16 Games Like Portal
Our collection of games like Portal offers other first person puzzle adventures with unique mechanics for puzzle fans to solve alone or with others.
The Portal series was launched in 2007 with a mysterious storyline that players advance through by using portal science to solve a range of puzzling rooms. Played in a first person perspective the original Portal was a reasonable short solo adventure with the eventual 2011 sequel offering a longer form co-operative experience. Set within the same universe as the popular Half-Life franchise players explore the Aperture Science Laboratories with a wealth of secrets to uncover.
The core puzzle mechanic of Portal is the portal gun that can create two connected portals for players and objects to teleport through. Building from this simple premise each puzzle room offers new mechanics and challenges for players that need to be mastered and combined to progress through the story adventure. This includes using your momentum, objects from the environment and different surfaces that create different portal interactions.
The games like Portal on this page focus on other first person puzzle games that utilise strange and unique mechanics to solve puzzles that slowly evolve over the course of a mysterious storyline.
The Stanley Parable
The Stanley Parable offers a meta-fictional interactive adventure that will mess with your mind as it takes you through a series of increasingly strange and wonderful events. While the game lacks traditional video game gameplay it more than makes up for with mind messing narration that will have you guessing video games and even your own existence in the real world. First born in 2011 as a free Half Life 2 modification this self reflecting experience saw a full release in 2013 which in turn adde...[Read Review]
Antichamber
Antichamber is a first person puzzle game that will mess with the way you perceive video games with its equally weird and wonderful game world that seeks to encourage players into thinking outside of the box to solve its challenges. In order to succeed in Antichamber you’ll have to rid yourself of preconceived notions relating to video games that you have played in the past. This Antichamber first person adventure challenge takes place in a fairly simple game world framework with this minimalist...[Read Review]
Tag: The Power of Paint
Tag: The Power of Paint is a free to play adventure that embraces the power of colour and combines it with a first person perspective and shooter based elements. Originally designed as a school project in a similar manner to Narbacular Drop the students behind the game contributed some of their puzzle concepts into the popular puzzle adventure, Portal 2 where they were transformed into the Gel mechanic of Portal 2. Made with a team of 7 students in the game was originally created over a decade a...[Read Review]
Fez
Released in April 2012 Fez is a puzzle experience like no other with its focus on game world manipulation (rotation) to solve puzzles rather than direct interaction from your avatar. With this unique premise combining with a fantastic art style and story Fez is a puzzle game that is more about the experience and overall design than delivering extreme brain teasing puzzles. For those that do consider themselves hardcore puzzle gamers that desire insanely difficult puzzles the anti-cube system mor...[Read Review]
Quantum Conundrum
Quantum Conundrum is a first person game that blends puzzles and platforming with the ability to shift between dimensions as a central game mechanic. At the head of the game was Kim Swift who previously worked on Valve’s Portal game while the famous actor John De Lancie voices the character that oversees your progression with his familiar mysterious tone. Players assume the role of a silent character in the story of Quantum Conundrum with a young boy who is sent to stay with the strange Professo...[Read Review]
The Swapper
The Swapper is a puzzle game that is all about cloning yourself in an endless cycle in order to explore the eerie abandoned space station that you find yourself trapped within. With this dark atmosphere of The Swapper the visuals and atmospheric elements are just as strong as the unique core puzzle mechanics and adventure experience. In The Swapper players get the chance to explore a futuristic research facility and space station known as Theseus without much initial context and who, what, where...[Read Review]
Mirror’s Edge
Experience an action adventure on the edge with Mirror’s Edge a Windows, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 title that is filled with parkour elements and a dark dystopian society setting. Drawing inspiration from vast running and chase scenes from Hollywood films Mirror’s Edge follows Faith Connors a parkour expert courier who allows those to communicate that want to evade the government eyes. Your main character in Mirror’s Edge is Faith who is known as a “runner” to deli...[Read Review]
Magrunner: Dark Pulse
Magrunner: Dark Pulse is a first person puzzle game with a number of similarities to the popular Portal series due to both the first person perspective and unique setting it aims to create. Magrunner was released in 2013 for Windows and made its way to consoles (PS3 and Xbox 360) later that year. The plot in Magrunner: Dark Pulse takes LoveCraft inspiration and while it has many moving parts that can make you feel stretched in multiple directions players that stop to take it all in will discover...[Read Review]
A Boy and His Blob
A Boy and His Blob for the Nintendo Wii revisits the 1989 NES adventure game with a refreshed look and refined gameplay which once again allows players to own a blob pet who loves to eat jellybeans. While fundamentally similar to the original the leap in hardware allows the Nintendo Wii edition to be a vastly superior re-imagining. Not content with limiting this experience to the Nintendo Wii the game was eventually ported to additional modern day consoles and computer platforms. Focusing on a s...[Read Review]
QUBE
QUBE (Q.U.B.E.) is a puzzle game based around physics and platforming and combines them both in a unique and challenging gameplay framework. With similarities to other first person puzzle games such as Portal QUBE builds on the fundamentals established in these titles with its own variation of mechanics. QUBE was developed as an indie game and a finalist in the 2011 Indie Game Challenge. QUBE stands for Quick Understanding of Block Extrusion places the player into a strange mostly white environm...[Read Review]
Infinifactory
Infinifactory throws players into an alien controlled facility as you create assembly lines in first person for blocks to go from point A to point B across 6 challenging worlds. With many different block types to master, a competitive leader board and dark sense of humour there is plenty to enjoy in Infinifactory as you break down the puzzles laid out before you and conquer them through logical constructions. The core Infinifactory offering is a highly structured experience with players selectin...[Read Review]
Odd Bot Out
Odd Bot Out offers players a puzzling mobile journey across a minimalist game world of challenges. Available for both iOS and Android devices players will help the small robot known as Odd after he fails the standardised robot test and needs a helping hand from the player. Released by Martin Magni who is also the creative mind behind Mekorama players will find a similar stress free and creatively focused gameplay across the 100 levels that require player mastery of blocks, electricity, motors, w...[Read Review]
Echochrome
Echochrome is a PlayStation exclusive title with unique puzzle elements that uses a rotatable world and physics to alter your perception of each level. Launched in Japan in early 2008 and the North American shores a few months later the game is only available on the PlayStation Network, for PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable. In Echochrome players will direct a character that is reminiscent of an artist’s wooden mannequin through simple black and white coloured game levels. Players won’t dir...[Read Review]
The Beginner’s Guide
Following up the unique experience of The Stanley Parable is The Beginner’s Guide, a game with similar ideas around abstraction and game creation. Narrated by Davey Wreden in a similar fashion to his past game players are taken through a number of areas that feature incomplete games by a person called Coda. These creations are then used as reflection points to understand who Coda is with a number of tie ins to real life and the relationship between game creators and their players. This sto...[Read Review]
Vessel
Vessel is a puzzle game with steampunk elements that focuses on physic puzzles based around liquid and challenges players to overcome a diverse roster of challenges. The game was released in 2012 and has proven to be popular among puzzle fans and the media for its unique mechanics and simulation of fluids. In Vessel players will be jumping into the shoes of M. Arkwright who is an inventor of Fluro which is also one of the core mechanics in your puzzle adventure. This Fluro was created in order t...[Read Review]
Narbacular Drop
Narbacular Drop might look like a Portal predecessor at first glance and that’s because it is. Originally a student project of game development the popularity of this unique idea led to students from the development team being invited by Valve to work on the Portal series which adopts similar mechanics. Narbacular Drop is available for free through the official website with several dozen user created puzzle maps for the game also available online to extend the gameplay beyond the original ...[Read Review]