Overview
In this guide ill explain how to make a good bee2 map. Let’s make the thing really good. Ill teach how to make a good palette, people love your map, best music, theme, test elements, and hints to help you use the better extended editor.
Step 1 – The Good Palette
The main attraction of BEE2 is the palettes. Let’s learn how to make a good palette.
Step 1 – Select the Blank palette type to you place custom items you want.
Step 2 – Essential things are cubes and buttons, so place that here firstly.
Pedestal buttons or right-left-middle buttons?
Bee2 gives you access to 3 different types of buttons. I recommend right-left-middle buttons, because you can change their location, making the map better, while making the same thing normal pedestal buttons make. I also use the Retractable pedestal button, which raises from the ground.
When you finish these steps, your palette will look like this:
Now that you have your basic palette, add fizzlers and laserfields. If you want, add faith plates too, and dont forget the doors. Optional items: Turrets and glass/grating.
People also like monitor screens, vactubes, triggers and tractor beams.
Instead of lasers, that dont kill the player, pick high energy pellet emitters and catchers. They make the test funnier.
If you are making a BTS map, pick catwalks. I will be using for example in this guide the Overgrown style, so i’ll not use catwalks.
Aesthetics is also a important point, so pick cutout tiles, crosswalls and windows. Surface markers are a good choice too.
Hard light bridges is another important thing, if you want pick them up. Ill use gels too. People like crushers. Obviously, use light strips. Ill pick up the normal, cold and warm to this guide. Track platforms are simple, so pick the Unstationary Scaffolds. (these are the things that float in the air, like the ones almost burned you in TC 19 Portal 1)
To give more aesthetics to your map, pick glass panels, angled panels and flip panels. Placing the flip panels without connection is a good way to add aesthetics, and placing angled panels and flip panels in different degrees near each other gives a destruction look to your chamber. It combinates very well with Overgrown style.
The last item of the palette you choose, so ill pick stairs.
At the end, your palette (if you picked up all items i mentioned here) will look like this:
Step 2 – Choosing Music, Voice, Style etc.
So, its time to choose the other things.
For overgrown style (used in this guide):
Pick up announcer for the voice, skybox Overgrown Sunlight, elevator video pick up one below Overgrown (Animal King or Remain Calm recommended) music pick Haunted Panels, its great.
So, everything ready! Oh, we forgot something: The items and their style. Check goo debris, goo mist, flickering overgrown funnel, and dont check P1 gun.
For Behind the Scenes (BTS):
Pick GLaDOS or Wheatley for voice. Skybox 3D factory, elevator video is not needed, there is none. The music i like Laser Dance but Ghost Stories (or something like this i dont remember the name) is more ‘original’.
Check whatever you like in the style/item tab, i cannot say what to pick, this one is your choice.
For Old Aperture (1950, 1960, 1970, 1980):
Voice pick Cave Johnson <year name>. Voice here is based in the style, so if you pick style 1960, pick Cave Johnson (1960). Skybox its better pick Sphere Exterior. No elevator video here too (these things are too advanced for 1960 lol) Music i love MoT Spheres.
Check Opened Enrichment Sphere, it add more details to your map.
For Clean:
Voice: GLaDOS or Wheatley. Skybox pick clean or something like this. Elevator video i like Aperture Logo. Music get something you like.
For P1:
Voice pick GLaDOS (P1), skybox get Portal 1. No elevator video here, and the last option (music) the best one is Procedural Jiggle Bone.
ALERT: NEVER pick Nigel in voice if you’ll export to Portal 2 or Thinking With Time Machine. I think the game will crash if you pick any Portal 2 voice for Aperture Tag, so for AT always use Nigel and in Portal 2 and TWTM never use Nigel.
Now things are ready. Hit EXPORT TO PORTAL 2 and done! Then open Portal 2 and create a new chamber.
PS: If you know how to use logic gates, pick them! They are good.
When you open the chamber, first thing u’ll do will be hit ‘build and play puzzle’ to test if things gone right.
Now, place cutout tiles where you want in the chamber.
This is a chamber i made with overgrown style. Take a look:
[link]PS: Dont publish your chamber yet.
