Wheatley

Appearances

The player-character Chell is introduced to Wheatley in Portal 2 when he revives her from her cryonic hibernation so they can both escape the deteriorating Aperture Science facility. Using a Portal Gun, Chell solves various puzzle tests until they accidentally revive the series' antagonist GLaDOS, who discards Wheatley while taking Chell to do tests. Wheatley eventually finds her and helps her escape, sabotaging GLaDOS' weaponry so they could defeat her. Chell initiates a core transfer, causing GLaDOS to be swapped with Wheatley, giving him control of the facility, which goes to his head, causing him to turn GLaDOS into a potato battery and send her and Chell into the facility's underbelly. He begins to change things, resulting in the facility falling apart. When they reencounter him, he forces them to do testing until he discovers robotic testing replacements, at which point he tries, unsuccessfully, to kill them. They eventually make their way to his lair, where they succeed in attaching corrupted cores to him to force a core transfer despite his efforts. He attempts to prevent this by boobytrapping a stalemate button, but Chell is able to remove him by putting a portal on the moon, causing him to be sucked out into space and letting GLaDOS retake the facility. After the credits, he is seen in space, expressing regret for his behavior.

Outside of the Portal series, Wheatley has appeared in several games in various capacities. An official plug-in created by Valve for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim features Wheatley floating around the Skills Menu. He also appears in Valve's multiplayer shooter Team Fortress 2 as an item, where actor Stephen Merchant reprises his role as Wheatley. In Rocket League, he appears as an antenna customization option for the player's car. He later appears as a non-playable character in Lego Dimensions, with Stephen Merchant once again reprising his role. In the main story campaign, he appears in Aperture Science and occasionally aids Batman, Gandalf and Wyldstyle in escaping and surviving GLaDOS's traps. In the bonus Portal-themed stage, Wheatley is now able to move and levitate under his own power; he is reunited with Chell and accompanies her through GLaDOS's new test chambers, expressing remorse for his previous actions and trying to ingratiate himself with Chell. He also appears in the Portal 2 adventure world, caring for a group of Frankenturrets and offering the player various sidequests. Voice-clips of Wheatley are used in the Portal pinball table released in Zen Pinball 2, Pinball FX2, and Pinball FX3.

Other appearances

For the 2011 Spike Video Game Awards nominations for Character of the Year, Wheatley appeared in a Source Filmmaker short made by Valve that was played during the event, in which Stephen Merchant reprised his role for a short time. An acceptance speech was also made had Wheatley won, but was not played at the event.

Wheatley also appeared as a laser-based engraving on a panel manufactured by NASA for the International Space Station, attached to the Kounotori 3 resupply craft.

Concept and creation

Wheatley's role in the series was originally meant to be fulfilled by multiple different "personality cores" that the player would meet throughout the game. This was changed to be Wheatley, a single personality core, out of the belief that player never got to really learn about the multiple robots. Wheatley was designed with the purpose of making a character who "you’d be seeing a lot". Erik Wolpaw added that Wheatley served as an "offset" of GLaDOS; while her voice is "slower-speaking and more deliberate", Wheatley is a "frantic person", which Erik says is performed well by Merchant due to being able to relay information quickly in his speech. Wheatley is one of several personality cores created for GLaDOS; specifically, he was designed by the Aperture scientists as an "Intelligence Dampening Sphere" (or, as GLaDOS puts it, "the dumbest moron who ever lived") as a means to hamper GLaDOS's decision-making processes by injecting poor judgment into her routines.

Voice actor Stephen Merchant was chosen for the role both because the designers were fans of British comedy and because of Merchant's role in the television series Extras and his podcasts. Wheatley's characterisation was always designed with a British voice in mind. While they were writing Wheatley's dialogue, they had Merchant "in their heads" as a result of watching Extras, though at the time they did not consider pursuing him for the role because they did not think that they would be able to cast him. They were instead considering Richard Ayoade, up until they went to Merchant's agents.

