Play Valve's Portal, today! For free!

[Apos]

If the new portal game sounds exciting, then check this out:
http://www.nuclearmonkeysoftware.com/narbaculardrop.html

It's a free indie game basically using the same concept... and lo and behold, see what happens in their blog? Valve hired them. :cheese: So basically, this is where Portal came from: Valve played this indie, loved the concept, and hired these guys to help Valve develop it professionally (and put it into the HL2 universe it seems, which is why I'm posting it here).

It may not be a looker, and it only comes with a few puzzles and no save, but the basic gameplay is really quite interesting and fun.

This also goes to show that if you are looking to get hired by a gaming company, it's not necessarily that your game has the coolest sniper rifle EVAR: it's that you demonstrate the ability to both think up a creative concept and really execute it.

 

[xombine]

Narbacular Drop!

 

[Asuka]

Meh it looks to old for me right now. Ill just wait for Portal.

 

[Hectic Glenn]

Meh it looks to old for me right now. Ill just wait for Portal.

Thats like saying you won't play HL1 because it looks old. Shame on you Raziel. Good concepts don't get old.

 

[Apos]

Believe me, its lots of fun even if its only sort of a proof of concept design. My favorite is putting two portals in the floor and seeing how high I can "fall," or putting one of the torches into an infinite loop.

 

[myth]

Meh it looks to old for me right now. Ill just wait for Portal.

me too..

 

[Apos]

Seriously, try it. It takes like, two seconds to download, install, and try out the basic idea.

 

[dfc05]

I was liking it up until the Ledge Climb level, where I would make it up like 5 or 6 of theledges and then get hit by a boulder and have to start over. After doing that 4 times I had to quit. I wish they'd let you save your game mid-level .

 

[Apos]

Heh: you haven't figured out the real trick, and are trying to do it the hard way. Remeber that you can shoot portals through other portals: to climb the ledges, you need not climb in real space...

 

[dfc05]

Heh: you haven't figured out the real trick, and are trying to do it the hard way. Remeber that you can shoot portals through other portals: to climb the ledges, you need not climb in real space...

Ohhhhh, interesting. Thanks for the tip... that helps a lot!

 

[ríomhaire]

It takes like, two seconds to download

Not everyone had broadband ;(

 

[Barney_Calhoun]

Not everyone had broadband ;(

Don't they? D:

 

[Beerdude26]

You know, that company IS developing Portal. gg

 

[giant384]

i had alittle trouble with the 3rd level

 

[Thadius Dean]

Can anyone get the turtle in the lava on the final "You Win!" level?

 

[The Brick]

Can anyone get the turtle in the lava on the final "You Win!" level?

Doesn't work for me too, but there is supposed to be a boss there.

 

[trineas]

Have you seen the credits at the end of the game?

TESTING & FEEDBACK
Kevin Prior
Joe Bourrie
Patrick Hackett
Joshua Billeadeau
Ryan Young
Joanna Leung
Josh Neff
Elliott Davis
Kirk Barnett
Mike Dussault <-- Valve employee
Robin Walker <-- Valve employee
Mat Noguchi
A massive blob of DigiPen students.
Our friends from Natural Selection, Detonate.net, and Garry's Mod.

 

[ZoFreX]

Heh: you haven't figured out the real trick, and are trying to do it the hard way. Remeber that you can shoot portals through other portals: to climb the ledges, you need not climb in real space...

Ooooooh! *squeals excitedly and goes back to the game*

 

[utherdoul]

Downloading this baby now... The website's a bit weird (as, it seems the game will be) - is this a mod for HL2 or a stand-alone game? Their website didn't seem to mention HL2 at all...

EDIT: I've played it a bit now - very bloody good game, I reckon. Especially since it's free! I can see it's not Half-Life orientated, but I can imagine the portal thing working quite nicely in a future episode of Half-Life... Gonna hafta play more Narbacular Drop when I get home from work! Think I'm addicted already...

 

[ZoFreX]

Entirely stand-alone, nothing to do with HL, HL2, or Valve afaik.

 

[Sufferin-rebel]

This game's graphics are awesome (for a free game) and the concept of the game is cool, reminds me a bit like PREY

I can imagine how they would intergrate this into the HL storyline, Combine Teleportation Gun

 

[Beerdude26]

Entirely stand-alone, nothing to do with HL, HL2, or Valve afaik.

