Anybody played reach yet?

Retr0gamer

NeoKubrick wrote: »

I've explained 'how' countless times to you, but you either ignore it or deflect to some random convoluted argument about PC gaming like it were a saving throw.

Nope, I just said your argument for it being revolutionary is silly because it does nothing new.

NeoKubrick wrote: »

You didn't prove me wrong. I did not claim that assigning a button to throwing a grenade was first used in Halo. I claimed it was innovative (complementing button) and there is a difference. I did not claim of shields that it was innovative, originally: I said that Tribes was not the first game to introduce it as you claimed. I know of one series that used it before Tribes and I was hoping that you would make the connection. A Mac game by the name of Marathon had shields; it was developed by a little known company called Bungie. The original topic you and Grumpy went off on a tangent was how 'influential' Halo was. You further went off on a tangent about 'originality', which has little relevance to how 'influential' something is. To judge how 'influential' a game is, you look at its design and see how many developers tried to ape it.

I believe Halo was influenced by the games I mentioned. I think it would be much fairer if they got the credit they deserved.

You need to look up that definition of innovative again. As for marathon I've played it and it doesn't have recharging shields like Halo does. You have a shield that you can recharge if you find a recharge station. It works nothing like Halo does and more like how the regeneration chambers would in the original system shock.

NeoKubrick wrote: »

Again, let's separate myth from truth. Halo: Combat Evolved had one dedicated Flood level and four partial (5). Halo 2 had two dedicated Flood levels and two partial (4). Halo 3 had three dedicated Flood levels and one partial (4). By counting levels, Halo: Combat Evolved is actually the most Flood-heavy game. However, Halo 3 is virtually the most Flood-heavy game in the series by virtue that it has three levels of pure Flood battles with no break in variety. And, one of the dedicated Flood levels in Halo 2 has an awesome lengthy vehicle section; so, it is actually good.

There's no such thing as half flood levels for me. If the flood were in a level no matter if there was another faction fighting them then my enjoyment level plummeted fast. Halo 2 I felt had a lot more levels with flood that went on a lot longer than in CE and I enjoyed it less and that vehicle level wasn't great either. It was also alot less enjoyable and snipers particularly on legendary destroyed a lot of the pace. Halo 3's first flood level wasn't bad because it was short. Cortana was unforgivably bad and the final section doesn't count.

NeoKubrick wrote: »

I'm using no debating tactics, here. I participate in this endless Halo debate, because you're missing out on a great game experience and I try, I really do. I'll PM my article on Halo's mechanics tomorrow, if you're willing to read it.

I'll read it but I feel you'll be reading far too much into the mechanics of it.

NunianVonFuch

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Nope, I just said your argument for it being revolutionary is silly because it does nothing new.

This.

Also a bloglink that did the gaming website rounds in 2008 for multiplayer (same as singleplayer anyway, barring the story & AI)
http://kotaku.com/379208/the-evolution-of-the-team-multiplayer-fps

(excerpt as bloglink is dead)

good list, with lots of explanations on it...as you will notice, neither Halo nor COD are on it, because lets face it, none of them did anything actually new.

http://www.edbordenblog.com/2008/04/how-7-games-created-modern-team.html

Doom

Gave us: First networked multiplayer gameplay

Quake

Gave us: Internet play, 3D engine, team play

Tribes

Gave us: Player ****s, vehicles/aircraft, 32 player servers

Battlezone

Gave us: Commander with distinct top-down view and abilities, and faction-unique weapons, vehicles, and buildings

Unreal Tournament

Gave us: New game types, including Assault

Counterstrike

Gave us: Tactical gameplay for the masses

Battlefield

Gave us: 64 players, vehicle gameplay innovations, cohesive in-game command structure, universal stats with unlockable weapons/abilities

Blazer

I liked Halo..loved the first one especially the Banshee parts and hated the flood parts but overall I was really impressed with it.
For the first time on a console I saw a game that matched up to what PC games had been getting all along with the likes of Quake/Battlefield 1942 etc.
I wouldn't say it was revolutionary in terms of overall gaming but on consoles you could definitely say that.
It bought fps to the masses plus you have multiplayer not only with soldiers but also tanks/air vehicles etc.
I liked 2 but missed the Banshee's and 3 was ok..only something was missing from 2 & 3...
I just didn't find that same buzz I got when playing Halo CE the first time.

Brendog

Is this Halo 4?




I read in the paper that this might be the last of the Halo series.

Vyse

Brendog wrote: »

Is this Halo 4?




I read in the paper that this might be the last of the Halo series.

Nope, this is a prequel to Halo 1. It's the last Halo game from Bungie but definitely not the last Halo game.

Brendog

Vyse wrote: »

Nope, this is a prequel to Halo 1. It's the last Halo game from Bungie but definitely not the last Halo game.

Cool, so the franchise will be developed by a different company.

kinda sucks because look of the next game will be different from the rest.
All in all I'm just happy its continuing.

NeoKubrick

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Nope, I just said your argument for it being revolutionary is silly because it does nothing new.

Read: you're claiming that PC players had experienced combat like that of Halo: Combat Evolved. So, cite one or more games with combat comparable to Halo: Combat Evolved before its release. If you cannot, then your claim is empty and you should stop repeating it. I posted this twice before, now, and you have twice ignored it.

If Halo: Combat Evolved's combat was nothing new, then you had have already cited one or more examples. The opposite is true: you have cited no games. Therefore, based upon your criteria and your failure to find an older game comparable, Halo: Combat Evolved is revolutionary. And that's by your criteria, not mine.

It's irrelevant to how you felt about which game had more Flood battles, because it's explicit how many levels the Flood were actually in in all the games, and that number did not match your opinion. It's also irrelevant how much time you felt you spent battling the Flood, because time is relative (one hour in a five hour game is comparable to five hours in a fifteen hour game).

And I know that Marathon didn't implement it the same, and Tribes didn't either. If you want to now change the criteria to games that implemented the same as Halo, then Marathon and Tribes don't apply. So, you're negating your own original point.

No one cares what game had what feature first: it's irrelevant (and Tribes is not the first to use a recharging shield). Your reasoning is comparable to that of someone criticizing a revolutionary design by an architect because he uses steel - what previous architects have one time used; that fact doesn't degrade the quality of the design or upgrade the quality of other designs which use steel. As I've quoted to you before: "Good Artists Borrow, Great Artists Steal", which means great creators make already existing ideas and designs better and become their owners. A game is a sum of its parts, not a collection.

NunianVonFuch, could you explain why you're linking and quoting from an article on multiplayer games to support an argument in a discussion on a single-player experience? Should we discuss which game is better, Half Life or Counter-Strike, next?

Blazer

NeoKubrick...I'd say no matter what game he'd quote you'd deny it asap.
I get the feeling you're a Halo fanboi (no offense intended) and am curious as to how you suggest that Halo revolutionized fps gaming across all platforms?

