Line #280 VideoGame/Portal


1	'''[-This page is for the Portal series as a whole. If you're looking for the first video game in the series with the same name, [[VideoGame/Portal1 please click here.]]-]'''
2
3	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/portallogo.png]]
4	[[caption-width-right:350:Aperture Science. We do what we must, because we can.]]
5
6	''Portal'' is a {{First Person\|Shooters}} PuzzlePlatformer video game series created by Creator/{{Valve\|Software}} that takes place in the [[SharedUniverse same universe]] as the ''VideoGame/HalfLife'' series. As the name implies, the core gameplay element of the ''Portal'' games deals with using a "portal gun" to create doorway-type portals in order to solve physics based puzzles. The game features the protagonist [[HeroicMime Chell]], a human who woke up as an unwilling test subject in the Aperture Science Enrichment Center, a research facility which has become completely abandoned, save for the personality of the [[AIIsACrapshoot insane]] [[MasterComputer central A.I.]] [=GLaDOS=].
7
8	'''Main Series:'''
9	[[index]]
10	* ''VideoGame/Portal1'' (2007): The relatively short game that started it all, chronicling Chell's journey as [=GLaDOS=] guides her through a series of test chambers in the Enrichment Center. Originally released as one of the five games included in ''The Orange Box''.
11	* ''Portal: Still Alive'' (2008): A standalone port of the first game for Xbox Live Arcade, separated from The Orange Box. It included bonus test chambers and new achievements, but no new content in the main game.
12	* ''VideoGame/Portal2'' (2011): The sequel that takes place an unspecified amount of time after the original. ''Portal 2'' is 2-3 times longer in terms of gameplay time than the original, and introduces a few major characters and explores in greater depth the history and workings of Aperture Science, as well as the origins and character of [=GLaDOS=] herself.
13	* [[/index]]''Portal Companion Collection'' (2022): a CompilationRerelease of the first two ''Portal'' games released on the Platform/NintendoSwitch. ''Portal'' has the bonus test chambers from ''Portal: Still Alive'' and the updated ending and ARG content from the PC version's 2010 patch included, and both games include motion control aiming as an option.[[index]]
14
15	'''Spin-Offs:'''
16	* ''VideoGame/TheLab'' (2016): A TechDemoGame for virtual reality, taking place in an Aperture Science pocket universe.
17	* ''VideoGame/ApertureHandLab'' (2019): Another VR tech demo, showcasing the Valve Index Controller's finger tracking by having you interact with several hands-possessing personality cores.
18	* ''VideoGame/ApertureDeskJob'' (2022): A short game made to show off the features and controls of the Platform/SteamDeck.
19	[[/index]]
20
21	'''Other Media and Crossovers:'''
22	* ''VideoGame/{{Peggle}} Extreme'' (2007), a tie-in demo version of Peggle that released for free alongside The Orange Box, containing levels themed around the titles included in The Orange Box, of which Portal was one.
23	* ''[[http://www.thinkwithportals.com/comic/ Lab Rat]]'' (2011), a short comic taking place before the original game centering on the schizophrenic Aperture scientist Doug Rattman (the guy who wrote all those messages saying TheCakeIsALie) around the time that [=GLaDOS=] was activated.
24	* ''The Final Hours of Portal 2'' (2011), an interactive digital book about ''Portal 2'''s development.
25	* ''VideoGame/PokerNight2'' (2013): [=GLaDOS=] is the dealer in this Texas Hold-em game and will occasionally converse with the participants ([[WesternAnimation/TheVentureBros Brock Samson]], [[VideoGame/{{Borderlands}} Claptrap]], [[Franchise/EvilDead Ash Williams]], and Franchise/{{Sam\|AndMax}}). In addition, using Portal-themed chips, cards, and table will cause the entire Inventory to resemble the Aperture Enrichment Center.
26	* ''[[VideoGame/BitTrip Runner2]]'' (2013): Atlas was made a PC-exclusive player character included with the "Good Friends" DLC pack.
27	* ''Portal: The Uncooperative Cake Acquisition Game'' (2015): A TabletopGame from Creator/CryptozoicEntertainment.[[index]]
28	* ''VideoGame/LegoDimensions'' (2015): A CrisisCrossover where Franchise/{{Batman}}, [[WesternAnimation/TheLegoMovie Wyldstyle]] and [[Franchise/TheLordOfTheRings Gandalf]] explore various dimensions to find a way to defeat [[OmnicidalManiac Lord Vortech]]. One location they visit is Aperture Science, and [=GLaDOS=] plays a supporting role as an antagonist throughout the level and later in the game, and even gets into an argument with [[Film/TwoThousandOneASpaceOdyssey HAL 9000]] at one point. There is also a level pack that is more-or-less a continuation of the Portal series story featuring Chell (as the playable character), [=GLaDOS=] and Wheatley. The ending song for the game, like the previous ''Portal'' games, was written by Music/JonathanCoulton and sung by Creator/EllenMcLain from [=GLaDOS=]'s perspective. This also features a "[[MacGuffin Foundation Element]]" for this universe [[TheCakeIsALie which is fittingly the infamous cake]].
