Halo2

[karlidog]

i picked this (and a second pad for co-op ) up today and, apart from pauses to cook/eat and things, me and my girlfriend've been playing it since we got home. um.. okay, it's really, really good. the first level's definitely a bit uninspiring and i'm left wondering where, oh where, my directional damage indicators have gone, but apart from that: single-player (up to level four, at any rate) is absolutely fantastic. loving the graphics (all the more so for the fact they're coming out of the same machine halo 1 ran on... hear that, id? that's the sound of *optimisation*), the lovely smooth framerate (a bit less so in co-op, but the sheer stupid fun factor more than makes up for it), the story and just, like, the joy of playing new levels with halo's mechanics, really.

oh, but multiplayer? nope, microsoft have decreed i can't use that half of the game i just bought. i've no desire or need whatsoever for a credit card, and yet for some godawful reason they demand one to use the two-month live trial, and i'm not applying for one just to play halo online. i honestly cannot comprehend why they'd possibly need credit card details to allow me to use a prepaid two-month voucher (or the twelve-month one i could, and would, go out to the shops and buy)... it pisses me right off
(if anyone's found a way around this or if you don't need a credit card for the retail 12-month boxes, do let me know... ...otherwise it's xbconnect for me, i think...)

[fragmast3r]

Played this all night...so far i dunno what all tghe fuss is about .. think you guys are living in some kinda dream world or somethin .. thinking this is like the best game ever.. the graphics are alright nohing special if you have played on a decent pc and doom 3.. the actual combat is average at best...nothing can touch a pc, mouse and keys.. pad is just so clumsy.. no rocket jumps.. wtf.. i will contine playing for the story as that seems to be the only part thats ok..its not the worst game by any means but i enjoyed playing riddick far more than i am H2, but its all a bit mah for my liking.. halo was nothing special .. and neither is this imo

i normaly ignore people who i dont agree with, everyones entitled to there own opinion and im normaly a nice guy




but fair play you talk some crap!!

[jassi singh]

Played some MP early afternoon with Soi, PeteJ and co. Was brilliant. Got strangley laggy after the first couple of rounds, but it cleared up. I got to shoot boog in the face, so it was ace! \o/

Then came online and played Replicant, Recipher, Winky or Wicky (?) Hodge on slayer enjoyed it immensly.


Random thoughts

Ivory Tower is a great level

Dunno whats going on with voice in team games

Live implementation\messages\clan\friends menus are great and easily accesible

When you are the host, at the moment finding it difficult to navigate through menus, but that will be no problem soon.

Fear the Sword! >_<

Still running around like a headless chicken on the levels. Slayer matches would help loads to get used to levels i think.

Its fun


*CBA to do a proper post, this will do. night night!

[Kotatsu Neko]

Been playing all evening.

God this game is great. I mean, really, really great.

Been playing on heroic and some bits have been nice and challenging, but mostly quite easy. Fun though, seriously fun! Loving every minute of it. Up to first covenant stage now. The cut scene before that stage was truly breaktaking, an astonishing display of modern graphics tecniques.

Music is perfection.

The only big gripe is just over the late load in on many of the cut scenes and sometimes during game play. Takes the shine of an otherwise fully formed game.

Also, it seems to be taking forever to find games on quick match and optimatch? Gets there in the end, but it's a long, long wait.

And does anyone find that their TV isn't switching into widescreen? Every Xbox game I've ever played with 16:9 support auto switches the TV to WIDE mode, but not Halo 2. Have to manually switch it. At least W/S support is in there.

And Half Life 2 early next week! An amazing time for gaming.

[Eight Rooks]

Eh, add me to the thumbs up line. I was going to leave it 'til some time next year - I'm pretty much broke at the moment - but I caved and traded a couple of things in and, well, Jesus it's awesome. (Campaign, that is; no Live yet for me.)

The problems do bear noting, though... IGN's review was basically unbelievable sycophantic bull****. Oh, of course, the graphics problems are barely noticeable - my ass they are. I don't like to bandy words like "unacceptable" around since I'm not a programmer, but the pop-in (whole character models!) and framerate judders are very jarring. It does drag in places... I liked the Covenant level/s, but they were still quite poorly paced (although the climax made up for it ). There are some great bits all the way through the game, but so far it really does feel as if it's shot its bolt with the city levels early on. Nothing matches up to that since. The AI is indeed quite frequently way, way suspect (on Normal at least) - standing dead still and doing nothing until I'm only a couple of feet away. There is some truly annoying finding the right way to go. The Halo universe is interesting, but the story isn't all that - I think they really rely too much on people having eaten ten copies each of all the books and memorised all of ilovebees.com.

