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Halo |OT 23| Thruster is Love, Thruster is Life

dwells

Member
Thanks. I have found sometimes my NAT will randomly turn to "closed" while in standby, and open in Energy saving mode. Maybe this is different from what you are talking about?
That's the issue. Here's the write-up.

The game is practically Halo: The Zanzibar Collection. Last Resort appears in 50% of the H3 playlist vote screens; Zanzi and Stonetown are heavily weighted in BTB in my experience.
Hundred something maps in the game and you're lucky to see more than a handful in matchmaking.

Stop playing Halo 2, game's a turd
The port of it is, but the game itself is the best competitive/tournament shooter of the Xbox Live Halo titles. Reliving prime Halo 2 was the entire reason I bought the game and my Xbone.

No skill (or even exp) ranking penalty + no quit deterrent/penalty x a Halo game being voted for that a player might not like = No fucks given when it comes to quitting

And really, there has to be responsibility from 343 for the lack of dedication and passion that is evident in the makeup of these playlists. You'll never eradicate quitting absolutely but the amount of care players show towards the game is a reflection of the care invested by 343 into this product: very little.
Yep, this is the problem. Still running a bad map and gametype selection set, often with incorrect settings. Feels incredibly haphazardly slapped together and without any review. Even little things like the names of the gametypes are wrong. For example, yesterday I had the option of "TeamSlayer", "Team Slayer BR", and "TEAM CRAZY KING".

Would it have been so hard to use consistent spacing or capitalization? It's a five second fix and something that's easily spotted. When I compiled community gametypes and maps in Halo 2, giving everything a quick proofread was part of the process before clicking publish.
 

m23

Member
Worked well enough last night for me aside from a couple issues. CE is so damn good on dedicated servers....even though I suck at it.

Now just make all the playlists BR starts.
 

MysteryM

Member
Does anyone else have problems with in game chat for parties? I play in a party of two and don't have party chat switched on so that we can talk to the remainder of the team. It seems that we lose party chat on every other game with it returning the following game and then going again subsequent to that. Its really annoying.

Pretty happy with the patch that came out last night, matchmaking was swift and we had a good session. Things we need addressed next:

1. The party in game chat issue I highlighted above is a big problem.

2. We normally game in h2A (for ranks) and that's rock solid most of the time in regard to hit registration, however I tried a slayer game on Halo CE and that was laggy like crazy with pistol shots feeling like they weren't registering. I'm not sure if this is shot registration or just lag but the game was a was a waste of time.

I want to come off playing h2A and play in the team slayer playlist, but H2C and Halo CE need to behave just how I remembered them but with dedicated servers.

3. Team Slayer needs ranks as quitters are spoiling the experience and ranks slow quitting down, I never bothered with social slayer and the same goes here.
 

jem0208

Member
So are we still in Beta or has the game finally went Gold after the update?
No, the patch just brought us out of Alpha.

Just had a game of AR starts team slayer on Isolation and two of my team mates just killed each other the entire game. Who knew Halo could be so shit?

Found the game in about 10 seconds though so that's good.
 
It's my first time playing Halo campaings, so I have not even played Halo 3 and 4 yet, except for testing. I'm almost ending Halo 2 campaing, and until now, I can say that Halo CE was quite more fun to play, specially against the Flood enemies (I play it on Normal btw, except when co-oping). The weapons in CE just feel more "impactful".

Wich are the favorite campaings generally speaking? I think I've read couple times that many believes Halo 2 had the worst campaing, and the best MP.

In my opinion, the Master Chief campaigns rank form 3>CE>2>4. Halo 3 may have the weakest story, but from a gameplay perspective, it easily ranks best. For me, missions like Tsavo Highway, the Ark, and the Covenant are what Halo campaigns are all about.
 

Welfare

Member
No, the patch just brought us out of Alpha.

Just had a game of AR starts team slayer on Isolation and two of my team mates just killed each other the entire game. Who knew Halo could be so shit?

Found the game in about 10 seconds though so that's good.

No one deserves that Hell. No one.
 
It's my first time playing Halo campaings, so I have not even played Halo 3 and 4 yet, except for testing. I'm almost ending Halo 2 campaing, and until now, I can say that Halo CE was quite more fun to play, specially against the Flood enemies (I play it on Normal btw, except when co-oping). The weapons in CE just feel more "impactful".

Wich are the favorite campaings generally speaking? I think I've read couple times that many believes Halo 2 had the worst campaing, and the best MP.

