Valve gives away demo of Portal to nVidia users

primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' BoopinDetroit, MI Icrontian
edited January 2008 in Science & Tech
Apparently Steam's hardware surveys have borne fruit. According to all their research, Valve have discovered that most PC gamers are using nVidia GeForce video cards. Behind closed doors, many a deal are made; and this one ends up meaning free games for nVidia users.

Immediately available by taking the test, nVidia owners are eligible to download Portal: First Slice, a special edition of Portal. As I stare down at my computer running an ATI card, I have no way of telling you what Portal:First Slice is all about, but an educated guess would be that it is a short, short game - perhaps a few levels designed to get people interested enough in the game to buy the whole shebang... Hey, I'm one of those who bought the whole Peggle Deluxe after playing the free "special edition", so you know how that goes..

My kids are gleefully making fun of me because they both have GeForce cards. Time to go ground them and play Portal: First Slice on their computers....

Comments

  • fatcatfatcat Mizzou Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    Yea, WTF...why the discrimation Valve?
  • SonorousSonorous F@H Fanatic US Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    I don't know about you guys, but my HD2900XT came with what was Valve's "Black Box" for free. Included Portal Team Fortress 2, and Half Life 2: Episode 2. Take that nVidia.
  • Gate28Gate28 Orlando, Florida Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    *hugs his new geforce 8600 gt* i shall share the slice experience to all with worde =p
  • NiGHTSNiGHTS San Diego Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    They did the same with Ati, as was stated above. Good for them to have both sides of the fence want a piece of action.
  • fatcatfatcat Mizzou Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    why cant I have cake AND ice cream?!?
  • ZuntarZuntar North Carolina Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    Ice Cream! Ice cream!!! WHERE IS THE ICE CREAM!!!!:hair:



    Ehem, Sorry about that.....wifes diet has deprived me of my regular partaking of said yummyness.:(

    So is this slice thing worth it if I already have the orangebox?
  • steste Manchester , England
    edited January 2008
    hmmi get

    "You already have all these games.
    You can access them in the steam 'My Games' list."

    i already have the orange box


    ste
  • LincLinc Owner Detroit Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    NiGHTS wrote:
    Good for them to have both sides of the fence want a piece of action.
    I would be interested to know whether either or both were sponsored by ATI/Nvidia. I suspect ATI's was, but this sounds like it wasn't by Nvidia.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    Well I've confirmed it: If you already own Portal, first slice does absolutely nothing. First Slice is just a demo for those who don't own it.
  • CBCB Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ Der Millionendorf- Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    Do want moar portal levels!
  • -MBG--De-Sniper-MBG--De-Sniper Alaska
    edited January 2008
    Portal First Slice is like over 6gig download good greif. Id never do that on my life.
  • mas0nmas0n howdy Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    =MBG= De Sniper wrote:
    Portal First Slice is like over 6gig download good greif. Id never do that on my life.

    Welcome to the internet.

    Seriously tho, I download 6GB/day on a regular basis. I threw away all my CDs for games registered through Steam and anytime I reinstall I just login and stream all my games to be installed while I'm at work.
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    mas0n wrote:
    Welcome to the internet.

    Seriously tho, I download 6GB/day on a regular basis. I threw away all my CDs for games registered through Steam and anytime I reinstall I just login and stream all my games to be installed while I'm at work.

    Word. I love teh internets. Not steam, particularly, but I love teh internetz.
  • -MBG--De-Sniper-MBG--De-Sniper Alaska
    edited January 2008
    We have only 10gigs of download bandwidth with our DSL provider so its kind of hard to download much in a month.
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    You're getting the shaft.
  • RyderRyder Kalamazoo, Mi Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    A demo is 6GB download? Portal and TF2 combined weren't 6GB for me...at least I don't think?

    EDIT:
    My whole Steamapps folder is 7.8GB and that is TF2, Portal, and HL2.

    The demo must be the whole game, but with limited functionality???

    Color me confused. :confused:
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    Since Portal and TF2 are really just HL2 on source, you need all the HL2 assets to play any of the games. a good 4.5gb of that are the source engine assets.
  • botheredbothered Manchester UK
    edited January 2008
    =MBG= De Sniper wrote:
    Portal First Slice is like over 6gig download good greif. Id never do that on my life.

    Steam download speeds are a joke. I got a game yesterday and for a lot of the time it was down to 4k.
    And I'm not alone - http://video-games.elliottback.com/2005/10/31/half-life-2-steam-installation-too-slow/
    The last thing I got from Steam also took almost a full day, I'll have to have a serious think before doing that again.
  • CBCB Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ Der Millionendorf- Icrontian
    edited January 2008
    I'm with you Bothered. I was pretty disappointed last night by steam's downloads. Crazy Joe, Zan, and I were going to play Titan Quest in co-op mode for our Sunday night RPG session. Everyone had it in time, except for Joe, who started downloading it Saturday evening, and still didn't even have half of it downloaded by 6pm on Sunday, so we didn't get to play this week :(...

    If we'd known that was going to happen, Joe could have just driven 5 minutes to the nearest game store and bought the damn thing. Of course once he paid steam for the game there was no way to say, "I want my money back, so I can just drive to the store and get this game."

    Lesson learned: don't order on steam if it's very important to you that you be able to play in the next couple of days.
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