How A Flash Game Changed Portal History
Vložit
- čas přidán 14. 06. 2024
- Portal: The Flash Version is one of the most iconic Portal fangames ever made, and it has a legacy no one has heard of in full. Today, I aim to reveal the lost history of Portal: The Flash Version and how it changed the history of Portal as a whole in a documentary.
Many thanks to Ido Tal, Hen Matshulski, and Josh Weier for their assistance.
-------------------------------------------------
CHAPTERS
0:00 - Intro
4:50 - In A Flash
12:12 - A 2D Legacy
16:24 - The Next Dimension
24:09 - A 3D Legacy
29:40 - Valve Enters The Scene
41:41 - Beyond Still Alive
50:11 - Conclusion
56:49 - Credits
-------------------------------------------------
Join My Discord! - / discord
Follow My Twitter! - / ossyflawol
Support My Patreon! - / ossyflawol
-------------------------------------------------
Music used in the documentary comes from Portal, Portal 2, Portal: The Flash Version, Entropy Zero 2, Undertale, and Deltarune.
-------------------------------------------------
Hey everyone, the name's Ossy Flawol! - Hry
Thank you all for your endless support. Captions are available :)
Love the video!
And I'm glad someone ported Portal: The Flash Version map pack as a bonus map for portal
Cuz now we've got Elliot's Mind
Hey man, super great video. Portal 2 was my first Steam game so this spoke to me.
Great work mate - Red panda arts
Great work, that was a great Video. I never thought i would watch a 1 Hour Long Video, but it was so well edited, i didn’t notice it.❤ Blocksantibuster
A personal thank you from me and Ido, it was a huge joy to watch and a crazy journey on a personal level. You've covered it perfectly, including finding out some stuff we didn't even knew about ourselves. I've had my theories over the years and you've solved and confirmed some of them. :)
Thank you so much Hen, it was an honour to finally document this story for the world to learn 💙
Do you still keep in touch with Yoav / Living Tombstone?
@@somebonehead We do and we released a video game together a year and a half ago called In Sound Mind :)
It’s genuinely amazing how 2 16 year olds not only created such an amazing snake if portal before it even came out, but also unknowingly and indirectly influenced portal 2. It’s amazing how all those pieces just fell into place
@@Hen787 i heard about your game but i never would have guessed that it influenced portal 2 this much i may as well not live anymore if portal 2 did not exist in a way you saved my life OMG
I've always felt like the human vault in P2's co-op was possibly inspired by the cloning lab in the Flash Version map pack. I feel like that's so much more likely knowing how much Still Alive influenced P2
I feel like the light bridges and discouragement beams and crusher plates in portal 2 were also inspired by it. I'm aware the crusher plates were in portal 1 trailer, but valve shelved it and might never have brought it back without encouragement.
And how you can still find the Borealis in Portal 2. And the test subject from the Flash Game? Maybe he became Rat Man.
@@aiodensghost8645 Wait, you can find the test subject?
@@Dr.Oofers Once you find the vault of fresh test subjects in Portal 2 Coop, GLaDOS reads any one information about the test subjects while scanning them. One of these test subjects is a reference to the flash version of Portal. The test subject number.
The reveal of who the composer for the game was had my jaw drop, I did not expect that.
I don’t think anyone did.
Who was it I can't find it anywhere and I can't see in the video
@@VEE0034 29:07 for the reveal
I still wasn’t expecting to recognize the composer, but he wasn’t kidding about it being someone you’d know if you’ve been online for the past decade. I should have guessed that he’d have a pretty wild career
same fr
THE LIVING TOMBSTONE???
Literally the second i heard you mention the name "Yoav" i was like
"there is no fking way thats him"
its so cool that he was involved
man truly had involvement so many childhoods
same! i am a diehard fan of TLT and it was amazing finding him here from all places!
Tbh, popular or not, a lot of people don't look into the histories of flash games, so it's nice to see someone actually pulling all the details.
