Valve’s ARG seemed to be hinting at an early launch of Portal 2 for the past week, and we’re not talking about stores breaking the street date, as some stores have already (with walkthrough videos flooding YouTube in the past 24 hours.) The ARG has been poured over, and one decoding seemed interesting:
Messages decoded by community members also hint at a possible early launch for Portal 2. “4/19/2011_7AM=4/15/2011_9AM” implies that Valve may open the floodgates four days ahead of schedule, while other in-fiction text fragments reference early releases and being “ahead of schedule” without saying anything outright.
If that weren’t enough, there was a countdown on the Aperture Science website. However, when it expired, the countdown reset to the regular release date an a new screen appeared. Bars representing Steam games and how many people are playing on each one from the Potato Sack bundle? Apparently,Valve is stating that if people start playing these Steam games all at once, enough “power” will be released so Portal 2 can be released earlier. Is this like clapping your hands to resurrect Tinkerbell?
Jonah Falcon is a blogger for TMRzoo and GameStooge.com and covers all gaming consoles and platforms including Sony Playstation 3, Microsoft XBOX 360, Nintendo Wii, Sony PSP and computer games designed for Mac OS, Microsoft Windows and Linux operating systems. Jonah provides his readers with reviews, previews and up to date gaming industry news and rumors.
