Author Topic: Halo: Reach  (Read 77481 times)

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Offline General Battuta

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Now you're just nitpicking. Halo did things that other games had not done. It broke new ground with its controls and its seamless integration of multiple gameplay features. Hundreds of reviewers agreed.

Whether or not you want to call that 'innovation' you've effectively agreed it was an excellent game.

I have no particular agenda with regards to Halo, but I've heard a lot of arguments like yours before and they seem to be rooted in a deep-seated fear of the game.

 

Offline Ghostavo

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Now you're just nitpicking. Halo did things that other games had not done. It broke new ground with its controls and its seamless integration of multiple gameplay features. Hundreds of reviewers agreed.

What ground? I've asked this before. What feature did Halo had that no other game before had? Tribes had most if not all those "innovations".

The reason Halo is more popular is because it was the best game on the XBox.

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Whether or not you want to call that 'innovation' you've effectively agreed it was an excellent game.

Again, I agree with you it's a fine game that gathers many features that were already there and presents them in a decent package, but innovating? No.

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I have no particular agenda with regards to Halo, but I've heard a lot of arguments like yours before and they seem to be rooted in a deep-seated fear of the game.

Neither do I, but when people start calling it innovating when other games deserve the credit for those innovations, it kind of gets on my nerves. This is just not with Halo, but with any game.
« Last Edit: July 31, 2009, 12:51:46 pm by Ghostavo »
"Closing the Box" - a campaign in the making :nervous:

Shrike is a dirty dirty admin, he's the destroyer of souls... oh god, let it be glue...

 

Offline General Battuta

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The combination of elements is innovative. By the logic of your argument, Tribes was not at all innovative because all its gameplay features were simply pieced together from existing pieces of code. It's reductio ad absurdum.

Halo may have riffed, it may have borrowed, or maybe its team simply came up with stuff on its own (doubtful!), but the fact remains that their implementation of features that had been used earlier but perhaps not as well or in a way that was not as striking is still innovation.

Writing is still innovative even if you're using all the same words. You seem to be asserting that a book is not innovative unless it's written in a new language, when in fact all that's required is a pleasing arrangement of the same characters - in this case, gameplay concepts and vocabulary.

 

Offline Ghostavo

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The combination of elements is innovative. By the logic of your argument, Tribes was not at all innovative because all its gameplay features were simply pieced together from existing pieces of code. It's reductio ad absurdum.

Halo may have riffed, it may have borrowed, or maybe its team simply came up with stuff on its own (doubtful!), but the fact remains that their implementation of features that had been used earlier but perhaps not as well or in a way that was not as striking is still innovation.

Writing is still innovative even if you're using all the same words. You seem to be asserting that a book is not innovative unless it's written in a new language, when in fact all that's required is a pleasing arrangement of the same characters - in this case, gameplay concepts and vocabulary.

So again with the earlier example, I make a program which aggregates various chat protocols and it becomes massively popular. Did I innovate?

If by using my definition of innovation, no one innovates, by using yours everyone innovates.
« Last Edit: July 31, 2009, 12:59:19 pm by Ghostavo »
"Closing the Box" - a campaign in the making :nervous:

Shrike is a dirty dirty admin, he's the destroyer of souls... oh god, let it be glue...

 

Offline General Battuta

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Then we're both silly, it's a dumb word and this is a dumb argument. (But yeah, I'd probably describe the integration as innovative.)

  

Offline StarSlayer

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Did I mention half the cast of Firefly is in ODST?  :P
“Think lightly of yourself and deeply of the world”

 

Offline Ghostavo

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Then we're both silly, it's a dumb word and this is a dumb argument. (But yeah, I'd probably describe the integration as innovative.)

Then I guess we are.  :P

Speaking of Halo, what happened to Halo Wars? There was a lot of hype going around and suddently it vanished.
"Closing the Box" - a campaign in the making :nervous:

Shrike is a dirty dirty admin, he's the destroyer of souls... oh god, let it be glue...

 

Offline General Battuta

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It came out, it was good but not quite great. A real blast for a console RTS, though; I'm surprised by how much fun it was.

It had a lot of excellent and immersive features, including a brilliant physics engine and really fun units.

 

Offline Scotty

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It's the smoothest running RTS I've played on console.  Granted, that wouldn't be saying much, but this was actually better than several of the RTSs I play on the computer.  The unit selection was very well handled, and was only clunky if you needed to select a half a dozen people out of a throng.

My favorite part of the entire game is when the Spartans completely kick the crap out of a dozen Elites in about 15 seconds (cutscene).  It was awesome.

 

Offline General Battuta

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I liked a lot of the story, but I had complaints with a few parts. The Covenant, particularly the Elites, seem kind of noobish - what happened to Fall of Reach/Halo 1 elites and their kickassery? Their ability to challenge a Spartan one-on-one in hand-to-hand combat?

It was also the first Halo story to seem misogynistic to me. Anders' princess complex was right on the line especially when paired with Forge's, uh, testosterone-soaked behavior, but Serena's 'interest in human relationships and chocolate' was a bit much.