Cave Johnson taught me how to give semi-casual presentations. When I was in college, I was told confidence was important to give a good public presentation. The most confident person I could think of was Cave Johnson, so after that I made sure to imitate him as best I could when doing public speaking for my projects. My presentations where I imitate Cave Johnson ALWAYS got 100%. My grades went up because a few exams in my final year were public speaking, and I got a scholarship. All because those teens were hyped. Thanks to those guys.
funny that Portal: Prelude was mentioned in this vid considering some of it’s levels are also reimaginings of Flash Version levels (chamber 9 of Prelude being a remake of chamber 15 of TFV comes to mind)
whenever people claim that fanart and fan works aren't as infulential or creative, stuff like this comes to mind. Never stop making art and contributions to stuff you love, it will be loved and appreciated
it wont
@@cheesepop7175 bad b8
Unless it's rule 34 then you are just poisoning the community
Ahem sonic/Undertale/FNAF fandom
@@cheesepop7175 low quality bait
Usually when stuff gets revealed I'm like "Oh cool" but the reveal of the composer for the 3D verson going on to become the living tombstone hit me SO HARD
It's also insane knowing that the flash verson Butterfly effected into making portal 2 the way it currently is, it might have been a completely different game without it, a portal without portals
in general, this was a extemely cool and well researched video, thank you for making it!!
Great work Ossy!!!
woah, the fact that someones passion for a game they were a fan of ended up forming the sequel to that game is so cool. that passion someone had for a game they love may have ended up indirectly changing my life in some way, as cheesy as it is to say. this whole story really kinda motivates me to continue to persue the fan projects ive been working on more. 10/10 video
Whoa hey I recognize you! I’m the guy who did the snark bit in your halflife streams years ago. Awesome seeing you in the wild
@@SuperQGS_ ayy i remember you, awesome seeing you in the wild too lol
Its… sad, how distant video game companies and fans have become… it used to be more symbiotic, now its more one sided, the big cold faceless corps vs the insignificant player…
Imagine if nintendo treated its fans with the same kindness as valve did..
holy damn that was an awesome watch, you really are the portal lore master
The flash version was what introduced me to Portal,I poured hours and hours into it when i was a kid but never finished it...Thanks for making this video and reminding me of it!
We Create Stuff really did the best work of making a 2D Portal Flash Game that I grew up with back in the day when the connection is slow before Fiber took over. Valve did brought his mappack and made Portal: Still Alive as a Xbox 360 Exclusive game in 2008. just the way we loved it. 😇👍🏻💙
One of the best videos ive seen in a long time, most documentaries people make on CZcams i get like 20 mins in, and get bored and leave. this one had me invested the whole way thrush. I loved the style of well, how you did everything. Just overall a good video
this video makes me want to stand up from my chair and walk around in my room.
watching this on my second monitor while making a portal fangame myself was... an interesting experience,
definetely gave me a lot of motivation. i hope i can use it to someday give my own story to this wonderful community
What an experience. You really went through a lot of research and digging, and honestly came across one of the most important pieces of not only Portal, but Valve history. If it weren't for you, who's to say anybody would've known? What an amazing video.
This is the game that got me into PC gaming entirely. I found it on Newgrounds shortly after the Portal hype train started up and decided to give it a try, fell in love with the concept and wanted more so I got a copy of the orange box and haven't turned back since
The We make stuff duo honesty reminds me of this person who help develop the L4D2’s Last stand and surprisingly to my knowledge, nobody has made a documentary on him yet. His username is Lleage, and normally you would think this is some fake story but he’s even credited in on the official website for the last stand update, I’m not sure he helped with the update but he wasn’t officially hired so he was most likely a person who came up with the map concepts for that update, his CZcams and steam usernames are the same being lleage
Just started the video, and can already tell how much work you put into this.
Your narration has improved a lot, congratulations!
You are now the Portal Loremaster
It really hit me when you said that every creation process is a story worth telling. The story of Portal Flash may not have been the most influential one, but like a river, Portal 2 didn't come from the void - it's a result of teams of people, multitutes of influences, all having their own stories like this. Having been in a story like this myself, events like these really do have an emotional impact, no matter how small other people deem it to be, and these tiny things really do mean something to me.
