My friend pre-ordered it from EBgames like 4 or 5 months ago, the $120 special edition version with the bust of Master Chiefs helmet. I think $120 is ridiculous price for that. It might different if you could actually wear the helmet..
I have never been a fan of Halo, I thought it was a wonderfully generic FPS that only managed to get the fan base it did simply because of timing and lack of any real titles on the Xbox. One quote I like is: "Is Halo popular because it is good? Or good because it is popular?".
If you have played any other FPS in your time, most people would be able to tell you that, there have been other, much better FPS out there, even a year or two out before Halo.
If you have played any other FPS in your time, most people would be able to tell you that, there have been other, much better FPS out there, even a year or two out before Halo.
Isn't that the truth. Though, it's easy to tell how Halo got popular....Online play! Without that, Halo would literally be nothing more than another FPS out there. I played the first Halo, got through the storyline, and...I was actually disappointed. So...I didn't bother buying Halo 2.
Somehow I'm betting people will do everything in their power to avoid playing the storyline and immediately get into the online play. Whenever you hear someone talk about Halo they don't really talk of the storyline.
Though....without the online play people would probably use Halo as a multiplayer for their friends.
Wait, I'm playing it now. It's been out all day (since before you posted this). Does that mean we (Australia) actually got the game before somewhere (other than New Zealand)?
According to the guy at EB I had to have a pre-order, but I think that's just their policy of not selling anything that isn't pre-ordered or pre-owned. I decided to give the good game store a shot, assuming they'd be sold out (it's a much smaller business), picked up a copy at a better price.
Though, it's easy to tell how Halo got popular....Online play!
Maybe for some people, but not for me. I have never played Halo 2 online, but I sill love the series. I love to play it single player and kill aliens. I just love the design of the game and how it works. I think they did a great job with that. The design of the game just makes you have fun while playing it.
Or yawn. I played both Halo 1 and Halo 2 and for the most part it was all run and gun and nothing else. It was a better looking version of Doom when you get right down to it. Sure you could use vehicles but all they were there for was killing stuff. Halo's online game play is nothing revolutionary on it's own. It boiled down to a pretty looking version of Quake 3 Arena. The only thing Halo is really good at, is generating a lot of money. It is a total cash cow. And I am sure it won't be the last time we see the damned title.
And I am sure it won't be the last time we see the damned title.
On that note, you ever come across a video game/movie sequel that did not have the original name of the first one in it? It'd be interesting coming across a Halo sequel that didn't have the name.
I guess there is a RTS in the works called Halo Wars or something. But I think it would be fairly easy to come up with a name for a new Halo title.
If you want an example for game titles, how about Bubble Bobble and Rainbow Islands? Although in this example, it might actually be compairing a prequel instead of a sequel. I forget if Rainbow Islands is supposed to come out before or after the events of Bubble Bobble.
I've seen a lot of FPSs with a large variety of gameplay. Had Halo no had good controls, and be pretty much the only FPS that was half decent on that generation of consoles, it would have failed horribly.
However, XBox pulled in a lot of new American gamers, and Halo was their first taste of FPSs. Because of that, they loved it. They had nothing to compare it with. So it took off. I can understand their point of view. The first FPS I played online was Gore. By most means it was a very crappy game, but I loved it, and still have some fondness for it after 6 six years.
Some of the more standout-ish games are HL2, because of the brilliant physics, and proper use of it. The Battlefield series for pushing the limit of size of maps and number of people in a game, along with the first ranking system(that I know of) that gave rewards worth a hoot. And my new favorite, TF2, whose extremely calculated classes makes everyone on a team very valuable, while still forcing correct teamwork to win a game(I assume TF:Classic was the same way, but I never played it). All these games didn't really follow the standard formula, and because of them, other games have started to including what made these games special (Well, except TF2{Team Fortress 2}, considering it is in beta, but I assume TF:Classic was very similar).
But how do those games deviate from the run and gun gameplay of shooters? Ultimately like halo, it comes down to running through the maps and killing stuff. Sure you can have fun playing with the physics and gravity gun in HL2, but it's purpose is to more or less kill stuff in cool ways.
Half Life 2 also includes puzzles and inventive ways of doing stuff. You had to think about what you were doing, there were secret areas accessable by solving certain puzzles, etc. When I've played Halo games, it was like a prettied up version of the original Timesplitters campaign - go here, kill stuff on the way, go somewhere else, kill stuff on the way.
By that argument, asteroids and pac-man are essentially the same game, because the over all point is to get points. Hell, by your definition, Ratchet and Clank is a run and gun. Yes, they all have something in common, shooting people. But that is not what you look at in the game. HL2 had some really interesting puzzles, that involved a lot more than just killing someone. Battlefield gave you many things to do besides kill. You could be medic and heal, you could be a commander and command, you could be an engineer and repair structures, you could be a Spec Ops and destroy enemy buildings.
Just because all First Person Shooters require shooting doesn't mean that they are all run and gun. There are even games like Splinter Cell where it's bad to kill people, at least in any tradition sense, and the best thing to do is to subdue them well.
My point is, games do deviate from the de facto standard all the time. Sure, at some point or another, you normally have to shoot something. If you didn't, it couldn't be called a First Person Shooter.
It is a total cash cow. And I am sure it won't be the last time we see the damned title.
Why the hell does Halo piss people off? It is a damn video game! Honestly, I think people who let a video game get to them should get a damn life. I find it so ridiculous, I can't find words for it. People honestly get pissed off, they actually get mad because a video game is popular. It boggles my friggin' mind.
HL2 had some really interesting puzzles, that involved a lot more than just killing someone.
This may make me look like an idiot, but I don't recall seeing any puzzles in there. Were they optional and I wasn't paying enough attention to stop and do them?
There were jumping puzzles and physics puzzles. The more prominent of the two was at the beginning of Sandtraps (I think it was Sandtraps), right before you're about to face the first antlion guard. You have to jump from rock to rock and avoid getting on the sand, lest the antlions get you. After that you have to use the gravity gun to make a pathway to non-sand land.
I have never been a fan of Halo, I thought it was a wonderfully generic FPS that only managed to get the fan base it did simply because of timing and lack of any real titles on the Xbox. One quote I like is: "Is Halo popular because it is good? Or good because it is popular?".
If you have played any other FPS in your time, most people would be able to tell you that, there have been other, much better FPS out there, even a year or two out before Halo.