I like the sytem because it's more tolerant of European connections to American hosts. I'll take the 'tie' every time, thanks.
In general, Reach's netcode is phenomenal. I just wish it didn't migrate the host so frequently. And while we're making wishes, I wish that multiplayer Campaign/FF was more playable.
The frequent black screens in BTB / Invasion don't appear to be host migration; the game should say on the scoreboard when it's picking a new host. In my experience, it doesn't most of the time.
It should get much better over the next few weeks as host records stabilize. Personally, I've found the past few days to be a big improvement
I like the sytem because it's more tolerant of European connections to American hosts. I'll take the 'tie' every time, thanks.
In general, Reach's netcode is phenomenal. I just wish it didn't migrate the host so frequently. And while we're making wishes, I wish that multiplayer Campaign/FF was more playable.
Edit: seems to be putting up final Arena season placements right now. I can see that Self Induced finished top 20% Gold, for instance.
For the most part, I haven't been matched up with many US players either. The backend tries to find local matches automatically, and this should only get more accurate over time. At the moment, it's not completely perfect, but it's pretty damn good.
I hold nothing against you guys on the other side of the Atlantic, but I have to admit that not having to play on crappy cable hosts a lot of the time does a lot for my blood pressure!
I didn't touch Reach yesterday, nearly did for the challenges but I need a break before I burn myself out from the lack of maps, balance issues and idiots in invasion.
anyone in AUS looking for a new 360 slim ? I bought the console brand new, its not even 3 weeks old. there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. I bought it for halo reach but the game ended up being underwhelming and I'm not really into gears or fable so I have no need to hang on to it. I have no idea how much to sell it for so someone make an offer.
I like the sytem because it's more tolerant of European connections to American hosts. I'll take the 'tie' every time, thanks.
In general, Reach's netcode is phenomenal. I just wish it didn't migrate the host so frequently. And while we're making wishes, I wish that multiplayer Campaign/FF was more playable.
Edit: seems to be putting up final Arena season placements right now. I can see that Self Induced finished top 20% Gold, for instance.
Im also from the UK, but im not a fan of the whole tie death thing, it literally cheapens getting the kill and makes streaks harder to get. Im not sure if this is down to lag or just the window being huge, but I literally headshot a guy, got the medal and while the medal was fading away he 'pummelled' me. I mean if he can pummel me after ive headshot him thats pretty impressive, maybe the sheer momentum of his Mjonir armour just crushed me? :lol
metareferential said:
I've read people complaining because in Reach there's no reason to play: trueskill is hidden, and the arena resets, so why bother to be good?
The Arena is a great way to put online gaming in a right perspective: the analogy with sports is perfect. But this is the generation of achievements, trophies and Call of Duty.
And I say that because Cod4 and sequels brought to the industry a model that is always rewarding the player, no matter what he does. You shoot badly and only get a bullet to hit? Nevermind, you'll see some numbers popping up, so you will feel proud.
These sort of things encourage selfish play and worthless grinding. You play to rank, that's it. To show off your rank. And no matter how good or how long you play.
For me the Arena is a good idea on paper but kinda fails in execution. The whole assists thing really takes away from a sense of team spirit and when its basically just FFA masked as a team game, that kind of takes away whats so special about competitive Halo. I know Halo isnt the ultimate team game, but its REALLY good. Some of my finest moments in Halo 3 havent been individual peices of skill, but actually more working as a team to do something.
I also think the whole 'reset every month' thing puts a lot of people off. Lets be honest 10 days of competitive play every month is a decent time investment, but thats not really it. The Arena favours those with the more free time. The people in Onyx might literally play all day every day ALL month to improve theyre rating/ trueskill. If I only have time to just about get 3 games in 10 days - thats not maximising my score, and in relation to the guys with more time im not going to show my true skill and im going to be placed in a lower division. I know some people are so good that they will get Onyx in the bare minimum needed games, but if your unlucky with matchmaking and get matched up against low people, you will need to play some games just to raise your trueskill before your games even matter.
And this isnt just me bitching, right now ive just graduated so I have all the free time in the world, im just pointing out a flaw I noticed.
