Portal is one of the best puzzle games so far. From the developers that made Half-Life, this first-person interactive and exploration game of up to two players has multiple endings, unique dialogues, special puzzles, and even a sequel.
But, if you’re already familiar with the Portal stories, then there are a few other titles that you could try.
From going to the space-time continuum to setting colored blocks to manipulate their gravity or travel to alternate dimensions, these similar games bring unique traits and tales worth playing.
11 Games Like Portal for Brain-Puzzle Maniacs!
Quantum Conundrum
- Release Date: Jun 21, 2012.
- Developer: Airtight Games.
- Publisher: Square Enix.
- Platforms: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Microsoft Windows.
- Metascore: 77.
Puzzle games like Portal aren’t easy to find. But one entertaining enough is Quantum Conundrum.
This first-person puzzle game puts you in control of a young boy who visits his uncle’s house. A strange house greets you, and your relative is not there.
You must now discover what happened and rescue him. Use a device to alter reality and enter strange dimensions to complete stages and solve complex puzzles.
Make things heavier or lighter and quickly adapt to the enigmas in the mansion. You’ll have to be clever and use all the props and environment you can find to achieve your goals!
Quantum Conundrum Game Features:
- Stunning game with physics-based puzzles.
- First-person perspective title.
- Multiple stages and puzzle elements to play with.
Quantum Conundrum is available for purchase on Steam.
Q.U.B.E.
- Release Date: May 21, 2014.
- Developer: Toxic Games.
- Publisher: Toxic Games.
- Platforms: PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Wii U, Microsoft Windows.
- Metascore: 69.
Q.U.B.E. is one of the games like Portal you should play if you like challenges and brain-twisting puzzles. This first-person puzzler gives you the ability to use gloves that manipulate cubes. So, you must use your puzzle-solving skills to find answers in 3D jigsaws and platform trials.
Figure what the Q.U.B.E. is, and explore its insides like an astronaut visiting other planets. Is it an alien structure? Is it from Earth?
The only certain thing is that it has something unique, curious, and threatening that lies between death, doom, and life. The story will take you further than the mind can follow in an intense first-person game.
Q.U.B.E. Game Features:
- Single Player campaign similar to the Portal series.
- Challenging puzzles to solve cleverly.
- Unique game modes.
- New and original soundtracks.
Q.U.B.E. is available for purchase on Steam.
The Swapper
- Release Date: May 30, 2014.
- Developer: Olli Harjola.
- Publisher: Facepalm Games.
- Platforms: PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita, Linux, Mac, Microsoft Windows.
- Metascore: 87.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be transported to a different body?
The Swapper puts you into a narrative story that will take you to an award-winning tale solving puzzles in space.
This is an isolated and cruel world where you’ll wield an experimental device to clone yourself and move your consciousness between bodies to solve challenging puzzles. The game may not have a portal gun, but it surely it’s an intense ride through multiple 2D environments.
The Swapper Game Features:
- Use critical thinking skills to solve puzzles.
- Find clever ideas for impossible solutions.
- Enjoy a game with unique art constructed using clay and standard materials.
- Powerful story with 2D touch and narrative.
The Swapper is available for purchase on Steam.
Outer Wilds
- Release Date: Jun 18, 2020.
- Developer: Mobius Digital.
- Publisher: Annapurna Interactive.
- Platforms: PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, Microsoft Windows.
- Metascore: 85.
Outer Wilds is another of the first-person puzzle games that you should try if you like Portal. As the 2020 BAFTA winner, it’s a critically acclaimed game with mystery and endless time loop traps.
In the Outer Wilds, you’re a recruit who will go into a space program and travel looking for answers in an ever-evolving solar system. But what lurks around in the vast and ominous universe? Find aliens, ruins, and exciting puzzles that hold the answers to unmeasurable dangers.
Visit underground cities, explore planet surfaces, prevent disasters, and uncover secrets under challenging environments.
Outer Wilds Game Features:
- First-person game similar to Portal games.
- Ever-changing worlds that will adapt to your experiences.
- Unique gadgets are available for planet exploration.
- Clever puzzles that will challenge your intelligence.
Outer Wilds R.O.W. Global Steam CD Key is available for purchase on RoyalCDKeys.
The Talos Principle
- Release Date: Dec 11, 2014.
- Developer: Croteam.
- Publisher: Devolver Digital.
- Platforms: Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Microsoft Windows.
- Metascore: 85.
The Talos Principle is essential for puzzle fans. This title follows a philosophical science tradition and includes physical puzzles in a new game made by the Swapper creators.
You’re a robot who awoke after a deep sleep only to find yourself in a strange world that contains ancient civilizations and modern tech. In this title, you’ll have to complete mind-bending puzzles in the first or third person and adapt to problems that require human consciousness.
Discover who you are, your purpose, and how to live in an intriguing story that will define your future.
The Talos Principle Game Features:
- Game with 120 great puzzles.
- Manipulate the environment at the very best portal style.
- Live a story-rich tale that involves humanity and its civilization's future.
- Enjoy a non-linear world full of possibilities.
The Talos Principle is available for purchase on Steam.
Antichamber
- Release Date: Jan 31, 2013.
- Developer: Alexander Bruce.
- Publisher: Demruth.
- Platforms: Microsoft Windows.
- Metascore: 82.
Antichamber is another title among the best games like Portal that you should play. This is a title with 25 awards and development honors that you can’t miss.