Thank you for having so much love for the Portal series, and thank you for telling this story :)
This is a grossly underrated documentary and it deserves more attention than it already has. It’s absolutely mind blowing how impactful the Flash version was and I’m glad that this video opened my eyes to the history of one of my favorite game series. Thank you so much Ossy for making this documentary
The way it all tied together at the end... Absolutely BRILLIANT. The insane amount of work that went into this was just... stunning.
Ossy, you're a legend.
It's mind-blowing to learn that such a small, seemingly innocuous fangame could have such a massive untold legacy on both Portal and Valve as a whole. Even crazier to think that there's a chance neither of us would even _be here_ to talk about it if it hadn't existed. Thank you for sharing this story - it's one that absolutely deserves to be told.
None of them have disappointed, but I think it goes without saying that this is your best and most in-depth video to date. Wonderful work, and congrats on 15k. I'm proud to be one of them.
Hey ossy, i rarely comment on videos but this documentary is more than great and amazing. The documentary made me rethink why portal and portal 2 is a popular franchise. I played the flash version and portal: still alive because i wanted to play something different and not play the same original game the x-th time. I didn't knew this mod was that important and even changed the timeline literally for portal 2. And Hen even created the idea putting portal in the half-life universe??? Now we know how important this modpack was for the sequel of portal. Thank you ossy! Now i love portal more than ever! (I'm sorry with my bad english grammar)
This was an amazing video! I didn't even notice that 1 hour passed, it felt more like 20 minutes. I also discovered Portal and Valve through P2 and if it wasn't for P2 I would have never bought every single Valve game available on Steam as well as a Steam Deck. When you were talking about the story I actually felt your emotional connection with it and the editing was superb. The captions are also an amazing touch! Have a great day, Ossy!
This story just goes to show how much a teenager with a bunch of crazy ideas in their head can actually impact this world. Don't feel like you can't make those dreams a reality.
"Did the unthinkable". I think another lesson here is that obscure Valve employees want recognition for their work as much as fan content makers want, even if they are paid for it. This isn't Gabe Newell, this is a guy who works for Valve who probably doesn't get any share of fan mail for his work.
Finding out Yoav was actually notorious youtube user The Living Tombstone was like a frying pan to the head
The nostalgia for this is big to me.
Got into portal in late 2010 and was also into flash games, I remember playing this so many nights in that cold winter sitting by the radiator
And in school whenever we had free time in the computer class I would play it a lot
Truly a beautiful story. It's incredible how people manage to make things and shape this really intriguing circle that one person finds fascinating enough to share it to the world. The world which has not seen it in it's entirety. Amazing video Ossy, Thank you for making it!
Damn, im not something who cries normally, but this one touched me, Portal 2 and still alive were a HUGE part of my life growing up, and the flash version as well
Thank you for this video
Impeccable subtitle work.
XD
Phenomenal video. A beautiful reminder of why I love Portal, the Portal community, and Valve themselves. If not for Portal 2, my life -- and I'm sure many of our lives -- would be completely different. Portal 2 introduced me to the world of games, sparked my fascination for level design, and is the reason I now have a career in the games industry. I have Hen and Ido, and their boundless passion and skill, to thank for that. And thank you, Ossy, for sharing this incredibly moving story with us in the form of such a detailed and well-researched documentary. Bravo, and may The Flash Version live long in our collective memory :)
This was spectacular! You did an amazing job with the research and editing! You have me invested all the way through! I'll keep supporting you with any endeavors you take on next, keep it up!
i love hearing stories like this i started doing game dev in 2022 and making stuff for me is something that i personally enjoy that maybe some day someone can enjoy something that i created no matter what it is art, music, or a game i haven't been working on my project for a while now because my computer went down but hearing things like this just makes me want to get back to working on my project its something that i want to put so much care into so much i even have a recreation of the first piece of art i made for it in lego on my desk that even if its never finished its still a memory i hold close to my heart that i had an idea to make something and went through with it
Im literally gonna cry dude this is the best video ive ever watched on youtube. Thank you
This is truly the first time in a long time I've had chills down my spine over something so incredibly amazing within a game community in a positive manner, watching this documentary on the spine of Portal 2's influence. Did not think a Flash game would have such an incredibly massive impact on the meat and potatoes of a game sequel.
