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Halo |OT14| They call it Halo

K

kittens

Unconfirmed Member
TheOddOne said:
There are enough way to push the player forward without having to push a button, though. While every alternative might seem or feel the same, they do prevent the feeling of repetition.
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No, you MLG groupies just want to play Halo 2. You don't even stop to think that Halo 2 had buttons, too. ZANZIBAR ring a bell? god halogaf so negative
 
T

TheOddOne

Member
kittens said:
No, you MLG groupies just want to play Halo 2. You don't even stop to think that Halo 2 had buttons, too. ZANZIBAR ring a bell? god halogaf so negative
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tumblr_mf1ban4ecP1ro2d43.gif
 
R

Reagan's BR

Banned
To shift the discussion ever so slightly. Does anyone of the more story oriented people here enjoy Halo 4's story? Personally it was a huge disappointment for me, the possibility for Master Chief to be digital and flesh at the same time is but one example of things that disappointed me.
 
S

Sr Kitsune

Member
kittens said:
No, you MLG groupies just want to play Halo 2. You don't even stop to think that Halo 2 had buttons, too. ZANZIBAR ring a bell? god halogaf so negative.
Click to expand...

Speaking of that.

Anyone knows why Bungie(and now, 343) stopped making interactive maps? I loved those little details... (Relic, Zanzibar, Last Resort, Containment, Terminal, Turf, High Ground; for name a few)

I miss them.

Reagan's BR said:
I'm fairly certain the last time we brought that up was before Halo 4 and Frankie strongly implied that there would be maps like that in Halo 4.
Click to expand...

So... not enough bandwidth.
(?)
 
Z

Zeouterlimits

Member
TheOddOne said:
There is a fine line between just outright trolling and criticizing. Geez.
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Bahaha, thanks OddOne, made for a good morning chuckle.
Reagan's BR said:
To shift the discussion ever so slightly. Does anyone of the more story oriented people here enjoy Halo 4's story? Personally it was a huge disappointment for me, the possibility for Master Chief to be digital and flesh at the same time is but one example of things that disappointed me.
Click to expand...
The whole Didact/Forerunner plotline was a wash for me.
Not only was I not a fan of suddenly throwing the Didact in Darth Vader esc light, it just wasn't well done. The pacing, the writing, were all not to my liking.

The Cortana-Chief plotline I did like, and while I'll agree it's flawed (and weird), I am/was a big Cortana fan boy, so it was good to have a close to her storyline.
Because 343 are smart enough not to bring her back. I hope.
 
R

Reagan's BR

Banned
Deadly Paw said:
Speaking of that.

Anyone knows why Bungie(and now, 343) stopped making interactive maps? I loved those little details... (Relic, Zanzibar, Last Resort, Containment, Terminal, Turf, High Ground; for name a few)

I miss them.
Click to expand...

I'm fairly certain the last time we brought that up was before Halo 4 and Frankie strongly implied that there would be maps like that in Halo 4.
 
O

Omni

Member
Reagan's BR said:
To shift the discussion ever so slightly. Does anyone of the more story oriented people here enjoy Halo 4's story? Personally it was a huge disappointment for me, the possibility for Master Chief to be digital and flesh at the same time is but one example of things that disappointed me.
Click to expand...

Eh. I felt like after reading all the books I knew most of what was going on... There was no real "oh shit" moment in this game, IMO. Halo CE had the release of the Flood. Halo 2 had playing as the Arbiter and the betrayal of the Prophets. Halo 3 had the Ark not being on Earth and Cortana arriving at the Ark. Halo Reach had Jorge and Kat dying. Even Halo Wars had the Flood. I still think that they made a big mistake revealing the Prometheans and Didact to us before the game released.

I didn't like that they made Cortana into a whiny bitch (I liked Cortana because of her quirky remarks and satire. I know she was entering rampancy, but at the end of the game things got a tad too weird). Master Chief being fleshed out was nice, but now it's entirely obvious as to what he actually is: a bland character. I love and hate 343i for that.

But yes. Overall, a huge disappointment (though thankfully not as bad as ACIII)
 
F

FyreWulff

Member
Barrow Roll said:
Team Hired N00bs, Fyrewulff and stephen08 just found their newest ally.
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I want the Reach TU to go global so nope.

