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[Deleted member 21120]

Good lord the Halo 3 skyboxes and environments are unbelievable. Makes me sad to see more "fragile crates" in Mass Effect 2. Bungie artists thanks for utilizing the potential of your universe!

 

[vhfive]

1 vs 100 meets Halo

Starring Marty & Frank...Feb 12th

Sad face, I'll be away from home in California.

nice. i haven't played in a while maybe i'll join that one

 

[Kapura]

Good lord the Halo 3 skyboxes and environments are unbelievable. Makes me sad to see more "fragile crates" in Mass Effect 2. Bungie artists thanks for utilizing the potential of your universe!

The Halo sound design is also better, IMO. The ME Assault Rifle and SMG both sound like they're firing plastic pellets. The Halo 3 guns sound better, as do the Reach weapons, of course.

 

[EazyB]

Speaking only in terms of cinematic quality, Mass Effect 2 is better than Uncharted 2.

:lol

Having just beat ME2 last night I can safely say that it does nothing better than Uncharted 2. As an RPG it couldn't even produce a more engaging storyline.

Edit: Uncharted set a new bar for cinematic in videogames. ME2 ported the first game's tech while producing some of shittiest dialogue I'd ever had to sit through. I enjoyed Dragon Age's writing a whole lot and would rather see more than that even if it meant static camera angles.

 

[Magni]

Anyone know what Magni was banned for?

Can't wait for the MP blowout. 1 Month!!

You have been banned for the following reason:
Also banworthy: backseat modding!

Date the ban will be lifted: 02-04-2010, 06:00 PM

Spoiler

I posted "In before ban" after a guy posted something VERY ban-worthy in the OT

X10 needs to be now.

 

[The Librarian]

Really? Why do you say that?
I'd certainly say Mass Effect 2 is a better "game", but I don't see how it it's cinematic-ly better.

I just felt that Mass Effect 2 portrayed the feeling of being in a movie better than Uncharted 2. I mean, the whole cutscene

Spoiler

following the trip through the Omega relay was spectacular. I really felt like I was a part of a movie. I wasn't sure if my team was going to survive or not, something I know I didn't feel when playing Uncharted 2.

Good lord the Halo 3 skyboxes and environments are unbelievable. Makes me sad to see more "fragile crates" in Mass Effect 2. Bungie artists thanks for utilizing the potential of your universe!

It's a shame because Mass Effect 1 had some very beautiful skyboxes.

 

[Arnie]

Speaking only in terms of cinematic quality, Mass Effect 2 is better than Uncharted 2.

That's just wrong Dax, but nobody expects Mass Effect's cinematic quality to reach the bar of Uncharted because one is a strictly linear experience and one is not. For the amount of content and choice present in ME2, it retains an extremely high standard of cinematic quality, however Uncharted 2 is the peak of the industry in this regard currently.

The information that Reach will be using Imagination Technologies or whatever they were called has me excited for the cinematics in Reach. One of the main reasons why UC2 is as good as it is cinematically is down to how the voice actors actually act out the scene and are motion captured while doing so. This makes the cutscenes and even certain in game segments feel organic whilst providing a verisimilitude you just cannot achieve with post production hand animated models. The VGA trailer was a huge leap forward in this regard, so let's hope the final game exceeds our expectations.

 

[kylej]

Good lord the Halo 3 skyboxes and environments are unbelievable. Makes me sad to see more "fragile crates" in Mass Effect 2. Bungie artists thanks for utilizing the potential of your universe!

Could you tell me the canonical importance of spools of wire and the Halo 3 Yellow Forklift Asset?

 

[NOKYARD]

Good lord the Halo 3 skyboxes and environments are unbelievable.

Nice groundboxes as well.



[edit] Holy crap, Cocopjojo! Just realized that pic is from my (rejected) Forge The Studio submission for your Running Riot visit.

 

[dilatedmuscle]

Good lord the Halo 3 skyboxes and environments are unbelievable. Makes me sad to see more "fragile crates" in Mass Effect 2. Bungie artists thanks for utilizing the potential of your universe!

I think some of the sky boxes in ME2 were far more awe inspiring, especially the once with cities in them. Although the playable environments look so much better then ME1, the well placed squared objects and crates really takes you out of it.

 

[Safe Bet]

I just finished ODST on Legendary so I thought I'd give Halo 3 on Legendary another whack...

WHAT THE FUCK!?!?!?!



