Well put. I feel by putting this ODST campaign experience AND the Halo 3 mulitplayer into one box Bungie are pretty much putting out the most awesome Halo game so far.
The similarities occurred to me as well, and are completely exciting. I think it’s probably for the best that we were forced to wait– we can experience better hardware technology, better voice acting, and the benefit of Bungie’s formidable experience.
The only thing really missing from the H2 demo was the exciting prospect of single-handedly saving Earth, playing as the master chief with Cortana by your side, wagering that you can’t stick things. But oh well, I’ll take it. ๐
PS I love your guy’s articles. All of them.
It would be really cool if ODST ended the same way as the e3 2003 trailer, with five drop pods crashing down, cornering the Rookie. But instead of attacking, the elites save him from some enemy, maybe a brute chieftain.
Oh oh! And one of the elites is Nโtho โSraom, thats how he came to Earth.
But thats just me wishing.
Your view on both Halo 1 and the E3 demo are rather skewed.
Halo 1 did have two levels where you were quite free to roam the environment: Halo and SC. The control room snowfields also offered some longer-larger-scale battles. These are pretty much the best parts of the game, besides the finale, and nothing like that is really seen after them. However, 70 percent of the game’s length is still the same linear room-to-room valleya-to-valleya -gameplay. In fact, Halo 1 has the largest amount of pure inside room environments. And those rooms are filled with the same energy shields to PP down and Flood to shotgun. The standard in Halo 2 and Halo 3 is actually a bit more open, and they do have some more open areas, see Outskirts and The Ark. And Halo 1’s environments are heavily restricted due to 90-degree walls all around.
And the gameplay of the E3 presentation showed no hints at open-ended gameplay. It was more of an action cinematic, where Bungie wanted to show a carefully crafted series of events. And the encounters were laid out in the same linear fashion. You defend the base, go through the ruins at the point you can go through them, drive hogs through a road that is two paths at best, and that’s the level! The level was still the same traditional linear Halo action we have seen thorough the trilogy. There were no soft nor hard walls because the devs knew they shouldn’t go off the path. The best events were stuff like cannon explosions and cinematics, not open exploration; it was more of a show to see if combat and surprising events can be meshed. And that’s what happened in Halo 2 and 3.
I get an impression that you are saying that the E3 is closer to ODST than to Halo 2. That is absolutely taking it too far.
You also mention Halo 2 having a “watered down sandbox” and “brief Earth levels”. Everything from Halo 1 and the E3 demo were included in Halo 2, even just in the Earth levels. And the two levels were pretty long, certainly longer than 7 minutes and included everything we saw at E3, albeit with less exploding cannons.
The Halo Trilogy games are very close to each other: linear progression with a few odd apples in the beginning. ODST is a completely new gameplay direction, and is different from anything Bungie has promised or delivered before it. We should be treating it as a new thing, not a fallback to pre-2004.
It sounds like you just experienced Halo 1 differently than others did. I consider the second level and The Silent Cartographer to be the defining levels of the game. The other levels are absolutely fantastic, but when I think back to Halo 1, I think of the rolling hills of the second level.
And I obviously can’t speak for Bungie, but I don’t think that it’s irrelevant that the first environment they ever created for Halo was the island for The Silent Cartographer. I also don’t think that it’s irrelevant that they chose a nonlinear environment to be the first level that the player experiences upon crash-landing onto the Halo. The corridors in AotCR and Two Betrayals were not put in because the developers thought they’d be really fun; they were put in because they were quick and easy to implement.
And as far as Halo 1’s environments being “heavily restricted due to 90-degree walls all around,” all I can say is that you must not have played much of the game. The longevity of the title for many fans came from the player’s ability to roam freely about the environments, specifically on the two levels I’ve already mentioned. If you saw some place on either of those levels, you could get there; with enough effort, you could get anywhere. Of course, the lack of soft walls was only because Bungie was still learning the hardware, but it still influenced and shaped many fans’ love for the title.
As far as the 2003 E3 demonstration, the “best events” for you may have been the cannon explosions and cinematics, but for others, myself included, it was the chase sequence. The implications were obvious: do you want to drive? Do you want the Marine to drive? You are in a city and there are streets: which street do you want to take? Developers don’t show off levels that are completely different from the rest of the levels in the game… they demo levels that are representative of the title as a whole. That’s the point of a demo.