Step 2A – If your chamber is a campaign one…
If your chamber is to a collection with story, you need the following things in the title and description:
- Collection name
- Map number (f.e. 4)
- Map name
With the title everything’s done. Now lets go to the desc.
In the description place:
- Basic info
- Map story
- (OPTIONAL) Next chamber name
Everything done! Now hit Publish.
Step 3 – Custom Photo/logo etc. for the Published Chamber
To do this, just press the C up your palette and check Custom. Take a screenshot in-game, edit it with whatever thing you have in your PC (if you want) and then click the thing that appears under Custom.
DO NOT CHECK Cleanup old screenshots, this will delete the screenshot file.
When you upload the chamber, you will have your nice screenshot as the map photo.
Items pt. 1
Here you will find things about ALL ITEMS of Beemod 4.36.1.
These are all the items of bee2 4.36.1:
This is a common item in Portal 2. Introduced in Test Chamber 5 of Portal 2 (chapter 2), the plate has been used many times in the rest of the game. This throws the player in the target direction.
Main property: Output
Properties
Start Enabled: Beemod allows you to select if the plate will be enabled or not at the start, like in a Portal 2 SP campaign where it is ‘broken’.
Connection visibility: The visibility of the connections.
Connect to…: Connect to a input to toggle it on or off.
Remove connections: Remove a connection with a input.
If the style is set to any Old Aperture styles, it will be switched by a wood plate with repulsion gel in it. Can still be turned off like normally.
This is the most featured item in the whole Portal series certainly. From a metal box to a pretty cube, it is used (obviously) to press buttons, stop lasers, smash turrets, protect players of turrets, and many other functions. It was introduced in Test Chamber 00 of Portal 1 (chapter 1).
Main property: Mobile item
The weighted storage cube has no property, except the fact it changes to a box that looks like a wooden cube in Old Aperture styles, and in Portal 1 it switches to a metal box.
Your beloved friend that finishes incinerated in Portal 1. Introduced in Test Chamber 17 of Portal 1, appears few times in the SP campaign of both games.
Main property: Mobile item
Properties
It automatically fizzles when the players approaches to it in the first drop (if dropper is enabled obviously) and activates a optional GLaDOS voice line.
In Old Aperture, it switches to a wooden cube with a pink heart in one of the sides.
Other very used item in Portal 2. Introduced in Chamber 3 (or 2 i forgot) of Portal 2 (chapter 2), it reflects lasers into a laser catcher or laser relay.
Main property: Mobile item
Properties
Reflects lasers.
I dont think they change of style in Old Aperture, it would be weird (if im wrong leave there in the comments).
Only appearing one time in SP campaign of Portal 2 (chapter 2 chamber 6), the Edgeless Safety Cube is a ball, which can be easily moved alone. I recommend not disabling dropper in a map which haves fizzlers as a TESTING ELEMENT like Chamber 8 Portal 2 (chapter 2), because it can be fizzled and the player cannot get it back unless he restart the chamber and it can be really annoying.
Main property: Mobile item
No properties except it moves alone because its a ball.
This is the famous cube Wheatley created. As he says, they’re BOXES with LEGS! Introduced in Portal 2 Test Chamber 00 of Chapter 8, these REALLY move alone. The legs are broken turrets. It walks into fizzlers and buttons!
Main property: Mobile item
Properties
Moves alone into fizzlers or buttons, is present in all styles (thanks BartoszMikMik)
Introduced in Chamber 11 Portal 2 of Chapter 3, these help you places you couldn’t without it. You can place a portal in their end to extend the bridge.
Main property: Output
Properties
Connect to…: Connect to a input.
Remove connections: Remove a connection with a input.
Start enabled: Start if it’ll be enabled or not in the start.
Connection visibility: Choose antline, signage or none.
The dietetic pudding attempt of Aperture. At the end, it has turned into a thing you jump into and you bounce a lot high. Accepts momentum.
Main property: Liquid
No properties.
Another mobility gel. This one makes you faster when you walk through it.
Main property: Liquid
No properties.