If anything the PC is where gaming revolution happens.
From the first fps to the first multiplayer games, to the huge MMORGs like WoW and the absolutely gigantic Eve Online (the economics and the variation in this game are absolutely mindboggling),
Battlefield 1942 introduced both fps, air and ground combat
Let's not forget Half-Life, Deux EX (still the finest game ever made), Call of Duty, Medal Of Honor etc
Now I play Halo myself and enjoy it but I've yet to see a game on a console that has something to carry it over to the PC...
actually in fact I can think of only one..the cover system in Gears of War which most games now copy...apart from that I can't place anymore.
But I could be mistaken

Retr0gamer

I thought Half-Lifes marine battles played out with a similar dynamic to the Halo battles with the way the AI reacted dynamically with the player, levels just weren't as open. Allied Assault was released around the same time and had some good reactive AI in none scripted segments. Hidden and Dangerous is even closer to Halo depsite being a buggy mess when unpatched, with large levels and dynamic sandbox AI. It's hard to compare FPS games because they all differentiate themselves from each other. Anyway just because a game doesn't play exactly like Halo doesn't mean it's revolutionary, it just means it's different, just like every other FPS game needs to differentiate itself. SMT: Nocturnes press turn system wasn't in any other RPG ever when it was released. Was it an RPG revolution? No, it was just different. Revolutionary would mean it instigated a massive change in FPS games and it didn't. Halo's combat was nothing new. Vehicles weren't new, AI buddies weren't new, one button grenades weren't new, rechargeable shields weren't new, and dynamic sandbox AI wasn't new and different weapons with 'elemental affinity' wasn't new either since different ammo types were in FPS games for years. Halo might have done some of these better but none of it is innovative or revolutionary.

It's not irrelevant how I feel about the flood levels in the Halo games. I had no fun whatsoever playing any of the flood levels in the halo games except the warthog race sections at the end of Halo 1 and 2. For me I foudn I spent more time in dull flood levels in Halo 2 than in the other 2 games although Halo 1 comes very close and these Flood levels are just terrible. The AI is as basic as in Quake and totally at odds with the challenges the Covenant presented. Halo 3 had 2 flood levels, one was acceptable since it was short and the other was as a bit more obnoxious than the other flood levels in the previous Halo games. That's how I felt about them. For me Covenent= fun, Flood = bad early 90's FPS.

Also if you have ever played Starsiege: Tribes you would know that the armour/shield in it works exactly the same as in Halo except with the added complication of it powering your jetpack as well. Effectively you recharge health when not taking damage. Marathons works nothing like that and I've played halfwaythrough Marathon so know about how it works.

imitation

I think its fair to say halo did one very important thing, it showed there was a market for shooters on consoles, as up to that point most console shooters were cack, and they were a minorty market, mainly because they were ports of PC shooters where you needed that fine control a mouse and keyboard game, and of course copious quick saves as they tended to be less forgiving (a tall order with a 512kb memory card). Its either a good and a bad thing, depending on your outlook, PC gamers will feel the games are a bit dumbed down, but on the other hand, producing for the PC market alone can't justify what it costs to produce games these days (notice how quickly crytek did a u turn with this on crysis 2)

The introduction of the analogue controller removed alot of that trouble, but I think halo went a bit further by reducing the accuracy required (just look at the aim reticules, there circles instead of crosshairs or dots). To me thats the most annoying part of the halo series, because between halo 1 and 3 other shooters proved you dont need such inaccuracy on a console. Some people love it I guess, but to me it just feels like your firing a blunderbuss.

grizzly

Regardless of how revolutionary halo was/wasn't... how is Reach? I'll not get a chance to play for a while due to work.

NeoKubrick

Sc@recrow wrote: »

NeoKubrick...I'd say no matter what game he'd quote you'd deny it asap.
I get the feeling you're a Halo fanboi (no offense intended) and am curious as to how you suggest that Halo revolutionized fps gaming across all platforms?

No, I would refute it, not deny, and it's ironic you use the word 'deny' (this isn't the first time I've had to point how ridiculous Retr0's argument against Halo is and he keeps bringing it up to un-ring that bell). I question why you're trying to tinge my posts by claiming I'll deny something without considering the logic and evidence and calling me a "fanboi". There is absolutely no evidence of that; in fact, if you took the time to read my posts in this thread, you would find that I criticize the third game severely. By your claim that the PC platform is where the gaming revolution happens, you're implying that Super Mario 64 or substitute any other great console game wasn't revolutionary and you should read this: "It's oblivious to console fanboys and PC artfags, but good game design is not platform-specific". So, who exactly is the "fanboi"? You're going to deny it aren't you?

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I thought Half-Lifes marine battles played out with a similar dynamic to the Halo battles with the way the AI reacted dynamically with the player, levels just weren't as open. Allied Assault was released around the same time and had some good reactive AI in none scripted segments. Hidden and Dangerous is even closer to Halo depsite being a buggy mess when unpatched, with large levels and dynamic sandbox AI. It's hard to compare FPS games because they all differentiate themselves from each other.

So, after deflecting from citing a single game that was comparable in experience to the combat found in Halo: Combat Evolved twice and my repeating the request a third time, you finally cite Half Life, Hidden Dangerous, and Allied Assault as comparable to Halo: Combat Evolved before its release. I didn't ask of you to find games comparable to Halo: Combat Evolved, just the experience of Halo: Combat Evolved's combat; so, you can't excuse your finding little to none examples because of a differentiation in mechanics. Allied Assault was released after Halo: Combat Evolved; so, that example is void. Hidden and Dangerous example is tenuous, because first it's third-person shooter with the option of a first-person view and second, play is mostly based upon stealth. Half Life had solid artificial intelligence for its time, but it is nowhere near advanced as Halo's, and consequently, the combat isn't comparable (Half Life was great because of level design). If those three examples are the basis for your argument that PC players had experienced it all before Halo, then that argument is completely and utterly void.

I'll repeat myself in the hope that you drop the ridiculous 'nothing new' argument. Your reasoning is comparable to that of someone criticizing a revolutionary design by an architect because he uses steel - what previous architects used; that fact doesn't degrade the quality of the design or upgrade the quality of other designs which use steel. As I've quoted to you before: "Good Artists Borrow, Great Artists Steal", which means great creators make already existing ideas and designs better and become their owners. A game is a sum of its parts, not a collection.

You continue to fail to understand that the sum of all those parts you cite with many others are the reason Halo's combat is revolutionary, not the parts themselves. Your inability to understand this is two-fold: you erroneously think Halo is a simplistic and dumb shooter, and you do not want to admit that all those times you've looked down upon players for praising Halo was based upon pretense.


And, Starsiege Tribes had armour and an energy cell. Energy cell powers the jetpack and armour is your health. Tribes implementation of its health system is not like Halo, at all.

johnny_ultimate

grizzly wrote: »

Regardless of how revolutionary halo was/wasn't... how is Reach? I'll not get a chance to play for a while due to work.

Well... it's Halo :pac:

I'm not a big Halo fan by any stretch. I enjoy them, but definitely count them amongst the most overrated games around. How is Reach? Well two levels into singleplayer (haven't gotten to MP yet, which is definitely where the series shines) and it hasn't necessarily differentiated itself from the previous games yet. I skipped ODST, so not sure if the health system is borrowed from that, but the mix of recharging shield and a health bar works pretty well. I'm playing on Heroic, and difficulty is fairly high - you definitely need to approach battles with some sort of strategy. You'll spend a lot of time running away and hiding! Still love the vehicle controls and the vehicles themselves, which is something Halo definitely does better than its competitors. AI is still **** when manning a turret though, while the enemy AI is the best around: more obvious than ever that there is genuine Covenant pack mentality at work here.