Carrying on with that sentiment let me speak on your statement that Halo 2 has everything in it that was in Halo 1 and the E3 demo… I disagree. There were no nonlinear environments like the ones seen in the levels Halo and Silent Cartographer. And the entire E3 demo sequence was removed from the game. Sure, the dialogue ended up in the game, but the chase through the city was removed. So for many fans the E3 demo, in the end, was not representative of the game as a whole.
It’s another reasonably well-known fact that Halo 2 was intended to have online co-op, which is why most of the environments were so compact – to keep players from straying too far apart. In fact, I honestly believe that one the reasons that Halo 2 began the shift away from nonlinear environments – to allow for the implementation of online co-op. The only solution would be to work out a way for the two players to not have to be in the same BSP at the same time.
Anyway, all we have here is a difference of opinions: You more enjoyed certain levels of the first game and other people more enjoyed others. I just think that Bungie feels the same way I do, and as I just stated, started shifting their design choices in part because of a technical limitation.
I had completely forgotten all that was promised to us in that e3 trailer so many years ago and now looking back at what we were given instead i am a bit disapointed at how the halo trilogy was “dumbed down” for more casual gamers. I’m really looking forward to ODST and hopefully it will fulfill what was promised to us all those years ago.
I loved that E3 trailer too, I remember downloading it and watching it over and over gleaning as much info from it as I could. Just like you that was the day I became a bungie fan! I can’t wait to jump in to ODST and experience this world that we have seen so many times before! Props on the writing being superb as usual.
As far as another game in the Halo universe with exploration and more of a city feel to it, you are exactly correct. This game could be a lot closer to what the hardcore fans thought Halo 2 would be. It may turn out that smaller, focused teams turn out the greatest games to me personally.
To me the problem with the sequels was lack of a smart, shield regenerating enemy. In Halo CE, we had Elites that were tough and if you hurt them they would run for cover and get their shield back. The Brutes never came close, but the Elites were an equal adversary for a Spartan. ODST fixes this imbalance by making the player weaker and slower. It could be a great and challenging experience. Reach could be the return to a large game with Spartans and Elites.
Bottom line, we are getting 2 Halo games roughly a year apart. Somehow, the terms win and awesome fall short.
fantastic investigative story. I mean this didnt even occur to me, mainly because the fitioon brought me in, and that was after 3 or 4 of the books were out. so i wanst there salivating over halo 2, even tho i know i was gonna play it.
either way just here to comment and say the article is fantastic, i love teh correlations you drew, the fact that for bungie this is more than jsut extending life to the franchise but more like fulfilling their own potential whether they knew it or not. And this is the perfect vehicle to do it. Halo could have remained a bit more niche, but its success by taking a divergent path to mass appeal, allowed them to make this game for US. I cannot wait.
And i need to know more about halo reach oh yes i do.
I agree with Matthew Scott above me. If this is what ODST is going to be like, think about the possibilities of Halo: Reach. We’ll finally be going back to killing Elites, we’re back as SPARTAN II’s in Mark V armor, and we’re fighting in a battle that all of us already know the outcome of. These two games NEED to be released or I’ll go insane.
Nice write-up. I have a random question about the M6C. There is writing on (what I assume is) the sight under the barrel. It appears to be Korean. Does anyone know what it says?
Comment by Interactive Civilian — June 10, 2009 @ 3:02 am
Once again I must give praise here. I enjoy visiting Ascendant Justice because you put all the pieces of the puzzle together better than anyone else online period. The writing here is second to none. I totally agree. The Halo 2 E3 2003 video had me actually pre-order Halo 2 something like 18 months before it even released. I remember going to electronics boutique and asking to preorder it and I was paying in full and they couldn’t because Halo 2 was not even set up in the system. But someway the manager took care of it. I still have the receipt to prove it. Best Buy also had a special Halo 2 bonus disc that they made availible to customers that pre-ordered Halo 2 in the summer of 2004 (another pre-order for me, but only for this bonus disc) that included the entire E3 2003 video from start to finish and some interviews with the Bungie staff. If the staff here ever wants to ‘borrow’ the disk to post its content online here I would be willing to send it to them. This site it the best.
