My review.
My review.
Campaign was absolutely spectacular. The story. The graphics. The emotion. The audio soundtrack didn't "feel" like halo, but that's a very minor setback. I give the campaign a 10. And it took 4 of us to complete in just over 6 hours.
Multiplayer: I've played for about an hour, and the game feels balanced. The DMR is the goto weapon for starters, BR is better at close distances. SAW is a beast at close and mid range (with burst fire). I have not played any CTF, but I think it will be ok. I do NOT like that they got rid of my pirate icon :(
Thus far, I am overly suprised at how much I am enjoying it. I'm not a fan of instant respawns, as I had a couple instances of a person spawning right behind me. Personally, I see no difference in jetpack. Light shield is decent, but thruster is where it's at IMHO. I said I was underenthused, and this game delivered. I am not liking having to unlock everything, as that is one of CoD's major setbacks. Perhaps with time, it won't be an issue. But for now, it is :)
Campaign:9.5/10
MMing thus far: 10/10
I have only played the campaign so far, but I consider this one to be among the best. I couldn't be a happier customer as far as campaign goes. I'll let you know what I think of the matchmaking after I get some rest.
Sorry I did not catch up with you Lou. Pick up at BB of my preorder was a nightmare. Apparently the order was "stuck" in the system. I was told this after standing in line for almost an hour. Finally, with the help of a manager, I was able to cancel my order with full refund then order it as a preorder to get the skins and stuff. After all that I came home, installed the game, and hit the sack. I plan on pounding the game pretty hard today.
I'm confused. You say "I give the campaign a 10" and down bottom you say 9.5/10
So what is it? 9.5 or 10!!!!! ;)
9.5. I deducted for the music ;)
LOL there IS a pirate icon for your emblem dude. Just rank up enough to unlock it. I have a ton of emblems to pick from now that launch people don't.
Loved the single player and some of the co-op stuff.
Multiplayer is horrific. It has potential to be okay at best if they create an actual vanilla playlist, but even slayer pro feels like this sham is nothiing more than a cheap knock off of the game franchise it used to be. This game is obviously trying to keep up with the the other big guy on the block, and plays like 343 thinks that Call Of Duty would be way more awesome if it had recharging sheilds. Reach was the kick in the left nut now this is the kick in the right nut.
The campaign was freaking awesome. Really, far better than I expected. Ending was just flat out great. I didnt care for the music at first either, but it grew on me. Some of the weapon effects sound weak or muffled to me. That is really my only complaint.
As far as MP goes - I havent played COD or Battlefield since the first COD. So I dont really have any context, but this MP feels like Halo to me. I like it a lot. I dont really care for the "no friendly fire" thing in Infinity Slayer because people behave differently, but with that exception, I have loved it. I have only played 3 maps so far, but I really like Complex.
I love the MP. I feel like a kid again.
Apparently even with friendly fire turned off, Quad can betray you. On a mongoose. Lmao...favorite moment of H4 so far for me!
Missing the X when someone dies. Even when uou know all the call outs, sometimes you're halfway between two of them, or "slightly to the left" of one. I know "on my X" is the worst call of all, but sometimes it's that or giving lengthy GPS directions...
And the lobby system doesn't tell me if youre with people or alone, unless i go through the whole process of looking at your party details. So I apologize in advance for sending everyone on my FL invites when I think you may be lonely lol
I have to say I'm absolutely unconditionally loving MM, sure I am getting my ass kicked but I am having so much fun I don't think I will be playing the campaign for quite sometime. It immediately showed me how much Reach MM sucked, even though I played that solidly for 2+ years.
Ok. It is next day and my conclusions are: what I have seen and successfully played of the game is great. HOWEVER -- I feel 343 has really screwed the pooch on the release and support of the game. After a day of major personal hassles (you don't want to know) I finally was able to get on last night and play a little MM. Things that I noticed while on:
-- when I checked some parties the party info showed no players in the list and 0 players in the party, WTF?
-- on multiple occasions MM just failed, of the few times we got into MM, lag was terrible.
-- finally was forced into customs just to play.
There is now a thread in the Waypoint Forums for reporting issues. As of a few minutes ago it had 40 pages. Some of the replies are standard Timmie rants, but most point to the same kind of thing -- insufficient network and server support for the online players. Come on 343 you had a chance to really stand up on this and you failed. Some would say that the load of players on release day contributed to the problem, but a large number of players should have been ANTICIPATED and ACCOMODATED.