If I were to be put in charge of Reach's playlists, first thing I'd do is make the entire game the TU and drop the stupid "TU" from all the gametype names.
 
H

Hydranockz

Member
Deadly Paw said:
Speaking of that.

Anyone knows why Bungie(and now, 343) stopped making interactive maps? I loved those little details... (Relic, Zanzibar, Last Resort, Containment, Terminal, Turf, High Ground; for name a few)

I miss them.



Not enough bandwidth then.
(?)
Click to expand...

There was a Reach map that once incorporated elevators but was cut afaik. I think it was too resource draining. Being able to Forge on those maps would cause problems or something.
 
T

TheOhrenberger

Banned
Reagan's BR said:
To shift the discussion ever so slightly. Does anyone of the more story oriented people here enjoy Halo 4's story? Personally it was a huge disappointment for me, the possibility for Master Chief to be digital and flesh at the same time is but one example of things that disappointed me.
Click to expand...

I thought that Halo 4's single player was the most disappointing part of the game. I don't really like where the story is heading (though if Halo 5's story turns out well I might take that back). No matter what, I thought the end got a little awkward and weird. I also thought the level design was "meh" for the most part. Only 1 or two levels stood out as something that I'd hold to a high standard.

It wasn't bad, but it's definitely the weakest single player entry in the series thus far.
 
G

Garrett 2U

Member
Okay, please don't kill me, but...
One part of the campaign that I REALLY enjoyed the first time through was the last QTE when you have to blow the bomb.

I was playing with my group of buddies.....
And as I climbing up the bridge we're like "How are we going to blow the bomb???"
Then you see Master Chief going over to push the bomb and we're like "NOOOOOOO WAYYYYY"
And then I (the host) get the prompt to detonate the bomb and I'm like "GUIZZZZZZZZZZ R TO 'SPLODE"
And they are like "NOOOOOOOO DON'T DO IT"
And I'm like "I HAVE TO!!!!!!!"
And we're all thinking to ourselves "NO WAY THAT 343 IS GUNNA KILL OFF CHIEF IN THE FIRST GAME, WTF"
And then I push it and I almost scream because I cannot believe I just kilt Chief.


........and then magic blue bubble shield, cortana pulls a pinocchio, is didact rly ded?, yadda yadda yadda.

BUT STILL, pushing the bomb was a really emotional moment, no matter how cheesy it actually ended up being.
For a few moments, I thought 343 was really going to make me kill chief.
 
H

Hypertrooper

Member
"I would say that's one of the more key challenges for the second half of the first season, I think," Spartan Ops mission designer David Ellis told Polygon in a recent interview. "We learned a lot of lessons from the first half [of the season], especially in how we use environments — and in some cases reuse environments — and I think we've done a much better job of compartmentalizing the maps."
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If nowise's friend is right, this won't be a problem in the second half.

"We sort of think of them as layers, and each time you go there you peel another layer back and another layer back," he said. "So you always have something new to do, something to see and something that's going to change your perspective on what that map or environment is."
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The problem of the first half was, there had not been really different objectives. At the end you fight wave after wave.

"I think in the first mission [in Episode 6], especially within the first 10 seconds, we're going to be doing things that we never did the first time around, and I think that's pretty exciting from the design perspective," he said. "We always like to do new things. You never want to the same thing over and over again.

"I think from that perspective, people will know firsthand that it's not just going to be the same experience, per se."
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I hope this will be true. There are several ways to design a interesting Halo mission. And I can imagine them to pull it off.

Ellis identified an area of improvement that the team focused on by trying to congeal Spartan Ops' dual narratives, which play out in CG cutscenes and through the first-person shooter's boots on the ground.

"I think we did a better job with the second half of the season of tying the storyline of the missions into the CG episode," he said. "They're not identical. They're sort of two parallel storylines that are going along, but what we tried to do is, when there was overlap, we wanted to make sure that they were important, that they were impactful.

"There are going to be some very key elements within this season ... where you're going to play a big role in what's happening in the CG episodes."

Ellis was tightlipped about what kind of role that is, but he was obviously excited about the way Spartan Ops is evolving. He praised the art department, which created bigger set pieces for this second half, but he was also careful to avoid revealing them for fear of spoilers.

"Especially as we get down further to the end of the first season," he said, "there's some big set pieces, some big moments that people aren't going to be expecting."
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I have not played episodes 4 + 5 but which story did the missions have? It was non-existent. Mostly because of the lack of in-game dialogues. But at the end these words get me excited that something significant will happen in the missions. I am really excited for the second half. Like Havok already said, I wish Spartan Ops to succeed in Halo 4. The story which the CGI tells is surprisingly interesting.
 
F

FyreWulff

Member
Hydranockz said:
There was a Reach map that once incorporated elevators but was cut afaik. I think it was too resource draining. Being able to Forge on those maps would cause problems or something.
Click to expand...

It was Citadel you're thinking of, I'm sure. It had the elevators from the campaign space it was based on (The Covenant) but they didn't work well for gameplay, and were cut.

edit:

http://halo.bungie.net/news/content.aspx?cid=22098

LB. Originally, it was much closer to the campaign space it's based around. Well, sort of. It was a much bigger level, with two elevators (one for each team) and really was designed for 2-sided objective games. We basically scrapped most of that design and it became a much smaller symmetrical space. The only thing remaining is the setting.
Click to expand...

It'd be interesting if Forge objects vs animations were preventing stuff like Terminal from coming back, but I'd think the solution would be to have those interactive parts clip through Forge objects when they move.

Hydranockz said:
That's just an Invasion animation I thought?
Click to expand...

Yeah, the bridge will animate if you use the Breakpoint Invasion gametype. I don't think it causes any problems if you put Forge objects on it. They had limited control w/ Megalo to trigger device-machines.
 
M

malfcn

Member
Anyone else experiencing severe lag tonight? Watching killcams show nobody on the screen and just deaths everywhere from fool skipping around. I haven't been able to dong on many people tonight, feels bad.
 
H

Hydranockz

Member
malfcn said:
Anyone else experiencing severe lag tonight? Watching killcams show nobody on the screen and just deaths everywhere from fool skipping around. I haven't been able to dong on many people tonight, feels bad.
Click to expand...

KIllcams. I've only ever seen maybe a few dosen of those.

Game winning killcam? Zero.
 
MrGreencastle

MrGreencastle

Member
Reagan's BR said:
To shift the discussion ever so slightly. Does anyone of the more story oriented people here enjoy Halo 4's story? Personally it was a huge disappointment for me, the possibility for Master Chief to be digital and flesh at the same time is but one example of things that disappointed me.
Click to expand...

It's hard to say, personally. I mean, if taken at face value, I tend to consider the story fairly confusing. I understand there was a crunch for time, but I really believe it was a mistake not integrating the Terminals more tightly into the main story line. That said, when the story + terminals and the novels are taken into consideration, I think the story is in a very strange and interesting place right now. I actually think that some events coming up in the latter half of Spartan Ops season 2 are going to be fairly important to the overall story arc that they seem to be wanting to explore. Last weeks Bulletin, as well as that Ellis Polygon interview certainly seem to suggest that. They were talking about introducing "seeds" for characters or events in the games at various parts throughout the game/Spartan Ops, the prospect of which instantly got me more interested. 343 seem to have a hatred for Halsey, though, which is fairly interesting.

All in all, the story in my opinion was pretty good, and I find the way that they are painting the Forerunners very deliberate, and I think it was handled well. Both expanding on some of their characters, and retaining and even increasing some of their mystery. There's a lot of questions about the events in Halo 4/Ops that I would like to see answered. I just which the Chief's story wasn't left so open-ended, but I suppose such is the pattern of a trilogy.

I have my hype in check for Monday's new Episode of SpOps, but from what they've been claiming, it seems this break may have been a good thing. Hoping for the best. I absolutely appreciate what they're trying to do, here, and as a story nerd it's like a dream come true: actual story "DLC". I've always loved the idea of doing that ever since Halo 3: Recon was announced as being an expansion. But it's sad to see it underwhelm the first half of the season; here's to the second half.

Hypertrooper said:
Polygon put their Spartan Ops back online:
http://www.polygon.com/2013/1/18/3889526/halo-4-spartan-ops-episodes-6-10


And inside gaming has published their preview, too, with game play footage of a new SpOps mission(I can't really say if it shows a new missio but they embedded a video with the name "Gameplay demonstration.) :
http://www.insidegamingdaily.com/20...an-ops-season-one-interview-with-david-ellis/
Click to expand...