Comment by PhillySpartan — June 10, 2009 @ 12:57 pm
I too give praise to this writing, and I remember the days of that wonderful E3. The Best Buy nearby perhaps had too few preorders, because I picked up the disc without preorder(packed with an odd, but serviceable ‘prototype’ controller). The most important part of that ad was not the bomb cinimatic (the explosions were too big to be really in the game) but the city walkthrough. Covenant troop carriers, a city block that the player walked around! It felt open.
That demo had another aspect that, though it did get into the game, reminds me of all that didn’t-Brutes. And so I go to the source of the Halo 2 SE bonus disk. Of course you know of the things abandoned from Halo over time; the blindwolf (‘couldn’t get herd AI’?), that giant Drennol monster (So cool though), engineers (if not but just to get infected by Flood). My point of this trip down memory highway is that All Halo games so far have been great, but from the remnants of larger ideas. If Halo: ODST is only what we have seen (for they haven’t shown anything not done often in games) it will still be an epic game for us die-hard tactical Halo 1 fans. But, somehow, if this is the only type of gameplay, is that living up to the dreams of previous games, let alone the released product?
Comment by Incongruous Derider — June 10, 2009 @ 5:35 pm
Great article, as usual i find myself constantly agreeing with what you guys say. At first i didnt want a sequel for Halo CE, I was afriad of being disappointed. The E3 2003 trailer changed all of that, I remember downloading that trailer with a horrible dial-up connection, must have waited hours for that thing to finish, but it was worth it. Halo 2 wasn’t what it promised to be, i was disappointed, but still loved the game. I must have played Outskirts and Metropolis hundreds of times, and still enjoy doing so.
Keep the articles coming guys.
Though this article will initially get you pumped for ODST and get your hopes up that it plays more like CE and the 03 demo, there’s a lot of things you have failed to point out.
Though we can’t dual wield anymore, we still have the same nerfed plamsa pistols, plasma rifles, smgs, etc that were nerfed to balance out dual wielding. And without dual wielding in ODST, why do we still have the same nerfed weapons from Halos 2 and 3 that are useless compared to their un-dual wieldable CE counterparts?
Another huge thing that no one ever mentions is just how close range Halo has become since CE. Weapons have much longer range in CE and the e3 demo. Even unscoped close-mid range weapons from CE like the Assault Rifle and Plasma Rifle shoot much further than the more midrange offerings of Halos 2 and 3. You can be at one end of a corridor in Halo 1 and be able to, rightfully so, shoot to the end of it with an assault rifle, red reticule intact. Shooting someone with brute spikers or plasma rifle or smg? Your reticule will be blue and make anyone more than 10 feet away from you a chore. Hell even the scoped Battle Rifle doesn’t have near the range of the CE Pistol.
Or for a more equal comparison just compare the sniper rifles of CE and Halos 2/3. Go to blood gulch in Halo 1 and have a base to base sniper fight. Your rifle has the range to hit enemies over there (hence the red reticule confirming this). In Halo 2 on blood gulch try doing the same thing. Your reticule will remain blue and barely reaches beyond halfway across the map.
Hell even grenades have a muuuuuch shorter throwing arc in Halo 2/3/odst as opposed to Halo 1, and again have been nerfed once dual wielding was thrown into the mix, but at this point is unnecessary given that dual wielding is no longer in ODST.
Halo 3 ODST, disappointingly, still has the EXACT gunplay of Halo 2 and 3, just without some of the features of those games (dual wielding, ridiculous jump heights, nerfed weapons, equipment, etc.). It’s just coated in the paint of the e3 2003 demo to fool you into thinking it feels more like CE.
A7XEric: Halo 1 has a larger field of view, meaning that things look bigger, or that the distances look less skewed. And 10 feet is insta-kill with shotgun range. For Halo 1, use the sniper scope, and for Halo 3, use local-LB-RB-LS-RS-A-DUP, where 1.0 = 10 feet.
Cocopjojo: I do enjoy the openness of both levels. They are amongst the best of the game, and the top tier of the trilogy. My point was that the other 8 were linear.
Two days before release. Figured I should check back here and read up on the news. It’s almost unfathomable that ODST was going to be a 90-minute game, and has now grown into all of this.
A7XEric, unless you’ve played ODST already I can hardly agree with anything you said in regards to it. Yes, they nerfed basically every aspect of the game starting at Halo 2. However, I’m almost certain that many of these modifications will be removed since the core of the ODST gameplay is player v. AI. That makes it unnecessary to balance weapons because of multiplayer. We’ve also lost shields. If balancing is such a big issue shouldn’t we have tougher weapons to keep us alive?
