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"Portalien" is the name given to an alien race that sent an automated probe to earth many thousands of years ago, programmed to use the ambient technology to construct a series of gigantic portals ("portal" + "alien" = "Portalien") through which their ground forces could invade. Of course, the native technology being what it was thousands of years ago, they didn't make much immediate progress. The original Portalien robots were able to replicate themselves crudely using clockwork gears and steam power, and secretly provided scientific guidance to many emerging earth cultures in order to achieve their ultimate goal. Their plan eventually culiminated in the Portal Wars of the 1980s. Though the aliens themselves were repeled and the portals destroyed, remnants of their probes still exist, rebuilding their forces for the next attempt. Portalien probes (usually referred to simply as Portaliens, as the actual biological race has rarely been encountered, even during the Wars) range from tiny toy-like 'bots tinkered together from spare parts (sometimes referred to as "gear gnomes" or "gremlins") to giant, city-striding mechanical monsters.
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