This gel allows you to turn a black surface into a white one! From saving you in a boss fight against Wheatley to killing Cave Johnson, it is useful of many different ways.
Main property: Liquid-solid
No properties.
This gel cleans other gels, it can also be called water cuz it REALLY IS WATER.
Main property: Liquid
No properties.
This was invented by GLaDOS but never used in her tests. Wheatley had to introduce it to you in chamber 01/02 of Chapter 8. It can carry you from a place to another, and you can place a portal in its end to extend it.
Main property: Output
Properties
Can be turned off, carries player from one point to another.
As the name says, it catches lasers. Can be used in many ways, like toggling on a funnel, a light bridge, opening a door, and very other ways.
Main property: Input
Properties
Catches lasers.
Emmits lasers. Can be reflected by reflection cubes, can be extended by portals, can be toggled on or off and does many functions in SP and COOP campaign.
Main property: Output
Properties
Activates laser catchers, laser relays, can be reflected by reflection cubes and reflection gel.
These are like laser catchers with a extended area they catch. Are not used many times as the catcher in Portal 2, but can make very enjoyable puzzles.
Main property: Input
Properties
Catches lasers and can be used to activate doors, toggle funnels, light bridges and other ways.
A unreleased gel Valve was planning to put into Portal 2. Does the same thing as the reflection cubes, reflect lasers that come in its direction. Player cannot choose its trajectory.
Main property: Liquid
No properties.
Fizzles cubes. Dont let anything pass through it except the player, lasers, funnels, light bridges and gel. Blocks portal shots. Can be turned on/off.
Main property: Output
Properties
Blocks portal shots, cubes and many other static items.
These kill the player when they walk through it. Does not fizzles cubes, allows portal shots through but kill the player. Can be toggled on/off.
Main property: Output
Properties
Kill players.
Called by many ways, they are a “water” that kills the player, destroys cubes, turrets and many other objects.
Main property: Deadly item
Properties
Kills players.
Glass its the classic. Anything pass it except lasers.
Grating lets portal shots and lasers through, but still dont let the player.
Main property (of the both): Barrier
Shoots without stopping the player if they reach their range. Do not abuse them because players can dislike your test and it can be really annoying. Unless your test needs turrets, do not put them in the map. Can be moved by the player when killed.
Main property: Deadly dynamic item
Properties
Is killed by gel, shoots the player, bullets can be stopped by cubes.
Used to make your test brighter. Make sure to always use them.
Normal is used to brighten the test.
Warm is used to brighten it and highlight a important place.
Cold is the same thing as warm.
Sphere does nothing.
Franken is a antline blocker. Antlines cannot be in the space it is, and it doesn’t appear in-game.
Both angled panels (normal and glass) are items which can be flipped in 30, 45, 60 and 90 degrees. They can be very helpful in chambers, from making a person fall to a BTS area to blocking a cube from falling at goo or being fizzled.
Main property: Moving item, output
Properties
Can be flipped in 30, 45, 60 or 90 degrees.
Items pt. 2
NOTE: There are many parts because i broke the character limit of a section that Steam allows 😛
One of the most ignored item in chambers, it can be a VERY POWERFUL item in tests. Connecting it to triggers, buttons, laser catchers and many other inputs can be a very good way to customize your chamber.
Main property: Flipping item, output
Properties
Can flip a surface, so it can turn a white surface into black and a black surface into white.
Obviously, they help the player climb a block up. Can be toggled off, can be turned into block stairs in Style/Item properties section, can be a useful testing element (very impressive) and other functions.
Main property: Output
Properties
Can be toggled on/off
Helps players climb one block up from the floor
Another element people dont care so much. It can be a very important testing element if used of the right way, like in one of my chambers where you need to jump to one. Also, it can be used aesthetically, by making moving walls. Just pick some 5 triggers, A LOT of piston platforms, place them in the wall, change cube type to companion or reflective and uncheck Auto-drop first cube. You will have moving walls.
Main property: Output
Properties
Can be used as a elevator
A very useful testing element (if used of the right way)
These platforms move along a track. Can also be used as a elevator, like in my chamber B3f0rE P0rtAl: Crashing Elevator, where I used it as a elevator which is toggled off by a trigger.