Just some thoughts. If your panties are in a twist over stuff that isn’t even guaranteed yet idk what to tell ya. The game is almost certainly going to be a fresh experience. We don’t have multiplayer to look forward to, but Bungie said that from the beginning basically.
I’m looking forward to it, and I’m sure loads of other diehards are as well. I don’t think we’ll be disappointed with this one.
I’m sad to say, perhaps not? This article alone got me pretty excited to play the ODST campaign mode which I am in now. There appears to be no way to avoid the first mission (Tayari Plaza) once you set foot in the New Mombasa streets. Furthermore, within that same mission there is an annoying one-way door toward the end preventing me from going back to scavenge weapons from fallen enemies. Ugh. I hope the entire campaign isn’t like this. The terms “open world” and “non-linear” do not apply to connect-the-dots level design in my book, no matter how much space you put between the dots.
Comment by Cold Glider — September 22, 2009 @ 1:25 pm
The boy was right.
Comment by UNSC-AI-CTN-0452-9 — September 23, 2009 @ 5:03 pm
Glider, the first couple of missions you have to play in consecutive order. After that, it’s entirely up to you how you explore the city and which waypoints to check out next.
And the missions in question are mainly short action-oriented setpieces and should be taken as such.
Comment by Red Scharlach — September 24, 2009 @ 10:43 pm
I very much enjoyed the campaign of this game. More so than Halo 3. It was a completely different experience than any other game I’ve played. Having to adapt my Mark VI tendencies to that of an ODST was a very fulfilling experience.
Just as a side note I’d like to point out Ascendant Justice being named in the credits as a rock of the Halo community directly after the 7th column.
I have since beaten the game on Heroic and wanted to follow up. It’s true what Red Scharlach said about the city opening up a little after the second mission. Fair enough. Yet once those four are done it is back to linear mode again for the final two. The last two levels needed to be played sequentially (avoiding spoilers here) but those first two didn’t, so I wish they would have opened up the city from the start. I’m sure it was a playability decision; otherwise, many kids would have spent 20 minutes wandering around in the dark not finding the missions and reconsidering how to spend their $60.
In the end, you have to be a detail-oriented player and Halo fiction fan to enjoy the city. Fortunately for me, I am. I’m still working to unlock the secrets of New Mombasa so I personally can’t complain that the game is too boring or short. But I was bored there in the middle. By the time I was able to explore the city I felt that I had already seen it all and went steamrolling through the missions anyhow if only to avoid Jackal #95 sniping me from nondescript catwalk copy #343. Things have changed a little since I’ve beaten campaign, but the jury is still out whether or not the Mombasa Streets was a clever game/story device or just some technical flash to dress up the old game for new market space.
Firefight is a blast to play with your friends, though… even if you have already spent lots of time with the competitors’ horde modes.
The real ODST topic here should be: how about those symbols? If I were allowed to join the forums, perhaps I’d contribute to that topic. ;D
Comment by Cold Glider — September 25, 2009 @ 7:51 pm
I felt the city centre had a lot of character and was great to wander around, especially thanks to the continuous presence of the Superintendent (The cameras, car alarms, tills and dispensers being set off, the road barriers…) and all the little piecemeal details it hands you via the audio logs (which tied in thematically very well with unlocking weapons cache. It makes sense that in trying to help you out, it would also want you to pay close attention to what it’s trying to tell you), as well as the clever enemy patrols and indeed even the snipers.
Comment by Red Scharlach — September 26, 2009 @ 12:42 pm
Well put. I feel by putting this ODST campaign experience AND the Halo 3 mulitplayer into one box Bungie are pretty much putting out the most awesome Halo game so far.
Comment by Nuvalari — June 8, 2009 @ 6:45 am
Do you by chance have the link to the E3 vid from 2003 that you refer to? It would be cool to review it in light of your excellent discussion here.
Comment by Marquimarque — June 8, 2009 @ 3:53 pm
The similarities occurred to me as well, and are completely exciting. I think it’s probably for the best that we were forced to wait– we can experience better hardware technology, better voice acting, and the benefit of Bungie’s formidable experience.
The only thing really missing from the H2 demo was the exciting prospect of single-handedly saving Earth, playing as the master chief with Cortana by your side, wagering that you can’t stick things. But oh well, I’ll take it. ๐
PS I love your guy’s articles. All of them.
