The game got recycled for me earlier this year when I realized what a great physics game with a quirky sense of humor it was for a precocious child, so my son and I played through it.

I bought Portal 2 for co-op, mainly to play with friends Kate Baker and PoorYorick, but since I’m baking cupcakes tonight (don’t ask), I decided to try out the single player game as a stop-gap.

Wow.

Valve (the developer) is brilliant. Whether you’re talking about Half-Life or Half-Life 2, Team Fortress 1/2, their management of Counter-Strike, or their entire Steam platform, they have the Midas touch. They managed to make what should have been a retread of survival horror into one of the most compelling co-op games out there (Left4Dead), and now they’ve taken platform-style puzzling by the scruff of the neck. Valve has squared off and kicked the Mario Brothers square in the nuts.

This is an adult’s platformer, filled with gallows humor, dark sarcasm, and interesting characterizations. The world is dark and foreboding, so much so that I will not play this one with the kiddo for a while. The resurrection of GLaDOS (your nemesis that you burned at the end of the first game) isn’t a surprise, but they way it happens is visceral and hysterical simultaneously.

Stop reading this review and go download Portal 2 off of Steam. You won’t be sorry.

Long live the resistance!

9:05 PM – Language, Violence, Adult Content, Nudity – How can this be bad?

9:07 PM – The wall is really impressive. Nice special effects.

9:08 PM – Did anyone else get the sense that the  Night’s Watch cloaks wouldn’t be that ragged? And OMG at the child impaled on the tree. Wow. Wildings arranged in a weird geometric shape, torn limb from limb?

Waymar Royce is PERFECT. Just as arrogant as he was in the books.

9:12 PM – The white walkers are perfect. The blue eyes are effing creepy. Looks like the filmmakers borrowed something from the fast zombie camp to make their first showing. Not exactly my picture of them.

9:14 PM – The opening credits were really cool, going across the surface of Westeros. Musical score left me a little cold, though.

9:16 PM – Bran Stark and Jon Snow are perfect. Jon Snow acts more like a big brother than Robb. Not sure I like Robb yet. Arya and Sansa are just like I pictured, although Sansa appears to be older than she was in the books. Is that because of her destiny later?

Rickon looks good as well. Catelyn looks a little too old and not as beautiful as I had in my mind’s eye.

9:18 PM – Oooh…good tension between Jon and Catelyn.

9:20 PM – Jon Snow again more of a brother to Bran than Robb. And wow…actual beheading. Could’ve done without that. That’s two in only fifteen minutes.

9:23 PM – The direwolf, and the symbolism is awesome. Killed by a stag. The pain in Jon Snow’s face as he says there are five pups, and then he finds the albino. Amazing.

9:25 PM – King’s landing not quite how I pictured. Is that Jon Arryn lying dead? And a parade of the silent sisters? Followed by a secne between Jaime and Cersei that did not happen in the books, but probably works better to establish the characters.

9:27 PM – The Godswood is beautiful, peaceful. The love between Catelyn and Ned Stark is obvious.

9:29 PM – The point of the barber scene was what? And is that Theon lurking in the background? Not how I pictured him.

9:30 PM – Bran climbing – he’s SOOO perfect.

9:32 PM – Joffrey looks like a little bastard. Perfect casting. But Joffrey and Robb were supposed to be the same age, or near enough? That doesn’t look apparent.

Mark Addy is a little to grizzled to be Robert Baratheon.

9:35 PM – Tension between Cersei and Robert crackles.

9:37 PM – Random boobage. A scene not in the book where Tyrion is in a Winterfell whorehouse. A great introduction to his character, and a good way of establishing Tyrion and Jaime’s relationship when he interrupts the frivolities.

9:40 PM – Emilia Clark as Danaerys – I was worried that she wasn’t good for the role, but seeing her (and seeing her naked with her creepy brother getting her ready for a bath), makes me reconsider. She is beautiful and looks as though she possesses true steel.

9:44 PM – Viserys is a douchebag. “I’d let his whole tribe fuck you, all forty thousand men and their horses too, if that’s what it took.” I’m already rooting for him to die screaming.

9:46 PM – Sansa is just as simpering and vapid as she was in the books. Again, good casting.

9:49 PM – I didn’t mention this before, but Peter Dinklage is beyond perfect as Tyrion. I love the scene between him and Jon Snow. “All dwarves are bastards in their father’s eyes.” Such raw pain in Tyrion’s face there.