29	* ''VideoGame/PortalPinball'' (2015): A PinballSpinoff available for ''VideoGame/ZenPinball'' (''Pinball FX'' for Microsoft platforms). It takes most of its cues from ''Portal 2'', though there are some nods to the first game as well.
30	* [[/index]]''Bridge Constructor Portal'' (2017): A fusion of the ''Bridge Constructor'' and ''Portal'' series, with the former's gameplay in the latter's environment. Released for PC, mobile devices, Platform/NintendoSwitch, Platform/Playstation4, and Platform/XboxOne.
31	* ''[[VideoGame/SuperBomberman Super Bomberman R]]'' (2017): The Steam port has P-body and Atlas as exclusive characters.
32	* ''VideoGame/EscapeSimulator'' (2021): The Portal Escape Chamber {{DLC}} released 8th of September, 2023 has the players escape the Aperture Science Enrichment Center following "a minor workplace incident" which has put the facility on lockdown.
33
34	The official website of the Portal series can be found at [[http://www.thinkwithportals.com/ ThinkWithPortals.com]]
35
36	Do not confuse this with the similarly-named but wildly different-in-tone ''VideoGame/{{Postal}}'' game series.
37
38	'''This page applies for the series as a whole. Please add any examples from an individual game to their dedicated pages.'''
39
40	----
41	!!The Portal series contains examples of:
42
43	* ActionGirl: Chell, the PlayerCharacter.
44	* AbandonedLaboratory: There ain't no one in the Aperture Science labs except you and and a few leftover [=AIs=] ([[spoiler:oh, and Doug Rattmann]]).
45	* AdorableEvilMinions: The gun turrets.
46	* AffablyEvil: The modus operandi of Aperture Science in a nutshell, and of course that of [=GLaDOS=]. They are absolutely willing to risk your life, yet they're ''so'' sincere about it...
47	* AICronym: [=GLaDOS=] is an acronym for '''G'''enetic '''L'''ifeform and '''D'''isk '''O'''peration '''S'''ystem.
48	* AIGettingHigh: The Aperture Science testing chambers give the AI controlling them a burst of pleasure whenever a subject completes a test chamber. It's apparently highly addictive.
49	* AIIsACrapshoot: A pleasant, amusing, physics game is turned into a brilliant story demonstrating the power of the medium merely by the judicious application of an Insane Killer Disk-Operating System. [[TheCakeIsALie And cake.]]
50	* AllThereInTheManual: The Aperture Science website revealed much of the backstory, this was removed in December 2010. Then [=GameInformer's=] Portal 2 hub listed [[http://gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2010/03/24/Aperture-Science_3A00_-A-History.aspx an updated version of the history as stated in the Aperture website.]] The [[http://combineoverwiki.net Combine OverWiki]] can also help. The names of [=GLaDOS=] and Chell are never stated in-game, except in the optional developer commentary. However, Chell is listed in the credits, and [=GLaDOS=] has her name on her side.
51	* AlternateRealityGame: On March 1, 2010, the game received a surprise patch, featuring a new achievement and a load of seemingly innocuous sound files full of static. Until someone savvy enough to know old-school technology (SSTV) found images hidden within them and [[https://combineoverwiki.net/wiki/Portal_ARG#Sound_list oh bloody hell]].
52	* AmbiguouslyBrown: Chell.
53	* {{Antepiece}}: The early test chambers are designed to ease beginners into the game, and gradually introduce them to the different elements and aspects of the game, like the concept of portals itself, the cubes and buttons (and how these two aren't necessarily always linked together), entering portals of both colors as opposed to mistaking blue portals for entrances and orange portals for exits... A few test chambers were redesigned in development for that same reason; they introduced too many gameplay elements at once, and confused playtesters.
54	* AsciiArt: Used in the credits to ''Portal'' as well as in the ''Portal 2'' [[AlternateRealityGame ARG]].
55	* {{Autosave}}: The games autosave in certain places or intervals. If you want to to back before an autosave, you can always load the previous save file.
56	* AutoTune: Ellen [=McLain=]'s voice is processed through a harmonizer to make [=GLaDOS=]'s voice sound computer-generated.
57	* AwesomeButImpractical: Downplayed with the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device. A marvel of engineering with the power to create a link between any two points in space -- but it only seems to work on certain forms of concrete, specific ceramic tiles, [[spoiler:and anything coated in or made of lunar soil]]. However, the games also repeatedly point out that with proper application, the portal gun could revolutionize the world for the better, but Aperture pointlessly wasted it on simply running similar tests over and over again for no definable reason other than gaining nebulously useful research on what the portal guns can accomplish.
58	* BadassNormal:
59	** Chell, of course.
60	** Doug Rattman, a schizophrenic DeadpanSnarker scientist [[spoiler:who was indirectly responsible for almost all the events of both games, and escaped [=GLaDOS=] to do so.]]