Story is pretty uninteresting, and there haven't been any majorly impressive setpieces yet. Mainly just moving from battle to battle, although said battles do occasionally take place on cleverly laid out maps. You can't just run and shoot for sure: instant death ahoy!

It is a fairly basic conclusion, but on the strengths and weaknesses of the first two levels - the opening cutscene of Mission 3 promises more variety, plus still the space stuff to come! - this is Halo through and through. I'm sure everyone will draw their own conclusions from that! Won't win over the haters, will be a fine addition for the fans. For me, someone whose fairly on the fence about the whole series, it is entertaining if far from the masterpiece many have heralded.

Predator_

grizzly wrote: »

Regardless of how revolutionary halo was/wasn't... how is Reach? I'll not get a chance to play for a while due to work.

Played 2 games of online and turned it off, im not a fan of it at all. Will give the single player a go but more then likely going to trade it in for FIFA 11.

Retr0gamer

NeoKubrick wrote: »

So, after deflecting from citing a single game that was comparable in experience to the combat found in Halo: Combat Evolved twice and my repeating the request a third time, you finally cite Half Life, Hidden Dangerous, and Allied Assault as comparable to Halo: Combat Evolved before its release. I didn't ask of you to find games comparable to Halo: Combat Evolved, just the experience of Halo: Combat Evolved's combat; so, you can't excuse your finding little to none examples because of a differentiation in mechanics. Allied Assault was released after Halo: Combat Evolved; so, that example is void. Hidden and Dangerous example is tenuous, because first it's third-person shooter with the option of a first-person view and second, play is mostly based upon stealth. Half Life had solid artificial intelligence for its time, but it is nowhere near advanced as Halo's, and consequently, the combat isn't comparable (Half Life was great because of level design). If those three examples are the basis for your argument that PC players had experienced it all before Halo, then that argument is completely and utterly void.

I'll repeat myself in the hope that you drop the ridiculous 'nothing new' argument. Your reasoning is comparable to that of someone criticizing a revolutionary design by an architect because he uses steel - what previous architects used; that fact doesn't degrade the quality of the design or upgrade the quality of other designs which use steel. As I've quoted to you before: "Good Artists Borrow, Great Artists Steal", which means great creators make already existing ideas and designs better and become their owners. A game is a sum of its parts, not a collection.

You need to look up your definition of Revolution again. Just how was Halos combat revolutionary? How did Halos combat mark a sudden, rapid and landmark change in FPS combat. As far as I see there is nothing revolutionary about it. Not only did it do anyhting new but it also has changed the face of FPS gaming very little. Your statement that the combat in Halo was revolutionary is utterly ridiculous and you can't bring up any examples to back it up. Slight influenences in console FPS games maybe but a revolution? Nonsense. So I'd like to see what you come up with that are examples of this sweeping revolution that Halos combats. I find it hard to believe that you wil lcome up with something considering Halo is a game full of borrowed ideas, slight refinements and a boring weapon selection. Do you really honestly think that Halo's combat is such a massive leap ahead of the games I mentioned that it's a huge revolution or have you just been reading Edge too much?

NeoKubrick wrote: »

You continue to fail to understand that the sum of all those parts you cite with many others are the reason Halo's combat is revolutionary, not the parts themselves. Your inability to understand this is two-fold: you erroneously think Halo is a simplistic and dumb shooter, and you do not want to admit that all those times you've looked down upon players for praising Halo was based upon pretense.

It is a simplistic and dumb shooter just like most shooters out there, it's not a bad thing. You point at things and pull the trigger until they stop moving and move to the next group. I can't see how anyone can say it's anything other than that but there's certain people out there that think it's the pinnacle of game design and innovation. The only reason I can think of that people would have this opinionis if their only experience of FPS games was on the console were the last great one before Halo was Goldeneye whereas any person I know into PC's at the time didn't see the bhow Halo was a big deal other than how pretty it was at the time.

NeoKubrick wrote: »

And, Starsiege Tribes had armour and an energy cell. Energy cell powers the jetpack and armour is your health. Tribes implementation of its health system is not like Halo, at all.

Denying this doesn't make it true. You've obviously never played tribes. I doubt you have much PC gaming experience either.

Magill

^ Exactly... how can something be considered revolutionary when there are no other games out there like halo... arguing that halo was a revolutionary game is ****ing stupid.

I had been gaming on the PC long before halo was released and wasn't overly impressed by it, don't get me wrong, it was a good game but i wondered what all the fuss was about.

I would consider MW + MW2 to be more of a revolution that halo, because even tho halo was the first decent online console shooter, these games really pushed console gaming on Xbox live + PSN to another level.

I'll probably get reach in a few weeks hopefully its good.

Shammy

Played my first online game there , and some of the ranks it put me in with :mad:, they must have been playing it solid since midnight , didnt do too bad , an enjoyable game , cant see myself spending hours at a time playing it though.

GTR63

Anyone finish the Campaign how long does it last.I might be able to convince one my brothers to play co-op with me.

SoulRock

just finished it there.. im a big Halo Fan, The first one blew me away and 2 and 3 were great fun, Reach just does'nt feel the same at all to me.. its a good game but i did'nt have any of those 'wow' moments that i got with any of the other games, and the Atomosphere that was created in previous games away from all the shooting etc was totally missing for me... it just seemed like bungie have finally run out of ideas.. its a shame 'cause i really was expecting so much more... graphically i think it was average and although i believe bungie built a new engine for this game.. you would'nt really notice it... all in all good fun but it didn't hold me like the other games in the series.. im a bit dissapointed
played on heroic and took about 8/10 hours... not a bad game but prob my least favorite in the series... shame.

Jazzy

Halo is to the young console generation as doom was to us. fact is, we had spent years playing games of an easily comparable standard, halo was just marketed really well. decent game, but very very lackluster.

halo 2 and half life 2 came out at the same time... half life 2 eats halos face off. theres bugger all comparison bar hype.. and one didnt need the hype

RAIN

I don't think lingering on the past is very useful in this argument. The fact remains though that in its current state its hard to find ANY game that does community like Halo:Reach. I think thats the only really revolutionary thing Bungie can really claim to have done. I'n terms of community its doing more then any other game has ever down on console. Everything else had been done before but thats far from insulting. Bungie have always been good at refining an experience to its most user friendly.

LanceStorm

very much enjoying the campaign so far!!
heroic is very tough, but hey if its the way its meant to be played, I often find myself wanting to just run at enemies and shotgun them to bits but the AI is fantastic and they will just pick you apart, there really is alot more strategy and its a great feeling when you've picked the right one and got passed the section where you died 10times!!

havent played MP yet, will give it a go tonight, but I played the beta for it and loved it, the Armour abilities make it a little more interesting in my opinion!!

RAIN

RAIN wrote: »

The fact remains though that in its current state its hard to find ANY game that does community like Halo:Reach

I agree with this. Reach as a package offers a staggering amount of value for the 45 quid I paid Gamestop for it. The amount of fun you can have in this game with a few friends who are serious enough about it is amazing. There are areas of it that are better and worse than H2/H3 but as a package it is going to be hard to beat in terms of replayability and overall fun factor for some time. It's best quality is that the online portion is so varied that there's something for everyone (I heart firefight).