It appears to me that 343 was simply not ready for this, which is a trend I have seen on others things from them (this missed the cut, that missed the cut, etc.). I believe that throwing a beta out there would have highlighted some of the problems which then could be fixed, but because of either hard deadlines, or their arrogance, or both, that did not happen and now we as gamers are paying the price. Thanks 343.
End of rant.gif "54")
I have had zero networking issues online. Is your NAT set to moderate?
Open Nat 20+ down/10 up. H 4 shows only the NAT; does not show packet loss or upstream bandwidth like Reach, but last time I played Reach all three were good. I wasn't the only one having problems last night. Today was better but there was still some lag in MM and I was playing only Regicide. Several games I started off "dead." BTW, 343 admits there are problems.
The boltshot is crazy. It charges real quick and it's stronger than the shotgun. Really good for popping around corners and getting a free kill. Sadly the BR is just not worth using anymore. At any range it's either equally as good as the DMR or worse, so you might as well stick with the DMR so your damage doesn't drop off at range.
Agreed. The BR just feels weaker especially considering the size of these maps. I would prefer to use the BR becuase it's just more fun to use, but it I want to keep my struggling K/D to the positive, I'll have to stick with the DMR. I haven't unlocked the LR yet, so we'll see how it plays.
Also, people have to expect there will be connection and servers issues during launch. It happened with Bungie, so why not expect 343 would have issues too?
I did have some strange connections issues last night, but we were never unable to play. I say be patient, 343 has delivered one hell of a game.
I haven't used the bolt shot charged yet. It's fairly accurate at range. That might make it the best default secondary.
the magnum seems really strong now. As does the AR. Both seem to kill a bit quicker.
My Arctic Camo BR was just plain shit last night. I suck anyway, so what's new with that. I just thought the BR might account for my lousy aim.
Werebad connection issues day one. Yesterday and last night we hit a few, but not as bad.
I now know that my KD will always be negative. I realized that last night I had just as much fun winning a game as I did losing one. I love explosions.
Got a chance to play a few Regicide games during the day yesterday. No issues getting into the games, but in a couple I started off dead WTF? -- and I have no bandwidth or NAT problems. Also as stated by others, the "Roster" is definitely missing info. When I go in to see party details I see only which general "lobby" the party is in. Nothing else.
As a guy that loves to hate on this game- haven't liked any titles since Halo2- I find myself extremely impressed with just about every aspect. Most importantly- ITS FUN TO PLAY AGAIN. Weapons feel very balanced- finally the AR is useful at close range, DMR and BR both have their places, and the many other weapon choices are fun to use.(full disclosure-starting to hate the sword) As far as the networking issues are concerned, I've finally relaxed enough as a gamer to just give it a few weeks. For the last 8 years every time one of my go-to titles gets released I play it the next day and go on a huge rant about how the devs failed, multiplayer is broken etc, networking sucks, and it inevitably works itself out. I'm sure it will be much smoother in the coming weeks and I'll hold judgment till then. 343 had a lot to live up to. I think they gave it their all and it shows. On a side note, why all the hate on the BR? I know its no DMR long range but mid it's pretty brutal, and I think it gives you more liberty with your aim to snag a head shot while aiming more for center mass on account of the 3 round burst. Just my opinion.
This is brilliant (and not just because you're my brother) because of how accurate it is. I like to hate Halo at this point. I've been disappointed for nearly 3 titles and as much as I thought this would be another POS I was completely shocked. I spent the entire Chicago LAN actually PLAYING this game. I got heated over matches, felt the responsive nature of H2, and was addicted to gameplay. Will I be playing it for years to come? Probably not, but then again I swore I'd never play another Halo title again.
343 did something I never thought they would do. They saw what COD was doing and built on it. They took ideas that were outside of their nature and ran with it. They moved with the times and responded to the current era of FPS gaming. Its not perfect, its not revolutionary, but its still a better Halo. I understand hating on the game, I've done it myself for nearly 2 years, but I'm not sure how you can say this isn't an improvement. I'm thinking of even trying to get into a cool clan like 2old2playhalo.
Oh now your'e making me blush!
Yah Achy. I'm pretty confused over the spawning into game thing. I'm often on the other team of the party I joined, and appear to often start off dead as well. Last night it looked to me like the game joined me, but not the other member of my party that was waiting to join with me, and that was similar to what he experienced.
I'm confused, and I may not understand the new lobby system yet.
I'm finally getting used to the lobby system. It's not as good as the Reach one, it's less intuitive and takes more button presses to get the same info you used to get at a glance, but at least it works right?