Halo 2 Anticipation Thread: Hype Vs. Reality

[Uli]

I have not read any of the books, I might do in the future though.

do yourself a favor and read the first Halo book "The Fall of Reach". i think it's a must have and so essential for understanding a lot of Halo's background story. it answers so many questions - you even haven't come up with - and, moreover, is simply one great science fiction book to read! highly recommended!

[nips]

Ah... I didn't think they got there faster, I thought they were already there, inspecting Halo.

According to the book, iirc, the Pillar of Autumn managed happened to jump to a site of interest to the covenant - Halo. But the covenant who they were fighting before the initialted Cole Protocol were able to beat them to thier jump point becuase thier ships are faster equally.

[JRMacumber]

Nips, it was both. The Covenant already had ships there investigating Halo, and more Covies followed them from Reach. That's why there were so many.

[nips]

And that's why we're so good, becuase we kicked all thier asses.

Congrats to everyone who completed the game. We Rock! :P

[Alf-Life]

Legendary on both Xbox and PC.

It got Elite! - RUN!!!

[Uli]

Alf-Life, why did you play it also on PC? is the single player any different? in what way?

[Eight Rooks]

I just bought #1 again, actually. Enjoying it as much as I ever did, but Jesus, I can barely handle Heroic. The very thought of Legendary makes me cry. I don't understand how people can claim it's not hard - are they afraid of talking their mad skillZ up or something?

[evilmatt]

Nah, its just like what I was saying about Ninja Gaiden in the first play thread - you really do get better as you play. First go at Legendary you'll probably struggle, but after that it feels much easier second time through I found playing through normal, then heroic, then legendary, the game was always somewhere around the limits of my capabilities, so it was always a challenge but not impossibly so. Perfect learning curve 8)

[Uli]

in fact, the Halo Legendary difficulty mode is a game on it's own! it's hard but always fair. changing to a more defensive or stealthy approach often got me through and to the next savepoint!

btw, i was so proud of completing the game on Legendary the first time, that i felt i had deserved a kind of award! i try to upload a pic of it, hope it works

update: seems that file attaching doesn't work for me, too bad! any suggestions?

[Eight Rooks]

Ah, but I'm not saying it's unfair or anything. Yet.

Seriously, it's just always been one of my favourite pet peeves, the whole thing with people saying hard games aren't hard at all, when in fact they seem to have blinkers on as regards their own abilities re: videogames in general. I believe, as with anything like this, there are examples you can point at and say that's a hard game, and anyone who claims different just because they coasted through it is simply deluding themselves because they think if something isn't challenging them personally, it can't be hard, as if theirs is the only sliding scale that matters. Ninja Gaiden is hard. Flat. It manages to coax you through the learning curve pretty well (despite some rough spots/unfair bits) if you persevere, and you go back and think "ah! I see it now!" but that doesn't make it suddenly not a hard game. Halo on Heroic, based on a couple of levels, seems like a hard game to me. The Elites are faster than you (so it's difficult to run away from them, since the Master Chief feels as if he's wading through treacle), you can empty an entire clip into them and not kill them, they dodge around all the time, they can take out your entire shield bar in a second or two and kill you a second after that... sure, I can well believe if I persevere I'll get the hang of weapon switching, using cover, blah blah blah and say "well, damn! that was easy!" but it won't actually make the game itself easy . And I just wish people would stop saying it does.

I'd forgotten how much fun it was, though (I haven't played it since I had my first XBox, and that was more than a year ago since I got rid of it). Tears in my eyes remembering how much it did right that near every other PC FPS at that point was getting wrong, wrong, wrong. Roll on #2... ****ty PAL release dates, grumble, grumble.

[Alf-Life]

Uli: I bought the PC version for the modding and online multiplay, and after owning it for a while one night started playing the singleplayer and thought "Feck! This is amazing! I'd forgotten how good this was!" And suddenly it was 4am and I was riding out of the Maw.

Eight Rooks: Nah, don't get me wrong, Halo on Legendary is hard (I doubt those on the gearbox forums who say they've completed it only using melees... :/) but it's manageable because of the checkpoint system. Personally, the learning curve for me came on Halo (the level) against the 2 Banshees. I breezed through PoA, and then became unstuck when the Dropship passengers started laying into me at the same time as those Banshees... until I found a sweetspot behind the big boulder past the bridge.

And I think that's what elevates the game on Legendary; there are some real tough spots, so you are often forced to use your head (shoot an Elite with a charged Covie pistol to take out his shields and then zoom-in with the human pistol to headshot him), be stealthy (duck-walk around most of AOTCR's identikit rooms meleeing one patrolling Covie and so sneaking by the rest of the room's inhabitants), find sweet spots (snipe all the grunts and Shades in the night section of T&R by taking shots while in mid-air after jumping from a boulder in the corner, or hiding behind the aforementioned rock in Halo (the level) to take out the Banshee (causing the other to flee) while remaining hidden from the Dropship guys), be cheeky (trigger enemies in Truth & Reconciliation, then run up to the landing above and take them out, or jumping down in the hangar bay when they trap you), or just find really cheeky shortcuts (leap down a chasm in Silent Cartographer just after the rock-kicking cutscene).

[fishbowlhead]

Halo, on legendary, using only Melee,

Thats a great joke. i wonder how many more those PC players over at Gearbox forums have.

[Kevvy Metal]

Has anyone seen the leaked Halo 2 beta screen shots that were posted on bungie.net forum then speedily taken down?

They do seem to be genuine and the Microsoft employee who put them on the internet is in big trouble.

They are pretty cool, six screens of Multiplayer showing the new HUD that is prob still a work in progress and two shot of the Game select screen stuff.

I am not gonna stick links on here cuz might get shouted at by someone but these shots do genuinely exist.

[demon9k]

I have not seen them yet but if you would PM me the links I would be very grateful.

[Tom Salter]

Halo, on legendary, using only Melee,

Thats a great joke. i wonder how many more those PC players over at Gearbox forums have.

I've seen scarier things than that