page_title: Potato Sack
section_title: Development
hierarchical_section_title: Potato Sack / Development
caption_attribution_description: English: Gabe Newell, Game Developers Conference. Français&#160;: Gabe Newell à la Game Developers Conference en 2010.
context_page_description: The Potato Sack is the name of an alternate reality game created by Valve and the developers of thirteen independent video games to promote the release of Valve's game Portal 2, in April 2011. Valve president Gabe Newell envisioned the game as a "Cross Game Design Event" in December 2010, and allowed the developers a free rein to design the game using Valve's Portal intellectual property. The game, requiring players to find and solve a number of puzzles hidden within updates of the thirteen games, led to the opportunity for players to release Portal 2 about 10 hours earlier than its planned release by playing games under the pretense of powering up GLaDOS, the sentient computer antagonist from the Portal series. The ARG's theme of potatoes is based on plot elements within Portal 2, specifically that for part of the game, GLaDOS's personality module is run off a potato battery.
  Large numbers of people participated in solving the puzzles. Reaction from players and journalists was mixed; while some felt the ARG had limited benefit, some saw the ARG as a show of commitment from Valve to independent game development.
context_section_description: Valve had previously performed an ARG in the week prior to the announcement of Portal 2, at the start of March 2010. The ARG was initiated by a new patch to Portal that led to a sequence of puzzles, which were ultimately solved within hours of the patch's release.
  The idea of the Potato Sack ARG came from Valve president Gabe Newell sometime around December 2010. Following on the success of the first ARG, he saw a way to promote both the highly anticipated Portal 2 release along with several independent games through a "Cross Game Design Event". Dejobaan Games' Leo Jaitley believed that Valve targeted developers that had proven track records of working with other developers, and not necessarily for the sales or popularity of the specific games. Valve invited the twenty independent developers to their headquarters on December 16, though did not explain the rationale for the visit. Only there did Valve explain the promotion, with the ultimate goal being the early release of Portal 2 at the conclusion of the ARG, according to Gaijin Games' CEO Alex Neuse. According to Rob Jagnow of Lazy 8 Studios, Valve assured the developers of an open relationship, stating that they had "No constraints. No NDAs." and that the project was "built on trust and mutual respect". Jaitley commented "most studios got involved knowing that there was likely to be some payoff, but without anything upfront or any promises of riches".
  To help with the ARG, Valve gave the developers a free rein over the game's structure, and full access to Portal intellectual property to include within their games.  Such assets included further voice work from Ellen McLain, the voice actress for GLaDOS, who recorded additional lines for the developers of the games to taunt the players with. Furthermore, the developers were given the opportunity to play what had existed of Portal 2 to build ideas for the ARG. Valve and the indie developers worked together over the next few days to design the ARG, creating the three phases, the timing between phases to allow for the puzzles to be solved, and the general fiction of the game. The developers decided to design the fiction of the ARG around the return of GLaDOS, who had been apparently destroyed at the end of Portal, leaving clues to her revival in the various games. The potato theme was based on Portal 2's fiction, in which, during a portion of the game, GLaDOS' personality is placed into a potato battery. To help promote the ARG, Valve and the developers arranged for the Potato Sack sale as to "make it easier for hard-core fans to participate in every aspect of the ARG".
  Between the December meeting and second gathering in March 2011, prior to the ARG's launch, there was no direct verbal communication between Valve or the developers. Instead, the independent developers spent time, using a shared wiki provided by Valve, to plan out and coordinate the game. They also had to develop the new content for their games, which in most cases was work in addition to existing projects that they were presently undertaking. Others had to go back to older programming code and re-acquaint themselves with it before undertaking the new additions for the ARG. Valve's Jeep Barnett helped to coordinate the large effort. The second visit to Valve in March 2011 was to affirm the plans for the launch of the ARG.
  The first update was tied with April Fools' Day, with the addition of potatoes and gibberish sentences being in line with the pranks one normally sees on that day. Throughout the ARG, the players were monitored by the developers through the Internet Relay Chat, forums, and web sites that were being used to coordinate the solving effort. This allowed, for example, Two Tribes to prepare for Jake_R's visit, and the integration of a screenshot of the chat log into one of the puzzles. In another example, another chat room user, following a red herring, visited a physical location near the California studio for Team Meat; Edmund McMillen was able to arrange to meet the user and give him a signed copy of Super Meat Boy. Monitoring of the players 
caption: Gabe Newell, president of Valve, is credited with the concept behind the Potato Sack ARG.
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