Astounding.
This was an awesome documentary, much thanks, Ossy! I think it's really important to preserve such pieces of history while it's still possible, if somebody were to try digging this deep 5, 10, 15 years later, it could be that... this would've been impossible by that point. This video will likely remain the only (and maybe the last) source for years to come
The algorithm should notice - it did for me at least :)
P.S. Very good captions too, many creators completely ignore this aspect - thanks, Reese Rivers!
P.P.S. Nice piano arrangement in the credits, was it a Permatemp's special for this video?
Correct!
I remember there was a time many years ago when I first watched my uncle play Portal 2, and being super interested in it. He had the Portal 2 DVD box, so you just know that he was a complete OG.
I don't remember when I had first played Portal TFV, but I remember that I have played it before, it being the first experience I had of actually playing Portal back on my grandmother's old Asus EeePC netbook.
When you had stated the possibility of how if TFV didn't exist, Portal 2 very likely wouldn't have existed, I started sitting back in my chair, starting to tear up contemplating that reality. Portal 2 continues to be my most favourite game of all time, with only one game coming close to beating it.
Coming across this video on my recommended page, the second I saw "Flash game" and "Portal", and saw the 2D test subject, I immediately knew what game you were talking about, and it brought back the memories of when I was a kid playing that game. I had entirely forgotten about its existence, but once I saw it and immediately knew what you were talking about, it immediately jogged my memory. I might revisit the original Flash game and play the 3D remaster for the first time for a stream later.
Thank you for presenting this video, Ossy. I'm hoping more people get to see this history, because it not only shows a piece of art that two fans had become inspired to make, but it also showcases the history of Portal 2's development process, how fanwork is such a crucial part of any kind of media, and the history of The Living Tombstone that still continues to be a major part of so many people's childhoods even before he was known as TLT.
Bravo, well done! I imagine with how many times you had to restart the export, the last few days probably felt a whole lot longer than usual.
i love the fact that at some parts of this, i literally cried! amazing work, fantastic video and a simply astonishing history and telling thereof!
Honestly, I didn't even know that a simple Flash game would have such a big impact on the Portal history. Great video!
i remember playing this game! nothing fixes a day like listening to you ramble about obscure portal stuff for an hour
amazing video!!!! your work on the history of the portal community has been a joy to watch. thank you for making these videos
Phenomenal video! Portal was the first game I was able to play on the family computer and it stuck with me ever since. It was a gateway to a much bigger world of Valve and even the flash version! I've only found the flash map pack in recent years and the Still Alive port to the PC and they've got such a unique feeling to them. I hope to see more documentaries in the future!
this video is a masterpiece telling a story of just 2 kids having fun and creating a little project to influencing the making of one OF THE MOST INFLUENTIAL GAMES IN YEARS. Beatiful
These guys ended up making In Sound Mind, my favorite psychological horror game, and i would never guessed they were the ones behind TFV and the mappack, such a small world.
Outstanding documentary, Ossy! You did an amazing job with your research.
I always want to know the history about this version of portal actually the history of this flash game actually changing an entire franchise forever and that's really impressive to be completely honest.
Absolutely amazing story. Great video! Your best yet!
This was amazing. I never knew anything of the flash mappack, only that the flash version existed and was given some maps in still alive. And this video is beautifully edited and deserves so much more than 15k views.
Nice documentary!
To be honest, there's not a lot of long videos on CZcams that can keep me interested. This one managed to do that. Thank you for making this documentary.
Wow, this made me tear up a little. Great documentary, dude. Hope to see more like this in the future.
"I couldn't just talk about one aspect of this game's history. I needed to talk about ALL of it"
And only then, I realized, this is a hour long video. I thought "It's going to be a fun hour"
such a beautiful and inspiring video this was!!!! praying this blows up, bcuz it absolutely deserves so
I just reached the conclusion, and... wow. You put this together *beautifully.* I'm so glad I got to hear this story about Portal and its legacy, and how this Flash game made such a big impact on Portal. It's eye-opening, and it's great to hear its impact on you personally. Thank you for putting this together.
