[Scotty]

With Starcraft, their trying to recreate the "lightning in a bottle" that the original had.  The mistake that they seem to have made here is that people are going to get turned off by the idea of having to buy 3 games to complete the story and be able to play all 3 armies in multi.  The whole Starcraft 2 and 3 separate releases reeks of Bobby Kotick milking a cash cow till it's beyond dry and tossing it in the bin.  It's happened before and it'll happen again.  When all of SC2 is out we'll probably get a release announcement for SC3 and discover that it's been in development for 5 years.

All three armies in multi are available if you have any of the installments, IIRC.

[General Battuta]

I just got in early. God bless you, urk.

I love Bungie. So cool. Few devs personally give codes out to fans.

[General Battuta]

It's the best Halo game since Combat Evolved. Arguably better.

Amazing balance - all the weapons are useful and powerful, except maybe the Assault Rifle. Even the Plasma Repeater is great. Fantastic new game modes (Stockpile is fun.) The Pistol and DMR don't completely dominate the way the BR did. The Needle Rifle is actually probably better than the DMR.

The Plasma Launcher is the most fun FPS weapon I've used in a long time.

Players have a lot more health. Battles are more tactical and balletic. There's a lot less 'charge, fire AR, melee.'

Grenades are like nukes.

The Focus Rifle is terrifying.

All the armor abilities are useful, but not equally so in all gametypes. In King/Oddball type games, you really want to have Sprint. In slayer, Armor Lock is great for teamwork. On Sword Base, the jetpack is amazingly handy.

Elite Slayer is incredible. Elites play totally differently. You feel athletic and powerful. The Evade move totally changes the game, in a good way. it's insane.

I am enjoying this game in an unreserved way that I did not experience with Halo 3.

[Scotty]

This game met with General Battuta's Seal of Approval^TM 

[General Battuta]

 A lot of people seem to be getting hung up on changes that I didn't have much trouble with: 5-shot DMR and pistol instead of 4-shot BR, reticle bloom, and especially the new shield/melee system.

Basically, if you have even one point of shields left, it'll absorb a full hit (one bullet or melee.) That means that if you don't have someone's shield down when you melee them, the melee isn't going to kill. This is exasperating some people, but I like it; melee is now sort of an equalizer.

[Scotty]

I think I'm going to love this because it takes my favorite FPS setting and incorporates the great mechanical elements of other really good FPSs (reticle bloom from MoH/CoD to name one) to make it even better.

Can't wait until Monday.

[Klaustrophobia]

what are the chances of this ever making it to PC? 

but i already know it's going to be windows 7 only.  or whatever new OS is out by that time.  still haven't ever played HALO 2. 

[Dilmah G]

You're not missing much, dude.

[Klaustrophobia]

i know.  especially since they would be half-assed ports of the console version.  but i still would like to play through single player.  i couldn't care less about multi.

[carbine7]

For anyone playing in the Beta already, does the UNSC grenade launcher seem overpowered or abused in any sense? I can already see the amazing potential for a "noob tube".

[Scotty]

People only get mad at "noob tubes" when they start losing to them.

[Thaeris]

That, and random frags are hilarious...

 

[General Battuta]

For anyone playing in the Beta already, does the UNSC grenade launcher seem overpowered or abused in any sense? I can already see the amazing potential for a "noob tube".

No, not at all. It's a very skill-based weapon, extremely tricky to use right but powerful when in talented hands.

[General Battuta]

Day 3 wrapped up. It felt better than either Day 2 or Day 1. Everything is clicking in my head, skills falling into place.

This game is amazing.

I played for about seven hours today. I've never been one for objective gametypes, but playing with a friend, I had a blast with one-flag CTF and Stockpile.

One Flag on Sword Base is fantastic fun, an inch-by-inch struggle to get to the flag to a gravity lift, then pull a tricky physics glitch to get the flag up to the highest balcony where the capture point is, all as the enemy team uses Armor Lock to slow your progress and then - once you've moved the flag to the balcony - Jetpacks to soar up after it and try to recover it.

I still love the weapon set. The AR is useless, but everything else seems to have its place.

The game's graphic design is gorgeous in the menus. Clean and moving. I'm not as big a fan of some of the HUD elements, specifically the loadout menu and hud indicators.

Movement speed feels faster, and the controls are more responsive. The helpless 'stuck in tar' feeling from Halo 3 is gone.

The melee metagame is actually pretty good, I've decided.

The psychology of multiplayer is much more relaxed now, because (hooray!) there's no numerical rank next to your name that frustratingly tops out and then collapses from under you as you lose games. My record is not exactly shining, but I know I'm a good player and I'm enjoying myself because I'm not stressing about my rank.

With only two maps and a few gametypes, Reach is already more fun than most games I've played this year.

[mxlm]

It's the best Halo game since Combat Evolved. Arguably better.

Assuming the answer won't require umpteen paragraphs (I only played CE): why weren't 2/3/ODST better than 1?

[carbine7]

For anyone playing in the Beta already, does the UNSC grenade launcher seem overpowered or abused in any sense? I can already see the amazing potential for a "noob tube".

No, not at all. It's a very skill-based weapon, extremely tricky to use right but powerful when in talented hands.

Thanks General, good to know.

Shame I have lots of homework to do tomorrow, because I'm going to be up all night finishing it, but only after a few hours of Reach 

[Dilmah G]

Battuta, you're tempting me to buy a second-hand copy of ODST, download the beta, and return it for my money back when I'm done with all this good feedback.

[Scotty]

Holy crap, I freaking love Invasion.

I prefer being Spartans, but that's only because of the DMR.  The whole gametype is pretty awesome.  Balanced, too.  I've managed to both win and be beaten on each side, usually determined by only seconds on the clock.  It's also helping my K/D skyrocket.  +42 in the last three games.

This game looks like it's going to be worth getting solely because of the multi.

[General Battuta]

Invasion's a good time. The Elites get a little shortchanged by their lack of an anti-armor loadout as incredibly powerful as the Spartans' Grenadier. All in all it seems a bit tilted towards the Spartans right now, but I still managed a few caps as an Elite.

[Scotty]

Yeah, the more I'm playing, the more it looks like the Elites got a little gimped on starting positions too.  All of them are within LOS of the Spartan positions, and Spartans star with DMRs.