Well it does use the Source engine.

 

[ZoFreX]

Well it does use the Source engine.

He was talking about Narbacular Drop, not Portal:

Downloading this baby now... The website's a bit weird (as, it seems the game will be) - is this a mod for HL2 or a stand-alone game? Their website didn't seem to mention HL2 at all...

 

[ríomhaire]

I can imagine how they would intergrate this into the HL storyline, Combine Teleportation Gun

No, Combine don't have local teleport tech (unless that's what the data-packet was). Maybe something to do with the g-man?

 

[Tamer17]

There's no reason to put the gun in the FPS. It won't be a good idea to have at your disposal anytime - the same problem as in the blue gravity gun.

 

[Beerdude26]

He was talking about Narbacular Drop, not Portal:

Woops lol

 

[Para]

Narbacular Drop was fun although very buggy, hopefully Portal won't be as buggy as Narb is

And to be honest I felt stupid after managing to get squashed by the boulders for the first time...I actually transferred them both to the long hallway so that the end result was like this:
[ and ] = portals
O = boulder
x = me
->, <- = direction of movement

[ O -> x <- O ]

...oh well

 

[ríomhaire]

There's no reason to put the gun in the FPS. It won't be a good idea to have at your disposal anytime - the same problem as in the blue gravity gun.

Yes, it would be unfair but it'd be to mess around with for fun!


Anyway, I've downloaded it. I'll play it when I get home.

 

[utherdoul]

I can imagine how they would intergrate this into the HL storyline, Combine Teleportation Gun

No, Combine don't have local teleport tech (unless that's what the data-packet was). Maybe something to do with the g-man?

I can imagine this in HL2 as a weapon (like the gravity gun), but I'd prefer it to be Xen technology... Perhaps the Vortigaunts manage to make it for you or something?

Something from the teleportation gun in Opposing Force and the Vortigaunt stuff in HL2 and Episode 1 hint it might be Xen.. to me, at least.
EDIT: I've just noticed there's a subforum for Portal and Narbacular wotsit... this topic should really be moved there.

 

[Xyfo]

Neingrrr! Bandwith limit exceeded. Could someone upload it to filefront or to somewhere else if possible

Edit. Nevermind. I found it on fileplanet http://www.fileplanet.com/161458/160000/fileinfo/Narbacular-Drop-[Free-Game]

 

[Unfocused]

Neingrrr! Bandwith limit exceeded. Could someone upload it to filefront or to somewhere else if possible

Same thing here D:

 

[Javert]

I can imagine this in HL2 as a weapon (like the gravity gun), but I'd prefer it to be Xen technology... Perhaps the Vortigaunts manage to make it for you or something?

Something from the teleportation gun in Opposing Force and the Vortigaunt stuff in HL2 and Episode 1 hint it might be Xen.. to me, at least.

I can not see this being a weapon in the HL-verse. This opens the possibility of being able to see yourself (Gordon Freeman), breaking of one HL's cardinal rules.

 

[Apos]

Doesn't work for me too, but there is supposed to be a boss there.

No. The game is very very short, and not really finished (since they got hired by Valve and put to work on something else!). In the Showroom you can see the boss, but he doesn't really work in the game.

The instructional drawings are pretty amusing though: you can see where they went with that style of silly instructional humor for Portal....

 

[Canadian Gunner]

This is pretty awesome. Can't wait for Portal. I can't play this for too long though. It makes me sick (headache). It's weird. This is essentially the first game to do so. Bah. D:

 

[bigburpco]

Neingrrr! Bandwith limit exceeded. Could someone upload it to filefront or to somewhere else if possible

Edit. Nevermind. I found it on fileplanet http://www.fileplanet.com/161458/160000/fileinfo/Narbacular-Drop-[Free-Game]

The HL community made the website explode... harhar.

 

[giant384]

man i cannot wait until valves portal game comes the trailer for it just looked amazing. im defiantly buying it

 

[The Brick]

im defiantly buying it

It comes free with Episode 2.

 

[bbson john]

It comes free with Episode 2.

And pushes the price of Episode 2 up.

 

[destrukt]

And pushes the price of Episode 2 up.

source ?

 

[bbson john]

source ?

Speculation. No pay, no "game".