And I'm not keen on the rejigged music... a couple of the pieces are utterly terrible, and Steve Vai's guitar isn't that great. Plus the voice work does indeed seem a bit forced now - though "that thing's really starting to PISS ME OFF!" did get a grin out of me.

But oh God when it hits the high notes it does it so well. I don't possess the mental capacity to understand how people can't see this game is indeed, in places at least, a work of ****ing genius. Even with all these little faults Campaign is simply on another level to everything since the first game came out - it just feels so right, so epic, so immersive. Even if the AI is faulty the fighting is just so down and dirty, alive with tactical possibilities, worth playing over and over. Even if the cutscenes are broken and just a wee bit hokey they're still more cinematic and more absorbing than just about anything else this year.

Loving it. 9 out of 10 so far - maybe 8 if I'm being really, really harsh. And I haven't even had a chance to play Live yet.

[the shape]

i honestly cannot comprehend why they'd possibly need credit card details to allow me to use a prepaid two-month voucher (or the twelve-month one i could, and would, go out to the shops and buy)... it pisses me right off

Why you ask? Well, it's a trial, and when it comes to an end they'd very much like if your laziness facilitated their monthly charging of your account to stay on Live, instead of you going out to get a 12 month card. Nothing's really free, and all that.

But anyway. Doesn't your regular bank card work as a debit card? Mine always have. You know, the Visa and MasterCard versions of debit? So there's never any interest to pay or monthly bill. But you can use them everywhere just like credit cards. Nothing to be frightened of. My XBL service is signed up to one of these.

[JRMacumber]

Has any game ever offered the amount of detailed information that you can get from Bungie.net? That is just amazing.

[Magnakai]

Can anyone tell me why exactly it takes so long to find games? Sometimes the matchmaking can be going for almost 5 minutes before I get a game. It's never been less than a couple of minutes, and it's really starting to get on my nerves.

[charlesr]

Join a friend's party - jumps to their party immediately.

[Hodge]

Can anyone tell me why exactly it takes so long to find games? Sometimes the matchmaking can be going for almost 5 minutes before I get a game. It's never been less than a couple of minutes, and it's really starting to get on my nerves.

Probably down to testing everyones connection to see what players best match up with you to have the best lag free game possible. When i`ve tried it, it doesn`t usually take any longer than a couple of mins tops so i can`t see why it`s taking 5 mins really?

[Morcerf]

Can anyone tell me why exactly it takes so long to find games? Sometimes the matchmaking can be going for almost 5 minutes before I get a game. It's never been less than a couple of minutes, and it's really starting to get on my nerves.

I found this last night - really really annoying!! At first I thought the game had crashed or something!

Guess I need to make some friends or join a party or clan or something.....

[Shez]

I've only tickled the game at the moment, but what I have seen is nice. My only complaint is the brightness. I had to zap it up on my tv, because I was getting spanked....too dark

Might venture onto live tonight, just kick camps ass

[Jakeway]

anyone know what all the different medals mean?

[Tom Salter]

I've only tickled the game at the moment, but what I have seen is nice. My only complaint is the brightness. I had to zap it up on my tv, because I was getting spanked....too dark

Aye, I found that, and for some reason when I put the flashlight on, it cut off after two seconds

Yet another bug in there then :P

[Ravon]

Aces.
Ravon in pro one format/game, negative another shocker.
How unique. Why not compare like for like, or maybe, not even compare at all?

Just a thought.

like for like... fps i was.. i think

anyway.. its not like i was saying its the worst game ever,i think its "alright" just that there is so much hype around certain titles now that i think people tend to get rose tint-itus and go whailing on how wonderful it is .. when it clearly has problems, but then again it is "my opinion"

if somebody is willing to lend me an adapter so i can use K&M.... im sure i would change my so out of date opinion


but i think level 4 is the best so far by the way... level 3 was a bit weak...
and you would have thought after the boring driving through the tunnels in Halo 1, they wouldn't have put something like that in again... and it apears again in pratically the same place. ft: