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Halo |OT8| A Salt on the Control Room

I liked these shots so I capped em:
mJOE8.png


XpA0d.jpg


6hd9O.jpg


0GxEJ.png


huSCO.jpg

Hopefully they upload some direct feed screens from the vidoc contents.
I'm torn on the new model for Cortana. At times she just looks more naked, but it doesn't feel necessarily objectifying or sexualized. It's just a matter of fact, more realized image of what she was always supposed to look like. But then at times she does seem overtly sexual, and sexualized, and it's at those times that I don't like the new direction. I hope that makes sense.

Yeah, I mean its not so sexualized on its own, but when compared to past Cortana models it seems to be. It could be just the greater fidelity of the engine with more details, but she seems so have way larger hips and breasts. She doesn't look bad, but I would have preferred her Halo 3 body type. Its not the biggest deal, but it seems they tried to sexy Cortana up when she was already fine the way she was.
 
Bomb autopick is even weirder because you could conceivably have situations where someone fires the Oddball at a teammate who is unaware, and the latter suddenly finds themselves holding the ball. I feel like a passing game should be dependent both on the action to pass and the action to catch. Timing the catch should be as important as nailing the throw. Again, this would make the action inherently rewarding (because you have to do something other than be in the right place), and widen the skill gap so players who practice this stuff will be rewarded with possibilities and performance, not just points.

That sounds like a nightmare online with latency.
 

Plywood

NeoGAF's smiling token!
There is a large number of point incentives to grab the flag, help the flag carrier, and defend against your flag being stolen and scored, but the real incentive for people to grab the flag will be the same as it was in Halo CE, H2, H3, Reach, and any other game that's ever had CTF, to win the damn game!
Couldn't one just cap twice and then play unlimited slayer?
 

Plywood

NeoGAF's smiling token!
I think the slaying rewards should be decreased in objective gametypes. Maybe they could cut it by 2/3rd's or have the reward for kills decline after a certain limit or time. Of course I can't really say on how to balance it considering I don't know about all the workings of the games reward system.
 

Plywood

NeoGAF's smiling token!
Well yeah, but your an extreme minority that's going to grieve the gametype to squeeze out some more kills/points/xp/cr.

I don't know how you'd do something on a gametype level to prevent that from happening.
Heh, sounds like the best thing to do come launch.
wolfpack unite
 

heckfu

Banned
Just played a game of Cards Against Humanity with Domino, Biggy, Barrow, Duncan, his friend, Hypertrooper, and Wu.

Amazing, amazing card game.
 

nillapuddin

Member
I know i pointed out that a cap was 100 and I was happy, but enduldge me here
What if..

600 points
200 per flag cap
5 per kill
(map appropriate) time limit

3 caps, auto win
2 caps + 40 kills
1 cap + 80 kills

God forbid
0 flags, 120 kills

I guess the problem is, how do I ensure the other team tries to cap flags?

Some teams will just want to play slayer to 120 and my team will be throwing our lives away consistently trying to score : /

Also, i dont feel There are enough kills to go around, I just really don't want to make a kill only count for 1 point.

Someone smarter than I am right now make this work

P.s.
Damn these would be quick matches

p.s.s
For BTB the numbers would have to be doubled at least
Fuck, that doesnt help
 

cocamola

Banned
Jeff Steitzer...... Never before did i think i would be so goddamn sick of hearing his voice but 343 made it happen:
"YOUR FLAG TAKEN!"
"PROTECT YOUR FLAG!"
"ENEMY FLAG DOWN!"
"FLAGSASSINATION!"
Also he puts way to much emphasis into every word, making it sound forced and awkward. Almost sounds like someone else doing the announcements, just taking the piss out of him.

I cannot agree more, the announcer is over used.

"YOU HAVE THE BALL" "PROTECT YOUR FLAG" "ODDBALL SCORE POINTS TO WIN FIRST TOUCH" I mean seriously? Steizer should not be saying entire sentences, I too think it sounds nothing like him with that stupid echo.

The announcer Overkill and the fact you cant pick up and drop objective items are the worst 2 things about Halo 4.
 
Finally got caught up, my thoughts:

1) All the new CTF stuff is still shitty
2) The music for picking up the flag is distracting and annoying, please put an option to turn that off
3) The Road Trip announcement sounds stupid. In fact, most of the announcements seem really forced
4) Does it really announce that you're holding the ball every 10 seconds?

Also, would it really kill 343 to tell us why they're doing what they're doing when they announce new stuff? I'm really tired of getting all the new info from off-screen footage and twitter with next to no explanation of the motivation behind some of the changes. Tell me what was wrong with flag juggling before, what this fixes, etc, because I don't buy that it needed changing or that "it promotes teamwork" bs.
 