61	* BadLiar: It's a wonder that [=GLaDOS=] even ''tries'' to manipulate anyone to her side, as her attempts at deception are laughably see-through.
62	* BagOfSpilling: The Emancipation Grill (also called "the fizzler" by the developers) is a forcefield which is harmless to Chell (mostly, probably, unless sometimes it's not?) and her Portal Gun, but prevents her from taking foreign objects like cubes through it, and there's one at the end of each level, which prevents you from cheating or breaking the game. Additionally, you can't shoot portals through one, and passing through erases all current portals. Many puzzles force you to creatively circumvent Emancipation Grills.
63	* BlackComedy: Aperture Science's approach to anything is steeped in this. So is [=GLaDOS=]'s sense of humor.
64	* BloodlessCarnage: Like in ''Half-Life'', there is a cheat (one that doesn't invoke NoFairCheating) that disables blood. Specifically, the cheat is violence_hblood 0.
65	* TheCakeIsALie: The TropeNamer. [[spoiler:Let's just say that the cake [=GLaDOS=] promises turns out to be a bit different than expected.]]
66	* CanonImmigrant: [=GLaDOS=] stars in the ''VideoGame/DefenseGridTheAwakening'' DLC ''Defense Grid: YouMonster''.
67	* {{Cloudcuckoolander}}: Aperture Science CEO Cave Johnson, according to the company's {{backstory}}. His many questionable acts include founding a shower curtain manufacturing company named Aperture Science, believing time was flowing backwards as he laid on his death bed, and deciding that developing a [[UnwantedAssistance Heimlich Counter-Maneuver]] and creating a [[EvilIsPetty Take-A-Wish Foundation]] were two important plans for Aperture Science's future ([[TimeyWimeyBall or past, as he saw it]]). Even the portal project was originally developed because, [[http://www.gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2010/03/24/aperture-science_3a00_-a-history.aspx in Johnson's own words]]:
68	-->'''Cave Johnson:'''...Well, it’d be like, I don't know, something that would help with the shower curtains I guess. I haven’t worked this idea out as much as the wish-taking one.
69	* CollisionDamage: Averted, with a HandWave thanks to Chell's heel springs. Played straight with the toxic floors and energy orbs. [=GLaDOS=] even lampshades it:
70	-->'''[=GLaDOS=]:''' [[AC:While safety is one of many Enrichment Center goals, the Aperture Science High-Energy Pellet, seen to the left of the chamber, can and has caused permanent disabilities, such as vaporization. Please be careful.]]
71	* CoolGate: Portals.
72	* CoresAndTurretsBoss: [=GLaDOS=], who has cores attached and uses a rocket turret on Chell.
73	* CreepyMonotone: [=GLaDOS=] again, or at least very passive-aggressive.
74	* CreativeClosingCredits: The ending song plays over a text screen that displays the lyrics in the form of a computerized personnel file report, accompanied by some rather hilarious ASCII art.
75	* CriticalStaffingShortage: The Aperture Science Enrichment Center. Never mind staff, the only actual living ''person'' in the entire game is Chell. There used to be a lot more people working there, but [[spoiler:[=GLaDOS=] killed them all]].
76	* {{Crossover}}: With ''VideoGame/DefenseGridTheAwakening'', complete with levels that look like the Enrichment Center.
77	* CuteMachines: The turrets, as well as [=GLaDOS=]' curiosity core.
78	* CyberCyclops: If Aperture made it, it has only one eye. Even with no depth perception, the turrets are annoyingly good at aiming for you if given the chance and a few seconds of your now-ended life.
79	* DeadlyEnvironmentPrison: There are multiple indications throughout the series that the world outside the Aperture Science complex poses more danger to Chell than the tests endlessly invented by the murderous AI [=GLaDOS=] inside.
80	* DeadMansTriggerFinger: The turrets will spray bullets for a few seconds after you knock them over.
81	* DeadlyGas: Neurotoxin to be specific. [=GLaDOS=] has tons of the stuff, which she used to kill most of the people in the Center prior to the start of the first game. She attempts to use it again at the end of the first game and in the second.
82	* DistinctiveAppearances: The white tile surfaces you can attach portals to are significantly different in color and texture than surfaces you can't use the portals on. This is so you can view things from a distance and know what your options are.
83	* EccentricAI:
84	** [=GLaDOS=]'s residual trauma from [[spoiler: her conflicting emotions she retained from Caroline]] combined with the cold and callous experimentation from Aperture have driven her insane. She flooded the building with Neurotoxin until she was attached with several sentient personality cores to impede her sociopathy.
85	** Thats not to say said cores actually made her less insane. The personality cores attached to her include one that constantly ask questions about every mundane thing going on around, one that rambles on forever about making a cake, one that's incredibly angry and savage, and one specifically designed to be stupid. And on that note...
