The Portal reference in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive's Danger Zone Blacksite is not an ARG after all
Counter Strike: Global Offensive players thought they've found a Portal-related ARG in the game, but Valve has weighed in to suggest otherwise.
Update: Following the reveal of this supposed ARG, Valve has clarified the Portal room was just meant as an Easter egg, and not intended to be a teaser for future games.
The first official word came from the CS:GO Twitter account. "We’re just having a bit of fun and the Easter egg is not a product announcement," the Tweet reads.
And if you needed further proof, Valve News Network's Tyler McVicker posted this alleged screenshot of a fan's email to Gabe Newell himself, in which Valve's head also denies it has anything to do with an ARG.
Of course, there's always the chance Valve is intentionally trying to mislead players. The developer is known for its long-winded, exhaustive ARGs, and this may just be a first test. If that's indeed the case, Valve's dedicated community will no doubt decipher the message.
You can read the original story below.
Original story: YouTuber Valve News Network has gathered together a bunch of in-game clues that point to the possibility of another ARG that could be leading up to the reveal of a new title - via PCGamesN.
The first clue comes from the boarded up Room 3 in the newly rolled out Danger Zone's Blacksite map. YouTuber snaileny accessed the room via a secret passage and found a handful of computers inside, emitting a code.
Redditors assembled to decode the message and discovered that it translated to the first line of Portal's ending song, Still Alive; "This was a triumph, I’m making a note here: HUGE SUCCESS.”
There are more weird things that have popped up that players haven't figured out yet, including cameras on the map that lead to a shipwrecked boat, and detailed test pattern textures that don't appear in Blacksite.
Redditor birkir has created a list of oddities that may be a part of this potential ARG, while Valve News Network is going to continue with his datamining efforts to see if he can root out anything else significanct.
As he points out in his video, Valve included an ARG in Portal ahead of the Portal 2 announcement, so it could be at it again in the run up to the announcement of another new game.
Either way, the investigation continues for now.