Portal 2 Review

I have to be honest, I was a bit disappointed when Valve announced Portal 2 last year. I was really hoping for Episode 3 or Half-Life 3. The thought of, "come on guys where the hell is Episode 3 instead of Portal 2", came to mind when I heard Portal 2 was coming out. I almost came to the conclusion that I was going to skip this one when it releases because I was a bit mad nothing is being said about the Half-Life products. As the release date came near, I started to get excited about Portal 2. Valve knows how to make their fans happy, even if we are a little mad about Episode 3. They got me, Portal 2 is an awesome distraction to not getting Episode 3 or Half-Life 3.

Where do I begin? Portal 2 is a fine example of high quality craftsmanship in video games. I can't praise this game enough, I was extremely pleased from beginning to end. Portal 2 starts off where Portal 1 ended. You play as Chell, a test subject that survived and stopped the psycho AI named GLaDOS. After beating her, something drags you back into Aperture Science facilities and you are put into stasis. This is were Portal 2 begins and you meat a new character when you wake up from stasis. Wheatley is this new character's name and is voiced by Stephen Merchant. Wheatley is a personality core that will guide you through the first part of the game. Right from the get go you will be solving puzzles using a portal gun that allows you to open up two door ways or portals that you can go through. These door ways that you create will be used to solve all the puzzles in the game that are presented to you. It is not required to play Portal 1, but it is recommended. This is because the first half of the game will be played through test chambers that were used in Portal 1, but this time they look run down with plant growth and lack of maintenance. This is present through out the beginning of the game, and is most likely do to the fact that GLaDOS was shutdown and is unable to maintain the chambers. But things go back to normal once Wheatley and you turn GLaDOS back on, by mistake of course, and she takes over from here on out. I don't want to spoil any of the storyline from here, but it gets a lot better as you progress through the game and never stops to amuse you. Valve did an excellent job with the writing of the story in Portal 2 and you have to play it to understand the value it adds to the game.

Game play in Portal 2 is just like Portal. You use a gun that produces portals that you can pass through to solve puzzles, which I explained above. Valve did add new toys to play with through out the game to help solve the almost never ending puzzles. These new toys or objects are: Lasers, Gravity Beams, Light Beams (that allow you to walk on like a bridge of sorts), Jump Pedestals, and Gel. There are three types of Gel; Blue Gel which allows you to jump high if you jump on it, Red Gel which allows you to speed up as you run across it, and White Gel which allows you to force a surfice to produce portals once covered. These new objects allow for more variety in the puzzles you face and more challenging puzzles to solve. But even if the challenge rating went up a little, Valve still did a great job on making sure all the puzzles still had a solution that wasn't extremely hard. With my play through in the singleplayer I came across a few puzzles that I had to scratch my head at, but with time I was able to figure it out with ease. The new additions and characters to Portal 2 really makes the gameplay enjoyable and fun.

To add more icing to the cake, Valve added a Co-Op multiplayer to Portal 2. The Co-Op offers a separate story line from the singleplayer and is about the same in length as well. Unfortunately I have yet to play it...none of my friends have the game and a human player is required for the Co-Op missions. So I can't say much about it other then I have heard the Co-Op is worth it on it's own.

Portal 2 has to be one of the best games I have played thus far in 2011. It has easily blown away anything that has come out thus far. With a longer singleplayer then the first, added Co-Op missions, and top notch writing, Portal 2 is my first pick for Game of the Year in 2011.

I give Portal 2 a 5 out of 5, just go buy it and play it already. :-D

0 = Total Garbage (Don't waste your time)
1 = Crap (Maybe rent, maybe not)
2 = Ok (Rental only)
3 = Good (Buy it, rent if low on cash)
4 = Great (Buy this game)
5 = Amazing (Don't even think about it, just get it)

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Another Call of Duty: Enough Already

Anyone who is anyone could have predicted that Activision will be putting out yet another Call of Duty this year. I am really getting tired of this franchise. The yearly releases is forcing the franchise to produce no innovation. I loved the first two but after them Call of Duty hasn't changed at all. Activision is quickly becoming a publisher I don't want to buy from because of their lust for cash and copy & pasting Call of Duty every year. They already killed Tony Hawk games I use to love to play, they destroyed Ravensoft (who use to be a bad ass developer), and they ran Guitar Hero into the ground (not that I ever cared to play GH).

