Very nice puzzle. I like how it subverts our expectations from the first part. Also, you very rarely get cube-stacking. Good job.

WOWY WOW of WOWS

A nice long and well put together laser and cube-button level.
I'll give this another go without glitches at the end of each puzzle (which seemed a requirement at first glance (after playing Magician's Boxes first)).

https://www.dropbox.com/s/lskm90umqsy7m0h/PillarsOfHerculesByTudor.dem?dl=0

Bose-Einstein: Yeah, this map (that does NOT require glitches) actually inspired me to create the Magician's Boxes puzzle (that does).

well I discovered the floating glass box glitch through this map, at least.

Thank you Lost!

No glitch-abuse is required in this map. I have a separate category for glitch-requiring puzzles.

so I DIDN'T have to make the glass blocks float to solve the puzzle?

you´re wellcome. I don´t notice unintentioned solutions. your level is solid, stronng as... Hercules xDD. I play many levels. Portal is my.... Sudoku daily xD.And I don´t know your maps... a pleasantly surprised. You have a new fan xDD.

Thanks Requiemsoul! You've been active at playing my maps... Wish you also recorded a demo of your first playthroughs (the instructions are in my profile), but thank you for the feedback anyway.

In my opinion, "The Twist" is your masterpiece.. but this one is really good. Nice puzzle and atmosphere. Thumbs up!

Simply brilliant! Great work!

Thanks TCJ!

I enjoyed this epic map! I hope you enjoy watching this TCJ Episode

Sub'd will play soon!

Yeah, I am aware that you can shoot through the gap between the angled panel and the wall. It is not part of the intended solution. I don't know of any way to fix it that does not involve the possibility of the player becoming stuck in panel when it moves. (Well, didn't. I'll have to test if the Living Panel element that I recently created for the PTI will help.) Thanks for the demo, will check that.
EDIT: Oh. I already had changed that particular angled panel, which I thought you were talking about. As for _that_angld panel... I thought it didn't work! It didn't work when I tried it... Bah. Thanks for reporting :)
EDIT 2: Also, fixed. Did several changes to the chamber in the past few days.

Yeah, I am aware that you can shoot through the gap between the angled panel and the wall. It is not part of the intended solution. I don't know of any way to fix it that does not involve the possibility of the player becoming stuck in panel when it moves. (Well, didn't. I'll have to test if the Living Panel element that I recently created for the PTI will help.) Thanks for the demo, will check that.

Here is my new run (after the changes): https://www.dropbox.com/s/smnnofq1wgmotq2/pillarsofhercules2.dem (it freezes at about 2 min, where I paused the game but if you wait a while it'll unfreeze) You can shoot through the gap between the angled panel and the wall to get the cube. Once you work out the cube stacking idea, the rest of the map is fairly easy.

Thanks Frosty Andy!

It's sad that I can't thumb up twice. Gorgeous test, and the most beautiful part of this is button chamber

Allright, I think that with the latest update, I have fixed all the problems that have been reported so far. It is also no longer possible to accidentally push your cubes into an observation room. See this video for more information about this glitch: http://youtu.be/Y5uHVIV6b44

If I put the angled panel inside, it would be high candidate for trapping the player with a physics brush as it moves. I am now changing it into a door instead. In the making, I discovered something...

Could you not just put the angled panel on the inside of the hole? this would seal the hole and prevent this trick. I didn't actually succeed in flinging up there, just attempted it. No idea why the demo would freeze...I didn't do anything unusual...

The random flip panels are for discouraging some really unintuitive routes that the antlines love to take. EDIT: Watched the demo, until 4:03 - around the time you reached the first lift for the first time. Then it jammed, and the demo won't progress forward anymore.
So you're another flingy type person. I guess I'll have to remove some portal surfaces after all. I have had seriously hard time believing people would love to try replacing portals mid-flight unless as a last resort, but I guess I'm wrong. You also shot through the glass panel seams. There's nothing I can do to avoid that problem. Needless to say, it's not part of the intended solution...
The cube droppers behind a single fizzler are just mini puzzles. I didn't want all the cubes just laying there so I did at least something.