This psychological puzzler for all Portal fans involves mind-bending events where you can’t trust what you see.
Space reconfigures itself to make unique environments while also showing you optical illusions that will prevent you from solving problems.
Enjoy an indie title that will make you question all you see!
Antichamber Game Features:
- Psychological experience that will make you feel like doing a Turing test.
- Unique challenges with twists and turns.
- Fictional world to explore and discover using a forced perspective.
- Elements that will help you create and manipulate matter to overcome obstacles.
Antichamber is available for purchase on Steam.
Limbo
- Release Date: Aug 2, 2011
- Developer: Playdead.
- Publisher: Playdead.
- Platforms: Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, Xbox One, Xbox 360, Microsoft Windows.
- Metascore: 88.
Limbo is a 2D platform puzzle horror game about a young boy looking for his sister. You will have to go to a place that looks like an alien planet and avoid terrible creatures, think outside the box, solve various puzzles, and pray that your relative is still alive.
The game adds real physics, so your explorations will be harder as you progress.
Guide the boy through traps and nightmarish environments.
Limbo Game Features:
- Indie video game with a deep story.
- An immersive environment with sounds and graphics.
- Hard puzzles that will require everything you have.
- Disturbing art, unique from Playdead.
If you liked Limbo, you could also play Inside, which takes deeper meaning into this game's classical and disturbing elements.
Inside & Limbo Steam CD Key are available for purchase on RoyalCDKeys.
The Ball
- Release Date: Oct 26, 2010.
- Developer: Teotl Studios.
- Publisher: Tripwire Interactive.
- Platforms: Microsoft Windows.
- Metascore: 68.
The Ball is a first-person adventure and single-player experience based on Unreal Engine 3.
You’re an experienced archeologist working somewhere in Mexico when you suddenly discover a golden and metallic ball in an ancient ruin.
You’ll have to complete puzzles to unveil their secrets. Learn to control it and go deep into a volcano. But you won’t be alone.
Some mythical creatures and traps protect the ball’s mysteries. This ancient artifact is the only way to protect yourself.
The Ball Game Features:
- First-person game with archeological elements.
- Challenging puzzles to complete throughout 8 hours of gameplay.
- Immersive physical experience.
- Unique enemies and vehicles with 35 mysteries to discover.
The Ball is available for purchase on Steam.
The Stanley Parable
- Release Date: Oct 17, 2013.
- Developer: Galactic Cafe.
- Publisher: Galactic Cafe.
- Platforms: Microsoft Windows.
- Metascore: 88.
The Stanley Parable is an exploration game that doesn’t have a beginning or end. You will play as Stanley and follow a story that will try to confuse you and make you think you have a choice.
Following these contradictions, you must learn its rules and find ways to bend them without breaking the game.
As a salaryman, you work in a normal office. Your day is going as usual until you realize your co-workers are missing. So, the final challenge is clear. You must find them and discover what’s going on.
The Stanley Parable Game Features:
- Award-winning game with a curious and unique story.
- Difficult puzzles to solve.
- Confusing storyline that will require critical thinking.
- Complete paradoxes in the best Portal style.
The Stanley Parable Steam CD Key is available for purchase on RoyalCDKeys.
Magrunner: Dark Pulse
- Release Date: June 20, 2013.
- Developer: Frogwares.
- Publisher: Frogwares.
- Platforms: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Microsoft Windows.
- Metascore: 70.
Magrunner is a first-person action puzzle game that uses elements from the stories imagined by H.P. Lovecraft. You are meant to be one of the runners who will participate in a corporate trial in a space station.
Use the Magtech, a powerful glove that can repel or attract objects, to bend reality and solve puzzles. Be careful of the real physics around magnetism because they could be your doom if you don’t understand them.
The story hardens as you find complex puzzles and nightmarish threads that will require everything in your brain to solve.
Magrunner Game Features:
- Possibility to meet Cthulhu and other horrendous creatures.
- 40+ levels with challenging puzzles.
- The first game that combines Lovecraft’s tales with riddles.
- Real integrated physics complicates the game.
Magrunner: Dark Pulse is available for purchase on Steam.
The Witness
- Release Date: Jan 26, 2016.
- Developer: Thekla, Inc.
- Publisher: Thekla, Inc.
- Platforms: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Microsoft Windows.
- Metascore: 87.
The Witness is an exploration, open-world game filled with puzzles and challenges. Enjoy your free will and use it to adventure through nature and industrial structures.
You wake up alone and stranded on an island. Everything is new, and you don’t remember who you are. Recover your memory and find the way out.
There are no instructions. So, you must discover what it’s all about and solve all your problems. Identify symbols, remember patterns, and find all the mysteries in this land.
A true Portal fan will love how puzzles are presented and their difficulty.
The Witness Game Features:
- Player-forced perspective, which will make your game harder.
- Unique story centered around discovery and memories.
- Over 500 puzzles in the game.
- No instructions, which means endless possibilities to solve puzzles.
The Witness Steam CD Key is available for purchase on RoyalCDKeys.
Games Like Portal - Summary
Whether going to different dimensions in the Q.U.B.E. or entering dark places in Limbo or Inside, these games like Portal, have something that goes far beyond overcoming obstacles.
They open doors to ancient ruins, tech to manipulate gravity and even the possibility of exploring an island full of secrets.
So, if you want more portals, these tiles are great opportunities to try new things!