86	** Wheatley, the aforementioned stupidity core is obviously dumb, but he has your best interest at heart... or at least he does until he replaces [=GLaDOS=] as the central core. As it turns out, being the central core alters the personality of the core to obsessively run tests and experiments. This results in a core becoming corrupted overtime, essentially becoming insane. Wheatley and [=GLaDOS=] were both partially corrupted, but other corrupted cores include one that obsesses over space, one that thinks its a suave action movie hero, and one that rattles off incoherent fake facts.
87	* ElaborateUndergroundBase: The Enrichment Center. The sequel shows how astoundingly elaborate it really is, and even then we don't directly see all of it. Aperture is ''huge''.
88	* EldritchLocation: The Aperture Science Computer-Aided Enrichment Center seems at first like a fairly normal, if deserted, underground testing laboratory. However, as stated above, the place is massive to the point where most of it seems structurally and financially impossible. It also seems to violate the laws of physics. Not only are [=GLaDOS=] and [[spoiler:Wheatley]] able to create new testing chambers out of thin air, but the ending to ''Portal 2'' shows that [[spoiler:you're able to see the moon and sky from Wheatley's chamber, only to be lifted from an elevator multiple floors up in the scene afterwards]]. Granted, it's shown that whatever AI runs the place is able to control and rearrange the facility on a whim, but that still raises the question on how they're able to make such drastic changes to a building that's fixed underneath the ground.
89	* EnigmaticInstitute: Cave Johnson founded Aperture Science to conduct...scientific research. All kinds of research. Any kind of science, even if seemingly had no practical purpose. While it initially had good success, after an incident involving a prototype technology that eventually led to the portal gun, which resulted in a number of test subjects vanishing, Aperture's fortunes crumbled. Cave Johnson then moved all his more questionable projects deeper into underground labs to avoid further scrutiny.
90	* EternalEngine: The facilities behind-the-scenes. Taken to further extremes in the sequel.
91	* EverythingIsAnIpodInTheFuture: Or more accurately, about the same time the iPod came out. The similarity between Aperture's aesthetic and Apple's has been noted and was even exploited for one of Valve's teaser pictures when they were about to release Steam for the Mac. Several fans have even semi-jokingly, semi-seriously compared the differences between Aperture and Black Mesa as analogous to the differences between Apple and Microsoft.
92	* EvolvingTitleScreen:
93	** After completing the game, the player is returned to a title screen that shows the famous cake sitting in a dark room, instead of the detention chamber where they start the game.
94	** ''Bridge Constructor Portal'' has the stick figure at their desk. With each group of 10 levels completed, they receive power to their computer, a security camera, a turret, a radio, a companion cube, and a portal device.
95	* FauxAffablyEvil: [[spoiler:When Wheatley is in control of Aperture, he attempts to mimic [=GLaDOS=]' mannerisms, but fails miserably]].
96	* FoeRomanceSubtext: ''VideoGame/Portal1'' drops several hints that [=GLaDOS=]'s fixation on Chell goes beyond the usual KillAllHumans motivation, with lines such as "Despite your violent behavior, the only thing you've managed to break so far... is my heart." It could be unintentional... but then ''VideoGame/Portal2'' ramps it up further, giving [=GLaDOS=] every PsychoLesbian trope in the book, and she frequently tries to guilt trip Chell using language common to abusive partners. This culminates in "Want You Gone", a BreakupSong in everything but name. ''The Final Hours of Portal 2'' reveals that a cut plotline had [=GLaDOS=] growing increasingly jealous as the player collected personality cores, culminating in them entering a room to be greeted with the sight of a cold roast dinner, at which point [=GLaDOS=] would berate them for missing dinner because they were busy cheating on her with a personality core. In "You Wouldn't Know", the credits song of ''VideoGame/LegoDimensions'', [=GLaDOS=] tries to make Chell jealous, shows resentment over her keeping away, and reminisces over "how much we had".
97	* {{Foreshadowing}}:
98	** The moon is everywhere on the early game graffitti in the second game. The nail is then hammered in a little deeper by Cave Johnson's explanation on the uses of moon powder. [[spoiler:The climax involves creating a portal on the surface of the moon.]]
99	** In his introductory scene, Wheatley attempts to move Chell's cryochamber throughout the facility to the testing area, and hits about every obstacle on his way, before forcing the chamber through a wall. His idea of "hacking" a door is also to break the glass. [[spoiler:So of course, he's not going to be very delicate with the facility once he's in charge.]]
100	* ForScience: Aperture Science doesn't seem to be too good at considering the future implications of the gadgets they make. As the theme tune says, "We do what we must / Because we ''can''."
101	* GaidenGame: To the ''Half-Life'' series. Of course, given that it involves completely original characters and the sequel has been confirmed to have nothing to do with ''Episode Three'' or ''Half-Life 3'' after all, you could also consider it a BackdoorPilot.
102	* GeniusLoci: The Enrichment Center is alive, and reshapes itself according to the whims of the AI in charge. This becomes much more apparent in the sequel.