Comment by J.R. — June 8, 2009 @ 5:10 pm
It would be really cool if ODST ended the same way as the e3 2003 trailer, with five drop pods crashing down, cornering the Rookie. But instead of attacking, the elites save him from some enemy, maybe a brute chieftain.
Oh oh! And one of the elites is Nโtho โSraom, thats how he came to Earth.
But thats just me wishing.
Comment by Janaka — June 8, 2009 @ 5:21 pm
Your view on both Halo 1 and the E3 demo are rather skewed.
Halo 1 did have two levels where you were quite free to roam the environment: Halo and SC. The control room snowfields also offered some longer-larger-scale battles. These are pretty much the best parts of the game, besides the finale, and nothing like that is really seen after them. However, 70 percent of the game’s length is still the same linear room-to-room valleya-to-valleya -gameplay. In fact, Halo 1 has the largest amount of pure inside room environments. And those rooms are filled with the same energy shields to PP down and Flood to shotgun. The standard in Halo 2 and Halo 3 is actually a bit more open, and they do have some more open areas, see Outskirts and The Ark. And Halo 1’s environments are heavily restricted due to 90-degree walls all around.
And the gameplay of the E3 presentation showed no hints at open-ended gameplay. It was more of an action cinematic, where Bungie wanted to show a carefully crafted series of events. And the encounters were laid out in the same linear fashion. You defend the base, go through the ruins at the point you can go through them, drive hogs through a road that is two paths at best, and that’s the level! The level was still the same traditional linear Halo action we have seen thorough the trilogy. There were no soft nor hard walls because the devs knew they shouldn’t go off the path. The best events were stuff like cannon explosions and cinematics, not open exploration; it was more of a show to see if combat and surprising events can be meshed. And that’s what happened in Halo 2 and 3.
I get an impression that you are saying that the E3 is closer to ODST than to Halo 2. That is absolutely taking it too far.
You also mention Halo 2 having a “watered down sandbox” and “brief Earth levels”. Everything from Halo 1 and the E3 demo were included in Halo 2, even just in the Earth levels. And the two levels were pretty long, certainly longer than 7 minutes and included everything we saw at E3, albeit with less exploding cannons.
The Halo Trilogy games are very close to each other: linear progression with a few odd apples in the beginning. ODST is a completely new gameplay direction, and is different from anything Bungie has promised or delivered before it. We should be treating it as a new thing, not a fallback to pre-2004.
Comment by Mutoid Log — June 8, 2009 @ 5:47 pm
It sounds like you just experienced Halo 1 differently than others did. I consider the second level and The Silent Cartographer to be the defining levels of the game. The other levels are absolutely fantastic, but when I think back to Halo 1, I think of the rolling hills of the second level.
And I obviously can’t speak for Bungie, but I don’t think that it’s irrelevant that the first environment they ever created for Halo was the island for The Silent Cartographer. I also don’t think that it’s irrelevant that they chose a nonlinear environment to be the first level that the player experiences upon crash-landing onto the Halo. The corridors in AotCR and Two Betrayals were not put in because the developers thought they’d be really fun; they were put in because they were quick and easy to implement.
And as far as Halo 1’s environments being “heavily restricted due to 90-degree walls all around,” all I can say is that you must not have played much of the game. The longevity of the title for many fans came from the player’s ability to roam freely about the environments, specifically on the two levels I’ve already mentioned. If you saw some place on either of those levels, you could get there; with enough effort, you could get anywhere. Of course, the lack of soft walls was only because Bungie was still learning the hardware, but it still influenced and shaped many fans’ love for the title.
As far as the 2003 E3 demonstration, the “best events” for you may have been the cannon explosions and cinematics, but for others, myself included, it was the chase sequence. The implications were obvious: do you want to drive? Do you want the Marine to drive? You are in a city and there are streets: which street do you want to take? Developers don’t show off levels that are completely different from the rest of the levels in the game… they demo levels that are representative of the title as a whole. That’s the point of a demo.
Carrying on with that sentiment let me speak on your statement that Halo 2 has everything in it that was in Halo 1 and the E3 demo… I disagree. There were no nonlinear environments like the ones seen in the levels Halo and Silent Cartographer. And the entire E3 demo sequence was removed from the game. Sure, the dialogue ended up in the game, but the chase through the city was removed. So for many fans the E3 demo, in the end, was not representative of the game as a whole.