As someone who didn't get to play portal until 2010, it was insane learning about all the stuff I missed out on. Thanks for covering it, my mind was blown when Yoav ended up being Living Tombstone lmao.
This video was super awesome! I put it on to have something to listen to while drawing, but I was focused in paying full attention by the end. That doesn't happen a lot with me! Really impressed with how above and beyond you went to get answers, what a legend!
The crazy thing about CZcams is that I saw someone’s let’s play of the flash Portal game, so then I played it.
Now I’m watching the history of that game on CZcams 10+ years later 😂
The Flash Version of Portal was the first time I'd been exposed to it. Had no idea it came out before it, that it was made through hype, or any idea of the legacy behind it, or how it moulded the future of Portal and more notable Valve. This... was an enlightening experience... thank you.
As someone who grew up with Portal: The Flash Game and, upon seeing the trailer for Portal 2, assumed it was a sequel to this, this is a maddening experience.
I have still never played the actual Portal games.
Good job as always! This is indeed an incredible story of passionate fans creating something amazing.
I remember watching my uncle play Portal for the first time, it was one of the first video games I played period. He was on the turret introduction level lol.
Portal was something I was so passionate and interested in, and my friend at the time emailed me the link to the flash version that I could play on school computers or at home on my mom's laptop. I had no idea how important or influential it was, especially towards Portal 2, which is like... my favorite game ever.
Wow this was a lovely thing to find in my recommendations! Absolutely loved this video;
I never knew about this at all! Thank so much for sharing this and to everyone else who helped! :D
This was one of, if not THE best video about portal I've ever watched. Thank you for sharing this.
I heard about the Flash version, but I didn't realize it actually came out before the original; I also wasn't aware of how everything was connected. Thanks for doing all that in-depth research and digging to piece it all together. I think any fan of these games tends to be a fan of that type of thought process, I know I have been about Big B (
It's crazy how a project inspired by a game that wasn't even out yet had such an impact on the sequel to that game.
I started watching your channel a few days ago and I've watched pretty much all of your catalogue in just a few days. Your videos are so fun and they stand out to me compared to other portal/source youtubers. The things I know about the BTS of the games is the same parroted info every other source youtuber talks about when mentioning portal. Watching your stuff genuinely piques my interest because I have never heard about a lot of this stuff. First heard about you through your collab with Richter Overtime, but I'm so glad I started watching your stuff. Especially this documentary style video. You go into great detail about the whole history between We Create Stuff and Valve, how they influenced Portal 2 and you just blew my mind in general. Great stuff and I can't wait to watch more of your videos in the future. Plus you have a nice voice when you talk, whether it's the one you use in your videos or the one on streams, they both sound nice.
absolutely phenomenal video, you’ve REALLY outdone yourself this time :)) i grew up with the og flash version of portal bc like most people, after i played portal i just knew i needed more. i remember playing it on obscure unblocked game websites in middle and high school on my school mandated chromebook during classes and being absolutely in love with it. i never knew any of the history behind it though, i didnt even know it came out before portal, and this video truly just blew me away with how much of an incredible untold story this game has to offer. thank you for making this video, you’re doing a massive service to the portal community (as you already do frequently)
spoiler: the bit with the living tombstone caught me SO off guard LMFAO
I had no idea one of the devs was also behind Nightmare House until this video, really amazing piece of flash game history and nostalgia right here
Amazing documentary. This deserves so many more views and you deserve so many more subs.
THE TLT TWIST REALLY CAUGHT ME BY SURPRISE IN THE BEST WAY! LOL, I love how you sorta alluded to it before the reveal by talking about his music making experience,
19:49 voice crack
"...flash game. The BiGgEsT indicator of this..."
I haven't looked for anyone that may have already mentioned this but in the co-op mode for Portal 2 there's a part of the game where you are tasked with unlocking an enormous storage area filled with countless clones of test subjects, replenishing the enrichment center's supply of human candidates which is undoubtedly another nod to the flash version.
really cool documentary. this was really interesting, good job ossy!
That's why I love so much the lore of a simple video game!
It has such a history made of gold which seems unbelievable from the first point and surprising from the other!
Love your hard work! Good luck!