103	* GenreBlindness: Aperture Sceince, you guys gave the sentient supercomputer the ability to release neurotoxin through the air vents, [[TooDumbToLive in your own facility]]. How did you ''think'' that would turn out?
104	* GenreBusting: A first-person puzzle-platformer game series. And in terms of its literary genres, it's a strange blend of science-fiction, BlackComedy, {{Satire}} (in terms of how it mocks the typical office culture of corporate America), and even {{Horror}} at times whenever the game's atmosphere pushes the comedy to the side.
105	* GlowingEyesOfDoom: Only a ''few'' things in the game with glowing eyes won't try to kill you.
106	* GoneHorriblyWrong: The ''only'' thing Aperture Science has made that hasn't (yet) had terrible repercussions or just been a flat-out terrible idea? The Portal Gun, and that's only until the singularity inside it destabilizes.
107	* GraffitiOfTheResistance: Doug Rattman's graffiti is of this nature.
108	* GrowBeyondTheirProgramming: [=GLaDOS=] was originally intended to "only" be a sufficiently advanced artificial intelligence to run enough experiments in an efficient and
109	* HeroicMime: {{Lampshaded}} by [=GLaDOS=], naturally. Chell's lack of response to her monologues leads her to say "[[AC:Are you even listening to me?]]" WordOfGod is that Chell won't offer her the satisfaction of speaking; she's just that stubborn.
110	* HighVoltageDeath: Used to justify Chell's Super Drowning Skills; falling into water causes the portal gun to short out and (presumably) give her a fatal dose of electricity.
111	* IncompetenceInc: Aperture Science was '''not''' a well-run research center.
112	** They were great at inventing innovative things and making profound scientific breakthroughs, but also seemed almost willfully ignorant of the uses to which said discoveries could be put and tried to shoehorn them into products for which they were completely unsuitable. See InventionalWisdom below.
113	** As admitted by Cave Johnson, Aperture started from scratch with every bit of science they did, paying no attention to the lessons learned from previous generations of scientists. This lead to situations like the experiment with the Aerial Faith Plate, where they tried to see how well test subjects could solve problems when catapulted into space. [[FalseReassurance The results were quite informative]]: They could not. This mindset no doubt lead to the deaths of countless test subjects, to the point where multiple Senate Hearings on missing astronauts were held in 1968, with Aperture as a "vital participant."
114	** Not only are the tests themselves dangerous, but just about everything else around Aperture [[NoOshaCompliance seems to be needlessly dangerous as well]]. In the beginning, they gave test subjects coffee laced with fluorescent calcium to track the neural activity in their test subject's brains, which had a slight chance of hardening and vitrifying their frontal lobes -- especially if they visualized it happening while under stress. One control group had postcard-sized "microchips" implanted into their skulls that had a chance of suddenly spiking in temperature. They also apparently had ''radioactive folding chairs'' at one point. And after the Portal Gun was invented, it apparently took several test subjects falling to their deaths before devices like the Long Fall Boots were invented.
115	** In Aperture, if it's not dangerous, it's horribly inefficient. Case in point, the enormous system of pneumatic pipes designed to carry objects around the facility. [[WordOfGod Developer commentary]] describes it as being a ridiculously complex and expensive solution to a simple problem, with apparently no way to control where things go. But since Aperture has so many random stuff they're constantly churning out, they simply don't care where everything ends up.
116	** Ends up somewhat {{deconstruct\|ion}}ed in ''Portal 2''. All of this wasteful spending and death lead to Aperture's bankruptcy in TheSeventies, where they took to hiring homeless people as test subjects before eventually making testing mandatory for all employees. They also couldn't afford to buy ''$7'' worth of moon rocks, but still went ahead with buying $70 million worth and made them into a portal-conducting gel. A move that poisoned Cave Johnson and left him a bitter, dying old man who blamed [[VideoGame/HalfLife Black Mesa]] for all his failures.
117	* IndustrializedEvil: The whole maze is one giant example, with however many test subjects came before.
118	* InsistentTerminology: "Deadly neurotoxin" throughout both games.
119	* InventionalWisdom: The actual functions of Aperture Science's inventions are almost entirely tangential, if not antithetical, to their ostensible purpose. [=GLaDOS=] and the portal gun started as a fuel system de-icer and a shower curtain, respectively... at least until the retcons established in the sequel. And even in the sequel, the Propulsion and Repulsion Gels started out their existence as simple ''dietary aids''.
120	* KillAllHumans: Apparently, [=GLaDOS=] spearheaded a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7bkewdgjKA&feature=player_embedded Human Annihilation Studies]] program.
121	* LawOfInverseRecoil: The android turrets are easily knocked over and picked up as if they are quite light, however their guns don't seem to have much recoil - they don't tip back when they fire.
122	* LevelGoal: In each of the test chambers, the elevator to the next test chamber.
123	* LighterAndSofter: Compared to ''VideoGame/HalfLife''. While ''Half-Life'' is an intense FirstPersonShooter[=/=]ImmersiveSim series set in a CosmicHorrorStory, ''Potal'' is a DenserAndWackier puzzle platformer series fully laden in BlackComedy.
