Everyone’s favorite game featuring portals that make a “blowmp” sound is free on Steam for the next few days, until September 20. So, if for some reason you haven’t played Portal and the generally super cheap entry fee hasn’t been cheap enough, now you have no excuse.

The minimum system recommendations are pretty low, not even requiring DirectX 9. The Windows version recommends a 1.7 GHz processor and a measly 512MB of RAM, while the Mac version recommends a OSX 10.5.8, 1 GB of RAM, and an NVIDIA GeForce 8 or higher, or an ATI X1600 or higher, or an Intel HD 3000. So, basically, if you have a Windows computer from five years ago, you can play Portal for free, and if you have a MacBook from the Leopard days, you can play Portal for free. What I’m saying here, is if you haven’t yet played Portal, you should go play Portal. It’s free for the next few days. Get it here.

(via Rock, Paper, Shotgun)

Super Meat Boy fans have been waiting for this for a long time (and, truth be told, they’ve weathered some delays), and it’s finally here: A full level editor for the popular indie platformer has been released on Steam, allowing players to create their own devilish levels.

Here’s what you’re getting: You can create levels, upload them to Super Meat World, and then vote on your favourites. You can create and upload whole chapters with custom par times, titles and music. You can choose which Super Meat Boy characters are used in your levels, selecting from the whole cast of 20 characters. The best levels and chapters will be periodically chosen by Team Meat and featured for maximum exposure.

The editor is currently available in beta, and can be accessed by PC users in Steam’s “Tools” section. It won’t, however, be coming to XBox Live Arcade: “No, we cant legally do a non-regulated editor on Xbla, but we will try to continue to upload new chapters to xbla via the internets.”

(Team Meat via IndieGames)

Back at E3, Valve honcho Gabe Newell said the PlayStation 3 was going to be the platform with the best Portal 2 experience available. A bit after that, it was revealed that the PS3 title would be receiving Steam integration. Now, continuing to back up Newell’s statement, Valve has announced that if one buys the PS3 version of Portal 2, they’ll receive a free voucher for the PC and Mac Steam versions of the game as well, simply by linking one’s PlayStation Network account to their Steam account. If that weren’t enough, all these platforms will be able to play and chat with one another, as well as store save files on the cloud, which can be accessed by any of the platforms. Valve also promised to add “more Steam features and functionality in DLC and future content releases.”

Portal 2 is currently set for an April 20 release. I apologize, but it has to be said. This is a triumph.

(via Ars Technica)

Prepare Your Wallet: Steam Now Recommends Games For You (That Videogame Blog)

Why The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Don’t Use Their Weapons (CollegeHumor)

The Trailer for Source Code (Bleeding Cool)

The LAPD’s Stolen Art Database (BoingBoing)

Mr. Peanut Speaks, Is Product of Impressive Stop-Motion Animators (Motionographer)

The First Page of Watchmen Goes For $33,500 (Bleeding Cool)

Amazon Expands Its Game Downloads Service (Joystiq)

(pic via Reddit.)

MySpace’s New Logo ಠ_ಠ (TechCrunch)

Steam Will Be Down on Monday: DON’T PANIC (Kotaku)

New Trailer/Poster for Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Coventry Telegraph)

You Can Play Zork On A Bunch of Ereaders (Joystiq)

Who Else Is in the Deadpool Movie (Bleeding Cool)

Automatic Spirograph Cake Decorator (Gizmodo)

NYCC Cosplay Day 1 (Kotaku)

Kotaku reports that South Korean authorities have been cracking down over the weekend on unrated games, and this may mean considerable bad things for Korean Steam users.

Korean law states that all games available to the public must be rated by the Game Rating Board. That’s all well and nice, except that game makers must pay to get their game rated, and many cannot afford the price. When South Korea says all games, they mean all games. Tiny indie games, flash-based or mobile whatsits, big blockbusters, and everything in between.

Team Liquid, a StarCraft community site, reports that Steam games may even be in the sights of Korean authorities.

Last weekend Telltale Games released an inexplicable teaser trailer for an upcoming project, that primarily featured the above image, calculated to create one specific response in the viewer:

What the heck kind of game is going to have Tycho from Penny Arcade, Max from Sam & Max, Strongbad, and the Heavy from Team Fortress 2 in it?

Today, we have an answer: A poker game.

THINQ.co.uk is reporting that Apple has pushed out a significant OS X software update, designed to improve performance and visual quality in the Mac version of Valve’s Steam client. Since Steam was released for the platform three months ago, many sources have lamented the performance of the games compared to their Windows counterparts. Some have even gone as far as to set up Windows partitions using Boot Camp to avoid the reduced frame rates in the Mac client.

That’s all changed now, thanks to the Apple’s graphics update and some Steam optimizations added by Valve. By tightening up some software inefficiencies pertaining to how the OS drives the graphics hardware, the games no longer have such a pronounced reduction in frame rate when running at higher resolutions or with cranked-up visual settings. One of the most hyped of these visual improvement is known as an “occlusion query,” or as the guys at Valve put it:

Read on...

As of about an hour ago, Alien Swarm, Valve’s remake of the groundbreaking Unreal Tournament 2004 mod, is available for free download on Steam. Servers currently appear to be under heavy load, but if you hang in there, you too can “blaze your way through an overrun, off-world colony, eradicating the alien infestation in environments ranging from the icy planet’s surface, to a subterranean lava-flooded mining facility.”

Valve’s launch trailer below — but really, just download the game when you get the chance.

Behind the scenes of bioprinting (Wired)

Crowdsourcing the search for aliens (O’Reilly Radar)

Sweet: Track the price history of Steam games (Steam game sales)

How one man outsmarted The Price Is Right (Esquire)

Disturbing update on Steve Perry homicide case (WTF Japan Seriously)

Finally: Beer-filled flashdrive (Mulher Cerveja Futebol)

Real-life Portal companion cube (TDW)

(Title image via RedCafe)