Havok

Member
Good stuff. Thanks for that. Enjoyed the read and I agree.
Thanks, much appreciated. I'm going to try and make it a regular thing, since it's usually not appropriate to drop a six paragraph blowhard bomb on the thread, especially not when the current discussion doesn't merit it. I just finished a retrospective on CEA's failure to maintain the standards of Halo's visual feedback systems a few minutes ago, which I'm not sure would ever fit into a conversation naturally around here.
 

Noricart

Member
the transition to ball pickup looks so wonky
edit: there seems to be a manila folder/off-white door off to the side of the griffball map. wonder how large it is outside.
 

Gui_PT

Member
So Banshee weapons were made more effective.

And this ball throwing feature is going to be exploited to no end.

Almost every bit of news I see sounds worse and worse.

Oh and ROOOAAADDD TRRRRIIIPPPP

Ugh
 
So Banshee weapons were made more effective.

And this ball throwing feature is going to be exploited to no end.

Almost every bit of news I see sounds worse and worse.

Oh and ROOOAAADDD TRRRRIIIPPPP

Ugh

tumblr_m8ehgdypIi1rbmu12o1_500.gif

LOL Gui I was trying to help you by prying you away before you lose yourself!

Did they ever directly give a reason as to why you can't drop the flag at the panel?
 

IHaveIce

Banned
I won't watch the campaign vidoc but I will watch the panel later today. I hope.

The changes for oddball sound like fun.
But damn, the community needs so much explanation on things and what do we get? Grifball..

The changes to CTF are ok.. I think if that is their vision then we have to follow, but it is not okay to exclude the classic version if flag. There should be a custom option for dropping the flag. There is no excuse.

And the thursday war is readable on amazon?... I have to resist ..
 
"Encourages teamwork" and anyway the flag carrier is "the ultimate badass", I guess because he has his own theme music?

hahah sounded like Kevin Franklin was a little nervous.. Did a fine job overall I thought. That theme music is pretty sweet though, but definitely does not make up for the fact that you can't pass the damn flag around now. Now you HAVE to go the simple/obvious/less complex routes in places where you could've made epic passes.

I say they allow you to throw the flag now too, but not as far as the OB.. screw it.. we're too deep at this point.

I won't watch the campaign vidoc but I will watch the panel later today. I hope.

Screw that, don't do it man. Just read the quick and easy summations, skip over the Campaign stuff that you see "MC" or "Cortana" and call it a win.
 

L1NETT

Member
Wait wait wait.... Plasma Pistol and Stickies are allowed to be in the loadout in BTB and these big vehicle maps?

Why? Makes very little sense tuning the vehicle around the PP and stickies. Why not just take them out of the loadout for these modes?

And teamwork, as Shake's excellent post said yesterday will only come about if there is an incentive to win. This usually involves there being NEGATIVE consequences for NOT winning.

The problem seems to be that every one is a winner in Halo 4! Run out into the open like a moron? Have a medal!

The only way people will want to win and work together is if they don't want to lose, and there seems to be none of that in Halo 4.
 

Plywood

NeoGAF's smiling token!
I see the reason to give all these rewards for play and that's largely(I'd imagine) to keep people from quitting. But at the same time I can see this system getting easily abused.

edit: Just had another thought on balancing Objective, shorter game times would force players to push harder for the objective and make riskier plays in order to secure a win if that window for victory is itself smaller.
 
I see the reason to give all these rewards for play and that's largely(I'd imagine) to keep people from quitting. But at the same time I can see this system getting easily abused.

edit: Just had another thought on balancing Objective, shorter game times would force players to push harder for the objective and make riskier plays in order to secure a win if that window for victory is itself smaller.

Shorter game time (8-10 minutes)&& Higher win payouts. Only way to minimize the crap that goes on in objective Reach.
 

Amazing Mic

Neo Member
Why make the flag and bomb both auto pick up?

I don't know if it's close to a good trade off- but there are times, if the flag/bomb is dropped in a pile of weapons, where I've can't make a pickup just as it resets. No idea if this played any part in the decision or if it comes close to to making up for accidental pickups (which I also don't think will be that common).

And teamwork, as Shake's excellent post said yesterday will only come about if there is an incentive to win. This usually involves there being NEGATIVE consequences for NOT winning.

I agree to a point. This incentive to win was also why during my last days in Arena, +25% of my games involved some sore of system manipulation which made it infuriatingly unplayable. I think gameplay and rank (and enforcement) are both solutions to the problem.
 
I think gameplay and rank (and enforcement) are both solutions to the problem.
My post was largely about rank, but I completely agree with gameplay being a solution. That is, the key to making people want to pick up the flag and go for the objective is to make picking up and carrying the flag inherently fun and awesome (rather than just extrinsically awesome because it gives you metagame points). Removing your ability to do anything else but carry the flag, handing you a short-clip pistol as meagre compensation, and meanwhile stitching a target to your forehead is not a viable way to do this. Exciting music isn't it either. It could blast fucking 'Eye of the Tiger' all the way home to base and most of the population would still not going to want to touch the thing.
 
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