124	* MadScience: One kind of gets the sensation Aperture Science was run a little like this even before [=GLaDOS=] took over; the test rooms don't really seem to be built with "safety" or "sanity" in mind. The sequel plays this for all it is worth.
125	-->''[[AC:CAUTION: This Sign is Radioactive.]]''
126	* MascotVillain: [=GLaDOS=], though her #1 mascot status is edged out by the CompanionCube. The evil comes in the fact that she forces Chell to run around an deadly obstacle course [[IWasToldThereWouldBeCake with the promise of cake]], and that when she gets to the end, tries to kill Chell.
127	* MinimalistCast: A HeroicMime and a [[TheVoice disembodied voice]]. That's it, besides an absent nutcase who wrote messages on the walls, an [[CompanionCube inanimate box]] and some [[AdorableEvilMinions automatic turrets with cute voices]]. The web comic "Lab Rat" establishes that Rattman, the "nutcase", was actually still there. He [[spoiler:[[DownerEnding apparently died at the end of the comic when he saved Chell from the Party Escort Bot]],]] but a particularly creepy easter egg in the second game implies that he's still alive: the sixth and final Rattman Den you can find is just like the others. When you leave, [[ParanoiaFuel any and all portals you made inside the den mysteriously vanish and the wall closes so you can't get back in...]]
128	* MisappliedPhlebotinum: The Portal Gun originated as an "improved" shower curtain. [=GLaDOS=] originated as an "improved" fuel system de-icer. Aperture developed wormhole teleportation and artificial intelligence, yet used them for nothing more than to run hapless subjects through mazes like lab rats.
129	* NiceJobBreakingItHero: The trope namer, though ironically, [=GLaDOS=]' first use of it is not an example. There are several examples thereafter, particularly in Portal 2, when [[spoiler: Chell puts Wheatley in charge of Aperture...only to discover that [=GLaDOS=] was the only thing standing in the way of a nuclear meltdown that Wheatley has no intentions of stopping, and the facility is now about to blow up with all three of them inside.]]
130	-->'''[=GLaDOS=]:''' Oh good, my slow clap processor made it in here.
131	* NoMedicationForMe: Inverted in the ''Lab Rat'' comic. Doug Rattman has been saving the last of his anti-psychotic medicine so that he'll have a clear head when Chell destroys [=GLaDOS=] and he can escape, even if his ([[HearingVoices imaginary?]]) CompanionCube tells him he doesn't need it.
132	* NoProductSafetyStandards: Shower curtains, the emancipation grill, and probably not the Portal Gun.
133	* OminousMultipleScreens: The cluster of monitors surrounding [=GLaDOS=]' mainframe at the endgame, each showing a sped-up slideshow of random images, many of them being cake photos, and some of these monitors change to a timer [[spoiler: when she starts pumping in the neurotoxin.]] For extra humor, her dialogue makes certain frames pause based on what she says.
134	-->'''[=GLaDOS=]:''' Was it worth it? Because despite your ''violent'' (shot of a knife held over a [[VisualPun violin]]) behavior, the only thing you've managed to break so far, is my heart.
135	* OnceDoneNeverForgotten:
136	** [=GLaDOS=] never quite lets Chell forget about the time she incinerated the Weighted CompanionCube.
137	** In one test chamber in ''Portal 2'', she spits out [[ReplacementGoldfish another Companion Cube]] for you to use for the puzzle, [[KickTheDog only for it to disintegrate as soon as you touch it.]] She "apologizes," and gives you another one. [[CrossesTheLineTwice Which also disintegrates.]] The third one can be used, and after the puzzle is solved she even tempts you to try saving ''this'' Cube by taking it through the (disabled) Emancipation Grill, [[ReversePsychology explicitly warning you not to try removing anything from the test area.]] [[spoiler:[[RuleOfThree She disintegrates it anyway when you reach the elevator.]]]] Then she reminds you that [[spoiler:they are sentient]], and suggests the last one [[spoiler:was about to say "I love you"]].
138	* OpeningMonologue: [=GLaDOS=] shortly after waking up Chell, warning her about potential injuries that may occur.
139	* OrangeBlueContrast: Orange and blue are common complementary colors in the game; the portals are blue and orange, Excursion Funnels are blue or orange depending on their direction, the two primary gels in ''Portal 2'' are blue and orange, [=GLaDOS=] has an orange eye while Wheatley has a blue one, and more.
140	* OverdrawnAtTheBloodBank: Chell can take tons of turret shots, and leaves ''large'' blood smears on walls when hit. 5 seconds, [[RegeneratingHealth and you're okay again, ready to lose another three pints.]]
141	* PeaceAndLoveIncorporated
142	* PeopleJars: Implied in the Relaxation Vaults.
143	* PointOfNoReturn: Within some levels, there are doors that close once the player goes through. (The divisions between each GameLevel are also points of no return, of course, as they prevent players from putting portals across levels.)