9:52 PM – Cersei asks Sansa if she’s bled yet. Ouch. That’s kind of direct, isn’t it? They left her at 13 years old. Also, nice conflict with Jaime and Ned there. Not something I would have expected, but it fits.

9:55 PM – Catelyn and Maester Luwin arguing with Ned Stark of his future – not exactly as the book had it done, but well done anyway.

9:59 PM – *sigh* – I should have known that the Dothraki made the perfect stage for HBO to do their usual shenanigans.

Jorah Mormount – I’m ambivalent about him.

Ilyrio’s gifts of the dragon eggs caused the music to change. Anyone who has not read the books should know that something is definitely up with them.

10:02 PM – The wedding consummation, with the “no” repeated over and over again by Khal Drogo was awesome. Too bad they didn’t convey the tenderness that Martin did in the books. (And holy crap, Emilia Clark is my new crush.)

10:07 PM – “The things I do for love.” Some Jaime is drilling his sister. Is the only sexual position in Westeros doggy-style? Really? Only the dwarf had something approaching normal sex. Was this Martin’s intention?

AFTERTHOUGHTS:

No scenes with Arya and Sansa and their wolf pups. I thought this was a missed opportunity. In that vein, no one talked about naming their pups, which I also think is very important/symbolic.

Jon Snow was relegated to the outdoors, rather than with the commoners during the banquet in the books. I prefer the book approach to this and am not sure why they changed it.

The Dothraki are HBO’s excuse to throw mindless depravity on the screen. I can see the producers meeting: “Do we have frontal female nudity in this episode yet?” Another producer: “No.” Writer: “Well, we haven’t finished the Dothraki scene yet.”

Seeing Bran get pushed from the tower was even more horrifying than reading the books. Jaime’s impetuousness was perfectly portrayed. It makes you want to punch him in the face.

Would someone who hasn’t read the books understand what’s going on? I’m not sure. Ned and Catelyn; Robert, Jaime, and Cersei, Jon Snow, Bran, Arya, Sansa, and Robb;  Viserys, Ilyrio, Khal Drogo, and Danaerys; it’s too many characters in such a short time. Will the standard television audience make the mental investment? I hope so, because I was enamored.

(This isn’t a statement for or against homosexuality. If you came here seeking traction in the on-going debate, you’ve come to the wrong place. This is simply me taking the two best looking characters in the game and rubbing them together until sparks fly.)

As my character kisses her for the first time (full-on girl/girl kiss, booyah!), I see the indicator flash across the top of the screen that I earned an achievement called “Flirtatious.”

Awesome.

Nothing is more jarring, particularly in a role playing game that already makes it difficult for me to take it seriously, than seeing a bullshit message that exists firmly in the “meta” territory go across my screen. I could give two tinker’s damns about achievements in a role playing game. Most of what I want to see involves character development, choice-driven plot development, and the drive to get better equipment.

Why, Bioware? I endured it with Mass Effect 1 and 2 because I realize our less savvy console brethren need a constant reminder that they are progressing through the game; also because both of those games steered fairly close to shooter territory.  Seeing it here in Dragon Age 2 once again reminds me that I’m outgrowing the direction that the game industry is heading. Developers are spending their time on console games and giving us shitty ports on the PC.

Am I against all achievements? Actually, in shooters, I like to see them. In that case, I want to know how many times I’ve shot my best friend in the crotch, or blown up a Humvee full of terrorists with a rocket launcher. It’s useful, because the arena is competition between and among other human players.

My fear is that we’re raising a generation of gamers that expect achievements for every little thing they do. I could see a kid eating his vegetables every day for a week, then having his mom hand him a certificate that said: “ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED – VEGETASTIC!”

God save me from the idiocracy, because I think it’s coming.

Winter is coming…

Best short story: “The Things” – Peter Watts

Best dramatic presentation, long form: Inception

Best dramatic presentation, short form: “Vincent and the Doctor” – Stephen Moffat, Series 5, Dr. Who; “Brown Betty” – Jeff Pinkner and J. H. Wyman, Season 2, Fringe

Best editor, short form: Neil Clarke, Clarkesworld

Best professional artist: John Picacio

Best semiprozine: Clarkesworld

Best fan writer: Jerry Holkins, Penny Arcade

John W. Campbell award nominee: Dan Wells (author of I Am Not a Serial Killer and member of the “Writing Excuses” podcast).

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Currently listening to:
“Everlasting” – Hillsong

Currently sitting:
In my man cave

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Currently listening to:
“Alive” – Pearl Jam

Currently sitting:
In my man cave