Announcing Portal: Revolution 2
There have been a lot of moments like this on Portal: Revolution. When your heart is pounding as you write up the blog post and you can't believe what words are spilling out of your fingers.
Release was the most surreal experience of my life. 8 years have been building up to that one moment. What next? It's a question I got a lot. I should have been prepared for it, but I wasn't. This announcement gives me that same feeling yet again.
It's now been over a year since the release of Portal: Revolution. Our public stance on a sequel has so far been
"Eh, maybe. Would be cool, but we want to do other things and have no ideas for a sequel" - us
And at the time that was true. We didn't really know what a sequel would look like, but then slowly, ideas started to come.
So let's just get to it.
Portal: Revolution 2 is in development
Yup. And that's all the details you're going to get today. We just want to confirm its existence. We just want to stop tip-toeing around this fact and see no reason to keep this secret. So while we don't have anything to show you (because not much exists yet), we just wanted to formally announce it and share our plans.
As you can see, this announcement is very scrappy. Proper showcases will happen in time.
We don't even have a logo. That's where we're at.
Dev cycle
What we do have however, is an entire, front to back design concept. The whole story, all environments, gameplay elements and aesthetics are already planned out.
We're currently in pre-production, where we intend to build a full level design blockout of the entire game. As of writing, 16 map blockouts exist and ~15 puzzles have been designed.
In parallel, we're creating design studies and story scripts.
Once the full blockout is done, we will enter production, where we take the ugly concrete foundation and sprinkle some polish on top.
I don't want to give away and promise too much yet, but let me put it like this: I would not be making a sequel, if the plan we came up with wasn't this good. Just you wait.
We're not here to churn out content for the sake of content. I want to see this mod done and I'm even more excited about it than I was for the original.
Q&A
1: How long will this take to finish?
Hardest questions out of the way first.
As much time as it needs, but we don't plan to go into another crazy 8-year dev cycle.
We're much better - and faster - at game development than we were as teenagers. The engine is built and stable and we can draw from a huge pool of existing work. We have a very strong and concrete plan, so we don't expect too many changes and cuts down the road. We're trying to keep it within ~3 years of development. But this is not a promise! Just an early goal we pulled out of the hat.
Point is: We don't want to spend another 8 years on this, but we won't rush something out the door for a deadline either. We're cleverer now.
2: Will the cast be returning?
Yes. Both voice-actors and our music producer will be back on the project.
3: Will the sequel be as big as the first game?
Yeah that's the plan. It might even be longer, we don't know yet. We're trying to be smart about scope and not over-plan right off the bat. There's no point in adding filler content just to pad the runtime, but we already have a lot of exciting new gameplay ideas.
4: Will the mod have new mechanics?
Yes. We have already prototyped 2 completely new mechanics which will play major parts in the campaign. There's even more new stuff to come and in Portal: Revolution tradition, we want to bring new life into some of the 'forgotten' elements. And yes we hear you, you wanted more Quantum Cube puzzles. Let's do it.
5: What will the story be?
Obviously you won't get a full script out of me, so here's the elevator pitch.
It's a full singleplayer sequel that picks up after Portal: Revolution. You play as the same test subject, stranded on the moon with Emilia Conly.
We have a lot of surprises waiting for you.
6: What do these blockouts look like?
Players aren't used to seeing this. But just to give you an idea of what early maps look like, here's a screenshot. We're currently building the entire game to this standard. This allows us to make changes early and quickly, before a lot of time has been spent on decorating.
7: What engine are you using?
We're still using Strata Source. In fact, we're now back on the latest version. Expect to see some Portal: Revolution 2 features added to Portal 2: Community Edition over time.
In fact, we already have >:)
8: How can I follow the development of this mod?
Best channel for that is our Discord Server.
9: How do the developers find time to work on this?
So one of the biggest changes between Revolution 1 and 2 is our time and availability. I, and most of the core team, were students and early job-less adults during the creation of the first mod.
We're much busier now. But who cares. This is fun! This is how I relax at the end of the day.
So, if you have any more questions, feel free to send them our way either on Discord Server or any of the other channels listed below.
Good fun! See you!
- Stefan Heinz (Creator)