HaloGAF campaign rankings turbo ultra super remix alpha edition goooo

For me, it goes CE>ODST>2>4>3>Reach. That's largely due to my perspective; CE was one of my all-time favorite games as a kid, and I replayed the campaign endlessly. I'm also a story-focused sort of gamer, which is why 3, despite having inarguably the best level design, is hanging out towards the bottom, and why 2 (which is plagued with crap like Sniper Alley) is in the top 3.
 

DJ Gunner

Member
Matchmaking itself, along with party formation and searching, seems to be pretty much fixed. I played for about four hours last night, half alone and half with a party ranging from 3-5 people. We never waited longer than 3 minutes for a match (big team, times were near instantaneous in other playlists). Party stayed together, we didn't have to quit the build a single time.

As many have mentioned, there's still a myriad of other issues- the most obvious of which involved the random lag spikes while playing anniversary. We also had a game of BTB on Headlong that was going along swimmingly- with even teams- end at 22-17. Beyond that, shot registration on H2C seems vastly improved, as playing snipers on it is more than serviceable now.

Overall, I feel like this is a real turning point. Yeah quitters suck, the network shit needs to be ironed out, ending games early (wtf) and ranks can't come soon enough. But as someone who was beginning to think there wouldn't be any hope for this game, I'm excited to start playing again with my friends.
 

Fuchsdh

Member
Impossible to rank them definitively (even if such a think were objectively possible) just because they have so much differences, and also far different ambitions.

Best overall campaign? Probably ODST. It's short, sweet, and plays like a "greatest hits" of Halo scenarios (better than Reach did, actually.) Aerial combat, Tanks, Warthogs, Infantry holdouts, Sniping insertions.

Best story? Probably Halo 2. I think Halo 4 had better character moments and interesting story beats but they shot themselves in the foot in the storytelling aspect in a few key areas that you can only get past easily if you're a lore nerd like me. But the campaign grates on me the hardest. Outside of Metropolis, Delta Halo, and Great Journey, I'm not a fan of a lot of missions, especially when the Flood become involved.

Best overall game including story? CE. It's got a tightness and pace that the other games cannot match. It tells a spare story, but it tells it well, and even with backtracking in the campaign (which has definitely grated on me more on recent playthroughs) it still has a cohesiveness and tight marriage of gameplay and story.

Ultimately, though, I love all the game's campaigns. Even a bad Halo mission is usually better than the vast majority of shooters.
 

jem0208

Member
No one deserves that Hell. No one.

It's okay, made up for it with BR starts on Ivory Tower.


Campaign ranking again? Alright, I think it's changed a bit since I played through some on the MCC.

1st half of Halo 2 up to and including Regret > CE > Halo 3 > ODST = Halo 4 > Reach > 2nd half of Halo 2 from Sacred Icon onwards.
 

RBK

Banned
Impossible to rank them definitively (even if such a think were objectively possible) just because they have so much differences, and also far different ambitions.

Best overall campaign? Probably ODST. It's short, sweet, and plays like a "greatest hits" of Halo scenarios (better than Reach did, actually.) Aerial combat, Tanks, Warthogs, Infantry holdouts, Sniping insertions.

Best story? Probably Halo 2. I think Halo 4 had better character moments and interesting story beats but they shot themselves in the foot in the storytelling aspect in a few key areas that you can only get past easily if you're a lore nerd like me. But the campaign grates on me the hardest. Outside of Metropolis, Delta Halo, and Great Journey, I'm not a fan of a lot of missions, especially when the Flood become involved.

Best overall game including story? CE. It's got a tightness and pace that the other games cannot match. It tells a spare story, but it tells it well, and even with backtracking in the campaign (which has definitely grated on me more on recent playthroughs) it still has a cohesiveness and tight marriage of gameplay and story.

Ultimately, though, I love all the game's campaigns. Even a bad Halo mission is usually better than the vast majority of shooters.


I don't know if a perfect post is possible, but this is pretty close.
 

Nowise10

Member
Anyone who says anything but Halo: Reach as the best campaign is wrong. Reach had basically everything the other campaigns had, just better.
 

Mix

Member
Anyone who says anything but Halo: Reach as the best campaign is wrong. Reach had basically everything the other campaigns had, just better.

eh, it's a good campaign, it was just lacking in something big. Everything it did it did well, it just felt like there was no real climax.
 

jem0208

Member
Anyone who says anything but Halo: Reach as the best campaign is wrong. Reach had basically everything the other campaigns had, just better.
It's good, but there's not really anything about it which sticks out as being amazing.

Except Lone Wolf, that was fantastic.
 

TheXbox

Member
It's good, but there's not really anything about it which sticks out as being amazing.

