I am obviously a huge fan of computer games, and if you are too, you’ll probably recognize this strange looking device in just seconds.
Yes, what you’re looking at is a full-size replica of the primary weapon from Portal. If you aren’t familiar with Portal, let me give you quick summary of what it’s all about.
Basically, the game is a single-player, first person, puzzle platform game coded and designed by Valve.
Game play requires the player to solve a series of puzzles – teleporting the character and other simple objects using the gun you see here.
The gun opens a portal from one location to another, allowing the player to solve the puzzles. Now, fans of genre game are often willing to buy tons of merch and paraphernalia, so it doesn’t really comes as much of a surprise that Neca – a Japanese-based company – is kicking off pre-orders for the replica weapon this week.
If you don’t remember the weapon, officially dubbed the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Gun, you’ll have to take my word for the fact that it looks exactly like the gun from the game. Then again, I always thought it looked more like a spider or one of those human harvesting machines from the flick The Matrix than a gun of any sort. Sadly, it won’t open a portal from my office to the kitchen, but it will light up in a blue or orange glow depending on what sort of portal you are making.
The Portal gun will sell for ¥16,000 working out to roughly $208 here in the United States. It’s not clear if the company will ship the replica to the US, or if you need to find someone in Japan to ship it to you, er, assuming you can’t live without it.
Truthfully, I’m always surprised that more companies don’t make replica weapons from popular video games, even if the economy is kind of down. I mean, I know my son would buy every Halo weapon ever built if they had replicas at Target.
