Though I suggest we take this with a grain of salt, the Portal 2 release date has been nailed down to February 9, 2011. We here at Pixel Well, though not begrudgingly, usually consider Valve’s release dates tentative at best. We reminisce fondly of standing around a ping-pong table talking about how cool Half-life 2 would be for, well, ages. Check out this additional gameplay video, where you can hear some of the grand voice acting by Stephen Merchant who plays Wheatly the robot in the game. Lets keep our fingers cross that in a mere couple of months we’ll have the new installment securely in our ravenous mitts. Thanks to Game Informer for the news.

Check out this tidbit regarding the first showing of Portal 2. This comes from a press release directly from the horse’s mouth:

“Valve would like to invite you to a special Portal 2 press showing on Monday, June 14 at the Regal Theater in the LA Live Event Center (adjacent to the convention center). The event will begin at 7 pm. Beverages will be served.”

Who knows what the world will see, let alone those let inside the event. Are you ready for Portal 2? I sure am.

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You’ll just want to skip this text and head straight inside for the gallery of Portal 2 concept art. All the images here are taken from Gameinformer, and some of them are definitely new, while others still haven’t graced Pixel Well yet. Take a look anyway, and expect more speculation it the weeks to come.

Is Aperture Science through? Does Portal 2 and Aperture Science’s destruction tie into the discovery of the Borealis? I have a feeling we’ll find out a lot more about Episode 3 on the heels of Portal 2…

Valve is busy again with their upcoming iteration of Portal 2. I am very excited for the release of this game as it will play a large role in the upcoming story line for Half Life 2: Episode 3. Game Informer had the opportunity to interview Valve’s concept artist Matt Charlesworth on how the character designs are coming along. The first character that he discusses is the main character from the last game, Chell. All of the designers explored other character ideas for Portal 2 but ultimately came back to using Chell again. The team decided that she needed the same type of look, clean and simple. “Some of the images started with a sporty look – almost like motorcycle gear.” The designers are also looking for a different color scheme and not the orange suit from the first game. Along with the cosmetic look and feel of Chell they also discussed changing her appearance to have a more recognized nationality.

The best result so far is the concept art you see here. Matt states that “The stuff that was more successful was the really minimal approach, and that’s sort of led us to this concept. This just seemed to strike a chord with everyone, because it really seemed like it belonged in the Portal world. It made her look physically capable, but at the same time, there is a vulnerability about her. That’s what is attractive to everybody.” The suit that Chell wears is supposed to represent her as a test subject among the machines of GLaDOS. The design of the suit, along with the hat (which Matt described as reminding him of test pilots) make it so the machines can easily recognize her without having bar codes all over her. That was something the designers felt had been done before. They are all about originality when it comes to Portal 2. “We’re still not entirely sure what we’re doing with the spring heels. They were always something that was in Portal 1, and some of us are attached to them, and some of us aren’t, so I’ve experimented with how we can do with them right this time around, and how we would go about replacing them. Everything should look 10 times better than the first Portal, that’s the goal.”

In Portal 2 there will be a new Co-Op feature where you can play with a friend. In this version of the game the characters are robots made from salvaged parts from personality spheres and turrets. The concept art for the robots looks great and something that will definitely fit into the Portal story line. Matt finishes the interview by saying “We drew them holding hands because it just kind of describes the whole co-op idea, if slightly tongue-in-cheek. Portal’s got a sense of humor. It’s quirky, but it shows that one of the biggest things that is important to Portal 2 will be that you’re playing with a friend. It’s one of those weird things, where somebody just kind of did it, and we had the sort of team moment where we were like ‘yeah that’s pretty cool.’”

Portal 2 is shaping up to be an amazing game. As usual Valve is taking their time in developing all aspects of the storyline and characters. According Gabe Newell from and interview with 1up, Portal 2 is “the best game we’ve ever done.”

Apparently one of the survivors is going to die, for real, in the new DLC The Passing, to be released soon for Left 4 Dead 2. This comes from Valve’s Chet Faliszek, who said that one of the original survivors will have to bite it.

This is cool and all, but there are definitely some flaws with this type of idea. Left 4 Dead is a game not unlike the RPGs of yore, the pen and paper games where characters were inextricable to the play experience. In other words, the only way for a player to interact with the game is through a character, and if that character were to “die,” or have something more like permadeath, then the game stops being fun. In fact, it stops being a game. In D&D this means the player gets in his/her car and goes home. So I mean, in Left 4 Dead this might work a little better, since what, you would just go back to the server browser?

But the problem, more concisely, is that the survivor’s death doesn’t, at this time, seem to impart any kind of significant emotional impact to the player. Who cares? When you’re playing a pen and paper game you usually try to kick the players out of their “I can do anything because I know if I die I won’t play and the DM doesn’t want me to go home” syndrome by have an orge that cleaves them in twain. Over a volcano, so they can’t be resurrected. But with Left 4 Dead all this means is that the survivor won’t be selectable on certain maps, something I’m sure can be modded in.

Character death is obviously way more important in a game like Mass Effect 2, where you care that Rex won’t be in the next game. As it is it barely seems like Valve will be picking the character anyway, since it’ll probably be the players choice as to who dies when the time comes. Then they browse for a new server or start playing a survival match or something.

I would say that the most value I’ll get out of this is a nice Valve cutscene. In another direction, it would almost seem to me that Valve is trying to imply some new angles with the Left 4 Dead franchise, where others are most certainly exhausted.

Bottom line? Portal 2 and Episode 3 will be where the storyline magic happens, and Left 4 Dead may just be a good multiplayer experience.

If you watch this promo here you’ll see a clip where Gabe Newell of Valve is being interviewed. In the promo clip it says questions are raised about Episode 3 and the next Portal. Though this may not mean anything and Gabe may dodge those questions, at least it means that there is another portal. I’m pretty excited about that.