Portal has to be after Combine Defeat

[nimby]

Maybe Aperture's first forrays into portal technology led them to a strip-mined world left for dead by the Combine.

Black Mesa stumbled upon Xen, started experimenting on wildlife and triggered a large scale invasion.

Aperture Science stumbled upon a derelict citadel and started experimenting on Combine technology without them knowing.

Maybe the guys at Valve were smoking something when they wrote down the story.


Nobody will ever know...

 

[Maynard]

Worthy of noting the fact that the sign off dates on the blueprints are all in the 1994 timeline also.

 

[Glenn the Great]

I just know that it was painfully obvious in my playthrough that the Aperture technology has some form of connection with that of the Combine.

Some other similarities that struck me were:

-the sound of the rising elevators. That sound effect is made by several combine devices, like the reactor observation door in Ep1, and the Advisor incubation device in Ep2.

-the appearance of the Portal Gun's casing was familiar to that of an Elite Overwatch Soldier's armor plating. The holding "fingers" on the end reminded me of the design of some devices like the Advisor's mechanical appendages.

When people talk of the Combine stealing/modifying/adapting human technology, I think they are referring to some things such as:

- Pulse Rifle/OSIPR/AR2. This weapon was made by the Combine for use by humans. It resembles and operates like a human assault rife, like an AK-47, and thus could be used comfortably by an Overwatch Soldier. Basically taking a human design and augmenting it with the Combine touch.

- Teleportation technology. A main motive of the Combine being to learn the technology.

- Natural resources. Not really technology, but this is primarily what the Combine are stealing in their invasion.

- Communication. Perhaps the biggest one. The Combine didn't steal our television and broadcasting technology, per se, but they did learn it and apply it in order to be able to provide Breencasts to the citizens so that they'd come in even on old televisions. That would require making use of probably the PAL encoding.

 

[Crash Happy]

If it was painfully obvious, go see a doctor since both the pain and the 'link' are both entirely in your head.

 

[Minion]

This is my first post ever, so go easy on me.
While playing through portal I definately felt a sense of combine technology. I don't think this would be an accident or laziness by Valve, so I'm taking it as something intended.

I have a theory that Glados has taken technology from the combine, and meshed it with earth's technology. The stasis bed in the beginning, the energy fields and elevators all have a combine 'feel' to them. So do the portal gun and turrets, and the turrents especially seem to have some Glados AI in them.

I agree with others who say Glados seems happy about what happened, and the lines of the end game song give away a lot. Things like 'feeling fantastic', 'beta testing being finished and ready for the real thing', and finding 'other people' to help you. If Glados is helping humanity, using the combines technology with Glados' own science would be a great way to do it. All Glados has to do is find people who can use it properly

This is just an idea so feel free to tear it apart if you can, I always enjoy reading half-life theory of any kind.


P.S. I haven't played EP2 yet because my computer is too slow to run it properly, so I might be missing something big.

 

[Glenn the Great]

If it was painfully obvious, go see a doctor since both the pain and the 'link' are both entirely in your head.

You can go **** yourself. You and everyone else here who gets off on shit-treating everyone who freely voices their thoughts on the series and whose thoughts don't happen to conform nicely to this community's dominant group-think.

 

[Acepilotf14]

The Combine and Aperture Science have no relation. Simply because they have the same sound effects proves nothing. Hell, even TF2 has some combine and HL sound effects. It's Valve's laziness.

 

[Kyorisu]

Why make new sounds effects when you have ones to fit the task perfectly? Don't read into things too deeply people. I tend to agree with the majority on the subject but keep my theories to myself, I'd rather wait it out and see what happens. As opposed to arguing with folks on a forum.

 

[CLASSIFIED]

Why make new sounds effects when you have ones to fit the task perfectly? Don't read into things too deeply people. I tend to agree with the majority on the subject but keep my theories to myself, I'd rather wait it out and see what happens. As opposed to arguing with folks on a forum.