Not too difficult, didn't really see the point of the cube droppers behind the single fizzler or the random flip panels but heres my blind run https://www.dropbox.com/s/mub1kiz38d2l3lp/pillarsofhercules.dem

Thanks for playing! Piling the cubes indeed takes some practice to get it working fluently. I agree that the tilted cube method is ugly. Luckily there's another solution that works just as well (different from yours) and is much nicer. You were the first person to try bouncing to the upper room using floor & ceiling portals and you succeeded at it, too. Good job. I'm not going to change the map to disable your method; it's difficult enough, that anyone who tries it deserves that it works. Your solution to the last part of the puzzle was by far the most efficient one I have seen so far, unless you take the cubes from the second part with you right after completing it , which would require foreknowledge of what the button right next to the fizzler does.

The cubes under button part was awkward in the beginning, after a while with some practice it went smoothly though. I watched your walkthrough after playing and I would prefer to not ever see that method again which you used to hit the laser catcher. That's a "dirty" solution in my opinion. Next thing is we're hopping on door frames and pedestal buttons...
Here is my blind run: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/16159596/pillars.dem

Thanks! Yeah, you can do that. There are a couple of other tricks too, but they are minor enough that I'm not bothering to "fix" them. Yeah, in the end you need to collect the second room first. Sorry that you didn't finish it, but nice to hear you did figure it out anyway. There's another reason besides the fizzler why the two rooms differ slightly, but what I did not count on was that most people figured out the second-part solution (which works for both parts) before the intended first-part solution. The intended first-part solution does not work for the second part...

Genuinely enjoyed this one. Some cool tricks I hadn't seen before, and your arrangement of the glass panels looked pretty cool. There is an exploit however; if you walk with the cubes over your head you can carry them over the fizzler, meaning I didn't need to use that button, meaning the two rooms were exactly the same. Collecting a stack of 3 cubes with one portal was fun, but I did the first room first and couldn't be bothered to set it all up a third time just to get both rooms. Good work.

In fact I saw the portalable surface at the top, but I thought that I will need the 8 cubes to activate the 4 buttons and I thought that if I used this surface I would only be able to get the first 4 cube and then be unable to access the last 4 cubes... But now you say it, it was possible yeah X)

Thanks! Yeah, playing Magician's Boxes before this one definitely helps, even though this one is a no-glitch chamber. You can abuse e.g. the glass panel seams here, which I am glad you didn't do. I wonder why, though, along with Cave's narration, I did not hear the timer ticking sound on those buttons. I liked your reaction in the 2nd part :-) You pretty much solved the 1st part the way the 2nd part was supposed to be done, so there was less novel thinking required for the 2nd part for you... Now, when you got all 8 cubes in one place, you forgot that there's a portalable surface at the very top, with which you can directly return to the 4-buttons room . Instead, you took the long way... By the way, you don't need to lean the cubes. Just stack them normally . I can totally understand why you did what you did in the end though. There's not much I can do to help that problem.. Again, thanks!

Really cool chamber ^^ I think playing your other maps first helped a bit to get the main idea :p
I think I did it the right way, until I accidentally fizzled a laser cube just before I could exit... So I hack-spawned a new one instead of doing all the process again X)
Blind demo here [www.sendspace.com].

That is exactly what I did. :D
I'll give it a new try when I have time.

@AimingOverrated, I fixed a problem which should make sure that you can no longer progress to the four buttons room and have your cubes in an area that you cannot access them. If you made stairs from cubes , that was wrong and it no longer works :-)

too hard for me :(

I couldn't figure it out.. :(
I got to the top with four buttons, and I think I'm supposed to drop down to collect all eight cubes? But i can't proceed because the cubes are on upper level and behind fizzler..

Please try my map: https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=142330589
comments are appriciated!