14 DAY TRIAL // 
Portal is considered one of the best experiences available in gaming. It's a really smart physics-based first-person puzzle platformer, and if you haven't tried it yet, do yourself a favor and get it.
It's one of Valve's finest titles, challenging and amusing, with a great story and mind-boggling puzzles that will make you look at other such titles in a much more discerning and demanding way.
It seems only logical that such an influential part of pop culture will be exploited in as many ways as possible, from comics and fan-created animations to nods in other video games, and now we finally got our hands on a Portal-themed pinball table.
Zen Studios just released the Portal Pinball table for Zen Pinball 2, the most advanced and varied simulation in existence, and I took it for a quick spin, curious to see what it has to offer.
Gameplay
Zen Studios has so far managed to deliver a ton of pop culture themed pinball tables, merging endearing mechanics and iconic imagery with the classic arcade mechanics of flipping balls into bumpers and through lanes.
The Portal theme lends itself pretty well to the arcade setting, and the Aperture Science Heuristic Portal Pinball Device delivers a ton of instantly familiar mechanics.
You will be guiding Chell and Wheatley as they make their way through a series of test chambers, opening portals, taking down turrets, redirecting laser beams, and eventually coming face to face with GLaDOS itself, before escaping the test facility.
The table is chock full of stuff to discover, and you would do well to at least glance at the pre-game tips before jumping in, because there's quite a lot of stuff to do.
Right from the beginning skill shot and the autosave feature when releasing a new ball and managing to fumble and immediately get it into the drain, the Portal table oozes the unique atmosphere of Valve's beloved video game.
There are a ton of gates, combos and tricks to play with, some of them easier to trigger, while others a little more complicated due to the difficult nature of hitting the exact spots.
While some of the main mechanics of the table, such as triggering experiments, are pretty easy to hit, the experiments themselves require some practice in order to be completed.
Some of the events are timed, so you have to practice consistently hitting certain targets and lanes before actually being able to perform the sequence of moves that gets Chell through the experiments.
On the upside, there is a lot of stuff to discover, and playing the table is fun enough even when you don't really know what you're doing.
That said, it's also a little more difficult than some of Zen Studios' previous offerings. It takes a bit of practice to hit all the ramps and lanes at the top, especially because they're all so tightly bunched, but it also makes it easy to hit something while you're honing your skills.
Chell is sitting near the flippers, patiently waiting for you to activate the numerous missions available on the table, and GLaDOS is constantly watching you and taunting your throughout the action.
“While some of the main mechanics of the table, such as triggering experiments, are pretty easy to hit, the experiments themselves require some practice in order to be completed”
You can open portals on the field that send your ball to the upper lanes and there are also mini-games that you can engage in. Of course, activating certain bonuses can make those mini-games yield far more points upon completion, but that's for advanced players to tackle.
Every familiar character in the game makes an appearance, including Atlas and P-Body, who once summoned let you indulge in some multi-ball action, and you can even raid the Turret Factory before facing off against the menacing AI.
There are a ton of dynamic events to trigger while playing, even outside the missions, including toying with the laser and directing its beam through rotating prisms attached to the slingshots, letting you spill some fluids on the game board, altering the speed of the ball as it passes through those areas, just like the propulsion and repulsion gels.
Also, there's cake. And you can even get an extra ball by hitting the cake target enough times, although it's pretty difficult to pull off.
With a total of four flippers and some really challenging sequences to memorize and pull off, Portal Pinball is definitely one of the more challenging tables Zen Studios created so far, but also one of the most satisfying and charming.
Sound and visuals
The Portal theme has been very well implemented, both mechanically as well as visually. The table is cluttered but at the same time maintains the artistic direction of the inspiration source, that pristine look, with highly contrasting and strong colors, consisting mostly of black, white, blue and orange.
However, upon a closer look, you can see that Aperture Laboratories are not what they once were, and have fallen in disarray, full of dirty and cracked tiling, and littered with debris from their time of glory.
It's a visually intensive table and you would do well to take some time and watch the zoomed in overview before jumping in. There are a lot of things to hit, and they require some accurate aiming, so getting to know the layout is pretty important.
Fortunately, there are also some clear highlights that point to the things you have to hit during missions, making it easy to discern what your next step should be, and the busy table never ends up feeling chaotic.
The dialogue, sounds and music are the same ones found in the Portal video games, making the experience all the more exciting, and making it really hard to find a fault in the pinball table's soundtrack.
The Good
- Great integration of theme
- Lots of eye candy
- Challenging
The Bad
- Sounds start getting repetitive after a while
- Table is a bit too cluttered
Conclusion
It's definitely a worthy time sink for Portal fans, as the atmosphere has been recreated faithfully, and you would be hard pressed to imagine someone making a better themed pinball table than this.
There is plenty of eye candy and plenty of action, both the usual array of mechanics you might expect from a classic pinball table, including multiball, jackpots, extra balls, timed rounds, and some clever ones themed after Valve's first-person puzzle game.
There's even a boss fight against GLaDOS, and several missions you can complete beforehand to make it easier, if you do want to master all the table's challenges.
In a nutshell, it's a great table for newbies and pinball wizards alike, that can offer tons of fun even to those who are not particularly crazy about flipping metal balls around, but are into Portal.
