14 DAY TRIAL // Portal 2, the highly-anticipated sequel to Valve’s 2007 FPS puzzle game, reached Macs and Windows PCs yesterday through Steam, the popular gaming platform developed and maintained by the same company.
Downloadable for $49.99 in the States, and for €37,99 in European territories, Portal 2 builds on the success of its predecessor by introducing a captivating new story that picks up where Portal one left off.
New puzzles, new gameplay mechanics and, of course, highly improved graphics and effects are just some of the many strong points Portal 2 has to share with avid fans of the title.
A new co-op mode featuring its own story is also available in the game, and the game’s score is even more atmospheric than its predecessor’s.
All in all, the game couldn’t be off to a better start.
Now, for those who haven’t yet downloaded the game, it is important to outline that Steam will let you buy the game but will not check the system requirements for you.
Since that’s your job now, you’d better know that Portal 2 is quite a bit more demanding hardware-wise, compared to the original.
Mac gamers now need to run the latest version of Apple’s Snow Leopard operating system, a machine equipped with an Intel dual core processor, at least 2GB of RAM (though more is always better), close to 8GB of free hard disk space, and a fairly capable graphics card.
Here’s the complete breakdown, according to Valve Software themselves:
Mac System Requirements
· OS: MAC OS X 10.6.7 or higher · Processor: Intel Core Duo Processor (2GHz or better) · Memory: 2GB · Hard Disk Space: At least 7.6 GB of Space · Video: ATI Radeon 2400 or higher / NVIDIA 8600M or higher / Intel HD Graphics 3000
For comparison sake, Windows PC system requirements include:
Windows 7 / Vista / XP; 3.0 GHz P4, Dual Core 2.0 (or higher) or AMD64X2 (or higher); Memory: 1GB XP / 2GB Vista; Hard Disk Space: at least 7.6 GB of Space; video - 128 MB, DirectX 9 - compatible with support for Pixel Shader 2.0b; audio - DirectX 9.0c compatible.