Cutscenes were gorgeous though.
« Last Edit: July 31, 2009, 04:45:39 pm by General Battuta »

 

Offline NGTM-1R

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Anders was unfortunately pulling something close to par for the course for an untrained civilian in comparison to the military. Serena on the other hand had no excuse.
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Offline General Battuta

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Give me Cortana any day.

 

Offline Leeko

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I thought Halo 3 was too full of next-gen gamin cliches.
I.E. Covering up bad repetitive game design with beautiful graphics and completely ruining the immersion for me by adding that stupid helmet overlay and still not including a static health bar or any sort of health bar at all. Halo 3 was decent, but it was by far the worst in the entire series. I'd pick Halo Wars over Halo 3. Halo: CE was by far the best, as it included the health bar underneath the shield, implementing the perfect blend of tactical battlefield strategy and FPS survival.

Halos 2 and 3 don't need a health bar, because it regenerates like shields though slightly slower. Master Chief upgraded to MJOLNIR Mk. VI armor at the beginning of Halo 2, which has built-in biofoam injectors.
Bungie hid it so they could put in all these convoluted mechanics. It only starts to regenerate after a certain amount of time out of combat, etc. You shouldn't need to see it, because if your shields are gone you should be ducking into a hidey hole. Not to mention it's a much less brutal system... the health system of Halo:CE was what made Legendary nigh impossible sometimes.
Halo Wars was a terrible excuse for an RTS in my opinion. It comes down to building a massive army of tanks, the Flood are terribly unbalanced and unplayable, and it's riddled with inconsistencies to the rest of the Halo series. (Elites with claws? Grunt/jackal combat forms?) But nitpicking aside, I'm probably just spoiled by computer RTS games like C&C and Starcraft.:P

Anyway, Halo is less Bungie's baby than it is Microsoft's baby.

Microsoft bought Bungie after Halo was well in development. If you see gameplay footage from the 90s (it was announced in 1999 after it had been underway for several years; Bungie was bought in 2000) it's evident that Bungie's vision remained largely intact. The biggest differences were cosmetic (elites with one jaw, Master Chief with an antennae, smaller scorpion), aside from things that were cut due to constraints (some of which were added in Halo 2, such as the particle beam rifle and specter).

The Covenant, particularly the Elites, seem kind of noobish - what happened to Fall of Reach/Halo 1 elites and their kickassery? Their ability to challenge a Spartan one-on-one in hand-to-hand combat?

This could be said about the other games as well, though to a lesser degree. Eric Nylund was either taking a huge artistic liberty, or writing based entirely on Legendary. :lol:
Though I suppose if the John-117 of the books was able to blow away his enemies with the ease of a video game character, it would detract from his otherwise amazingly well-written story.

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Give me Cortana any day.

Seconded. Halo would have been very quiet without her witty comments, too. :nod:
Though I think she was a much more interesting character in the books.

And as for my favorite levels... I'd have to say in Halo:CE it was either Truth & Rec or The Library. No, I'm not a masochist, The Library is just a huge challenge. And I like challenge. Though my favorite moment is the finale. And I always found Silent Cartographer to be rather annoying... I have no idea what all the love is about. :wtf:
In Halo 2 I liked Cairo Station and that level after Outskirts. The one where you kill the scarab. It had good vehicle action.
In Halo 3 the only favorites I have are the part of The Covenant (I think that's the level) where you kill the scarab on foot, and the homage to Halo:CE's ending. The whole game was good but not great. I liked Halo:CE the best... it had a certain charm, probably because it wasn't trying at all to be balanced (is the pistol really a tiny rifle? :lol:). Grenades were also very overpowered fun in Halo:CE.
« Last Edit: August 01, 2009, 11:07:12 am by Leeko »

 

Offline Dilmah G

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Take the scarab out on foot in The Covenant? Are you frakking crazy!? Didn't you see the two Hornets?

 

Offline Leeko

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Er, whichever one it was where there was the huge boat that looks like MC's helmet from behind. And the Ark Portal in the background.

 

Offline General Battuta

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Er, whichever one it was where there was the huge boat that looks like MC's helmet from behind. And the Ark Portal in the background.

Yeah, that was The Storm. Way earlier on.

 

Offline Leeko

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Heh, I just remember associating The Covenant with a scarab. Much more well done than the scarab in Halo 2, I must say. Both in appearance and actual gameplay.

 

Offline Scotty

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My favorite Halo 3 moment is on the actual Covenant mission.  Hornet vs. Banshee dogfights FTW.

 

Offline Leeko

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You know, if Halo for Freespace had a big staff they could probably put together atmosphere sequences with Banshees, Hornets, and Pelicans. Or, if all else fails, just rip something off of SoL. :drevil:
I'm not sure how banshees would handle in space, what with their anti-grav pods, and hornets rely on moving air. And pelicans... they just aren't meant for space combat.

 

Offline Scotty

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But they can function that way in a pinch.  Read First Strike if you haven't already.