When Activision made the announcement of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 I saw forums exploded with people say they are not going to buy it and support Battlefield 3. Of course you got your fans of the franchise praising MW3 and hating BF3. I always find it interesting reading about these love/hate wars that happen on the Internet. Normally I wouldn't speak up about it and just let those who love it get sucked into Activision's black hole of death. But I have to say something now. This is because Call of Duty is causing other publishers to make their games Call of Dutyized. And what I mean by that is the fact that they are changing their games to suit the sheep that buy the yearly releases of the crap that has become Call of Duty. Publishers have Call of Dutyized some of my favorite franchises because they are trying to get a piece of the pie. Adding multiplayer to Bioshock 2 and Dead Space 2 was a huge mistake. No one played them, or even cared about the multiplayer part 2 weeks after release. To me it was a waste of resources that could have been focused on the singleplayer. Luckily for Dead Space 2, the singleplayer was still good but you can tell that adding multiplayer to the game put resources elsewhere. Another game that got Call of Dutyized was Dragon Age 2. I liked the combat, but the RPG felt like garbage and watered down. You can tell it was made for another audience, the Call of Duty crowd.

This type of thing happened before in the MMO genre. Everyone is trying to be a clone of World of Warcraft and because of that that it destroyed my all time favorite MMO, Star Wars Galaxies. Unless the beast that is Call of Duty is brought down I have fear it will spread into my beloved franchises. Call of Duty needs to die and I am really hoping this is the year it will be brought down. I really don't want to look forward to a game only to find out it was revamped by the publisher because they wanted to change it for the Call of Duty crowd.

I know for sure I will not be purchasing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. I already took a chance on Black Ops last year and I have seen that the franchise hasn't changed at all. Here's to hoping that the franchise begins it's down fall this year and is dead by 2012. Die Call of Duty, just die already....

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Summer is coming....Game releases lessen

Everyone knows the biggest time of the year for video games is the holidays. So what does that mean for the upcoming summer? I my self have noticed that the game releases have lessened since summer is coming up. The only games I really care about that are coming out during the summer are only a few, but they seem promising to me. Duke Nukem Forever is one, Dungeon Siege III is another, but I am getting very excited for the release of Deus Ex 3 (looks promising). Other then those three, there really is not much more releasing this summer.

Till then I have been enjoying L.A. Noire on the Xbox360. Rockstar has done a good job with this game and it is very addictive. I only played about 2 hours of it so far, and it is a little slow on the pacing, but it is a game worth not passing up. When I am done, I plan to have a full review of the game posted up on my blog. I also want to dedicate a full review for Portal 2. Another fine game worth checking out if this summer seems boring to you. I also picked up Darkspore, it is fun but haven't been that impressed by it yet.

The Fall is filled with amazing games this time around, but I am looking forward to the summer. It provides me time to catch up on games I haven't finished or played yet. Bring on the HEAT.....

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Stulz Cosmotec - 3D Animation

Dopo qualche settimana di lavoro abbiamo terminato le tre animazioni realizzate per Stulz, leader indiscusso nella realizzazione di componenti di raffreddamento per server room e data center.


Per la realizzazione della animazioni sono stati renderizzati con 3ds Max ben 8158 render, compositati tra loro in After Effects e rielaborati con altre grafiche esterne.

1 – PRODIGY

Prodigy è la linea di prodotti per il raffreddamento di alto livello. È disponibile per case universali così come per case standalone. La potenza di raffreddamento è notevole e consente di effettuare una refrigerazione a corridoi caldi/freddi o direttamente all’interno del rack.
Prodigy consente l’integrazione con altri scambiatori di calore ed ha una modularità infinita, senza perdita di resa all’interno del volume da refrigerare.

2 – KRYOS

Kryos è un raffreddatore più semplice ed economico rispetto alla linea di prodotti Prodigy. La sua funzionalità non consiste nel raffreddare l’aria ma ne convogliarla verso l’interno. Grazie alla sua caratteristica progettuale, è possibile montare due dispositivi: uno per convogliare l’aria fredda dall’esterno all’interno del cabinet e l’altro per prelevare l’aria calda ed espellerla.
Il costo del dispositivo è estremamente contenuto, ma le caratteristiche di filtraggio sono evolute con supporto per filtri IP54 e IP55 in grado di bloccare pulviscolo, particelle grossolane e umidità.

3 – TOP²

TOP² è un sistema di raffreddamento per cabine elettriche di grande portata. Al suo interno TOP² nasconde un sistema di raffreddamento a doppio circuito in grado di garantire una corretta e costante refrigerazione dell’ambiente di lavoro anche in situazioni estreme.
È presente un sistema per il recupero dell’umidità dovuta allo scambio termico e la sua successiva espulsione sotto forma di vapore.

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