GLaDOS

"All I know is I'm the only thing standing between us and them. Well, I was."

- GLaDOS

GLaDOS (Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System) is the guide and, later on, the main antagonist of Portal.

Background
When Black Mesa reportedly began research on similar portal technology in 1986, Aperture Science began construction of GLaDOS (however, based on the copyright date of GLaDOS v1.07a, found on the Aperture Science website, which is 1982, this information may be incorrect. The correct date may be 2002, as one employee mentioned everyone was working on twenty year old equipment). A presentation on a projector seen briefly in game suggests that GLaDOS was at one point designed in competition with Black Mesa for a Defense Logistics contract looking to develop a Fuel System Icing Inhibitor (FSII). Aperture Science's proposal argued that their solution was not only cheaper than Black Mesa's, but it was in fact a 'fully functioning disk operating system' and 'arguably alive' as a bonus.

The 'Disk Operating' aspect of the A.I.'s namesake was completed in 1996, after which work began on the genetic lifeform area. GLaDOS was switched on for the first time several years later, during Aperture Science's first annual bring-your-daughter-to-work day. Initial tests are said to have gone well.

How and when GLaDOS became self aware and took control of Aperture Laboratories is open to speculation. The installation of the red phone and the morality core are evidence that GLaDOS was not able to seize control of the Enrichment Center immediately after she developed the desire to do so, and that her creators had some inkling of the extent of her psychopathy. This suggests that there was a protracted struggle for power between GLaDOS and the human occupants of Aperture. It is also possible that GLaDOS overtook the Enrichment Center prior to the Black Mesa Incident, as the projections in the observation areas make mention of Black Mesa. It is unlikely that Black Mesa would have remained a viable company after the incident, and therefore competing with Aperture for government contracts.

On the other hand, external factors may have intervened. Towards the end of the game GLaDOS makes several references to the world outside Aperture Laboratories. She says "much has changed" since Chell last saw it, that she is the only thing "between us...and them", and Chell would find death preferable to what is currently going on outside. This seems to reference the Combine invasion of Earth, which would place the events of Portal somewhere after the Seven Hour War and the lead up to Half-Life 2; however, because GLaDOS' word is so characteristically vague, she could be referencing something completely different, or indeed making things up.

Valve have stated that they deliberately kept this and GLaDOS's fate ambiguous, because they are as yet undecided as to whether and how to tie future Portal releases into the Half-Life series. However, references to the Aperture Science research vessel Borealis in Half-Life 2: Episode Two suggest at least some degree of continuity between the two stories.

Portal


GLaDOS talks to and aids Chell as she progresses through the Aperture Science test course, issuing instruction in the use of the Portal Gun and offering oblique and occasionally sinister advice and warnings. Her smooth female voice, issued through a PA system which pervades the whole of Aperture Science Enrichment Center, is the only outward face of the organization the player is ever aware of, or allowed to be aware of. It is not completely obvious who or what GLaDOS is, and what her actual role is at Aperture, until the very end of the game; however, it is strongly hinted at the beginning when GLaDOS says "... Computer Aided Enrichment Center ...".

At the end of the test, it becomes apparent that GLaDOS never intended to let the player leave the labs alive, a fact which she had actually been hinting at all along. The platform Chell is riding on carries her into a fire pit, echoing GLaDOS's strange statement in Chamber 18- 'You will be baked, and then there will be cake'. When Chell escapes through the use of the Portal Gun, GLaDOS's behavior starts to become alarmingly erratic. As Chell advances through abandoned labs and the industrial areas of Aperture, GLaDOS demands then pleads with the player to turn back, maintaining that cake will be served if Chell just stops behaving badly.

Eventually GLaDOS is discovered to be the "Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System", a huge supercomputer which is now apparently the only occupant of the Aperture Science Enrichment Center. A red phone was installed in the central chamber which GLaDOS occupies to be used as a warning system should she turn rogue; this has, for reasons not revealed, failed to work (it is worthy of note that the red telephone's cord is severed.) There is some suggestion that GLaDOS murdered the former human incumbents through the use of a neurotoxin, which, after the player destroys her morality program, she gleefully reactivates. Using the Portal Gun, Chell is able to redirect rocket fire from a Rocket Sentry and eventually destroy GLaDOS by dislodging and incinerating the rest of her cores.

The cores appear to be programs that control different aspects of GLaDOS, and are in order of incineration: Morality, Curiosity, Intelligence (Currently preoccupied with calculating cake recipe), and Emotion (Currently preoccupied with anger).

At the game's end, a cutscene following vents throughout test center reveals many more of GLaDOS's cores lighting up in a storage area (with the infamous cake in the center, and the Companion Cube to the left). During the credits sequence, GLaDOS can be heard singing "Still Alive", adding to the question of whether or not she was actually destroyed.

Appearance


GLaDOS represents Aperture Science, and guides the player from their chamber into and through the test course. It swiftly becomes obvious that despite her polite and equable tones, GLaDOS is neither particularly bothered by what happens to the player, nor entirely rational. She frequently lies about such concerns as the deadliness of acid pits, and also has a fixation with cake, which she insists will be served after the test is completed. She presents this and the bewildering and dangerous tasks the player is forced to perform as common procedure at Aperture. GLaDOS is also prone to seemingly intentional vocal malfunction, often blotting out important pieces of information in bursts of static. In one case, she promises to stop lying to Chell; however, as soon as she counts down to one, her voice is cut by loud static. Whether these are actual malfunctions, however, is still to be speculated.