Campaign is very good, straight forward for a change, musical score is excellent, graphics are very good but the framerate tanks occasionally which pulls you out of the game, AI is strong, almost to the point of cheapness sometimes, but strangely the teammate AI is still retarded and as much of a liability as it always was. Occasional difficulty spikes can be a bit annoying, particularly in cases where the right weapons for the situation at hand are not available. (Being pinned down by a shade turret and charged by bullet dodging elites with only an assault rifle to save you is NOT fun).

Overall, reach is not perfect but it's a strong contender for game of the series and one of the best console FPS games out there.

manic mailman

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Well... it's Halo :pac:

I'm not a big Halo fan by any stretch. I enjoy them, but definitely count them amongst the most overrated games around. How is Reach? Well two levels into singleplayer (haven't gotten to MP yet, which is definitely where the series shines) and it hasn't necessarily differentiated itself from the previous games yet. I skipped ODST, so not sure if the health system is borrowed from that, but the mix of recharging shield and a health bar works pretty well. I'm playing on Heroic, and difficulty is fairly high - you definitely need to approach battles with some sort of strategy. You'll spend a lot of time running away and hiding! Still love the vehicle controls and the vehicles themselves, which is something Halo definitely does better than its competitors. AI is still **** when manning a turret though, while the enemy AI is the best around: more obvious than ever that there is genuine Covenant pack mentality at work here.

Story is pretty uninteresting, and there haven't been any majorly impressive setpieces yet. Mainly just moving from battle to battle, although said battles do occasionally take place on cleverly laid out maps. You can't just run and shoot for sure: instant death ahoy!

It is a fairly basic conclusion, but on the strengths and weaknesses of the first two levels - the opening cutscene of Mission 3 promises more variety, plus still the space stuff to come! - this is Halo through and through. I'm sure everyone will draw their own conclusions from that! Won't win over the haters, will be a fine addition for the fans. For me, someone whose fairly on the fence about the whole series, it is entertaining if far from the masterpiece many have heralded.

This is a fairly accurate summary for me. I've just gotten past the space battle and I have to say the storyline was developed very well at this point. The best part of the campaign for me so far has been the voice acting...it really has come on in leaps and bounds compared to the previous titles. It makes everything seem alot more 'real' for want of a better word.

The matchmaking so far has been excelent, but I haven't gotten to firefight yet so I don't know if it's just an upgraded version on odst or something more. Apparently there is massive customisation for it so maybe that bodes well for that gametype?

Has anyone played firefight in depth yet? Or online?

Magill

RAIN wrote: »

I don't think lingering on the past is very useful in this argument. The fact remains though that in its current state its hard to find ANY game that does community like Halo:Reach. I think thats the only really revolutionary thing Bungie can really claim to have done. I'n terms of community its doing more then any other game has ever down on console. Everything else had been done before but thats far from insulting. Bungie have always been good at refining an experience to its most user friendly.

one word, "Valve", that is all

Just messing, but the amount of content you got from half life 1 + 2 is insane and they support they're game for YEARS, ****.. css (released what.. 6 years ago) is getting new updates right now.

Bungie are awesome tho, they beat the ****ing **** out of IW when it comes to updating and balancing there game.

Chairman Meow

Jazzy wrote: »

Halo is to the young console generation as doom was to us. fact is, we had spent years playing games of an easily comparable standard, halo was just marketed really well. decent game, but very very lackluster.

halo 2 and half life 2 came out at the same time... half life 2 eats halos face off. theres bugger all comparison bar hype.. and one didnt need the hype

If theres bugger all comparison...why are you bringing up HL2?
HL2 was miles better than H2 alright, because 2 was mostly focused on MP and SP suffere din comparison. But Halo CE deserves to stand alongside Hl2 as one of the most enjoyable shooters in recent memory, and it was released quite a few years before HL2.

Anyway, played a few hours yesterday, Reach is pretty excellent so far, very reminiscent of Halo CE. Looks great, plays excellent, only let down by some dodgy squadmate AI and poor voice acting

NeoKubrick

Retr0gamer wrote: »

You need to look up your definition of Revolution again. Just how was Halos combat revolutionary? How did Halos combat mark a sudden, rapid and landmark change in FPS combat. As far as I see there is nothing revolutionary about it. Not only did it do anyhting new but it also has changed the face of FPS gaming very little. Your statement that the combat in Halo was revolutionary is utterly ridiculous and you can't bring up any examples to back it up. Slight influenences in console FPS games maybe but a revolution? Nonsense. So I'd like to see what you come up with that are examples of this sweeping revolution that Halos combats. I find it hard to believe that you wil lcome up with something considering Halo is a game full of borrowed ideas, slight refinements and a boring weapon selection. Do you really honestly think that Halo's combat is such a massive leap ahead of the games I mentioned that it's a huge revolution or have you just been reading Edge too much?

It is a simplistic and dumb shooter just like most shooters out there, it's not a bad thing. You point at things and pull the trigger until they stop moving and move to the next group. I can't see how anyone can say it's anything other than that but there's certain people out there that think it's the pinnacle of game design and innovation. The only reason I can think of that people would have this opinionis if their only experience of FPS games was on the console were the last great one before Halo was Goldeneye whereas any person I know into PC's at the time didn't see the bhow Halo was a big deal other than how pretty it was at the time.

Denying this doesn't make it true. You've obviously never played tribes. I doubt you have much PC gaming experience either.

First, you shouldn't question others' experience of PC gaming when you up to a year ago you still held that Half Life was a better game than Half Life 2. Tribes does not operate like Halo's recharge shield mechanic.

You claimed that the combat in Halo wasn't revolutionary because it did nothing new and that PC players had experience of the type before Halo, and I asked you to provide examples of this combat comparable to Halo: Combat Evolved's. You cited a game that was released after Halo, a third/first person tactical shooter/stealth hybrid with little to nothing in common with Halo, and Half Life, which was nowhere near Halo in terms of combat. Therefore, by your criteria and not mine, Halo is revolutionary. Don't waste my time with semantics. Revolutionary: involving or causing a complete or dramatic change (Oxford dictionary).

Halo isn't a simplistic shooter. If you can't understand this simple statement, how am I to expect that you will understand how Halo's combat was a 'dramatic change' from everything that had been previously written on PC or console? To you, Halo is Doom. Here's the distinction:

Lessons from Doom

The 30 Second Combat Cycle

Magill wrote: »

^ Exactly... how can something be considered revolutionary when there are no other games out there like halo... arguing that halo was a revolutionary game is ****ing stupid.

Heh clueless.

NunianVonFuch

NeoKubrick wrote: »

NunianVonFuch, could you explain why you're linking and quoting from an article on multiplayer games to support an argument in a discussion on a single-player experience? Should we discuss which game is better, Half Life or Counter-Strike, next?

Because the gameplay mechanics are the exact same, the only difference is AI. If the core of your arguement is the AI then then fair enough, but ye go on about the weapons and shields for most of the back and forth which are gameplay mechanics present in any shooter be it single or multiplayer.

Anyway Tribes: Vengeance is better than any other jetpack game out there. Halo: Reach's jetpacks need to be powered up, maybe with Forge there might be some way in the future to tweak it.

