Fall 2011 Video Game Playthroughs: Fable III, Portal 2, Fallout 3 GOTY
Portal 2 Co-Op (4.5/5)
Other than online multiplayer or the occasional console tag team, I rarely play cooperative mode. Up to this point, the best experience I could claim was from plowing through the Halo trilogy one weekend with a college buddy, and even then, the actual “help your teammate complete a task” moments were few and far between.
With Portal 2, the gameplay is similar to the main game, but distinctly different. It takes you awhile to remember that having four portals as opposed to just two means you can try all kinds of complicated stuff. And yet, there were three times I forgot I could just HAND a weighted cube to my teammate. Overall, I lucked out in getting a decent random-assigned partner, who was on the same level as me for figuring out puzzles.
The Co-op campaign had enough new spin on the game mechanics to warrant a playthrough, but none of the great story of the main campaign. Unless you can deal with the player-competence lottery and long stretch of time needed to run the whole thing in one go, it’s a pass without local friends and a night free.
