If you download it before then, you’ll own it forever.
It’s all part of Valve’s Learn With Portals initiative, which aims to promote Portal’s reality bending puzzles as an educational tool, and hopes to encourage the next generation to start building a new wave of even more dastardly test chambers. You can see our future tormentors learning the basics at Valve HQ in the video above. You can build your own levels with the free Portal authoring tools, which you’ll find the “tools” section of your Steam library.
Steam trading is out of beta, Portal 2 and Spiral Knights items can now be traded
The Steam trading beta we mentioned a month ago has stumbled out of the beta wilderness into the bright sunshine of a full release. Valve’s own Portal 2 and free to play MMO Spiral Knights are the first games outside of TF2 to join the trading program, which means you’ll be able to swap Team Fortress 2 and unredeemed Steam games for Spiral Knights loot and gear from the Portal 2 item store.
Valve announced the launch of the Steam trading beta on the Team Fortress 2 blog, where they also mention that more than a million items have been traded in the beta period. “To celebrate, items are on sale in the Team Fortress 2, Portal 2, and Spiral Knights in-game stores,” the blog post says. To invite someone to trade, open up a Steam chat window, open up the drop down menu next to their name and select “invite to trade.” For a full run down of how trading works, check out Valve’s Steam Trading FAQ.
Gabe Newell: Portal 2 “did better on PC,” Left 4 Dead “did better on consoles”
In a fascinating interview with Gabe Newell and Erik Johnson over on Gamasutra, Newell reveals that Portal 2 “did better” on PC than it did on consoles. A surprising fact given the massive multimedia marketing campaign, the addition of cross platform support and the inclusion of Steam for Playstation 3. “We can never predict” says Newell. “We just try to build good games and then we tend to be surprised.”
“Left 4 Dead did better on the consoles than it did on the PC” he went on to add. Perhaps an even bigger surprise given the fact that the regular updates and additional maps we PC gamers got for free took an age to reach the Xbox 360, and came with a price tag.
Portal: No Escape breaks out the drama
Further proof that, in the best possible way, Valve really does have the fans it deserves. This short Portal movie is a little unusual, throwing out the usual jokes and cake references in favour of a rather more totalitarian view of Chell’s imprisonment in Aperture. Easily one of the most impressive implementations of the portal effects though, and an intriguingly moody alternate universe take on the games.
Weighted Question Cubes: A Portal 2 Proposal
As spotted over on RPS, Gary Hudston is a more romantic geek than you. That’s all that really needs to be said about this, one of the most adorable, heart-touching Portal 2 maps ever created. Imagine yourself in his shoes, as the lady of your life plays through it. Will she say yes? Will she give up on the laser puzzle? Or is the way to a woman’s heart really through a magic blue portal?
The answer: Not necessarily. An orange one will probably do just as well.
Portal 2 competition winner announced. Sad sock dude takes first place
You’ve completed Portal 2 by now right? No? Ridiculous. Go and finish it off now…
What an ending eh? What a tune. But sadly, “Exile, Vilify” – the track by The National that sounds during the Portal 2 end credits – didn’t get released with its own music video. To compensate, Valve set up a competition which attempted to correct the oversight. They promised an Eastwood guitar signed by The National and “the ultimate box of schwag” to the person who created the best video to represent the song. 320 people entered and the winning entry is embedded below.
