Portal Alive Kicking Alive Kicking achievements

Steam lists nine achievements for Portal: Alive & Kicking. Five are story-gated and unlock naturally as you progress. Four require specific actions in particular chambers or the Extras menu. This page documents each one with the chamber, the verb that triggers it, and the common mistakes that block the overlay.

The achievements below are confirmed from the Steam overlay and community guides. Names match the in-game text. Pair this page with the walkthrough for chamber numbers and how to beat GLaDOS for the ending sequence.

Do this first

Turn cheats off before you care about the overlay. Source achievements refuse sv_cheats 1. If you noclip through a room looking for a secret, reload a clean save before you check the overlay.

Do not console-load achieve.bsp. Launch-day testers warned against that map by name. It is not an achievement menu. It skips the story and can corrupt your save. The known issues page repeats it.

Portal: Alive & Kicking full playthrough — achievement reference

Story achievements

These five fire automatically when you reach the corresponding beat. You do not need to do anything unusual — just play through the campaign.

High-Energy Professional — Complete the first High-Energy Pellet test. This fires in Chamber 15 when you first redirect a pellet into its catcher. The pellet system is introduced slowly; you will see it coming. See the walkthrough for Chamber 15 geometry if the catcher refuses to register.

The Device Has Been Modified — Acquire the Dual Portal Device. Chamber 11 gives you blue and orange together. When both portal colours are in your gun, this unlock fires. If it does not, confirm you received both colours and that the game saved the pickup. See how to play if you are still firing one colour.

Fratricide — Do whatever it takes to survive. This is the companion cube achievement, fired in Chamber 17 when you incinerate the cube GLaDOS asks you to destroy. The walkthrough covers the cube handling for that room; the key is following GLaDOS’s instruction rather than trying to preserve the cube. If the overlay stays dark, you may have left the cube in a pellet lane that caused a softlock — check known issues.

Life of the Party — Make the incorrect party escort submission position decision. This fires during the GLaDOS boss sequence, before the credits. The game presents two buttons; one is wrong by design. If you pick the wrong one intentionally or accidentally, the achievement unlocks. Veterans call this the “party chair” decision.

Heartbreaker — Complete Alive & Kicking. Credits. This is the final story achievement. If the overlay is silent after the ending sequence, confirm you launched from Steam, online, with no cheats active.

Challenge achievements

These four require specific actions outside the main story path. Mark them before you start a fresh run so you do not miss any.

Unappreciated Business — Make a toilet hate you. Return to the Aperture Science Relaxation Vault in Chamber 00. Find the toilet and flush it repeatedly until the lid closes on its own. This is a standalone Easter egg unrelated to the test chambers. No portal work required — just persistence.

Get Stuck — Get stuck in Test Chamber 05. Place a Weighted Storage Cube behind the exit door so you cannot leave the room normally. Use portals to position the cube, or throw it far enough by hand. Once the game registers that you cannot proceed through the exit, the unlock fires. Reload your save to continue.

Blameless — Complete Chamber 16 without knocking over any turrets. The turret room is the most punishing in the campaign for this specific constraint. Approaches that work:

• Cube as a mobile shield — keep it between you and the turrets at all times.
• Portal behind the turret line — fire an exit portal behind the row and walk through without touching the turrets.
• Pick up individual turrets and place them facing the wall so they cannot track you. Do not sprint the open lane. If you knock a turret over by accident, reload the chamber. See the controls page for pickup binds.

Multiverse Explorer — Beat all of the levels in the Extras menu. This means completing every Advanced chamber, not just the story ones. The community has identified Chamber 18 Advanced as the final required clear. Enter the Extras menu, run through all Advanced remixes, and the overlay will close the set. See advanced chambers for the full list.

Achievement unlock order

The five story achievements fire in roughly this sequence:

1. The Device Has Been Modified — Chamber 11
2. High-Energy Professional — Chamber 15
3. Fratricide — Chamber 17
4. Life of the Party — GLaDOS sequence
5. Heartbreaker — Credits

The four challenge achievements can be earned in any order or on any save file.

Technical notes

• Launching the game is not an achievement. If Steam will not add the title to your library, that is the missing-button issue on troubleshooting, not a locked overlay.
• Finishing a map with -threads 1 is not an achievement. It is a crash workaround.
• Opening achieve.bsp will not grant the nine. It deletes your save and wastes your weekend.
• Offline mode or cloud sync issues can delay overlay updates. Confirm you are online and let Steam sync before troubleshooting the overlay itself.

100% checklist

1. Clean story run through walkthrough and GLaDOS. Screenshot the overlay after credits.
2. Back to Chamber 00 for the Relaxation Vault toilet.
3. Chamber 05 for the Get Stuck cube trap.
4. Chamber 16 for the Blameless turret run.
5. All Advanced chambers for Multiverse Explorer.
6. Compare screenshots to the nine boxes. Whatever is still grey is either missable (Life of the Party needs a specific wrong choice) or a known issue.

If a box stays grey after the correct action, verify Steam is online, relaunch from Steam, and check known issues. Do not open achieve.bsp.