Poll Question 304 – Which would you rather have…

8th December 2014

Single Player First Person Shooter Maps and Mods for Half-Life 1, 2 and Episodes 1, 2 and 3

I’m shamelessly stealing this question from Reddit because it seems such an interesting choice.

The original choice was between the Super Gravity Gun and the Portal Gun

However, I have also added the choice of Lamarr. Having weapons seems fun but I wanted a less destructive option too.

To be honest, I’m not really sure which I would choose.

The general consensus on Reddit seems to be the Super Gravity Gun because of the limitation of using the Portal Gun. But what if the gravity gun worked on all solid surfaces, would that make a difference?

Anyway, what are your thoughts?

Time to votes


19 Comments

  1. I’m just revisiting Portal,, its such a fun game,, 🙂 so my view is probably skewed,, but I really like the portal gun,, Its a movement device as opposed to a weapon.

    Hey Phillip,, how do i donate money to the latest mapping contest ?

    1. You have two options:
      1. Buy me a first class return plane ticket to your country of residence and book me into the neatest top hotel and meet me in the restaurant to buy me dinner and then slide an envelope full of US Dollars across the table just as we are finishing dessert.
      2. Send the money via PayPal to [email protected]

      Obviously, option 1 is my preferred choice but option 2 is fine too.

  2. wunnle

    I can’t believe I’m only one voted for blue gravity gun.

  3. I think the portal gun is probably the one I’d be more likely to use. I think the gravity gun is a bit to cumbersome for practical use and considering the amount of times in game I’ve tried to pick up something on a table and ended up picking the whole damn table up. I feel I could wreck my house fairly quick if all I wanted was the phone I left on my computer desk.

    Of course the portal device has the risk of accidentally falling to your death (if you don’t have the special boots) but I feel it would ultimately save on travel. Even if travelling safely between two floor portals would be kind of awkward.

  4. portal gun ,every time … creating portals would be good fun … especially dropping through the bedroom ceiling on to the bed …. or making a shortcut from the bedroom to the kitchen missing out the living room …
    on the other hand the super gravity gun would do more damage especially with all my wifes ormanents !

  5. Mega Sean 45

    Lamarr is pretty destructive. Just put her in a ventilation shaft of a Combine base and just watch the base explode as we epicly walk away in slow-mo.

  6. asterixer

    I prefer the gravity gun and then run a movers company 😉

    1. You could make a lot more money using the portal gun for that. London to New York in under a second! That’s gotta be worth millions to business.

  7. JG

    Oh, I’d take the Portal Gun, no question about that. It would be sweet to visit somewhere nice, plop a portal down, and then be able to transport yourself there from your own home whenever you want.

    Also, it has limited Gravity Gun-style functionality. You can pick up heavy things with it. You just can’t toss them at high speeds… but when would that be useful in a real-world context anyway?

    The only drawback is the two portal limit. And, of course, this supposes that I’m the only one with a Portal Gun. I’d imagine it could do some incredibly nefarious things in the wrong hands.

    1. You’d have to be careful where you place your portals, you don’t want people just wandering into your house off the street through a portal.

  8. I picked Lamar, but question, which Lamarr are we talking about?

    1) The Lamar who jumps through the teleporter at the beginning of the game.
    2) The Lamar who Kliener is looking for after the slow teleport.
    3) The Lamar who takes off in the rocked in Episode 2.

    Kliener really needs to do a better job taking care of his pets…

    1. JG

      Or the Lamarr that goes to the zoo? 🙂

      Isn’t it all the same Lamarr?

  9. Zekiran

    Portal gun without a doubt. With it extended to “flat surfaces of the appropriate size”, it would be far more useful than the grabbity gun, even though I do love me some grabbing action. The gravity gun would be able to break walls and maybe stuff things through the holes you make in walls, but… at least the Portal gun doesn’t leave any lasting damage when you use it reasonably smartly.

    Lamarr is… well, yeah the question is, how many Lamarr are there, really? Because she most certainly can’t have been the same individual headcrab through the whole thing – she is first lost in the Outlands, or perhaps merely “talking to Gman’s ravens” because when she breaks the teleporter at the start of HL2, that’s where she gets off. I’m not sure where she is most of the rest of the time, but if he’s claiming she’s the same one, that is one incredibly smart, powerful headcrab there, to make it to White Forest in order to… sacrifice herself to the cause? Or try to sabotage it? WHAT IS SHE DOING IN THAT ROCKET!?

    😀

    But yeah, Portal Gun > (normal) Grabbity gun > Lamarr. I don’t particularly care for the super-gravity gun, for general use, because what if I don’t WANT to kill everything I touch with it?

    1. JG

      WHAT IS SHE DOING IN THAT ROCKET!?

      Clearly, Lamarr is operating under the G-Man’s orders. 🙂

      “Time, Lamarr? Is it that… time again?”

      *SQUEAK*

      1. I would play the hell out of that mod.

      2. Zekiran

        ^^ I would too.

        I’ve got several noclipped screenshots of the conversation in question, actually heheh. I’m fairly sure though they didn’t *mean* to create such a weird little background story in Lamarr, there certainly is at least as much room for speculation on her nature and reasoning just based on those few things.

  10. The portal gun for me.

    The super gravity gun is more fun and a far, far, better offensive weapon. If you want to kill someone with it, you just aim and shoot. With the portal gun, you need to plan things out. You need a portal somewhere else that’s either ready to drop something on your enemies or ready to drop your enemies somewhere you’d rather they be.

    However, the portal gun is a tool first and a weapon last. The huge increase in mobility makes it worth it to me. Even if it can’t deal with enemy troops as well, you can always take the pacifist route and use it to avoid them entirely (and dropping a portal on the ground as you leave a doorway stops them from being able to run after you).

    The portal gun is also a lot less destructive. Letting the super gravity gun work on anything solid just means you’ll be ripping apart everything you come across. Great if you have anger issues you can only work out by smashing everything in sight to bits, not great if you ever have to deal with delicate objects, such as human beings.

    The Lamarr option makes me wish I had time to make a map about that. I’m imagining a puzzle level where you have to direct her around by dropping watermelons from a separate area.

  11. Kevin Foster

    Portal gun for me as well! If it was implemented as well as it was in Portal 2, it would be really special. I could really see mixing the combat of HL2 with the thoughtfulness of P2; it would be revolutionary.

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