Wheatley was designed with the intention of writing a video game character who spoke informally, which Wolpaw stated gave the sensation that the events were really happening, something players do not often see in video games. He also stated that sidekicks in video games have never "sounded as if they were just making things up as you go along". While they later discovered that Merchant was famous in the United Kingdom, they noted that he was not chosen for his fame. Wolpaw noted that Merchant was the most famous actor that they had featured in one of their games. While they wrote a script for Wheatley, Merchant had an "improvisational style" that they let him employ in the dialogue. Merchant also spoke some of the written dialogue in a way that seemed improvisational, such as in the "reading and repetition of words". This was one of the qualities that made them want to cast Merchant.

Merchant himself has compared Wheatley's personality to characters typically played by Woody Allen, and noted that while initially he did not know the gravitas of the role, the reaction by others made him take the role a lot more seriously. He described the recording sessions as "exhausting", so much so that by the end he was "not looking forward to it", but once the project wrapped, he was overwhelmed with the fan response and expressed interest in returning for a sequel.

Critical reception

Stephen Merchant won two awards for his voice role as Wheatley: "Outstanding Achievement in Character Performance" at the 15th Annual Interactive Achievement Awards, and "Best Performance by a Human Male" at the 2011 Spike Video Game Awards. Wheatley earned a Spike TV nomination for 'Character of the Year'.

Edge staff wrote that Merchant's portrayal of Wheatley was "neurotically stuttering and blubbering" and that his "idiosyncratic staccato Bristolian burr" was a "fascinating choice". Edge staff also wrote that he served as Portal 2's "comic relief" and called him "alternately hapless and sinister, the mesmerizing animations of his 'eye light' and a changing role throughout make him an unforgettable presence". GameSpy's Will Tuttle wrote that Merchant's portrayal of Wheatley was "pitch perfect" and is "sure to be a fan favorite". The Telegraph's Tom Hoggins wrote that the "delightfully skittish" Wheatley's "casual, nervous patter reacting naturally to the events unfolding around you" was performed well by Merchant. He later wrote that the dialogue of Portal 2 was funny due in part to "the way that the frantic, nervous babble of Wheatley contrasts so effectively with the cynical, sinister goading from GLaDOS" and that neither are overbearing. The Guardian's Nick Cowen wrote that Wheatley was a "stammering, motor-mouthed droid" and at times "funny and monstrous and spine chilling". The Guardian's Will Freeman wrote that the "apparently sentient computers" in Portal 2 are "outstanding" though players may have a "divided opinion" on Wheatley.

An editor for The Province wrote that Merchant's portrayal of Wheatley "really adds to the personality and character of the game". Official Xbox Magazine's Jon Hicks praised the narrative of Portal 2 and cited Wheatley's "chirpy idiocy" as a contributing factor to its quality. OXM's Ryan McCaffrey wrote that Wheatley was "played to perfection" by Merchant. Computer and Video Games' Andy Robinson wrote that Wheatley's personality was "equally loud" to GLaDOS and "brilliant". GameZone's Ben PerLee wrote that Wheatley was "cute but stupid" and called him "adorable and bumbling, a lovable little guy who is much more involved than you might expect". The Escapist's Russ Pitts wrote that Wheatley was "a helpful – if dumb – robot companion with a chipper English accent". The Globe and Mail's Chad Sapieha wrote that Merchant was "enormously entertaining as a slow-witted sphere". Ars Technica's Ben Kuchera wrote that "the casting [of Merchant] was a brilliant choice". He also wrote that "there is something about his delivery that works wonderfully, and it seems like he was having a good time recording his lines". Kevin Wong of Complex included Wheatley to his "best supporting character in video games", and stated that "It's hard to get angry at, or form any kind of emotional connection to, something that has no face. Wheatley, however, makes up for his lack of humanity with dry, British repartee." Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition listed Wheatley as 37th in their list of "top 50 video game villains". TheGamer also included Wheatley on their "Iconic Video Game Characters", stating that "Wheatley is a fantastic villain, and his unique humor made him a fan-favorite character among the Portal fan base."