144	* PortalCut:
145	** Averted: The developers wanted players to feel safe, so if the player tries to put a portal elsewhere when the player or an object is in the middle of a portal, the player or object gets pushed out. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQYg1-t1PRU Most of the time.]]
146	** Inverted: ''Opening'' a portal pops off security cameras.
147	* PortalSlam: Gets averted, at considerable programmer effort.
148	* PoweredByABlackHole: [[https://youtu.be/wX9Sc88qreg?t=12 Aperture Investment Opportunity #4: "Boots"]] implies this for the Portal Gun, because it can stop working if the Miniature Black Hole inside fails.
149	* PressurePlate: The 1,500-Megawatt Aperture Science Heavy Duty Super-Colliding Super-Button.
150	* PuzzleGame: One of the only genres in which ''Portal'' readily fits.
151	* RedEyesTakeWarning: The gun turrets all feature glowing red eyes that provide aiming lights for their guns.
152	* ReedRichardsIsUseless: The portal gun could revolutionize the world: veritable {{Perpetual Motion Machine}}s[[labelnote:For instance:]]Using portals to create perpetually falling columns of water to move turbines to generate hydroelectric power without requiring the construction of dams[[/labelnote]], CasualInterplanetaryTravel, resolve all supply and transportation problems, but there's no suggestion that it was ever used for anything other than simply testing.
153	** Aperture Science also had a massive automated complex in the abandoned salt mines under Cleveland, OH[[labelnote:*]]Though the sequel {{Retcon}}s it so that Aperture is located in the abandoned copper mines of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan[[/labelnote]]. Just the logistics of ''building'' the damn place boggles the mind, much less its continued operation, and would've require considerable expertise in terms of engineering and construction. They used it for testing.
154	** Aperture Science also developed Repulsion and Propulsion Gels along with Long Fall Boots. The former two were intended as diet aids when they could have instead be better used as, say, perfectly efficient engine lubrication or the best possible shock padding in history. Meanwhile, the Long Fall Boots were first created only as a "foot-based suit of armor for the Portal Device" and help in testing, and yet Aperture managed to create boots that ''completely negate the danger of falling from any height''. If Aperture had sold the Long Fall Boots to the [=US=] Air Force so none of their pilots/paratroopers would need parachutes, they could've easily made millions. Third verse, same as the first.
155	* RequiredSecondaryPowers: Chell wears a pair of ankle-springs in order to ensure her legs aren't shattered when she comes flying out of a portal. [[WordOfGod The commentary bubbles]] indicate early on that the reason was that playtesters complained that Chell could survive falls that would kill [[VideoGame/HalfLife Gordon Freeman]]. Despite the fact that the springs are patently insufficient to realistically protect her, they stopped the complaints, so mission accomplished (then again, this ''is'' a game series in which dimensional rifts are created by harnessing the power of a quantum singularity and [[ItMakesSenseInContext the Moon]], so spring loaded heel devices really make just as ''much'' sense).
156	* ResearchInc: Deconstructed with Aperture Science. Yes, they did tons of scientific research (with some avenues admittedly being more valuable than others), but it seems like they never realized that the point of scientific research is to eventually ''use'' that information for practical applications. As such, they needlessly wasted multiple decades on testing the Portal Gun when they could've actually ''released'' the Portal Gun to the government/public and become the richest company in history. Even in the "present-day", for all her power [=GLaDOS=] is shown to have been essentially cursed for the rest of time with performing tests on using the Portal Gun to solve complex physics puzzles despite the fact that human civilization seems to have completely collapsed, so there's no real organized society left for her to ''sell'' the Portal Gun to after it's been put through sufficient testing.
157	* RestrainingBolt: [=GLaDOS=]' {{Morality C\|hip}}ore was installed in an attempt to curb her psychopathic tendencies. Similarly, [[spoiler:[[TheDitz Wheatley]]]] was added to her in an attempt to limit her dangerously excessive intelligence.
158	* RoomFullOfCrazy: Several backstage areas show insane scrawlings and disturbing drawings, [[spoiler:done by Doug Rattmann.]]
159	* SafelySecludedScienceCenter: The [[IncompetenceInc Aperture Science]] Computer-Aided Enrichment Center is a massive, underground series of laboratories and testing facilities all hidden beneath the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. ''VideoGame/Portal2'' reveals that isolating the Center was one of the ''few'' good decisions Aperture CEO [[PointyHairedBoss Cave Johnson]] made: past experiments included such things as the ''accidental'' creation of armies of mantis men, dangerously toxic fluids being injected into people, the generation of ridiculously hostile artificial intelligences, and potentially apocalyptic attempts at time travel.
160	* ScienceIsBad: Exaggerated and PlayedForLaughs. [=GLaDOS=] and Aperture Science in general regard science with a three-way combination of ComedicSociopathy, CrazyIsCool and ForTheEvulz.
161	* ShoutOut: [[ShoutOut/{{Portal}} Has its own page.]]