Speaking of the topic of this thread, why is the voice acting so bad? Early on

"Show some respect, her father just died"

is spoken with as much emotion as "For feck's sake, I asked for smokey bacon." It's been decent -> great in all the other Halo games, what's gone wrong?
Bring back the Firefly squadron!

Retr0gamer

NeoKubrick wrote: »

First, you shouldn't question others' experience of PC gaming when you up to a year ago you still held that Half Life was a better game than Half Life 2. Tribes does not operate like Halo's recharge shield mechanic.

You claimed that the combat in Halo wasn't revolutionary because it did nothing new and that PC players had experience of the type before Halo, and I asked you to provide examples of this combat comparable to Halo: Combat Evolved's. You cited a game that was released after Halo, a third/first person tactical shooter/stealth hybrid with little to nothing in common with Halo, and Half Life, which was nowhere near Halo in terms of combat. Therefore, by your criteria and not mine, Halo is revolutionary. Don't waste my time with semantics. Revolutionary: involving or causing a complete or dramatic change (Oxford dictionary).

Halo isn't a simplistic shooter. If you can't understand this simple statement, how am I to expect that you will understand how Halo's combat was a 'dramatic change' from everything that had been previously written on PC or console? To you, Halo is Doom. Here's the distinction:

Lessons from Doom

The 30 Second Combat Cycle

You still haven't given any examples of how Halo was a revolution. Stop avoiding the question.

I've read both articles and I still think Halo is doom with outdoor enviroments grenades and better AI, and linearity. Not exactly a revolution.

I also did provide examples of games with combat like Halos. Very good examples. All were games you point at things and shoot at them. You can fool yourself as much as you like by looking into game design theory but at the end of the day Halo isn't much more beyond this. It has it's own little systems in place like the way every JRPG has it's own little systems to differentiate them but just like these JRPGs Halo isn't revolutionary.

I was just waiting for the 30 second cycle thing to come up. I'm sorry to announce that this isn't a new thing, Bungie just gave it another name and people like Edge magazine try to present it as some massive move forward in game design. The 30 seconds of fun cycle has another name, pacing, and is an integral part of game design. Don't believe me that it's nothing new? How about half-life which has better pacing, seperating it's action segments with areas to build action and story with it's enviroment. Further back, try Rocket Knight Adventures and Gunstar Heroes. It's a 30 second boss battle followed by 30 seconds of action repeated. Further back, how about what is commonly regarded as one of the greatest games ever made Robotron. 30 seconds or less between each screen. Nothing new or revolutionary, just a videogame design 101 lesson given a fancy name.

Shields weren't a revolution. They just replaced health packs and encoraged more gun ho gameplay. There was no need to design levles around having health pick ups after every encounter. Did it fundamentally change the way FPS games are played? No. I've played CoD 1 and CoD 2 and the recharging health didn't change the way the game was played, they felt very similar. Neither did the AI, which for me was highly scripted in parts. You could tell a elite would do his roar thing when his shield was down which was stupid since he should have found cover and taking out an elite always made the little yellow turds run away. Anyway similar AI interaction behaviour was already shown well before it in playable for when MGS2 was demoed. As for the one button melee and grenades as I stated it wasn't a new innovation, far from it and its implementation didn't change FPS games just like it never changed FPS gaming in the other games that it was in first.

As for me preferring HL1 to HL2, well the games are so close in quality that it really only comes down to personal preference. HL1 has the better level design and weapons while I feel HL2 was consistently great the whole way through which swings it for me. If anyone told me HL1 was better I couldn't question it since the games are so close in quality. What took me to change my mind was that I recently played through them again and and re-evaluated both games,admitting to myself that I might have been mistaken which seems to be something you just can't seem to do.

I've just read that Doom article. It's overwritten. John Romero said the same thing in one sentence when he said Doom was Gauntlet in 3D. It's no secret.

How about this, Halo was de-evolutionary to the FPS genre. Before Halo came out FPS games were branching into new and exciting directions on the PC. The biggest change was the RPG hybrids like System Shock 2 and Deus Ex that showed just how complex and immersive FPS games were. Then came along Halo a simplistic shooter. Doom with a fur coat and jewellery and financially the way to make money was dumb shooters again. I'm playing Stalker at the moment and it's a breath of fresh air to actually be playing an FPS game with a bit of depth again. There'll always be a place for the simplistic FPS and there's nothing wrong with them. It's just when it's to the detriment of better and more complex experiences is when it's bad. Cliff Blezinski said that the future of FPS is in RPGs. I think he is right but I also think that it should have been in the past and that Halo prevented a revolution.

Here's some Tribes, check out those recharging shields

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_Thczu6UDA

Stephen

I'm not a big halo fan at all (found 3 very boring), but I'm enjoying Reach. Just picked it up because most of my friends over here have it and Walmart were selling it for $60 with $20 credit thrown in, which is fine with me since I get my groceries there!

Played the first 3 chapters of the single player campaign, then went playing it again co-op on live with difficulty set to legendary. Also did some firefight achievement whoring. I still yearn for keyboard and mouse control

TerrorFirmer

Just finished the campaign in system link Co-Op - fantastic fun, better than Halo 3 and ODST by a long shot, definitely the best since the original.

Not as many storyline driven achievements though as in Halo 3/ODST, having finished the campaign on legendary, and having got some MP achievements, still a paltry 385 points

NeoKubrick

NunianVonFuch wrote: »

Because the gameplay mechanics are the exact same, the only difference is AI. If the core of your arguement is the AI then then fair enough, but ye go on about the weapons and shields for most of the back and forth which are gameplay mechanics present in any shooter be it single or multiplayer.

In one, you're against humans and the other, artificial intelligence. Furthermore, competitive multiplayer's gameplay is emergent and controlled by the players of it, not the finely-tuned gameplay in control of the designer of single-player's.


Again, Retr0, that shield mechanic in Tribes is not the same as Halo's, which is what you claimed. So, your point is moot. And it is irrelevant how little difference there is in the quality of Half Life 1 and 2 (the difference is considerable, but beside the point), you questioned my experience of PC gaming and I was aware of Half Life 2's superiority long before you became aware of it. Therefore, if I understand little of PC gaming, you understand even less by definition.

Retr0gamer wrote: »

admitting to myself that I might have been mistaken which seems to be something you just can't seem to do.

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I've read both articles and I still think Halo is doom with outdoor enviroments grenades and better AI, and linearity. Not exactly a revolution.

See, you don't understand that Doom is simplistic and Halo is not, even after reading two articles which show that one design is different than the other and virtually explaining the difference. First, let's clear up a misunderstanding you have of what's simple and complex and establish the difference. Tic-tac-toe: it has one piece you can use (X or O) and nine squares to move to. This is a simplistic game, because you don't have a choice of what you can use and you have relatively few moves to make. Chess: it has sixteen pieces you can use, six variations, and sixty-four squares to move to. This a complex game, because it provides choice in quantity and quality and the field of play is expansive. This is the difference between a simple and complex game.