It's not about the sound effects.. and no Portal isn't a mod, it isn't a game using the Half-Life world to make use.. it's an Half-Life game period. thus using objects from the same common world isn't a matter of laziness I believe.

 

[Crash Happy]

You can go **** yourself. You and everyone else here who gets off on shit-treating everyone who freely voices their thoughts on the series and whose thoughts don't happen to conform nicely to this community's dominant group-think.

I've only time for a quick reply before I resume ****ing myself but how about this. Having a different theory is fine and all but ignoring all the reasoning that's already been posted and saying the equivalent of 'they are related because I think so' means there's barely any point in a sensible reply. I could post the same stuff again, but it's already been ignored so why they ignore it again?
One new thought to jam into your cranium though. If they were at all related to the combine then in the commentary would they say something non-commital like "once the artwork was decided". It's neutral and it doesn't give anything away and so still leaves room for fevered GMan = GLaDOS dreams. They don't though, instead it's quite a nice node about how they came up with the look with no mention of Combine at all.
So it goes like this for me.
Could the facility in Portal or the larger company of AS have a relationship with the Combine? Yes, because there's nothing so far in the games that absolutely precludes that.
Is a link between the two likely? No, for all the reasons already posted and probably more too.

 

[flyprdu]

The more I read theories, the more I think the following:

1. Portal takes place concurrently with Ep2.
2. Aperture Science Enrichment Center is an abandoned facility which is operated and defended solely by GLaDOS.
3. The subjects are the daughters who were brought to the facility on "Bring Your Daughter To Work" day. They've been imprisoned for almost 20 years.
4. Most of the facility workers and staff were killed by GLaDOS, the remainder abandoned ASEC after the Combine attack.
5. The Combine don't know about this place or have not been able to crack the automated defenses established by GLaDOS. The ASEC facility is most likely secret, heavily defended, and deep underground.
6. GLaDOS has autonomously completed the HPD (Handheld Portal Device). It was not complete at the time that ASEC was abandoned.

It all seems to fit, at least in my own head

 

[Fliko]

GLaDOS is clearly an older version of the G-Man.
Am I right?

Seriously though, all this talk of COMBINE technology, what about the XEN technology?

 

[Para]

Seriously though, all this talk of COMBINE technology, what about the XEN technology?

What about it?

 

[Andrew LB]

I think he's referring to all the posts saying "combine tech is inside Aperture Science", etc.

That theory has been show down a dozen times or more by now.

 

[xennyth]

The more I read theories, the more I think the following:

1. Portal takes place concurrently with Ep2.
2. Aperture Science Enrichment Center is an abandoned facility which is operated and defended solely by GLaDOS.
3. The subjects are the daughters who were brought to the facility on "Bring Your Daughter To Work" day. They've been imprisoned for almost 20 years.
4. Most of the facility workers and staff were killed by GLaDOS, the remainder abandoned ASEC after the Combine attack.
5. The Combine don't know about this place or have not been able to crack the automated defenses established by GLaDOS. The ASEC facility is most likely secret, heavily defended, and deep underground.
6. GLaDOS has autonomously completed the HPD (Handheld Portal Device). It was not complete at the time that ASEC was abandoned.

It all seems to fit, at least in my own head

In my opinion, the latter of those two theories is more likely because GLaDOS specifically says to Chell after dropping the fourth sphere, "All I know is I'm the only thing standing between us (Chell and GLaDOS) and them (Combine, most likely)."

 

[Andrew LB]

Going back to the original topic in this thread.... there is ABSOLUTELY NO WAY that Portal takes place "after the combine defeat".

100% proof is in my signature. You can watch the video and hear the audio of Gabe Newell on X-Play specifically stating that Chell will be part of Episode 3.

 

[Psychanalysis05%]

I've heard Doom sound effects in Half Life.

OHMYGOD THE DEMONS FROM DOOM ARE BEHIND EVERYTHING@! The GMan is the Cyberdemon IN DISGUISE!

Seriously, people re-use crap. Hell, I've even heard Doom sound effect in Deus Ex, and those two games are so far removed from each other it's not even worth trying to draw a similarity.