Valve Unveils Portal 2 Contest

The lovely collection of people behind the brilliance of Portal 2 and everything puzzly, are opening up a map making competition to their fans. The contest asks players to use their brain power and imagination in perfect harmony, to produce a challenging and enjoyable room of head scratching genius. If you are interested in entering then carefully read the entry requirements and rules below.

Valve’s map making contest will be open for participation from May 24th until June 6th, so currently it’s only a couple of days in. Feeling devilishly clever anyone? Check out the details below and sign up here.

Rules and Requirements:

All maps must adhere to the following rules and requirements. Failure to do so will result in your map or maps being disqualified! Have question about rules? Post about it on our forums.

• Maps must be submitted no later than June 6th at 11:59pm EDT.
• Both Single-player and Co-op maps are allowed. You may submit one map of each game mode.
• Maps cannot contain custom assets of any kind. No exceptions. Spend your time working on your puzzle, not making models, textures, sounds/voices, or other extra content.
• Maps must contain both an Entry and an Exit elevator, the style of which as appropriate for your map theme. 1940’s Aperture maps can use the old style elevators, destroyed Aperture can use the destroyed looking elevators, and so on.
• Maps must be able to be completed without using engine or portaling glitches of any kind.
• Entries must be uploaded to the ThinkingWithPortals.com Download Database and uploaded in a compressed file format (such as ZIP, RAR or 7z).
• Entries must include the source VMF.

Remember – making a puzzle extremely difficult does not necessarily make it better! Players of all skill levels will be playing and judging the maps, and while we all enjoy a good challenge, maps should be accessible to all players. But don’t take that to mean they should be “easy”!

Judging Procedure

Maps will be checked and, if necessary, disqualified when the submission deadline ends if they do not meet the contest rules. Maps will be judged based on several factors, including:
• Puzzle complexity
• Visual appeal and attention to detail
• Innovation and imaginative design
• Adherence to an overall theme (1940’s Aperture, destroyed Aperture, etc.)
• Overall fun and playability

Choosing a certain theme or game mode will not affect the outcome; the best maps will win.

Prizes

The first and second place ranking maps will receive the following prizes:
• Ultimate Portal 2 Gift Pack signed by the Portal 2 developers
• Map spotlighted by Valve on the official Portal 2 Website
• ThinkingWithPortals.com Community Spotlight