There's some screenshots up on the Polygon interview that are worth checking out.

David Ellis said:
One lesson learned by 343 Industries is that players prefer the large, open, vehicle-based conflicts. Naturally, they’re aiming to give people more of those trademark Halo battles in the second half of season one.
Click to expand...

Good stuff.
 
G

Garrett 2U

Member
IGN put up an article about Spartan Ops season 6.
It even has a video interview with David Ellis with footage from a new mission.

I would definitely watch the video interview, it actually made me excited for Spartan Ops' return.

Spartan Ops' second half mixes up the locations as well, with 343 promising plenty of new and unexpected areas to lay waste to Covenant and Promethean forces. The way these environments unfold in Episode Six feels much more akin to an actual Halo campaign -- open-ended environments with more of that sandbox freedom -- than the recycled, mostly enclosed wave-based arenas from Episodes 1-5.

This is because 343 is taking advantage of its own resources -- with campaign designers and animators no longer working on the core Master Chief portion of Halo 4, they're more readily available to help create better, more interesting add-on missions for Spartan Ops. The studio's using more of its talent to make Spartan Ops better -- and it is absolutely working.
Click to expand...
 
MrGreencastle

MrGreencastle

Member
M

Madness

Member
Reagan's BR said:
To shift the discussion ever so slightly. Does anyone of the more story oriented people here enjoy Halo 4's story? Personally it was a huge disappointment for me, the possibility for Master Chief to be digital and flesh at the same time is but one example of things that disappointed me.
Click to expand...

I was extremely disappointed. I'm one of those guys who only truly follows the main games/storylines. I'm not one of those expanded universe type guys.

I'll admit I liked forward unto dawn, not especially because it took place at my former uni in real life :)

But what I thought halo 4 would be and what it turned out to be are different. After the events of reach and halo 3, I thought we'd see a humanity that was broken. Reach was gone, Earth was overwhelmed and humanity was on the brink of extinction and you had Chief drift on the edge of the galaxy for who knows how long.

I kept picturing we'd see chief meet actual forerunners and that there was some type of Civil War going on in this last planet of them and Chief would side with one of the groups. Later they'd realize he was human, and the evil faction would learn all about what's happened in their time on this planet, learn that grave mind and the flood still exist and that there are brutes and covenant who worshipped then and they'd leave to restart the forerunner empire etc.

Stupid I know. But it's what I thought. Instead, humanity is somehow ten times stronger and united within 5 years, that they found the money for this new spartan program, have better technology and capabilities than before. It made it seem as if the past events didn't even matter. Who cares if reach falls, we got a brand new ship that can travel to the edge of the galaxy, bomb covenant and prone Athens at will and carries thousands of Spartans.

I wanted humanity to forget all about chief but remember him as the best of us. All he had in the memorial was the scratched 117 etc. Instead they find chief and he's treated like shit by a typical captain or dudebro Palmer who can't say anything except thought you'd be taller.

It's hard to get my point across but what I meant was, this was the reclaimer trilogy. We reclaim out humanity, our strength, our perseverance, our chief. Instead, it's already there at the start. The last thing I expected was for covenant to be there as if nothing happened, and then to have infinity show up and you basically stay in contact with them etc.
 
T

TheOddOne

Member
Reagan's BR said:
To shift the discussion ever so slightly. Does anyone of the more story oriented people here enjoy Halo 4's story? Personally it was a huge disappointment for me, the possibility for Master Chief to be digital and flesh at the same time is but one example of things that disappointed me.
Click to expand...
I feel that the story went a bit in a direction that was too "cartoony", embracing stereotypical sci-fi clichés and making it just a little too serious. Halo’s before were a little more grounded, with some level of realism that strikes a fine line between serious and self referential. A perfect balance to be honest, because it didn’t undermine each strength.
 
F

FyreWulff

Member
Reagan's BR said:
To shift the discussion ever so slightly. Does anyone of the more story oriented people here enjoy Halo 4's story? Personally it was a huge disappointment for me, the possibility for Master Chief to be digital and flesh at the same time is but one example of things that disappointed me.
Click to expand...