Please stick with the ODST model for Reach.

 

[squidhands]

I just finished ODST on Legendary so I thought I'd give Halo 3 on Legendary another whack...

WHAT THE FUCK!?!?!?!



Please stick with the ODST model for Reach.

What do you mean? ODST Legendary is waaaay too easy, and I say this as a relatively lame player. There's no need for Halo to keep getting progressively easier.

 

[Kibbles]

^ Where the hell is that pic from? (edit: oh wow, a map outside of Orbital. Nice!)

Guardian Post Mortem

 

[Zeouterlimits]

Question:
Why isn't Halo 2 on Games on Demand/Xbox Originals?

 

[Slightly Live]

Guardian Post Mortem

That was a fantastic read and I really appreciated looking at some of the old concept art and reading the thought processes that went behind it all.

Another great retrospective.

Urk, I do hope you can get some more of these in future before the of flow time steals the potential away, I really am enjoying these.

It should go without saying that I hope, in the future, we can eventually see this for Reach too.

 

[big ander]

^ Where the hell is that pic from? (edit: oh wow, a map outside of Orbital. Nice!)

Guardian Post Mortem

Good read, thanks urk!

 

[Sai-kun]

^ Where the hell is that pic from? (edit: oh wow, a map outside of Orbital. Nice!)

Guardian Post Mortem

Cool Sweet read!

 

[The Librarian]

^ Where the hell is that pic from? (edit: oh wow, a map outside of Orbital. Nice!)

Guardian Post Mortem

Good read.

 

[Safe Bet]

What do you mean? ODST Legendary is waaaay too easy, and I say this as a relatively lame player. There's no need for Halo to keep getting progressively easier.

trial and error sucks

 

[Warm Machine]

Seeing as though this is essentially the Halo thread, I picked these up at lunch. Please excuse the poor photo. Until today I didn't know the Wolverine was in the set. Also got the Gauss Warthog and Locust set which is new.

 

[NullPointer]

Question:
Why isn't Halo 2 on Games on Demand/Xbox Originals?

I've wondered this for a long time myself. It'd be as good as bought in a heartbeat if it was there.

I know its compatible, with a few graphical issues here and there.

 

[Kapura]

I liked that feature a lot. I think the multiplayer on that level is probably top tier throughout all of Halo 3, so it's cool to know that they iterated on it a bunch, and what it could have been.

Speaking of multiplayer design, Maption Sack is up. I want to see if the updated maps are there, but so far all I've gotten are maps that I played in the original, which are, as far as I can tell, not updated. The only maps that I could really tell if they are updated are my two, though, so take that with a grain of salt. Gonna hit it up some more later today.

 

[XenoRaven]

Question:
Why isn't Halo 2 on Games on Demand/Xbox Originals?

Are they even releasing original Xbox games on demand anymore? I know they did away with the "Xbox Originals" nomenclature.

It does work on the 360, but it is pretty poorly emulated. That could be a reason.

 

[Safe Bet]

trial and error sucks

To expand on this with an example...

Driving a warthog on Tsavo Highway

Game kills me twenty times in a row.

Switch to the gunner's seat.

Pass it on the first try.

*eyeroll*

 

[Syracuse022]

Cotton knows his shit. He seems to have worked on three of the best maps Halo 3 had to offer, especially when it shipped (Guardian, High Ground, Valhalla). I'd say he knows how to put together "something cool."

Have there been other post-mortems for specific maps? I must have missed them and I'd love to catch back up.

 

[Magni]

Cotton knows his shit. He seems to have worked on three of the best maps Halo 3 had to offer, especially when it shipped (Guardian, High Ground, Valhalla). I'd say he knows how to put together "something cool."

Have there been other post-mortems for specific maps? I must have missed them and I'd love to catch back up.

Only Construct so far, IIRC. Guardian is a great map. I prefered Lockout in H2, but Guardian is still better than most H3 maps, still bummed they removed it from MLG. Citadel and Guardian for MLG 2010!

What Halo 3 was missing at launch was small symmetric maps for 4v4 play. Narrows and The Pit were great, but a tad too big, Snowbound and Isolation don't play that well.. We had to wait for Heretic and Citadel, at least Foundry and Sandbox variants helped us wait :lol

 

[Louis Wu]

Cotton knows his shit. He seems to have worked on three of the best maps Halo 3 had to offer, especially when it shipped (Guardian, High Ground, Valhalla). I'd say he knows how to put together "something cool."

