I’ve downloaded the Portal Flash Version Map Pack this morning and I’m stoked to try it out. It apparently contains all 40 levels from Portal: The Flash Version, which was bad ass in its own right.

I’m not quite expecting the superb, iterated-to-hell, damn-near-perfect levels of the original, but I’ll write up what I think on here after I play it for a while.

So I haven’t been able to get much game time in this week at all, and won’t really be able to this weekend, either. Our wedding’s coming up on June 14th, so there’s marathon planning and preparation going on for the next few weeks until the big day. I did, however manage to get in a little bit of action this week:

• I played a couple more hours of IV during this past weekend. I’ve now unlocked all the islands and am conducting lots of “business” for the New Jersey mafia (hi, Sopranos references). I completed all of the assassin missions, appropriately adorned in my Agent 47 black suit/red tie getup. So far the only comment I can make regarding the “epic, Oscar-worthy storyline” is that it’s marginally more acceptable and tightly held together than the previous GTA’s, but not exactly the massive improvement referred to in the numerous 10.0/A+/5-star reviews.
• I’ve also been having a blast playing short bursts of many of the casual games on Kongregate. Games such as Dolphin Olympics 2, Fancy Pants Adventure, Gravitee, Chronotron, The Beard, Flash Portal, and Pillage the Village. It’s been a while since I played many games on the web. Flash has come so far that the browser can now be considered a distribution and gaming platform that’ll soon hang with the real consoles. If you haven’t played Offroad Velociraptor Safari, for example: first of all, you’ve missed out, and secondly, check out how technically advanced this game is for an entirely web-driven production. I predict all MMOs will soon be browser-based and platform-independent. You heard it here first (not really, everyone says this).
• Played a few more puzzles in Professor Layton, but not really noteworthy progress. Just played a little on our recent drive up to Atlanta for Colette’s bridal shower.

A few games I’m looking forward to soon: The World Ends With You, LostWinds, Boom Blox.

For those of you who’ve been not playing games for the last 6 months, you can now pick up Portal as a stand alone box copy off the shelf. Maybe you don’t feel like dropping the full price on the whole Orange Box? Who knows? All I know is as a gamer, Portal is a requirement for you to remain a real person. You can also pick it up on Steam, if you’re into that whole “digital distribution” thing.