Valve: PLEASE add an option to disable the extra radios

[Agrippina Siderea]

I know there's workarounds to trick the game into not including them, but I don't want to have to stay in offline mode to do it. I don't want to have to muck around with the files at all. Based on what I've learned via google, the game already decides whether to add the radios based on whether a player's completed it previously, so it should be trivially easy to add a checkbox in the options to disable them.

I just want to play one of my favorite games again. But constantly hearing that music is like a drill in my brain.

[Pocket]

Seconding this. They were only added for the Portal 2 promotion anyway; they should be an optional mode in the menu, like the challenge maps or commentaries.

[Evil Jim]

Thirding this as well. I haven't played the original portal for over two years because of this. I love everything about the game before the new achievements & updates were added to promote Portal 2. Those radios just ruin the atmosphere for me, & the new ending was entirely unnecessary.

I'd love to be able to download only the updates I choose (graphical improvements, etc.) & avoid those after the radio achievement & new ending.

Failing that, just please give me an option to TURN THE NEW RADIOS OFF! How hard would that be? Just please, please, please give me back my Portal experience again, so once more every time I play through can be as good as the first time.

[mfletcher]

Agreed. Those radios have destroyed replay value.

[swenor]

LOL. You don't even hear them unless uup close. They don't ruing anything. Treat them as proprs. You really don't have bigger issues like steam pipe beta breaking down support for sourcemods?

[Pocket]

One, they often are up close if you're going where you're supposed to. Two, whether they ruin anything or not is a matter of opinion, so don't act like you're objectively right and everyone else is objectively wrong. Three, I have no idea what a "propr" is; learn to proofread. And four, the fact that we're complaining about one thing does not mean it's the only thing in the world we care about.

Go take your I'm-so-much-better-than-you-because-I-don't-care-about-things attitude somewhere else.

[swenor]

One - radios are not always in your way.
Two - this IS a matter of opinion. For me they are ok. No damage done.
Three - typo - It should be PROP. I am sorry you didn't figure it out.
Four - good, you are making progress.

Radios fit the game really well. They have same colour palette and design as the rest of the game. Their sound also fits the game setting.
I have finished this game 4 times at least and they never ruined gameing experience for me.

İlk olarak Gordon Frohman tarafından gönderildi:

Go take your I'm-so-much-better-than-you-because-I-don't-care-about-things attitude somewhere else.

Damn you are sensitive. I have the right to express my opinion just like you.

[Pocket]

There's expressing your opinion and then there's jumping into a thread and immediately telling everyone else they're silly to care about something that you don't. You just come off as a troll when you do that.

[swenor]

Nope. I am not denying your right to voice yourself. At the same time this is not a big deal overall. It just does not suit 0,0001% of Portal gamers. If they add option to disable them - fine by me. I don't want radios to be removed though.
Make a petition for such option - I WILL SIGN IT to help you.

Valve won't take care of it for too many reasons. They are just too busy - they have more popular games to support, they have Steam Cards beta to take care of, they work on Windows/Mac/Linux platforms, they work on Steam Pipe beta for older games, they work on Big Picture support etc etc. It's not happening, just like fixing L4D bugs is not happening. Those games are just too old.

[Pocket]

Oh, don't get me wrong; I don't want them completely removed either, since there's an achievement that goes with them and you should never, ever completely remove a feature that's required to get an achievement.

Also, I wouldn't be so sure about Valve's priorities. Thanks to their GitHub page giving people a place to bring bugs to their attention, they're not only finally fixing some of the bugs in Half-Life 2 that the 2010 update introduced, but they restored the original soundtrack in Half-Life: Opposing Force and Blue Shift that have been missing since 2003! It's a crapshoot, but nothing ventured, nothing gained.

You can "sign" the "petition" here[github.com], by the way. I should have posted the link in this thread weeks ago.

[swenor]

Signed as I said.

[𝔽aɳɱaℝ]

I've been looking for this thread for ages. I'm replaying Portal now and those radio's completely ruin the original atmosphere of the game. I know it became a major point in promoting portal 2, but the Portal I knew and loved shouldn't be permanently effected by it without a way to disable it. That happy loop constantly being present made me stop playing after 5 rooms, because the entire game felt so 'fake' I couldn't stand it any more.

Please Valve, let us enjoy the original game again without having to delete the files over and over!

[CrazyCarl92]

They don't bother me. Just treat them like the can of beans and you should be fine.

[Hans Brotmeister]

Being on my second playthrough I know now what you mean. You will get close enough to them to hear them in nearly every room. While there should be an option to disable them, even muting them would suffice.

I see why some people don't bother but sound - or the absence of sound - plays an important role in games for certain players.

[Agrippina Siderea]

I find it interesting how incredibly dismissive some people are about this. It doesn't bother you? Fine, good for you. Hell, I envy you. But it bothers us. People are different and varied, and what affects you is not the be-all, end-all of what does or should affect others.

tl;dr, show some freaking empathy.

[rpgamer987]

This seems so weird. I liked the radios. I carried them around as often as I could, just to have something besides Glados to listen to. They're fun to hit turrets with. Or block energy balls. The music wasn't great, maybe. But it was still fun to have.