It’s another reasonably well-known fact that Halo 2 was intended to have online co-op, which is why most of the environments were so compact – to keep players from straying too far apart. In fact, I honestly believe that one the reasons that Halo 2 began the shift away from nonlinear environments – to allow for the implementation of online co-op. The only solution would be to work out a way for the two players to not have to be in the same BSP at the same time.
Anyway, all we have here is a difference of opinions: You more enjoyed certain levels of the first game and other people more enjoyed others. I just think that Bungie feels the same way I do, and as I just stated, started shifting their design choices in part because of a technical limitation.
Comment by Cocopjojo — June 8, 2009 @ 6:29 pm
I had completely forgotten all that was promised to us in that e3 trailer so many years ago and now looking back at what we were given instead i am a bit disapointed at how the halo trilogy was “dumbed down” for more casual gamers. I’m really looking forward to ODST and hopefully it will fulfill what was promised to us all those years ago.
Comment by Max12345 — June 8, 2009 @ 6:51 pm
I loved that E3 trailer too, I remember downloading it and watching it over and over gleaning as much info from it as I could. Just like you that was the day I became a bungie fan! I can’t wait to jump in to ODST and experience this world that we have seen so many times before! Props on the writing being superb as usual.
Comment by Jason — June 8, 2009 @ 11:22 pm
As far as another game in the Halo universe with exploration and more of a city feel to it, you are exactly correct. This game could be a lot closer to what the hardcore fans thought Halo 2 would be. It may turn out that smaller, focused teams turn out the greatest games to me personally.
To me the problem with the sequels was lack of a smart, shield regenerating enemy. In Halo CE, we had Elites that were tough and if you hurt them they would run for cover and get their shield back. The Brutes never came close, but the Elites were an equal adversary for a Spartan. ODST fixes this imbalance by making the player weaker and slower. It could be a great and challenging experience. Reach could be the return to a large game with Spartans and Elites.
Bottom line, we are getting 2 Halo games roughly a year apart. Somehow, the terms win and awesome fall short.
Comment by ZaneZavin — June 9, 2009 @ 12:09 am
fantastic investigative story. I mean this didnt even occur to me, mainly because the fitioon brought me in, and that was after 3 or 4 of the books were out. so i wanst there salivating over halo 2, even tho i know i was gonna play it.
either way just here to comment and say the article is fantastic, i love teh correlations you drew, the fact that for bungie this is more than jsut extending life to the franchise but more like fulfilling their own potential whether they knew it or not. And this is the perfect vehicle to do it. Halo could have remained a bit more niche, but its success by taking a divergent path to mass appeal, allowed them to make this game for US. I cannot wait.
And i need to know more about halo reach oh yes i do.
Comment by Matthew Scott — June 9, 2009 @ 8:31 am
I agree with Matthew Scott above me. If this is what ODST is going to be like, think about the possibilities of Halo: Reach. We’ll finally be going back to killing Elites, we’re back as SPARTAN II’s in Mark V armor, and we’re fighting in a battle that all of us already know the outcome of. These two games NEED to be released or I’ll go insane.
Comment by MC Warhammer — June 9, 2009 @ 8:56 pm
Nice write-up. I have a random question about the M6C. There is writing on (what I assume is) the sight under the barrel. It appears to be Korean. Does anyone know what it says?
Comment by Interactive Civilian — June 10, 2009 @ 3:02 am
Once again I must give praise here. I enjoy visiting Ascendant Justice because you put all the pieces of the puzzle together better than anyone else online period. The writing here is second to none. I totally agree. The Halo 2 E3 2003 video had me actually pre-order Halo 2 something like 18 months before it even released. I remember going to electronics boutique and asking to preorder it and I was paying in full and they couldn’t because Halo 2 was not even set up in the system. But someway the manager took care of it. I still have the receipt to prove it. Best Buy also had a special Halo 2 bonus disc that they made availible to customers that pre-ordered Halo 2 in the summer of 2004 (another pre-order for me, but only for this bonus disc) that included the entire E3 2003 video from start to finish and some interviews with the Bungie staff. If the staff here ever wants to ‘borrow’ the disk to post its content online here I would be willing to send it to them. This site it the best.