Behind the scenes

 * "GLaDOS" is a pun with the words "glad", "DOS" ("disk operating system"), and Gladys, a female personal name (the game files show a folder called "gladdysDestruction").
 * GLaDOS' "Anger Sphere" is voiced by Mike Patton, lead singer of the bands Mr. Bungle and Faith No More, among numerous others. It should also be noted that he provided all the sounds made by the Common Infected in Left 4 Dead, some reused from the sphere.
 * As stated in the commentary by Jeremey Bennett, GLaDOS went through several design iterations. Earlier versions included a floating brain, a sprawling, spidery mechanism, and an upside-down version of Botticelli's painting "The Birth of Venus" built out of robot parts and wire. Eventually, the team settled on a huge mechanical device with a robotic figure dangling out of it, conveying both GLaDOS's raw power and femininity.
 * A fan on a website found that when looked upon from a certain point of view, GLaDOS looks like a woman, but hanging upside down by her feet, her hands bound around her legs, making her look like an insane or imprisoned person.

GLaDOS's Cake Recipe


The recipe for the cake GLaDOS promises Chell has both safe, nontoxic ingredients and strange, dangerous additives. The player can find it on many of the screens in the abandoned offices, though it is mixed in with numbers and scrolls quickly. An easier way is to listen to the blue Intelligence Sphere that drops from GLaDOS in the final battle.

Safe ingredients

 * Four large eggs.
 * One cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
 * Nine large egg yolks
 * One 18.25-ounce package chocolate cake mix
 * One and two third (1 2/3) cups granulated sugar
 * One can prepared coconut pecan frosting
 * One cup granulated sugar
 * One cup lemon juice
 * One tablespoon all-purpose rhubarb
 * One teaspoon grated orange rhubarb
 * Pull and peel licorice
 * Three slash four (3/4) cup vegetable oil
 * Three slash four (3/4) cups butter or margarine
 * Two cups all-purpose flour
 * Two cups rhubarb, sliced
 * Two slash three cups (2/3) granulated rhubarb
 * Two tablespoons rhubarb juice
 * Three tablespoons rhubarb, on fire

Uncertain ingredients

 * Alpha resins (curic acid)
 * An entry called 'how to kill someone with your bare hands'
 * Proven preservatives
 * Deep penetration agents
 * Volatile malted milk impoundments
 * One cross borehole electro-magnetic imaging rhubarb (corrupted entry.)
 * Twelve medium geosynthetic membranes
 * Unsaturated polyester resin
 * One large rhubarb (rhubarb leaves are poisonous and roots will cause uncontrollable diarrhea; only rhubarb stalk is suitable for sweets)

Garnishes

 * Fiberglass surface resins
 * Fish shaped candies
 * Fish shaped crackers
 * Fish shaped dirt
 * Fish shaped ethyl benzene (an intermediate in the production of styrene, which in turn is used for making polystyrene)
 * Fish shaped volatile organic compounds
 * Sediment shaped sediment
 * Fish shaped solid waste
 * Candy coated peanut butter pieces - shaped like fish

Dangerous ingredients

 * Adjustable aluminum head positioner
 * Cordless electric needle injector
 * Cranial caps
 * Injector needle driver
 * Injector needle gun
 * Slaughter electric needle injector
 * Gas and odor control chemicals that will deodorize and preserve putrid tissue

Trivia

 * GLaDOS is more than slightly reminiscent of HAL 9000, the murderous AI computer of 2001: A Space Odyssey. However, those who read the book, 2001: A Space Odyssey, will find that the HAL 9000 was not self-aware, and driven to his actions in an attempt to rationalize two conflicting orders, to conceal the true mission objective and to never hide anything from the crew. Because GLaDOS became self-aware, and developed a sinister personality, it is safe to assume she is more alive, and more antagonistic, than the HAL 9000. In the film version of 2001: A Space Odyssey, it is strongly hinted that HAL 9000 is self-aware in the disconnection scene, where HAL 9000 is reduced to begging for his life.
 * GLaDOS also bears similarities to the homicidal super computer ARIA from the movie Eagle Eye and the super computer VIKI from I-Robot.
 * GLaDOS is featured in the game "Rock Band" through Jonathan Coulton's song entitled "Still Alive," which is the credits theme for Portal. As of April 16, 2008 this song is free on the XBox Live Marketplace and was released free on the Playstation Network on April 24, 2008.
 * Google made an extremely elaborate fake AI for April Fools Day 2009. The AI was likely inspired by GLaDOS, most notably because it "went rampant" and had to be shut off. Also, where GLaDOS had a fixation with cake, Google's fake AI had a fixation with pandas.
 * The thousands of pictures on the video screens in GLaDOS' main chamber display many various and considerably random items. They include hundreds of images of cake, tools such as bolt cutters (often coupled with cake), a photo of industrial workers (possibly her creators), computer parts, many micellaneous objects, and images of farm animals and equipment, possibly the basis for the genetic side of GLaDOS. There is also an image of the Black Mesa logo, reinforcing the connection between Aperture Science and Black Mesa.

List of appearances

 * ApertureScience.com
 * Portal