Doom is a simplistic game. As LeBreton said, it has more common with Robotron than a modern shooter. The strategy of the game is simple, less than Tic-tac-toe. Whereas, Tic-tac-toe has not an execution component, Doom has. So, Doom has simplistic strategy and relatively simplistic execution. Halo is not a simplistic game. A player has three types of attack, variations in enemies and enemies' attacks, and the artificial intelligence implements simple cause and effect behaviour, and all this increases the depth and complexity of the game, and it is also has an execution component. Halo is not a simplistic game and it's not a complex game, either (games comparable to a complex game like Chess would Starcraft etc.); it's somewhere in between and it is not comparable to Doom's level of simplicity/complexity at all. Deus Ex's and System Shock 2's mechanics are no more complex than Halo's are (I know this will sound controversial to you, but it really shouldn't be).

If this is no secret to you, then why are you claiming Halo is Doom? If you knew all of this, I would not have needed to explain it to you and you wouldn't compare Halo to Doom. So, don't feign knowledge or understanding after the fact. To add, you claim Halo is linear, which implies you don't understand the term 'linear', too. The 30 seconds combat cycle is a reference to how Jamie Griesemer labeled Halo's design, not Edge magazine, and it is not indicated as anything other than a label in the article, which article details what the label signifies (i.e. what Griesemer is referring to). So, I don't understand why you're arguing that it's nothing new when no one claimed it was new to begin with. I don't see how linking to an article explaining why Halo's combat is revolutionary is averting your question, which dwarfs your explanations why it's not in quality and quantity. One of the three examples of games you used to show that PC players had experienced Halo's combat was a game that was released after Halo.

However, there is no onus on me to prove that Halo was a revolution, because you just unwittingly proved it in your own post and therefore you've destroyed your own argument. You claimed that Halo was a de-evolution, which you can infer that it had changed the first-person shooter genre. If Halo had no significance and its combat was experienced on the PC before, then it wouldn't have been in a position to change anything and devolve the genre. So either, Halo had no significance and didn't effect any change or devolve the genre, or Halo had significance and effected a revolution of the genre but to the detriment of it. You're self-owning your own argument.

As you can read, you're constantly contradicting yourself: you tell me that I'm fooling myself to study the game design of Halo but use the same game design of other games as the basis for your argument for your praise of other games. You distill Halo to 'point and shoot things', which is the same as distilling Super Mario World to 'run and jump things'. I guess Chess is just people moving around a bunch of wooden pieces on a wooden board right? The foundation of design (any) is to differentiate between bad and good fit for purpose. The purpose isn't the goal of design. If that were the case, then Miyamoto would just have Mario 'run and jump things', because there is no task for a designer beyond defining a purpose of a game according to your reasoning.


I've played the first three levels of Halo: Reach. I cannot say much about the combat because it's too early, but I really like the music and tracks so far.

imitation

Got halo reach today, dispite the fact im still wary of the series after halo 3.

I'm noticing a few things though 20 minutes in.

Weapons feel more meaty, but still have that halo feel. Seems to be standard halo with a few tweaks, just like 2,3 (and no doubt odst which I haven't played.)

Its much browner than the other halo games

There also seems to be this really nasty motion blur thing going on, like when characters are moving while I move my camera, like some sort of weird flicker, its really turning me off.

Retr0gamer

NeoKubrick wrote: »

Again, Retr0, that shield mechanic in Tribes is not the same as Halo's, which is what you claimed. So, your point is moot.

You select the shield pack in Tribes. You take damage. After a set period of time your shield regenerates unless you take more damage which resets it.

In Halo you take damage. After a set period of time your shield regenerates unless you take more damage which resets it.

What's the difference? And don't even claim to think that Bungie weren't influenced by Tribes because after it was released in 1998 everyone was playing Tribes.

NeoKubrick wrote: »

And it is irrelevant how little difference there is in the quality of Half Life 1 and 2 (the difference is considerable, but beside the point), you questioned my experience of PC gaming and I was aware of Half Life 2's superiority long before you became aware of it. Therefore, if I understand little of PC gaming, you understand even less by definition.

Well I'd say that the difference is minimal, like the difference between Mario 3 and Super Mario World. Both superb games and it comes down to personal preference which one you prefer more. There's HL1's deathmatch mode which on somedays swings it for me because of how fun it was on my friends 4 player lan. So I understand less about PC gaming than you because I preferred HL1 to HL2 for a while? I think the fact that I'd been playing PC games since 1992 and had my own PC since 1996 counts more.

NeoKubrick wrote: »

See, you don't understand that Doom is simplistic and Halo is not, even after reading two articles which show that one design is different than the other and virtually explaining the difference. First, let's clear up a misunderstanding you have of what's simple and complex and establish the difference....

Doom is a simplistic game. As LeBreton said, it has more common with Robotron than a modern shooter. The strategy of the game is simple, less than Tic-tac-toe. Whereas, Tic-tac-toe has not an execution component, Doom has. So, Doom has simplistic strategy and relatively simplistic execution. Halo is not a simplistic game. A player has three types of attack, variations in enemies and enemies' attacks, and the artificial intelligence implements simple cause and effect behaviour, and all this increases the depth and complexity of the game, and it is also has an execution component. Halo is not a simplistic game and it's not a complex game, either (games comparable to a complex game like Chess would Starcraft etc.); it's somewhere in between and it is not comparable to Doom's level of simplicity/complexity at all. Deus Ex's and System Shock 2's mechanics are no more complex than Halo's are (I know this will sound controversial to you, but it really shouldn't be).

Doom is simplistic and so is Halo. Halo has 3 types of weapons. Doom has 8 to choose from as well depending on your situation. Oh but there's elemental properties like behaviour? Well Deus Ex and System Shock 2 has that as well but sure they're simplistic as well. Also if you have ever played Robotron you'd realise that for a simple game there's a lot of strategy involved in it as well just like there is in Doom and in Halo. You can go on and on about how Halo has a shield or one button for grenades or better artificial intelligence. These are small improvements to a formula that has been evolving since doom and before it. They aren't revolutions. The game is hardly more evolved than half-life not matter how much pomp and pretention its developers give it's mechanics that you seem to be swallowing hook line and sinker.

NeoKubrick wrote: »

One of the three examples of games you used to show that PC players had experienced Halo's combat was a game that was released after Halo.

I said it was released around the same time as Halo. Review copies were sent out about a month after Halos release meaning there was no time to be influenced by Halo.

NeoKubrick wrote: »

However, there is no onus on me to prove that Halo was a revolution, because you just unwittingly proved it in your own post and therefore you've destroyed your own argument. You claimed that Halo was a de-evolution, which you can infer that it had changed the first-person shooter genre. If Halo had no significance and its combat was experienced on the PC before, then it wouldn't have been in a position to change anything and devolve the genre. So either, Halo had no significance and didn't effect any change or devolve the genre, or Halo had significance and effected a revolution of the genre but to the detriment of it. You're self-owning your own argument.

De-evolution was the wrong word. Stagnation is more fitting.It's made sure that in the last 10 years the FPS hasn't moved on in the way it should have. You still haven't provided examples of how revolutionary the combat is.

NeoKubrick wrote: »

As you can read, you're constantly contradicting yourself: you tell me that I'm fooling myself to study the game design of Halo but use the same game design of other games as the basis for your argument for your praise of other games. You distill Halo to 'point and shoot things', which is the same as distilling Super Mario World to 'run and jump things'. I guess Chess is just people moving around a bunch of wooden pieces on a wooden board right? The foundation of design (any) is to differentiate between bad and good fit for purpose. The purpose isn't the goal of design. If that were the case, then Miyamoto would just have Mario 'run and jump things', because there is no task for a designer beyond defining a purpose of a game according to your reasoning.