Have there been other post-mortems for specific maps? I must have missed them and I'd love to catch back up.

Construct was done back in December:

http://www.bungie.net/news/content.aspx?type=topnews&link=Construct_Postmortem

 

[Blueblur1]

Could you tell me the canonical importance of spools of wire and the Halo 3 Yellow Forklift Asset?

Yes, please.

 

[Thermite]

Good lord the Halo 3 skyboxes and environments are unbelievable. Makes me sad to see more "fragile crates" in Mass Effect 2. Bungie artists thanks for utilizing the potential of your universe!

:lol Like there wasn't crates all over the place in Halo 3?.....joke post? Go replay Crow's Nest, The Storm, and/or Sierra 117.

And if you don't think Mass Effect 2 doesn't have some incredibly awesome skyboxes, you're totally nuts. I'm sorry. See: Citadel, Illium, or (story/area spoiler)

Spoiler

the Collector's ship

.

 

[EazyB]

Good lord the Halo 3 skyboxes and environments are unbelievable. Makes me sad to see more "fragile crates" in Mass Effect 2. Bungie artists thanks for utilizing the potential of your universe!

That's one of my main beefs with ME2. The cover system forces the designers to put so many crates throughout the environment it's ridiculous. Every shooter has this to some extent but ME goes way overboard. Wander through a well designed, believable lab room then get to an area filled with so many boxes and right angles you know immediately there'll be a firefight there. ME should let me crouch and get rid of the cover system. And please Bungie, never put a cover system into any of your games.

Edit: And Cotton is a map-making genius.

 

[Gui_PT]

Too late Eazy. Halo: Reach, Chest High Walls Edition

 

[duk]

Seeing as though this is essentially the Halo thread, I picked these up at lunch. Please excuse the poor photo. Until today I didn't know the Wolverine was in the set. Also got the Gauss Warthog and Locust set which is new.

holy shitt!!! i want!!!111111

 

[Deleted member 21120]

:lol Like there wasn't crates all over the place in Halo 3?.....joke post? Go replay Crow's Nest, The Storm, and/or Sierra 117.

And if you don't think Mass Effect 2 doesn't have some incredibly awesome skyboxes, you're totally nuts. I'm sorry. See: Citadel, Illium, or (story/area spoiler)

Spoiler

the Collector's ship

.

Joke post. Go back a page to where there was a comparison of Mass Effect's skyboxes to Halo's spools of wire.

 

[Thermite]

Joke post. Go back a page to where there was a comparison of Mass Effect's skyboxes to Halo's spools of wire.

:lol My mistake, dude...I was wondering what was going on.

 

[dilatedmuscle]

:lol Like there wasn't crates all over the place in Halo 3?.....joke post? Go replay Crow's Nest, The Storm, and/or Sierra 117.

And if you don't think Mass Effect 2 doesn't have some incredibly awesome skyboxes, you're totally nuts. I'm sorry. See: Citadel, Illium, or (story/area spoiler)

Spoiler

the Collector's ship

.

Illiums sky box is jaw dropping... But reach isnt using skyboxes which is far more commendable.

 

[Stinkles]

Could you tell me the canonical importance of spools of wire and the Halo 3 Yellow Forklift Asset?

They are the two lone ingredients required to build a space tether, but as you can imagine, you need a lot of both.

 

[big ander]

They are the two lone ingredients required to build a space tether, but as you can imagine, you need a lot of both.

If you look really closely, Orbital is constructed entirely of small barriers and pallets.

 

[Chinner]

They are the two lone ingredients required to build a space tether, but as you can imagine, you need a lot of both.

is this some kind of sick euphemism for sex??

 

[GhaleonEB]

^ Where the hell is that pic from? (edit: oh wow, a map outside of Orbital. Nice!)

Guardian Post Mortem

I'm really loving these post mortems; really fascinating. I get a kick out of the early designs ("something cool"). It would be great if a campaign mission or two could get the same treatment.

 

[kylej]

Joke post. Go back a page to where there was a comparison of Mass Effect's skyboxes to Halo's spools of wire.

Sorry, when I see cool space environments in ME2 I can't help but wonder why I had to pay to play a multiplayer match in this

and

this but at least those might be forgiven because they're human environments. Still confused why the penultimate Halo 3 level in an alien environment had to look like this

The least you could do is place it in some sort of alien warehouse or maybe inside Cortana's ass.

They are the two lone ingredients required to build a space tether, but as you can imagine, you need a lot of both.

Halo 3 Yellow Forklift Asset has saved my ass a few times on Standoff. Its appearance beside a staircase at the bottom of the world or wherever you were in the Virgil part of ODST is probably its funniest. Yellow Forklift Asset is one of the best Halo characters.

 

[rar]

Sorry, when I see cool space environments in ME2 I can't help but wonder why I had to pay to play a multiplayer match in this

and

this but at least those might be forgiven because they're human environments. Still confused why the penultimate Halo 3 level in an alien environment had to look like this

this is so true its scary

 

[Thagomizer]

You can look outside on Heretic and see an Assault Carrier so close you could grab it by the scrotum. I'd classify that as pretty awesome.

And as ass as Construct was as a map, it had a sweet skybox.

 

[urk]

Sorry, when I see cool space environments in ME2 I can't help but wonder why I had to pay to play a multiplayer match in this

You think about weird stuff when you play ME2.

 

[Stinkles]

is this some kind of sick euphemism for sex??

Only the kind I do.

 

[kylej]

You think about weird stuff when you play ME2.

When 95% of your video game playing is Halo and you're playing another shooter set in space it's kinda hard not to compare the two.

 

[Stinkles]

When 95% of your video game playing is Halo and you're playing another shooter set in space it's kinda hard not to compare the two.

Is it seriously a shooter? If you are lying to me, I will find you, and I will go into your house while you sleep and I will pee in every drawer I find. And I will eat mad asparagus all night before I do.

ACCEPTABLE LEVELS OF RPG FOR OUTERWORLDVOICE: Link to the Past, BG2 Dark Alliance.

UNACCEPTABLE LEVELS OF RPG FOR OUTERWORLDVOICE: Everything north of Actraiser.

 

[urk]

Is it seriously a shooter? If you are lying to me, I will find you, and I will go into your house while you sleep and I will pee in every drawer I find. And I will eat mad asparagus all night before I do.

ACCEPTABLE LEVELS OF RPG FOR OUTERWORLDVOICE: Link to the Past, BG2 Dark Alliance.

UNACCEPTABLE LEVELS OF RPG FOR OUTERWORLDVOICE: Everything north of Actraiser.

It's a third person action shooter set in space featuring, wait for it, yellow forklifts and a warehouse full of crates.

And space sex.

 

[kylej]

It's a third person action shooter set in space featuring, wait for it, yellow forklifts and a warehouse full of crates.

Yes look that industrial area has many unique assets to make it seem believable. If Bioware released a $10 expansion pack that had no story ties and thus gave them total creative freedom and they ended up stamping a bunch of boxes in a room I would criticize them too.

Is it seriously a shooter? If you are lying to me, I will find you, and I will go into your house while you sleep and I will pee in every drawer I find. And I will eat mad asparagus all night before I do.

ACCEPTABLE LEVELS OF RPG FOR OUTERWORLDVOICE: Link to the Past, BG2 Dark Alliance.

UNACCEPTABLE LEVELS OF RPG FOR OUTERWORLDVOICE: Everything north of Actraiser.

You will love ME2. It's a shooter with a few very simple RPG elements and a great story. You can run straight through the narrative and fling dudes into the air with your force powers then light them on fire with a flamethrower. Or you could spend 40 hours combing through every dialogue option and reading the massive amounts of universe backstory. Either way it's pretty streamlined and nothing like a clunky JRPG or baroque fantasy RPG. BUY MASS EFFECT 2.

 

[Louis Wu]

You will love ME2. It's a shooter with a few very simple RPG elements and a great story. You can run straight through the narrative and fling dudes into the air with your force powers then light them on fire with a flamethrower. Or you could spend 40 hours combing through every dialogue option and reading the massive amounts of universe backstory. Either way it's pretty streamlined and nothing like a clunky JRPG or baroque fantasy RPG. BUY MASS EFFECT 2.

Seriously, I think you might be in the wrong thread.

 

[Kapura]

The space sex was better in ME1. ME2 was just going through the motions. Too bad, as Kelly Chambers is damn fine. Better IMO than Ashley or Liara, and they both got some skin time in ME1.

For gameplay, Mass Effect is about 60% Gears of War, 50% Dragon Age, 30% KotOR, and 25% Lord of the Rings.