Portal 2 ARG Half-Life Teaser

Technology and Gaming
#1

Not entirely sure about this but it seems the Portal 2 ARG has unearthed some media relating to Half-Life/the Borealis. Judge for yourself…

Full Article: https://gamerant.com/valve-portal-2-arg-half-life-3-jc-79756/

#2

Looks faked to me. I can’t see that ascii image at the top turning into that really high quality life like image right after. And the close up on the life like Borealis doesn’t look right. Also, where the hell did that in-game shot come from? I don’t recognize it at all.

#3

I think its fake

#4

I think the shot is from ep. 2. It’s the model of the Borealis you can see on the screen after capturing the data from the citadel.

#5

yeah i’m gonna call it a fake as well, there’d be more buzz about it in the ARG wiki and i’m sure information like the announcement of 3 would be posted on GI or PCgamer by now

#6

The ASCII art seems to match perfectly for me, this is probably going to be one of those ‘wait and see’ things. Here’s to hoping! :smiley:

#7

btw the screenshot is either from the hl2 leak or from missing information hl2 mod

very easy to find a screenshot, here I just took one

#8

—LOG FROM [ REDACTED ], BY J.H. TO C.J.—

  1. We designed the entire thing to be very, very durable. It was easy to get the materials since everyone’s been thinking
    it’s a simple icebreaker ship. Ha.

  2. We have made sure to strip it of anything not necessary, so that we have plenty of space for it. It doesn’t have any
    backup supplies in the event the crew runs out of food, though. And there isn’t much food onboard in the first place.

  3. In the event you need to send it off all of a sudden, use the OR box with code ‘hb1’.

That’s all, C.J. Not much else I can tell you other than this won’t leave a blight on our record. Mesa is going to be sore
when they see what we’ve done.

#9

^^^
What’s that from?

#10

https://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1824635&page=126

pretty interesting stuff.:freeman:

#11

Obvious BS is obvious. Has everyone forgotten that the Borealis in Ep2 was red?!

#12

Come on, guys. Don’t tell me most of you haven’t ever played Missing information?

#13

So whats your point, if there is one?

#14

Let’s say for a second that it is the Borealis, just for the hell of it.

How is this a “Half-Life teaser”? The Borealis is an Aperture Science research vessel you know, and quite a legendary one at that. It’s not strange to find a small reference to it in a Portal 2 ARG.

#15

That’s what I was originally thinking although if it isn’t a Half-Life teaser (and if it is the Borealis) there must be some kind of reference to the Half-Life story seeing as the ship played a major part at the end of Episode 2.

This is what I’m basing my opinion on, If it isn’t the Borealis then I don’t know what it is!

[align=center]
Ship Overboard
Discover the missing experiment.[/align]

#16

It was more of a grey on the monitors. :stuck_out_tongue:

Yes it’s red, but that picture is an official piece of concept art, so it could be real.

#17

The Potato ARG wiki states that they received a TXT document within a password protected Winrar file. The document containted the following:

"—LOG FROM [ REDACTED ], BY J.H. TO C.J.—

  1. We designed the entire thing to be very, very durable. It was easy to get the materials since everyone’s been thinking
    it’s a simple icebreaker ship. Ha.

  2. We have made sure to strip it of anything not necessary, so that we have plenty of space for it. It doesn’t have any
    backup supplies in the event the crew runs out of food, though. And there isn’t much food onboard in the first place.

  3. In the event you need to send it off all of a sudden, use the OR box with code ‘hb1’.

That’s all, C.J. Not much else I can tell you other than this won’t leave a blight on our record. Mesa is going to be sore
when they see what we’ve done."

I’m presuming C.J is Cave Johnson, not sure who the mysterious J.H is though, funny because my initials are J.H (piece of useless information I know).

But what really interests me is this quote:

“In the event you need to send it off all of a sudden, use the OR box with code ‘hb1’”

What’s ‘hb1’? I’m hoping this is a reference to GLaDOS, and in the event we need to ‘send it off all of a sudden’.

Also ‘OR box’ sounds interesting, and slightly familiar. Any idea anyone?

Discuss.

#18

I really do hope that whole portal story happens way before HL story, so we could maybe see the beginning of borealis, how it was created and what was its real purpose. And also how it got stuck in the north (what was the mission, what can we expect to see on board). That would be beautiful introduction to the events of Episode 3.

#19

but didn’t valve say something like ‘the Portal and the Half life story will not come together’?

#20

But they have to. Too many clues. Borealis is one thing, but things like gravity gun and hev charger in comic are the second.

Besides, what makes this ARG fun and both stories so mysterious is the fact that they could eventually end as one piece. At least I would like to see it that way :slight_smile:

Founded in 2004, Leakfree.org became one of the first online communities dedicated to Valve’s Source engine development. It is more famously known for the formation of Black Mesa: Source under the 'Leakfree Modification Team' handle in September 2004.