Except Lone Wolf, that was fantastic.
Long Night of Solace? They ruined the shock with the E3 reveal, but it's still an awesome level. Tip of the Spear also worthy of a shoutout. Reach had so many great sandbox environments
 

jem0208

Member
Long Night of Solace? They ruined the shock with the E3 reveal, but it's still an awesome level. Tip of the Spear also worthy of a shoutout. Reach had so many great sandbox environments
Long Night of Solace was pretty cool but I thought the spaceship section dragged on a bit and they could have made it a bit more varied instead of essentially wave defense.

Tip of the Spear was good too but I don't think it was amazing, I hardly remember most of it.

That's kind of how I feel about most of Reach's campaign. It was very good, most of it was just a bit forgettable.
 

Spasm

Member
Stop playing Halo 2, game's a turd
You... You and I could be friends.

In a BTB voting lobby yesterday. 7v7, goes down to Bomb on Coag, H2C or Flag on Ragnorok, H4. H4 edges the vote. Two players instantaneously dashboard quit. Another immediately follows, presumably after seeing those two leave. Shall I stay for a 4v7 flag game of H4? Nah. So the best the remaining players got to play was 3v7.

Some people will religiously quit Halo 4. For others, it might take all their might just to entertain the notion of playing Halo 3 when they didn't vote for it, and if they go one flag cap down? Errrgh can't be bothered to try or maybe they'll AFK and go for a piss or straight up quit.
It's a damn shame. I know this time it was objective, but H4 BTB Slayer without AAs is damn good. And neither game type have ordnance drops. So there is that at least.

Edit: The biggest problem for me is people dropping out of CE matches. It gets voted in BTB fairly often, but I think I've only had one match that has ended with everyone still onboard.

I don't understand it either, it's got the best sniper, best pistol, best vehicles, the best maps; not to mention 6 new maps that the majority haven't ever played, and it's the first time ever it's had matchmaking. I really thought a lot more people would be into it.
 

Mdot

Member
Played a little last night after DLing the update. Wow. The speed to matchmaking was what I originally expected and a match of H2A, for the first time, didn't have any lag. I liked the new searching screen graphics as well, but I know that's minor. Pleased so far. Haven't tried any party functionality though.
 

dwells

Member
Because I got so invested in Noble Team.
They were trying so hard to make us emotionally invested in the characters, but it just didn't work.

They really need to work on the story aspect of the games. There's a lot of interesting lore, but it's so incredibly convoluted and confusing that you need to consume every form of Halo media and dedicate all your time to it if you want to understand it. Hell, Halo 4 hid over half its plot in terminals, and the plot just through the game itself comes across as incredibly silly without it.

That said, after replaying Halo 4's campaign recently, I appreciated the gameplay of it more the second time around. There's some good ideas in there that could be improved upon and better executed - the Longsword level reminded me a lot of Rogue Squadron.

Jumping topics again, the space combat in Reach is one of my favorite things in all Halo games and gave me a Starlancer vibe. It needs to be expanded upon in more Halo games and it needs to be a multiplayer mode.
 
In my opinion, the Master Chief campaigns rank form 3>CE>2>4. Halo 3 may have the weakest story, but from a gameplay perspective, it easily ranks best. For me, missions like Tsavo Highway, the Ark, and the Covenant are what Halo campaigns are all about.

My rank is 2>3>4>CE, imo I couldn't stand the flaws of CE campaign to this day. 4 is in a weird place, it has some really great set pieces but overall design is unimpressed, but in hindsight those unimpressiveness kinda make me not hate it that much compared to, say The Library, first part of Crow's Nest or Sacred Icon.
 

Brolic Gaoler

formerly Alienshogun
Reach and ODST were best campaigns. With Reach being slightly the best. Between firefight and the campaign reach was almost perfect, it's the MP that made reach suck, and mostly because of armor abilities.
 
The port of it is, but the game itself is the best competitive/tournament shooter of the Xbox Live Halo titles. Reliving prime Halo 2 was the entire reason I bought the game and my Xbone.

Two things about H2C really irk me. The lack of gamertags above your teammates' heads leads to confusion and can make on the fly coordination cumbersome. At the very least they have to remedy this by allowing in game symbol customisation. The other problem is the absence of directional arrows indicating where one's being shot from. Makes quite a significant dent on my enjoyment of the game.

I've never particularly rated Halo 2 anyway, just a personal opinion, a matter of preference. As a kid I thought Doom was the best game ever made. I got CE a few months after its release and was certain its formula would never be beaten (I still don't think the spine of Halo - two weapon limit, grenades mapped to a trigger, 'the golden tripod', a precision utility weapon - has been bettered). I used to LAN CE with friends. I was one of few who 'knew about' the pistol so I had great fun finishing at or near the top every game.

