Halo2

[Flompy]

Cheers guys!

[Hodge]

Just been looking at one of the cutscenes of kikizo and can see what people mean by the texture pop up along with shadows popping up aswell. Well most of the time i didn`t really see any textures pop up except in one case where it was plainly obvious but it tends to be more of a flicker you notice than anything. But i guess thats the price you pay for no loading times. The cut scenes still looked great regardless but i expected more polish from bungie tbh.

[demon9k]

Good old gameplay, dispatched last night and it gets here this morning.

Been on Xbox Live since 11! OMG its amazing. More thoughts later I am back off to play! Anyone who wants a game add me, name is "Space Coyote UK" I will be on till 5

[Smitty]

Just been looking at one of the cutscenes of kikizo and can see what people mean by the texture pop up along with shadows popping up aswell. Well most of the time i didn`t really see any textures pop up except in one case where it was plainly obvious but it tends to be more of a flicker you notice than anything. But i guess thats the price you pay for no loading times. The cut scenes still looked great regardless but i expected more polish from bungie tbh.

Apparently it's something to do with the texture system they're using. I've heard theres a better way to do it (it's some complex acronym) but that it's more processor intensive, and that having these little niggles is the best compromise.

[JRMacumber]

What you have to remember is that the xbox is an aging system now. Its natural that graphically it won't stand up against Half Life 2, or Doom 3 running on a PC.

The problem that I have is that there are elements of the engine which don't match The Riddick engine on the xb. The pop up during cut scenes is horrendous and god knows why Bungie implemented it in such a fashion.

Yeah, I don't understand that either. Then again, I was never all that impressed with CoR's cinematics either. Just something about that Normal Mapping that doesn't work right. Still, Halo 2's in game graphics are good enough for me, and the gameplay is the standard brilliance I've come to expect. I can't wait for the weekend so I can knuckle down with it.

[HaHaUK]

Nipped down to Trocadero today, and HMV had 2 pods with it playing. Played it for about 30minutes, and have to say it is kinda good. Dual wielding is great and the new enemies and stuff. But its not that much different from the original except for the new locations and weapons.

Also i noticed that the enemy AI aint that great. Stood behind one of the grunts for about 10 seconds, and he didnt even move.

Still well done Bungie!

[the shape]

Did two hours of this on Live last night, had a great time.

I love drifting around the network with your mates as a 'party' looking for people to fight. Amazed at how smooth it runs with stacks of people running around shooting from both the US and UK at the same time. Immediately feels more robust than Black Arrow or Battlefront.

The balance is wonderful. You can be in the thick of it all, peeling out thousands of rounds, but at the same time it's *actually valid* to get some distance with a sniper rifle and pick people off from way up a hill or five, six floors above the city. In my experience it's been suicide to take a sniper rifle in Rainbow Six.

With the official release of the game yesterday, people were in such high spirits that even the majority of Americans were came up against were saying new things like "good game, guys!" and "nice job!"

[HaHaUK]

So the US version can work on Uk Live?

[the shape]

I don't know; my friends have the UK PAL version, I have the US version.

But I'd assume it works...? There are plenty of peeps on here who use US Xboxes in the UK, aren't there? On Live? I don't even know if there *is* a UK Live. Isn't it all one big happy global Live network?

[VR46]

just looking at this friends stats

http://www.bungie.net/Stats/PlayerStats.aspx?player=JCT007

he's won 1 out of 46 games and still is upto Level 4 !

[007]

OH MY GOD!

I am the biggest tit, ever.

Remember I was complaining about the visuals being average?

Well, I went into my Xbox Dash. And I didn't even have it on Progressive Scan. I remember turning it off 480p to try out 720p on Soul Calibur.

Lets just say, it now looks absolutely amazing.

What. A. Tit.

[recipher]

just looking at this friends stats

http://www.bungie.net/Stats/PlayerStats.aspx?player=JCT007

he's won 1 out of 46 games and still is upto Level 4 !

He might have been second a lot. You don't have to win to get points.

[anephric]

Just got this....

Don't think I've seen sloppier cutscenes in an aeon. They ming.

Played the first two levels. I'm underwhelmed. I'm hoping it'll come alive in co-op (as did the first time around for me).

It's just not sparking. It all seems so... lacklustre.

[nips]

It all comes alive in Co-Op, just like the first one.

I was exactly the same as you, but it was after about 5 levels before I stopped playing. Got a friend around, played some co-op and now I'm mad for it. It's only going to get better from what I can feel.

I found myself giggling with glee and repeatedly shouting: "Woah" and "****" when all the cool stuff like the worthog happened all over again.

I've finally started to get to grips with dual-wielding... I thought it was ****, but after I played a little I realised some things were harder without dual weapons.

I enjoyed it so much after playing it in co-op I upgraded from the Master Chef and bought the Special Edition from work for a whopping ?45. Worth every penny so far

[anephric]

The only thing that truly bothers me about dual-wielding is feeling like I'm peering over an enormous pair of metal tits... they take up about half the screen.