Personally im just not feeling straight 4vs4 slayer in Reach, I have more fun in modes like BTB. The rare times I feel like playing competativly arent going to add up enough to give me an arena rating and thats where I feel the number system worked better, I didnt get my ranks in a month, it literally took 3 years of on and off trying when I was in the mood.
Bah not a fan really, but I think I'll grind out the 17 games, thats a lot of points to miss out on. I was hoping there'd be some campaign challenges today....
Improving your daily ratings won't improve your placement. In fact, no amount of time sinking will improve your placement. If anything, it will just make it more accurate/less subject to swings.
Im also from the UK, but im not a fan of the whole tie death thing, it literally cheapens getting the kill and makes streaks harder to get. Im not sure if this is down to lag or just the window being huge, but I literally headshot a guy, got the medal and while the medal was fading away he 'pummelled' me. I mean if he can pummel me after ive headshot him thats pretty impressive, maybe the sheer momentum of his Mjonir armour just crushed me? :lol
The window size is the difference in the latency values between the players involved and the host. The highest it can be is 300ms (again, at least with beta values), and for 99% of the time it will be much lower.
What you described sounds like a lag problem, though you have to bear in mind that melee attack damage is delayed for a few frames whilst the game waits to see if the other player is going to melee as well.
Woah, I just fell into the water on Paradiso and survived - I was literally underwater just standing there without dieing. Ill upload the video to my fileshare if someone is interested in seeing what happened. I think I landed on a rock which is just high enough that I can be submerged without dieing.
I had 3 teammates bail out on a Team Slayer match on Paradiso last week. I was up against some very teabag happy guys so I just hid under the water to piss them off. It worked...
With any luck, those challenges will take me to Major by the end of the day.
Stuff I could do before the challenge - i.e. double killing spree - suddenly becomes much harder after it becomes a challenge though. Oh well, I'll just keep running for those power weapons until I get it.
Question: Is there one of those gamercard things yet that we can link our gamertags to and it compiles up a list of some of our key stats? I remember there being one back in the beta days.
Question: Is there one of those gamercard things yet that we can link our gamertags to and it compiles up a list of some of our key stats? I remember there being one back in the beta days.
Disgusting, but honestly, the guy was an argumentative twat with all the patience of a moa on speed. Happy to be relieved of his company.
6PM to ~6AM Reach lock-in at college today, hosted by one Hydranockz. Should be good, travelling down to join in and see everyone, Hydra's lockins are always a blast.
Halo 3 is still the 3rd most played game. People disappointed by Reach? Are there any here? After playing Reach I don't see why you would go back to 3.
For the assist challenge the easiest thing to do is go into Multi team - vote Elite Slayer and literally just plasma pistol everyone you see. Im racking up the assists doing that. I even managed to get my 2 killing sprees while doing it. :lol
Shoogoo said:
Halo 3 is still the 3rd most played game. People disappointed by Reach? Are there any here? After playing Reach I don't see why you would go back to 3.
I prefer the sort of 1v1 combat in Halo 3. As in not 1v1's but the player vs player combat that occurs. Im going to switch between both games and its probably people doing this which keeps Halo 3 fairly high.
I will say though, that visually Reach makes Halo 3 look pretty ugly, and you can really feel the lag in matchmaking after playing Reach now.
To be fair though, Major Nelsons list might aswell just be tracking MW2 and Halo Reach, the populations for the other games after 2nd place are probably REALLY low. Halo 3 being 3rd is probably just because theres so many less people playing other games.
Halo 3 is still the 3rd most played game. People disappointed by Reach? Are there any here? After playing Reach I don't see why you would go back to 3.
Until either Bungie add the old maps, or the Forge Community remake them, Halo 3 will still have a certainly popularity. Some people just don't like the changes Reach has made, so its harder for them to move on.
Until either Bungie add the old maps, or the Forge Community remake them, Halo 3 will still have a certainly popularity. Some people just don't like the changes Reach has made, so its harder for them to move on.
For the assist challenge the easiest thing to do is go into Multi team - vote Elite Slayer and literally just plasma pistol everyone you see. Im racking up the assists doing that. I even managed to get my 2 killing sprees while doing it. :lol
I actually tend to kill more people when I'm playing for assists. It's weird.
"I'll just knock his shield off-- no, he's dead. I'll just take a potshot at that guy then-- whoops, headshot. I know, I'll just throw a grenade over there-- triple kill!? Don't they know I'm trying to get the assist challenge!?"
If the Ivory Tower and Blood Gulch remakes are any indication, remakes just don't work well enough in Reach. I rather have new maps by whoever designed Halo 2 maps, they knew what they were doing.
Those are two of my favorite maps. Can you tell me why Reflection doesn't work? The only thing I really agree with on Hemo is the tank, and they are fixing that.
As a pure DeathMatch game, it was awesome. After the Quake and UT series, everything started to shift towards tactical shooters and military style games. Most of the Forge maps I make for Reach are based around bringing the frantic Quake pace back to shooters. :lol
Kind of OT, but I loved them all three with a passion (not counting Quake 4, sorry kid) and for different reasons. Quake 1 because multiplayer on the internet was mindblowing, Quake 2 because of all the mods (Jail, Q2TF, that soccer thing) and Quake 3 because of all the competition and my love for Rocket Arena 3.
Halo 3 is still the 3rd most played game. People disappointed by Reach? Are there any here? After playing Reach I don't see why you would go back to 3.
So last night I FINALLY finish Reach on Legendary after missing the first 11 days of the game...
Loved the game, but boy I wish I didn't start it on Legendary off the bat, because while it wasn't hard, especially for someone who loves shooters like myself, I found myself in LOTS of extremely frustrating situations, which I definitely wouldn't have been in had I played the game on Heroic first like I've done with every other Halo...
Great story and variety of locations and missions, the best in the series by a good bit - you can see that they went all out for their last Halo hurrah, but one of the most frustrating things, especially when the battles got big, were the friendly A.I.
I mean, Mr./Mrs. Passenger, if we're getting severely pelted, it's usually a good idea to shoot back, instead of watching us count the seconds till we explode - why can the enemies hit us but apparently friendlies can't see as far as the enemies do? Forget about doing drive-bys to soften enemies up, you practically have to swerve into the pack to get your guy(s) to shoot. Just as frustrating is watching a whole crew of soldiers loitering on the battlefield all over the map while it's me against the Legendary Covenant on my lonesome - they might as well let me do the mission solo and have everyone else just chill at HQ while I handle business.
But the Elite A.I.?
Excellent.
Every encounter was like fighting a boss - dodging, taking cover, retreating to regenerate shields, flanking, oh man - I was really impressed while fighting them, got to hand it to Bungie for that. Incredible, best A.I. I've ever fought against in a game.
Now I can finally turn comments back on on YouTube (hell, I'm practically used to no comments and related videos there now after more than a month of them being off) and it was worth it too to go into the story cold turkey.
On another note, I've been reading so much about people not getting the "If You Came To Hear Me Beg" Achievement - so much to the point that although I never read where to do it, I knew what the Achievement description was (avoided all Achievements till I beat the game), and when I started
-------Winter Contingency--------
I tried it there a few times, until I saw that the fall would not have killed me at all so I just left it and continued playing normally till I reached
-------The Pillar's beginning cliff------
, saw how high it was and assumed that this is where it was meant to be done, and after a couple minutes of missing straight up and falling to my death, I got it three times in a row - so while you can probably get it on the other level in some strange luck, I'm sure that this is how it was meant to be done.
I made a clip of it being done three times in a row here so anyone can download it in Reach to see how it was done, but yeah, you have to make sure that you stop the sprint once you're out far enough.
I'd discuss the story and cutscenes more, but I really don't feel like making a whole bunch of spoiler text right now, so maybe another time or something, but I really enjoyed what unfolded...
Thanks for the ride Bungie, and now it's time for a whole lot more multiplayer!
Kind of silly that the challenge discourages playing extremely well, at least in single round gametypes.
This seems to be a problem with quite a few challenges. They don't give any thought to alternative ways of getting them. Just like a killing spree and then a killing frenzy should count, wheelman assists should count as well. It's just very sloppy and careless.
It's as silly as if the game ignored headshots with the sniper rifle because it gives a different medal, and it's not a regular headshot.