Prior to H2's release I didn't have the internet and I'd stopped reading gaming magazines so I was going in completely oblivious to any changes made to the game. First priority was to get hold of the pistol. You can imagine my confusion when the thing didn't scope. Completed the campaign and considered it howlingly inferior to CE's. Had one H2 LAN and wrote the game off; I didn't play Halo again until 2007. In retrospect, I now know we were playing the pre-patched version of H2 and I didn't get the full account of the games' potential.

Still, playing it now, the reality of its epoch makes for a very compromised Halo experience. It's a Halo simplified for functional compatibility with pre-broadband internet connections. Noob combo still pervades in its MCC incarnation. Absurd amount of aim assist makes BRing and sniping a lazy and uncompelling experience. Other things I personally dislike: The position of the shield bar above the radar (completely unintuitive) and the arc of the grenade throw (so limp you have to crane your neck upwards to get any elevation on the throw). Love BXR and BXB though.

It's impossible to objectively state that one Halo is better than the rest and it is utterly pointless to interminably reiterate why one Halo is bad every time it's mentioned (though some still do!). After everyone's agreed on the fundamentals - equal starts, power weapons at fixed locations on fixed timers, equal abilities (no BS like faster shield recharge from H4) - then it simply boils down to personal preference and one's personal tolerance to the handful of idiosyncratic peccadillos each Halo game has.
 

Kssio_Aug

Member
Thank you all for your answers! Yeah, it seems the opinion is really divided. Well, I can only say that besides I've enjoyed Halo CE more then I'm enjoying Halo 2 campaing, they're both better then any FPS I ever played. Trully fun to play, specially (but not only) in co-op!

Also, I hope they continue with Skulls in Halo 5 campaing, and that they allow us to use them from the start like they did with MCC. Skulls can really customize your game adding more fun to it! Loved it!
 

jem0208

Member
Thank you all for your answers! Yeah, it seems the opinion is really divided. Well, I can only say that besides I've enjoyed Halo CE more then I'm enjoying Halo 2 campaing, they're both better then any FPS I ever played. Trully fun to play, specially (but not only) in co-op!

Also, I hope they continue with Skulls in Halo 5 campaing, and that they allow us to use them from the start like they did with MCC. Skulls can really customize your game adding more fun to it! Loved it!

I want collectable skulls back... It was a really cool idea which really added to the replay value. Getting the grunt birthday party skull of Halo 2 was so rewarding, also insanely frustrating but still.

You mean IWHBYD? Because Grunt Birthday is one of the easiest skulls to get.
Uhm... I don't think so. I just remember finding The Arbiter a massive pain on Legendary.

Getting IWHBYD was easy though, just do the grenade jumping and you're sorted.

Main takeaways from the Reach campaign were
A. Noble Team deaths were a joke - like seriously
B. Some levels felt like an absolute chore playing solo Legendary (almost like they were forcing you to use armor abilities you didn't ask for and didn't want).

Jorge's death was pretty good. Especially when you realise that he thought his death would be saving Reach, yet it turns out Reach is fucked anyway.

6's death was also pretty amazing.
 

Mine01

Member
The game is practically Halo: The Zanzibar Collection. Last Resort appears in 50% of the H3 playlist vote screens; Zanzi and Stonetown are heavily weighted in BTB in my experience.

Man Im really tired of this map :( it appears almost everytime and is picked almost everytime :(.
 

Fuchsdh

Member
Long Night of Solace? They ruined the shock with the E3 reveal, but it's still an awesome level. Tip of the Spear also worthy of a shoutout. Reach had so many great sandbox environments


The problem for me is that Reach's *actual sandbox* wasn't great. It made CQC combat suicidal with its insta-kill feet-to-the-face Elites, had homing fuel rod turrets that made vehicle combat often torturous, and weapons like the Concussion Rifle and Needle Rifle that were far more effective in the enemy AI hands than your own. The game made the most effective way to play to pop out of cover from far away and just unload shots with the DMR at a slow pace to avoid bloom.

In comparison, Halo 3's Battle Rifle looks brilliant, because it made you get closer to engage and kept you involved in the fights.

I want collectable skulls back... It was a really cool idea which really added to the replay value. Getting the grunt birthday party skull of Halo 2 was so rewarding, also insanely frustrating but still.