Well Super Mario World is basically run and jump on things isn't it? It's basically just building upon the foundation that was laid before it in Super Mario Bros and Super Mario Bros 3. It adds a load of improvements to the formula. A new cape to fly, puzzle ghost house levels. New Enemies, bosses that use the SNES's mode 7 effect. However I'd never call in revolutionary. Halo adds it's own flavour to the established FPS genre but again I'd never call it revolutionary becasue it isn't in the same way that Mario Bros and Mario Bros 3 weren't revolutionary in terms of platform mechanics.

I tell you what was revolutionary, Super Mario Bros. and here's a good article much better written than the two you posted to show why:

http://www.gamespite.net/toastywiki/index.php/Games/G5-SuperMarioBros

Zeouterlimits

You're still going Retro? I admire your determination but at what point will you accept these people see it differently and move on?

Halo was revolutionary in that it perfected console FPS controls (Goldeneye) and popularised the genre on console.

The depth of the combat seems to be beyond you, it's not a twitch shooter, rewarding intelligence and not just quick reflexes. The campaign features great enemy AI that's designed to make the combat fun and does. The features (MM, FF, insane amount of Custom Game Settings, Forge, Theatre, Social Settings) are unmatched.
Is the game perfect? Hell no, far from it, I'm a huge critic of the many flaws. It's a great franchise, one that ignited the FPS market on consoles and is un-matched in that market.

Retr0gamer

The FPS console controls that Halo used were just borrowed from previous generation games like Quake 2 on the PS1, Alien Resurrection and in Medal of Honor you could configure your controls this way as well.

I'm just trying to correct some people that seem to think that Halo is unflawed and was something special when it came out when it really wasn't. It was special for console gamers thathad never played an FPS that polished but for people with PC gaming experience it was merely a good FPS in the vein of what had come before it.

So you don't see any flaws in NeoKubricks argument despite the fact he hasn't backed up his claims of how revolutionary it was?

Zeouterlimits

Retr0gamer wrote: »

The FPS console controls that Halo used were just borrowed from previous generation games like Quake 2 on the PS1, Alien Resurrection and in Medal of Honor you could configure your controls this way as well.

The configuration of controls is actually very limited in Reach.

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I'm just trying to correct some people that seem to think that Halo is unflawed and was something special when it came out when it really wasn't. It was special for console gamers thathad never played an FPS that polished but for people with PC gaming experience it was merely a good FPS in the vein of what had come before it.

I think you're fatally wrong here. Halo was and is something special. I came to franchise as a big PC Gamer (and still am).

Retr0gamer wrote: »

So you don't see any flaws in NeoKubricks argument despite the fact he hasn't backed up his claims of how revolutionary it was?

Oh I'm sure there are plenty (it's your posts I'm more interested in), I just thought it was unlike you to fight tooth and nail about it.

Speaking of Gamespite, Jeremy is a pretty HUGE Halo Singleplayer fan, gave Halo 3 an A (perhaps an A+, I can't recall).

Retr0gamer

Yep he is but he's also never had a PC before in his life and was a massive Bungie fan growing up with only Macintosh computers. I still doubt he would ever say Halo was revolutionary though. I'm also not saying the games are crap, they aren't other than the single player portion of Halo 2 which was bad.

Halo seemed something special on the Xbox because for over a year it was the only game worth playing on the machine. It didn't really popularise FPS games on the console, Goldeneye was a massive game and Quake 2 was pretty damn big on the PS1 along with other FPS games like Timesplitters and Red Faction on the PS2. As a PC gamer but mainly console gamer at the time, Halo was great game in the FPS mould but didn't change significantly or revolutionise anything in gameplay terms but did shape the face of the games market financially. The original Xbox is one of the worst consoles I own due to the lack of exclusive titles but Halo made it worth owning for a lot of people. If it wasn't for Halo I doubt the 360 would even exist.

In gameplay terms I'd say Halo has changed gameplay significantly less than even the cover system introduced in Kill.Switch and popularised in Gears of War. Sure a lot of games use it but I'd be hard pushed to call it a revolution.

Azza

Zeouterlimits wrote:

The depth of the combat seems to be beyond you, it's not a twitch shooter, rewarding intelligence and not just quick reflexes.

Sorry going have to call you on this one. Twitch shooters by which I assume you mean Quake and Unreal Tournament do reward intelligence as well as aim.

In those type of games yes aim and dodging are very important. Mastering them takes a lot of practise. But there are other factors like map knowledge and map control as well. The ability out think your opponent on the fly. Constantly trying to cut off his avenues to health and weapons while maintaining your own stranglehold on them if things are going well and trying to do the opposite if things aren't going well. You have to be constantly trying to outwit your opponent. This all has to done but at much greater speed than non twitch shooters.

Retr0gamer

Kind of have to laugh at me getting called out for looking at Goldeneye through rose tinted glasses after the amount of times I've been given out to on these boards for telling people it's aged terribly

Zeouterlimits

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Kind of have to laugh at me getting called out for looking at Goldeneye through rose tinted glasses after the amount of times I've been given out to on these boards for telling people it's aged terribly

It's generally safe to assume people hold it too high, didn't mean it personally.

Azza wrote: »

Sorry going have to call you on this one. Twitch shooters by which I assume you mean Quake and Unreal Tournament do reward intelligence as well as aim.

Agreed, considering I've played them with you before I would agree.
I was actually referring more to COD.

Retr0gamer

Zeouterlimits wrote: »

It's generally safe to assume people hold it too high, didn't mean it personally.

Ah don't worry, I'm just a bit notorious for trying to people that it's aged really badly and then al hell breaking loss

NeoKubrick

Sorry for being over a week late; Halo Reach's multiplayer is addictive.

Retr0gamer wrote: »

What's the difference? And don't even claim to think that Bungie weren't influenced by Tribes because after it was released in 1998 everyone was playing Tribes.

That's speculation and conjecture. What isn't is that Halo: Combat Evolved was originally a real-time tactical game, then a third-person shooter and finally a first-person shooter. So, it's more likely that Tribes had no influence on Halo: Combat Evolved than the opposite. Especially as I've said, Tribes shield mechanic is not the same as Halo's and recharging shields was present in Bungie's Marathon: one is integral and the other is an option/power-up. Furthermore, you've inadvertently implied that Bungie's Halo had influence on other developers: everyone was playing Tribes and therefore Bungie were influenced by it; everyone was playing Halo and therefore developers were influenced by it. Either both or none are valid.

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I think the fact that I'd been playing PC games since 1992 and had my own PC since 1996 counts more.

Quantity does not equal quality, and in agreement, you on more than on occasion have said that popularity does not mean a game is good; so, you can't use the number of years you've been playing PC games to justify any argument, because you would be hypocritically claiming that quantity equals quality. Super Mario Bros. is just "run and jump things"; again, it doesn't cheapen the quality no matter how little the quantity of words it takes to describe something, because quality does not equal quantity.

