It also had the rather neat idea of the protagonist being abducted for gladiatorial duty, and a “hexagon” of bosses embodying different warrior virtues and requiring different approaches to defeat. The explicit examples given were a big, fat Might guy who could squash you like a bug head-on and required lots of stealth, cover and careful shooting, and an opposing…Stealth, I think…boss who moved fast and was difficult to see and hit, so required profligate firepower and speed. It’s a shame some of the good ideas dropped out along the way. And of course that they simultaneously named their protagonist, who had always been Native American, Tommy Hawk and tried to make the game have a story.

As a not entirely relevant aside, if I were an indie developer with an experimental game like that, I would much rather have it distributed free with Episode Two than sold on its own. Since they’re not, anymore, but are instead part of Valve, I’m hoping it means that they want to promote the Portal name more than they want to make a bit of money off it. Because that would suggest future Portal stuff, and having now seen the Portal trailer, that’s an extremely exciting prospect. I cannot forgive you for having played it, by the way Dabs.

It doesn’t worry me too much that people might think Prey thought up portals first, as though that’s some kind of new invention to sci-fi, but I do hope people realise how different Portal is. Prey’s spatial trickery is arbitrary, rigid and didn’t make the experience any more interesting than Quake 4, for me. Portal and Narbacular Drop take a single strong concept and craft it into a completely original type of game, and I love Valve for noticing that, taking them on board, and rolling it out to the absolute largest number of people they could possibly reach.

It’s not ripping off Prey at all. I had this conversation with the people who made it (the same Narbacular Drop team). At the time, they felt it was pretty unfortunate for them that PREY was going to make it out onto the market before them. Fact is, they came up with this concept long before PREY had been re-announced and certainly before anything was known of portals playing a role in PREY. Furthermore, where portals are part of the game in PREY, portals ARE the game in this. This is totally unlike PREY as a gameplay experience, and this is coming from someone who’s played both. Portal is more challenging, much more of a unique experience and arguably just much more fun. I still can’t believe they’re just handing it over with Episode Two though. If stuff like The Ship and Dawrinia can ask for $20, there’s no sane reason why an arguably better product (certainly an equal) shouldn’t be able to as well.

I myself love a bit of TF, and the new style seems to suit it really well. As you said, TF never really took itself seriously, and this “Incredibles” style could be something rather nice. I’m hoping though the style doesn’t put too many people off. Look at The Ship – some people won’t even try that because they don’t like it’s Art Deco stylistic approach, and would prefer it to look “realistic” – without even trying the gameplay.