Comment by PhillySpartan — June 10, 2009 @ 12:57 pm
I too give praise to this writing, and I remember the days of that wonderful E3. The Best Buy nearby perhaps had too few preorders, because I picked up the disc without preorder(packed with an odd, but serviceable ‘prototype’ controller). The most important part of that ad was not the bomb cinimatic (the explosions were too big to be really in the game) but the city walkthrough. Covenant troop carriers, a city block that the player walked around! It felt open.
That demo had another aspect that, though it did get into the game, reminds me of all that didn’t-Brutes. And so I go to the source of the Halo 2 SE bonus disk. Of course you know of the things abandoned from Halo over time; the blindwolf (‘couldn’t get herd AI’?), that giant Drennol monster (So cool though), engineers (if not but just to get infected by Flood). My point of this trip down memory highway is that All Halo games so far have been great, but from the remnants of larger ideas. If Halo: ODST is only what we have seen (for they haven’t shown anything not done often in games) it will still be an epic game for us die-hard tactical Halo 1 fans. But, somehow, if this is the only type of gameplay, is that living up to the dreams of previous games, let alone the released product?
Comment by Incongruous Derider — June 10, 2009 @ 5:35 pm
Great article, as usual i find myself constantly agreeing with what you guys say. At first i didnt want a sequel for Halo CE, I was afriad of being disappointed. The E3 2003 trailer changed all of that, I remember downloading that trailer with a horrible dial-up connection, must have waited hours for that thing to finish, but it was worth it. Halo 2 wasn’t what it promised to be, i was disappointed, but still loved the game. I must have played Outskirts and Metropolis hundreds of times, and still enjoy doing so.
Keep the articles coming guys.
Comment by Shisno — June 14, 2009 @ 12:16 pm
I like how you threw in those jesus references. I agree, odst is the halo 2 that I’ve been waiting for.
Comment by Chaz — June 15, 2009 @ 1:47 am
Though this article will initially get you pumped for ODST and get your hopes up that it plays more like CE and the 03 demo, there’s a lot of things you have failed to point out.
Though we can’t dual wield anymore, we still have the same nerfed plamsa pistols, plasma rifles, smgs, etc that were nerfed to balance out dual wielding. And without dual wielding in ODST, why do we still have the same nerfed weapons from Halos 2 and 3 that are useless compared to their un-dual wieldable CE counterparts?
Another huge thing that no one ever mentions is just how close range Halo has become since CE. Weapons have much longer range in CE and the e3 demo. Even unscoped close-mid range weapons from CE like the Assault Rifle and Plasma Rifle shoot much further than the more midrange offerings of Halos 2 and 3. You can be at one end of a corridor in Halo 1 and be able to, rightfully so, shoot to the end of it with an assault rifle, red reticule intact. Shooting someone with brute spikers or plasma rifle or smg? Your reticule will be blue and make anyone more than 10 feet away from you a chore. Hell even the scoped Battle Rifle doesn’t have near the range of the CE Pistol.
Or for a more equal comparison just compare the sniper rifles of CE and Halos 2/3. Go to blood gulch in Halo 1 and have a base to base sniper fight. Your rifle has the range to hit enemies over there (hence the red reticule confirming this). In Halo 2 on blood gulch try doing the same thing. Your reticule will remain blue and barely reaches beyond halfway across the map.
Hell even grenades have a muuuuuch shorter throwing arc in Halo 2/3/odst as opposed to Halo 1, and again have been nerfed once dual wielding was thrown into the mix, but at this point is unnecessary given that dual wielding is no longer in ODST.
Halo 3 ODST, disappointingly, still has the EXACT gunplay of Halo 2 and 3, just without some of the features of those games (dual wielding, ridiculous jump heights, nerfed weapons, equipment, etc.). It’s just coated in the paint of the e3 2003 demo to fool you into thinking it feels more like CE.
Comment by A7XEric — July 28, 2009 @ 8:06 pm
A7XEric: Halo 1 has a larger field of view, meaning that things look bigger, or that the distances look less skewed. And 10 feet is insta-kill with shotgun range. For Halo 1, use the sniper scope, and for Halo 3, use local-LB-RB-LS-RS-A-DUP, where 1.0 = 10 feet.
Cocopjojo: I do enjoy the openness of both levels. They are amongst the best of the game, and the top tier of the trilogy. My point was that the other 8 were linear.