Honestly, it's a very interesting piece of trivia and an extremely well made video.
I'd shake your hand if I could, that is beautiful.
Rewatching this video 5 months after. Still a pretty interesting video but by god you weeping in the middle of it just sounds pathetic.
never knew portal flash was this important this is really cool to know, amazing video
I thougt it would be like a normal documentary, talk a bit of the after, expand on the subject and end it here. Damn this was so much in-depth. Thank you for this
beautiful subtitle work, it’s so rare to see them done to this quality and moved on the screen so that they don’t cover text or images
So the Borealis easter egg in P2 was also a reference to PFV3D? As well as them straight up using mechanics 2 kids came up with for a flash version of a game that hadn't even come out yet? Dope.
Wow, I know I’m very late to this video but this was one of the most compelling, interesting and thoroughly researched stories I’ve ever seen. Thank you for keeping this story alive and sharing it with all who watch this incredible video
Your voice sounds like you're on the verge of breaking into tears at the end, it really adds to the experience
i genuinely shed a tear watching this, the portal series has genuinely shaped me during my times on the internet and i cannot imagine a world without the second installment
great job man, greatly edited, great information, overall 10/10. 5 stars if it was still a thing
Well done! I remember when I first plated the first game. It was like nothing I had ever played before. I would get stuck in a level and could not get out. The next day I would go to work. The only thing I was thinking about was Portal and how to get out of the level I was stuck in. Sometimes I would figure it out. Other times not. The Portal games are my favorite of all. I only recently discovered Still Alive. Someone gave me an XBOX 360. I downloaded it and the magic is there again. Now that I know where it came from makes it more special. Thank you for this documentary I really enjoyed it !
Thank you so much for this documentary.
29:05 Lol, I just jumped off my chair, because I couldn't believe it at first
The orange box release for the sdk tools was a nightmareish release for mappers, it took me from the time they launched the orangebox update to about the 25th ish to get them to patch out a issue. I had contacted customer support through the support forums, support claims they don't support any of the developer tools, none of the mappers were able to make ANY maps from Oct 9th till the November 11th. There was hundreds of posts about it, the entire source mapping community was posting on this support forum trying to get them to patch the tools so they can work on maps again, some people refused to patch it to keep working on it, some used older pirated versions of hammer, some were using universal level editors that worked with many games instead, some found out the secret butter that got it to work again which was just a simple launch command "-engine ep1". No one was contacting valve's staff, not the support team that was getting hundreds of posts about the issue. I found out which software engineer software engineer who exactly worked on hammer, emailed them and he basically told me in back and forth conversation after several weeks of him claiming "it will be out very soon" to get mike to tell me to use "-engine ep1" in launch options and then within about a few hours after confirming it worked they released the update. I am pretty sure portal flash was known about. I was trying to get out the first 3rd party release mod for portal, I ended up scrapping it at some point due to multiple issues.
Amazing video. Subscribed. Thanks!
fabulous video :D
this really felt like getting taken on the journey of digging all this information up and you present it in a perspective that might be quite personal, but it is easy to imagine and manifest what it would be like to be in your shoes. I also appreciate that this was not filled with sponsors, just one pure hour of (hi-)story and information. i am definitely subscribing to you after experiencing this video, as this high quality content seems to become more and more of a rarity.
i am also joining the discord tbh y not >:3
Great video as always ossy
i think many people here, including me, played all flash version and the map pack before, not knowing its released before portal and all the backstory... especially valve looking into this, is crazy.
god you really dig anything related to portal hahah. this was so fun to watch.
i was thrown for a loop for a second when the superliminal game footage started playing in the background during portal2/f-stop segments lol
im a nobody, and even though im watching this video 10 months later, you did a killer job Ossy. putting all of this information together, and then hitting the hearts of portal players towards the end.. goes with what you said; art creates art. this video is a piece of art. thank you, Ossy.
Amazing documentary. I knew almost nothing. Thanks for your work.
I really wanna hear more flash game stories like this. They are so facinating to listen too!
I know this is unrelated but first time seeing that Intro animation which I haven't seen in your other videos and...
Omg it's so satisfying