And, I don't think the quantity of experience you have counts for anything if you think the difference between Super Mario 3 and Super Mario World is analogous to Half Life and Half Life 2. You either haven't played Half Life and Half Life 2 sufficiently to notice the significant difference, or haven't the sufficient understanding of first-person shooters, or both. You claimed that Half Life 1 was a better game than Half Life 2, not that you preferred it to Half Life 2, which is two different claims. It's absolutely valid for someone to prefer one game to another and to ignore which is actually superior, but it isn't valid for someone to claim one game is better than another if he hasn't a valid and sound argument as to why.

It's irrelevant that Medal of Honour: Allied Assault could not be influenced by Halo; I asked you to name three games which offered the same experience as Halo: Combat Evolved before its release as you claimed PC players had played and seen it all before, and one of the games you cited was a game (Medal of Honour) released after Halo was launched. So, how did PC players have the benefit of this experience a couple of months before the event of actually playing the game? This is the crux of the debate: if you can't prove that there were similar or superior combat experiences on the PC platform that is a basis for the comment that PC players had seen it all before, then Halo: Combat Evolved was revolutionary. The two valid examples, Hidden & Dangerous and Half-Life, were not anything close to the tactical and engaging combat in Halo, and if you had to point to an example of a game that was released after Halo: Combat Evolved, it does more to indicate how scarce, not abundant, the experiences, like Halo, were. Here with your wealth of years of experience since 1992 playing on someone else's PC and since 1996 playing on your own, you said:

"Also [Halo:Combat Evolved] was the best example of a FPS since Half Life and Deus Ex. The PC FPS games before it were terrible and repetitive crap."

I accept Halo's combat design as good because the design principles are logical and sound. First-person shooters are combat, first and foremost. Despite your repeated requests for me to outline why the combat is revolutionary, I've articulated it to you myriad times in different debates on this forum and wrote a thousand word essay on the subject on an independent blog, and you've never refuted any of my arguments other than responding with self-serving contorted claims; in this debate, I've even demonstrated that you've implied that it revolutionized the genre (devolution isn't synonymous with stagnation) and demonstrated that you can't prove that it didn't.

If you think the shield mechanic, weapons, grenade and melee gameplay, the variety of enemies and, especially, the artificial intelligence were small improvements, then you should be a bit more introspective of whose hook you bit after 2004.

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I tell you what was revolutionary, Super Mario Bros. and here's a good article much better written than the two you posted to show why:

http://www.gamespite.net/toastywiki/index.php/Games/G5-SuperMarioBros

That Super Mario Bros. piece was a good article, if you go by the tenet that anything posted on Gamespite is automatically good regardless of the content. The writer describes Super Mario Bros. and describes the change from iterative arcade games to a narrative game. He doesn't analyze the design of Super Mario Bros. at all, and how it was revolutionary, because either he wasn't able to or that wasn't the aim of his article. I think it's the former, because nowhere in his article which dedicates a lot of words on the subject does he mention that the lack of 'Continue' was a design decision; Miyamoto made that decision, because players like playing through parts of a game they now find simple and it allows them to show off how good they are - it's his guiding principle throughout all his 'action' games.

Although the writer mentions the experience of the start of the game, he doesn't analyze how its design is good: the placement of the first ? block to entice players to hit it, and increasing the chances of inadvertently stamping on the Goomba and making players understand how to kill it; the placement of the row of blocks when you hit the ? block for the mushroom to increase the chances of players failing to jump over the mushroom and easier to collide with it and inadvertently make players understand the mushroom is a power-up. That's game design. Now after reading all of that, try reading this with a straight face:

"Oh, and let’s not forget the impact Super Mario Bros. is still having on game designers to this day, with full recreations of that astoundingly memorable first level finding their way into modern games"

Do you really think he has a solid clue why the first level has an impact on game designers when he says that we shouldn't forget that some games have replicated the first level? You may limit your understanding of game design to the opinions of select high-brow journalists, but I don't.

Retr0gamer

I'll freely admit that back in 2004 I was 20 and full of ****. You'll find other posts by me praising Goldeneye and FFVII from that time that I admit with the benefit of hindsight were wrong.

ickle_pwincess

"The best example of an FPS since Half Life and Deux Ex" doesn't mean the best example ever! Maybe there had been a string of cruddy ones in between them games. Maybe it was fun when he played it the first time, and then it got old. But, who gives a crud?

Lets just put it this way, if someone said you were crap, Halo wouldn't put any effort in trying to defend you. Know why? Its 'cause it doesn't love you like you love it. 'Cause its not real.


... And that's a Dealbreaker ladies!

NeoKubrick

ickle_pwincess wrote: »

Lets just put it this way, if someone said you were crap, Halo wouldn't put any effort in trying to defend you. Know why? Its 'cause it doesn't love you like you love it. 'Cause its not real.

That would depend if I knew someone with the name 'Halo'. Anyway, it's overkill to come on to defend someone and directly imply it's because you love them, ickle_pwincess.

astrofool

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I'll freely admit that back in 2004 I was 20 and full of ****. You'll find other posts by me praising Goldeneye and FFVII from that time that I admit with the benefit of hindsight were wrong.

PC FPS games at the time were all going down a similar path, Halo did introduce a lot of mechanics that have since become popular in FPS games on the PC (shields, limited inventory, weapon pickup, vehicles meshed in with gameplay). I've played a lot of fps games over the years, Halo and HL2 have been by far the most enjoyable I've played in the last decade or so.

Though I'm jumping into this thread a bit, seeing Retr0gamer hating on Halo, Goldeneye, FF7, is as predictable as Basquille hating season 2 of anything over on the TV forum

Goldeneye hasn't aged well, a lot of N64 games haven't (bar Mario and Zelda imo), FF7 I could still see myself going back to, if I had the time to play games again, but while I used to play a lot of games, I now barely get to play any, I really did enjoy the brief experience that was Halo:Reach, more enjoyable by there being no perseverence test Flood level.

Now, I'm sure other games did Halo things before Halo did (e.g. Tribes), but none of them packaged and presented them the way Halo did.

Moogintroll

NeoKubrick wrote: »

recharging shields was present in Bungie's Marathon

I played a LOT of marathon back in the day (what with it being the only game worth playing on the mac back in those days... Not that things have changed much) and I'm pretty certain that while it had shields, they worked exactly like a regular health bar. The only way to recharge them was with pickups or health dispensers on the wall.

That being said, Halo was basically a sequel to Marathon and there are a lot of similarities.

Retr0gamer

Correct, it works nothing like the shields in Halo it's just a standard health bar that can be replenished at stations in the wall. Unlike Tribes shields which some people justwant to stick their fingers in their ears and shout lalala about.

Moogintroll

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Correct, it works nothing like the shields in Halo it's just a standard health bar that can be replenished at stations in the wall. Unlike Tribes shields which some people justwant to stick their fingers in their ears and shout lalala about.

Yes but in all fairness Halo was in development long before Tribes was released. I mean, Steve Jobs announced Halo back in 1999 (No, seriously, the iPod guy) and it had been in development long enough to morph from a RTS to a FPS.

Besides, what made Halo a great game wasn't the shield mechanics, it was being dropped repeatedly into these 30 second combat scenarios that were all a little bit different each time depending on the way you approached it and whatever weapons you were able to scavenge.

Still, it's not as good as Deus Ex though.