You mean IWHBYD? Because Grunt Birthday is one of the easiest skulls to get.
 

willow ve

Member
Main takeaways from the Reach campaign were
A. Noble Team deaths were a joke - like seriously
B. Some levels felt like an absolute chore playing solo Legendary (almost like they were forcing you to use armor abilities you didn't ask for and didn't want).
 

link1201

Member
Much improved, I'm loving it. This will make the wait for Halo 5 a little more bearable. I do wish they'd add all the customizations from the original games. I suppose that is out of the question right?
 
Stop playing Halo 2, game's a turd
Isn't this the thing you give me shit for, when I joke about Halo 3 like this? Funny thing is while I have joked about Halo 3, I've said several times how it's still a guilty pleasure of mine and serves as a decent palette cleanser.

Again, Halo 3 fans are teh absoloot wurst
1.0
 

singhr1

Member
I'm half tempted to buy a new 360 just to replay the Reach campaign. Shit would look amazing ported to the X1.

Do yourself a favor, don't. I'm at my parents house for a few days and tried to get back into to Reach and holy shit what have I gotten myself into. After MCC and Halo 5, Reach feels like you are shooting through a thick syrup. Aiming is slow, framerate is choppy, motion blur is terrible.

Only savior is the matchmaking times are fast, Invasion has a population of ~150 and I got a match in under a minute. Unbalanced, but fast. Campaign is fine, some of the pacing is off.

60 fps has spoiled me and Halo
 

HTupolev

Member
I feel like CE Heroic is pretty much the perfect difficulty. ODST on Heroic came close. CE Legendary is way worse than Halo 2 Legendary by pure virtue of how hard it is to cheese segments, though. In Halo 2 you can skip a solid 40% of the entire game if you try hard enough. I think the thing I had the most trouble with was the ending of Two Betrayals where you've got to get a Banshee in that huge Covenant encampment.
That's one of the most straightforwardly-cheesable encounters in the entire series. You can literally just drive a ghost up to the banshees and fly off without killing anything.

(I'd also argue that it's not really that "hard" of an encounter... just a fairly lengthy one, if you're out to kill everything. The camo elites can pose a pretty huge threat depending on your approach, but it's possible to plan for them, such as always staying close to your ghost and bringing it along when you make big moves across the battlefield.)

Do yourself a favor, don't. I'm at my parents house for a few days and tried to get back into to Reach and holy shit what have I gotten myself into. After MCC and Halo 5, Reach feels like you are shooting through a thick syrup. Aiming is slow, framerate is choppy, motion blur is terrible.

Only savior is the matchmaking times are fast, Invasion has a population of ~150 and I got a match in under a minute. Unbalanced, but fast. Campaign is fine, some of the pacing is off.

60 fps has spoiled me and Halo
The transition back to 30fps in similar content can be extremely jarring the first time. But it doesn't take that long to acclimate, and you get better at it after a few times.
 

Impala26

Member
That's one of the most straightforwardly-cheesable encounters in the entire series. You can literally just drive a ghost up to the banshees and fly off without killing anything.

(I'd also argue that it's not really that "hard" of an encounter... just a fairly lengthy one, if you're out to kill everything. The camo elites can pose a pretty huge threat depending on your approach, but it's possible to plan for them, such as always staying close to your ghost and bringing it along when you make big moves across the battlefield.)

That moment when, after trying for an hour to beat that section legitimately, you say "fuck it" and use aforementioned cheese method, escaping with the banshee with only one or two bars of health... only to die nearly instantly to the sentinels guarding the entrance to the final pulse generator.

True story. One of the most challenging/frustrating campaign sections (Legendary) across the entire series.
 

Deadly Cyclone

Pride of Iowa State
Dear 343:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9dQFSIJhOQ

These guys go 11 years without making a sequel and they nail it. No fuckin sprint or stupid ADS. UT looks great and sticks to its roots.

kDB3yrL.gif


(I can't believe y'all still complaining, the game is pretty much set).
Also you move WAY faster in UT than any previous Halo game. You basically ARE sprinting, just without an animation showing your arms move. It's always looked weird.
 

Kssio_Aug

Member
Even Halo 5 being quite different then the other games of the franchise, from what I've played, it is a great evolution.

I wanst excited for Halo 5 because MCC issues really turned me off. But yesterday's update really improved things here, so I'm more confident they're finally going the right way now to fix it, besides they still need to improve a serie of things.
 

HTupolev

Member
That moment when, after trying for an hour to beat that section legitimately, you say "fuck it" and use aforementioned cheese method, escaping with the banshee with only one or two bars of health... only to die nearly instantly to the sentinels guarding the entrance to the final pulse generator.
If you were that low on health, why didn't you hang back and hit the sentinels from range?

:s
 
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