Relied too heavily on the books being read to understand it , and "it was all set in motion by me ha ha you're just fulfilling my design on your destiny" kind of irked me. The whole seed thing is riding the line between "science fiction" and "magic".

Before, Chief was awesome because he succeeded at his training despite the bad lot in life given to him. Now he's awesome because the Forerunners made him that way.
 
O

Omni

Member
FyreWulff said:
Relied too heavily on the books being read to understand it , and "it was all set in motion by me ha ha you're just fulfilling my design on your destiny" kind of irked me. The whole seed thing is riding the line between "science fiction" and "magic".
Click to expand...

I thought 343i leaped over that line once the Didact started force choking the Chief

Sai-kun said:
I give the game so much shit, but I still cannot deny the hype of this trailer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s76uMzaQ120

That music. Fuck yeah. Mid way when it gets to the good drop, oh man. Feels.
Click to expand...
"Comments are disabled for this video."

Lol
 
F

FyreWulff

Member
randomrosso said:
I thought 343i leaped over that line once the Didact started force choking the Chief
Click to expand...

The gravity hammer was already capable of doing that, and Guilty Spark picked up things in the previous games, and the Covenant had the gravity lifts and such, so I can just explain that as Covenant using Forerunner tech.
 
M

Madness

Member
randomrosso said:
I thought 343i leaped over that line once the Didact started force choking the Chief


"Comments are disabled for this video."

Lol
Click to expand...

I knew Didact would be this telekinetic and powerful guy once I saw this video on Bungie.net before launch of halo 4 supposedly of a purple guy force choking and slamming guys and grabbing them through walls.
 
O

Omni

Member
FyreWulff said:
The gravity hammer was already capable of doing that, and Guilty Spark picked up things in the previous games, and the Covenant had the gravity lifts and such, so I can just explain that as Covenant using Forerunner tech.
Click to expand...
Yeah, sure. Just the way it was portrayed on screen wasn't exactly the best. It looked like it came out of nowhere.
Madness said:
I knew Didact would be this telekinetic and powerful guy once I saw this video on Bungie.net before launch of halo 4 supposedly of a purple guy force choking and slamming guys and grabbing them through walls.
Click to expand...

Eh, that video was soooo fake. But surprisingly accurate.

...


About to attempt to get the Scarab gun in Halo 2 Vista (there's an achievement). Never attempted it before on PC. Should be interesting.
 
M

Madness

Member
randomrosso said:
Yeah, sure. Just the way it was portrayed on screen wasn't exactly the best. It looked like it came out of nowhere.


Eh, that video was soooo fake. But surprisingly accurate.

...


About to attempt to get the Scarab gun in Halo 2 Vista (there's an achievement). Never attempted it before on PC. Should be interesting.
Click to expand...

It was a fake video? I thought it was leaked cinematics or something, especially since one of the models had Scout helmet or something?

But I had a feeling they'd do that too. An awakening evil with deadly technology needs to be scarier than a 7 foot 2 super soldier. So they make Didact like 12 feet tall and gave him telekinetic powers.
 
O

Omni

Member
Dark Orchid said:
There's a new Waypoint code for beating the campaign on LASO. When entered and completed, you get 50,000 xp and a skull and knives emblem that looks very similar to the Legendary symbol, but with a human skull.
Click to expand...

CrazY CroaTia said:
If you complete the campaign on LASO, you can enter a Forerunner glyph code and you will get 50.000 exp.

However, it has to be either LASO solo or LASO co-op. You can't do half solo and half co-op, because it won't work,

The code can be found on NakedHalo's YouTube channel.
Click to expand...
Hypertrooper said:
You have to play through 4's whole campaign on LASO and enter a code.




edit terribly beaten.
Click to expand...




Interesting! Is there a time limit?

It annoys me how these 'challenges' and whatnot aren't better communicated to everyone. Or maybe I'm just out of the loop... but none of my Xbox Live friends have said anything about it either so I don't even know
 
A

Akai__

Member
No time limit, at least all those people, who found this out, didn't mention anything about a time limit.

The most important thing is, that you do it either all solo or all co-op. A mix won't work.

And you are not the only one, who founds this out late. Mostly, someone makes a video about it and that's how it get's known. Would be much better if they announce it on waypoint and we have to find out the code somehow.
 
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