Comment by Mutoid Log — August 21, 2009 @ 7:18 pm
When are we getting a new article?
Comment by Tom-Tom — August 26, 2009 @ 4:26 pm
Two days before release. Figured I should check back here and read up on the news. It’s almost unfathomable that ODST was going to be a 90-minute game, and has now grown into all of this.
A7XEric, unless you’ve played ODST already I can hardly agree with anything you said in regards to it. Yes, they nerfed basically every aspect of the game starting at Halo 2. However, I’m almost certain that many of these modifications will be removed since the core of the ODST gameplay is player v. AI. That makes it unnecessary to balance weapons because of multiplayer. We’ve also lost shields. If balancing is such a big issue shouldn’t we have tougher weapons to keep us alive?
Just some thoughts. If your panties are in a twist over stuff that isn’t even guaranteed yet idk what to tell ya. The game is almost certainly going to be a fresh experience. We don’t have multiplayer to look forward to, but Bungie said that from the beginning basically.
I’m looking forward to it, and I’m sure loads of other diehards are as well. I don’t think we’ll be disappointed with this one.
Comment by SandsOfTime404 — September 20, 2009 @ 12:48 pm
I’m sad to say, perhaps not? This article alone got me pretty excited to play the ODST campaign mode which I am in now. There appears to be no way to avoid the first mission (Tayari Plaza) once you set foot in the New Mombasa streets. Furthermore, within that same mission there is an annoying one-way door toward the end preventing me from going back to scavenge weapons from fallen enemies. Ugh. I hope the entire campaign isn’t like this. The terms “open world” and “non-linear” do not apply to connect-the-dots level design in my book, no matter how much space you put between the dots.
Comment by Cold Glider — September 22, 2009 @ 1:25 pm
The boy was right.
Comment by UNSC-AI-CTN-0452-9 — September 23, 2009 @ 5:03 pm
Glider, the first couple of missions you have to play in consecutive order. After that, it’s entirely up to you how you explore the city and which waypoints to check out next.
And the missions in question are mainly short action-oriented setpieces and should be taken as such.
Comment by Red Scharlach — September 24, 2009 @ 10:43 pm
I very much enjoyed the campaign of this game. More so than Halo 3. It was a completely different experience than any other game I’ve played. Having to adapt my Mark VI tendencies to that of an ODST was a very fulfilling experience.
Just as a side note I’d like to point out Ascendant Justice being named in the credits as a rock of the Halo community directly after the 7th column.
Comment by GRIT — September 25, 2009 @ 12:21 am
I have since beaten the game on Heroic and wanted to follow up. It’s true what Red Scharlach said about the city opening up a little after the second mission. Fair enough. Yet once those four are done it is back to linear mode again for the final two. The last two levels needed to be played sequentially (avoiding spoilers here) but those first two didn’t, so I wish they would have opened up the city from the start. I’m sure it was a playability decision; otherwise, many kids would have spent 20 minutes wandering around in the dark not finding the missions and reconsidering how to spend their $60.
In the end, you have to be a detail-oriented player and Halo fiction fan to enjoy the city. Fortunately for me, I am. I’m still working to unlock the secrets of New Mombasa so I personally can’t complain that the game is too boring or short. But I was bored there in the middle. By the time I was able to explore the city I felt that I had already seen it all and went steamrolling through the missions anyhow if only to avoid Jackal #95 sniping me from nondescript catwalk copy #343. Things have changed a little since I’ve beaten campaign, but the jury is still out whether or not the Mombasa Streets was a clever game/story device or just some technical flash to dress up the old game for new market space.
Firefight is a blast to play with your friends, though… even if you have already spent lots of time with the competitors’ horde modes.
The real ODST topic here should be: how about those symbols? If I were allowed to join the forums, perhaps I’d contribute to that topic. ;D
Comment by Cold Glider — September 25, 2009 @ 7:51 pm
I felt the city centre had a lot of character and was great to wander around, especially thanks to the continuous presence of the Superintendent (The cameras, car alarms, tills and dispensers being set off, the road barriers…) and all the little piecemeal details it hands you via the audio logs (which tied in thematically very well with unlocking weapons cache. It makes sense that in trying to help you out, it would also want you to pay close attention to what it’s trying to tell you), as well as the clever enemy patrols and indeed even the snipers.
Comment by Red Scharlach — September 26, 2009 @ 12:42 pm