Main property: Output
Properties
Can be used as a elevator
Moves along a track
A room that can’t be accessible by the player which has inside a chair, a monitor and a desk. Is a light fountain.
Main property: Light fountain
Properties
Cannot be accessible by the player
Emmits light to the chamber
Another very used element. Weighted can be activated by player, cubes and balls. Cube obviously can only be activated by a cube. Sphere can only be activated by spheres.
Main property: Input
Properties
Can be activated by cubes, player and spheres
Is a input
These have four variants:
Right-left-middle buttons
Retractable pedestal button
Normal pedestal button
Wall pedestal buttons
These shut down GLaDOS in a core transfer– or they can just drop a cube! Retractable pedestal buttons can ‘seek’ them in the floor, right-middle-left buttons use the Weighted-cube-sphere property to choose where they’ll position in the surface. Wall pedestal buttons are used to place a button in the wall without turning it horizontally, like in my chamber B3f0rE P0rtAl: Broken Floor. Regular pedestal buttons do the same thing but they dont have any “special ability”
Main property: Input
Properties
Activates cube droppers, doors, funnels, and other outputs
Can only be activated by the player
Has three variants
Can seek into the floor
Can be in the right side, left side or normally in the middle of a surface
Can be placed in the wall
This is a special button, which toggles the portal gun on or off. This one can only be pressed by THE PLAYER (i recommend using in COOP maps) but can be very useful in singleplayer chambers too.
Main property: Button
Properties
Toggles the player gun on/off
Can be pressed by players
Can’t be pressed by cubes
This is the same as player button, but can only be pressed by cubes. Toggles the portalgun on/off, and this one is better to use in both singleplayer and coop.
Main property: Button
Properties
Toggles the player gun on/off
Can’t be pressed by players
Can be pressed by cubes
A variant and a very useful variant of the trigger once. Remember the portal gun on/off cube buttons? Very useful when doing multichamber maps. Place this in the hallway to the second chamber, and when the player walks over it (like a normal trigger) it will fizzle all cubes pressing weighted on/off buttons.
Main property: Trigger
Properties
Fizzle cubes pressing on/off buttons
Hints to your map
Make a hole in the roof of the chamber and place a cleansing gel (water) dropper in the ceiling with a grating in the other face of the hole. My chamber Overgrown Chambers 01 uses this mechanic to give aesthetics.
Place flip panels and surface markers around the map. That gives an destroyed effect to the chamber, making it more realistic.
Angled/glass panels with different degrees in the wall places more destroyed effects in the chamber.
Place a monitor screen in the chamber, it’ll look broken.
This next one needs photo explanation.
Malfunctioning Doors/Broken Panels and the On-off System
Step 1 – Make a room that can only be accessible with noclip.
Step 2 – Place there in the same direction a laser emitter (starting enabled) and a laser catcher.
Step 3 – Connect the laser catcher to the laser emitter.
Step 4 – Verify the laser emitter is enabled. If it is, do nothing. Otherwise, turn it on.
At the end, it’ll look like that:
You completed the on-off system. Now connect it to a door or a panel.
For panel: Start enabled.
For door: Start disabled.
What to NOT do:
A giant blue gel box which the player bounces forever.
The player dodge energy pellets to reach the exit. (thats really irritating)
Playground maps. There is a lot, workshop dont need more.
Forget to changing the connection visibility of triggers (any type) to NONE. Its really weird when people see a antline from the nothing.
What to DO:
A coop gel race map. (like Gelocity collection ones)
A Wheatley-styled map, with a monitor screen and a dumb test, like the first ones Wheatley made you ‘solve’
Copy a Portal 1 map in Portal 2 with advancements.
Copy a Portal 2 map with Portal 1 style. (people really like dat)
Maps with malfunctioning objects/elements people dont find regularly in the chambers
Maps with use of triggers and logic gates
Flickering light bridges using the on-off system
Broken faith plates (check start disabled)
How to do a fake antline?
Step 1 – Place a trigger in the same surface a button for example is.
Step 2 – Place another trigger in the surface on the same surface of the output object f.e. a door.