162	* SiliconSnarker: [=GLaDOS=] is a malevolent artificial intelligence who is ''famous'' for throwing sarcastic jabs at the protagonist Chell. She is especially fond of calling her fat.
163	* SleptThroughTheApocalypse:
164	** ''Portal 1'' is heavily implied to be set either during or shortly after the [[RealityIsOutToLunch Resonance Cascade]] and resultant [[GreatOffscreenWar Seven Hour War]] of the ''Half-Life'' series. [=GLaDOS=] and Chell are both implied to have not experienced it thanks to the Aperture Science facility being a SmallSecludedWorld BeneathNotice for the Combine. What is going on beyond the Enrichment Center only gets obliquely (yet [[NothingIsScarier chillingly]]) referenced at one point during the first game's final boss fight where [=GLaDOS=] mocks Chell's attempt to escape, claiming "I have an infinite capacity for knowledge, and even ''I'm'' not sure what's going on outside."
165	** Possibly turned up to the level of absurdity in ''Portal 2'', which is heavily implied to take place anywhere from two hundred years to ''multiple millennia'' after the events of the first game ([[DistantFinale and presumably, the rest of the]] ''Half-Life'' series). This even gets comically lampshaded near the beginning of the game as Chell struggles to escape the ruined remnants of the facility and the automated Announcer has [[DissonantSerenity cheery one-sided conversations with her]] where it notes how humanity has likely regressed to FuturePrimitive tribes [[AfterTheEnd after whatever disaster has ended civilization]]... but [[SkewedPriorities this still shouldn't stop testing!]]
166	* StealthInsult: In the form of a VisualPun: in the post-credit scene, the space-obsessed corrupted core is orbiting Wheatley, because he's so ''dense''.
167	* SoundtrackDissonance: "Still Alive", and the radio version that plays in the Relaxation Vault and Test Chambers. The song is an absurdly upbeat and cheery-sounding song about a ruthless psychopath being brutally killed before it turning out that they're NotQuiteDead and they're now vowing bloody vengeance upon their murderer.
168	* [[invoked]] SpiritualSuccessor: To ''[[https://www.digipen.edu/fileadmin/website_data/gallery/game_websites/NarbacularDrop/ Narbacular Drop]]''.
169	* StuckOnBandAidBrand: [=GLaDOS=] is apparently programmed to use the full name of all Aperture Science products every time she refers to one. Thus, you don't have a "Portal Gun", you have an "Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device". Even something that she doesn't know the name of ([[spoiler:supposedly]]) gets called the "Aperture Science [[BuffySpeak Thing We Don't Know What It Does]]".
170	** Averted on one occasion: "I hope you brought something stronger than a portal gun this time."
171	* SuccessThroughInsanity: Schizophrenic Doug Rattman was completely right in suspecting the operating system was [[AIIsACrapshoot out to kill everyone]] and so was the [[SoleSurvivor only survivor]] of the lab incident. Amusingly, the backstory comic ''Lab Ratt'' portrays this less as him being ProperlyParanoid and more being the OnlySaneMan of his TooDumbToLive fellow employees.
172	* SuperPoweredRobotMeterMaids:
173	** [=GLaDOS=] was originally designed to be a "fuel-injection system de-icer". Someone went just a ''tad'' overboard.
174	** The turrets don't really ''need'' to have independent thought and the ability to feel pain. Or an empathy chip, or a chip to cancel out the effect of the empathy chip.
175	* TacticalSuicideBoss: The final bosses of both games must be defeated this way.
176	* TeleportGun: The Portal Gun.
177	* TeleportInterdiction: Portals can only be created on certain types of surfaces (e.g. white tile, yes; bare metal, no). Navigating through areas with few or no portal surfaces becomes an increasingly common puzzle element in the later stages.
178	* ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill: Referred to in the first game's credits song.
179	* UnbrokenFirstPersonPerspective: Used in both games.
180	* VagueHitPoints: Chell's exact HitPoints are only known through console commands that enables that bit of HeadsUpDisplay information. Otherwise, Chell dies after an unclear amount of turret shots and heals up when not being shot.
181	* VisualPun: During her monologue prior to the final battle, [=GLaDOS=] displays several images on the monitors in her chamber in rapid succession. On certain words of her speech, the images freeze on something related to what she just said.
182	** Violent behavior; A violin being sawed in half.
183	** The only thing you've managed to break so far, is my heart; An actual human heart.
184	** Surprise; various skull and crossbones.
185	** That has got to be the dumbest thing; [[VideoGame/HalfLife Black]] [[TakeThat Mesa]]
186	** Good news; [[OhCrap A screw.]]
187	** Deadly neurotoxin; more skulls.
188	* VitriolicBestBuds: Darkly deconstructed in the sense that [=GLaDOS=] somewhat treats Chell in this manner, as one-sided as it is, but in practice it's shown to be just another sign of [=GLaDOS=] being completely insane.

Context VideoGame / Portal