Complete Portal Walkthrough

[Advanced Mode]
I have completed all six of these rooms. They are grossly evil parodies of the rooms you encountered during the last half of the storyline. Namely, room 13 through room 18.

The next version of this guide will feature information on how to beat each Advanced room in detail.

[Challenge Courses]
Again, these courses are rooms 13 through 18. The idea of the courses are that you must complete each course using a small number of portals, a small number of steps, or simply, the quickest time possible. You’d be surprised on how much you panic when you’re working under a time constraint. You forget how to place portals. You forget how to put buttons on cubes. You forget how to pick stuff up. You get all jittery. You curse like a sailor. It’s all in a day’s work, however, as once you have the Science Awards, you can brag to all your friends.

The next version of this guide will feature information on how to beat each room in detail, using the fewest steps, the best time, or the fewest number of portals.

[Achievements]
Here is a list of the accomplishments. Below is a list of solutions for each.

• Lab Rat: Acquire the fully powered Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device.
  You get this achievement in level 11. Simply pick up the orange portal gun to complete this.
• Fratricide: Do whatever it takes to survive.
  You accomplish this achievement in level 17. Simply destroy your companion cube when instructed. (NOOOOOO!)
• Partygoer: Make the correct party escort submission position decision.
  You accomplish this achievement in level 19. After you portal out of the firepit, fling yourself back across the firepit using a very high portal. The achievement didn’t register for me until I picked up the barrel at the end of the hallway to the left.
• Heartbreaker: Complete Portal.
  You accomplish this achievement in level 19.
  Play through the rest of the game.
• Terminal Velocity: Fall 30,000 feet.
  This one is simple. Set one portal on the ceiling. Set one on the floor. Make sure “Portal Funnel” is checked in the options. Now, look down, and jump in! Mute the sound, and turn off the screen. Take a break from the computer. Make yourself a sandwich. Eat the sandwich. Watch Doctor Who. Paint the fence. Fix the car. Take a trip to the mall. 30,000 feet is a LOT higher than it sounds. Consider: The typical hallway is 10 feet tall. You’ll have to fall through the portals 3,000 times in a normal hallway. Some people say that taller rooms are better for this. Well, if you turn your graphics detail way down in the options then I don’t see the difference.
• Long Jump: Jump 300 feet.
  The best place to accomplish this feat is in level 19. Once you reach the turret ambush room, you are in the right place. Experiment with distance jumping, and you’ll get it… Eventualy…
• Cupcake: Beat two Portal advanced maps.
• Fruitcake: Beat four Portal advanced maps.
• Vanilla Crazy Cake: Beat all six Portal advanced maps.
  Read the “Advanced Mode” section above for more information.
• Basic Science: Earn bronze medals on all Portal challenges.
• Rocket Science: Earn silver medals on all Portal challenges.
• Aperture Science: Earn gold medals on all Portal challenges.
  Read the “Challenge Courses” section above for more information.
• Camera Shy: Detach security cameras from the walls.
  Section 6 of this guide has a list of which rooms have which cameras. Just keep an eye out, and don’t leave a level until you’ve knocked off all the cameras.
• Friendly Fire: Knock down a turret with another turret.
  You are most likely to accomplish this in level 16. Place a portal on the ceiling above a turret. Drop another turret through the portal. If you are lucky, you will knock one down with the other.
  Another place to accomplish this is level 19, in the turret ambush room.

[Cheats, Glitches, and Spoilers]
Cheats can be found in the console window. GameFAQs has a section devoted for these. To open the Console window, simply press the [`~] key during the game. Type in the cheats as instructed, and voila! Now you can shoot rockets too!

Glitches? Heck, GLaDOS is a glitch. I wouldn’t say there are any real glitches that I’ve found in this game. It is truly linear. There are not multiple paths so far as I have found. If you have any information on this, if you have found multiple endings, or if you have discovered a way to beat the game without burning your companion cube, let me know! ;)

As for spoilers… THE CAKE IS A LIE! Again, Aperture Science and Black Mesa are competitors for DoD funds. GLaDOS was originally slated to be a de-icing module for Fuel Systems. However, the kind folks at Aperture Science decided to also turn it into an artificial intelligence with Genetic Lifeforms at its core… Oh, and as if that wasn’t enough, they also made it into a Disk Operating System. Because you need to integrate everything into one system. That couldn’t possibly go wrong.

Well anyhow, if you’re going to have an artificial intelligence run your corporation, take Marvin’s Advice, and don’t imbue it with cake recipes. “Here I am, brain the size of a planet, and they ask me to take you to the bridge. Call that job satisfaction? ’cause I don’t.”

Anyway, GLaDOS does give you some more story before she bites the big one. “You’re not even a full-time employee”. Apparently, Chell works here. It is as I had thought; A Cube Zero scenario. Chell was an employee who became trapped in the system. I don’t think the system was supposed to be that bad, either. I think that GLaDOS’s malfunctioning had a LOT to do with how dangerous many of the trials were.

So, Chell is a female. GLaDOS has a female personality. Do any males work here? I guess Black Mesa was a corporation that consisted entirely of male scientists and male security guards. The females have their aperture science. And portals seem a lot more stable than the teleporters you see in halflife 2.

[ApertureScience.com]
AKA: More Spoilers

If you go to this website, you are presented with a prompt. You can type:
LOGIN
LOGON
USER
at the prompt, and you will be asked for your name and password. There are two
options here. (As of this writing, the website is at version 17. Version 16 had
only one login name).
Your options are as follows;
Username: Any User Name
Password: PORTAL (or PORTALS)
You will taken to a Disk Operating System (Aka: GLaDOS). Only one file will be
present on the disk; “Apply.exe”
Username: CJOHNSON
Password: TIER3