Step 3 – Connect both triggers.
Step 4 – Place connection visibility to antline.
Step 5 – Remove all connections of the triggers, let only the other trigger connected.
Done!
The basic items for Behind the Scenes are:
Catwalks
Cube Fountains (if needed)
Vactubes
Turret droppers
Monitors (as well seen in the start of Chapter 8 – The Itch
Conveyor belts
Pneumatic Diversity Vents
Neurotoxin Emitters in optional areas (like in Chapter 5, where you unlock the achievement Good Listener)
Neurotoxin Timers (obviously needed when neurotoxin emitters are present)
Rocket Turrets
Turrets
Piston and track platforms
Glass futbols (if needed)
For aesthetics:
Warm/cold light strips
Gridded walls
Surface markers
Items that aren’t supposed to be in BTS:
Observation rooms (because its weird)
Cutout tiles
Floors (always if possible use catwalks)
Antlines are weird, always use signage or none to connect items.
Coop Maps made with BEE2
Ok. You know how to do SP maps with the extended editor, but what about coop ones? So, lets learn how now.
Ill make a overgrown coop map because i love overgrown style. The coop palette must look like this:
With this palette, you have everything ready! After choosing style, music, voice etc. export it to Portal 2, open it, and design your puzzle. The following steps will teach you how to make a really good coop map. (FORGOT ABOUT THE AIRLOCKS IN THE PALETTE, SO ADD THEM)
Step 1 – Add vactubes with weird stuff inside. People like this, im serious here. Place a hole of 1 surface difference from the rest of the ceiling. Pick a turret dropper and a vactube line in the same direction. Then make a hole in the floor the same way you made in the ceiling, and place a fizzler in the end. Make that with other stuff and it works very well!
Step 2 – Airlock areas are good. Place some in your map and your map will be easily popular.
Step 3 – Make puzzles like Mass and Velocity Portal 2 coop course, people like it.
Step 4 – Puzzles like Art Therapy ones are fun too.
This is a coop map i made with overgrown style.
[link]You made a good coop map! Congrats!
Q&A
Q: Can i export bee2 maps to Hammer and edit them?
A: Yes.
Q: Bee2 have actually, in any version, a in-mod editor?
A: No. You need to open Portal 2/Aperture Tag/TWTM to do it.
Q: Is Bee2 free?
A: Obviously it is.
Q: Can i export a PeTI map (without Bee) to Hammer, edit it in hammer and do the style things with Bee2?
A: No. That will crash the game.
My Collection (its a WIP)
My collection it’s called B3f0rE P0rtAl, it happens before Portal 1 and Portal 2. The story is that you are twin sister of Chell and need to escape the facility. (Chell only is mentioned in the story two times: in NOT in-game story of Chamber 5, and in chamber 21). Passing trough tests Chell pass in Portal 1, and some that only appear in Portal 2, you have 21 testing chambers (chamber 5 is a BTS) which 4 appear in original Portal 1 and Portal 2, and the others are custom. Featuring items like Sendificator, Custom Fizzlers, and many other testing elements, the collection, after the 22 first maps, has the B3f0rE P0rtAl BTS, a separated collection from the first one. You need to play first B3f0rE P0rtAl collection and THEN B3f0rE P0rtAl BTS to understand the story. Actually, the collection only have 8 maps, but the tests and story are very good in my opinion. You can try out the first maps already, all of them are published.
(nothing from these 2 collections make any holes in Portal series, there are no boss fights or something like that, only a neurotoxin chamber at the last chamber of the B3f0rE P0rtAl BTS collection, where you escape)
Update Log
6/23/2020: Solved the “error” in Frankencubes, which says them are not present in Old Aperture. Thanks @BartoszMikMik for discovering it!
4/27/2020: Started the major update that includes Items section.
4/8/2020: Updated this guide, adding the Q&A, My Collection, Step 3 sections and updated the Step 2 section, adding more style options to it.
3/20/2020: Updated this guide, placing my coop map Coop Overgrown Chamber 01 in the Coop maps with BEE2 section.
3/20/2020: Uploaded this guide.