Halo 4

[ShadowWolf64]

The majority of the mp matches that I've played in have been lag free with only a handful of them being laggy.MP is alot of fun but more importantly is team oriented similar to how Halo 2 mp was.Really can't wait when 343i adds more gametypes along with the skill based ranking system at the beginning of next year.On a sidenote, I'm really loving the Dominion gametype as its a mix of Gears of War 3's Horde where you fortify bases after being captured and similar to Battlefield's Conquest mode.Regicide is also alot of fun as well..

 

[Turok]

Halo 3 and Reach mp had good gameplay but the majority of the map design was medicore to say the least.With Halo 4, map design is far better than those two games by a wide margin along with controls being more intuitive and tighter as well.Considering these 343i first Halo game, it's a fantastic game and can't wait to see what they do with the series on the next Xbox..

Can't say I agree at all. There's no areas in Halo 4 that stick out as memorable to me. Nothing like the single Scarab fight or dual Scarab fight in 3, the last level in 3 where you have to escape the exploding Ark, New Alexandria in Reach, or the run to the Pillar of Autumn in Reach.

 

[kagemaru]

I agree with the points about there sometimes being too much bloom and even some of the opinions on the campaign itself. It's true that the game lacks those 2 scarab battle-type moments from Halo 3, but in a lot of ways ODST and Reach were the same for me. I can think of a couple memorable firefights in Reach and the same for Halo 4 (opening of the 4th mission IIRC and the one firefight where you're teleported to that pretty big battle with the tanks and wraiths). I think the bigger issue is how common the game is padded with duplicate objectives TBH. I also agree that the game has lost some of it's humor and the new enemies lack distinct and easily recognizable features to tell them apart very well.

Even with this said, I still think it has solid level design and was one of the better campaigns in the series. IMO it seems like 343i were intentionally playing it safe with Halo 4, maybe to calm any fears that they don't understand the core design principles behind the franchise before they do anything radically different. At least that's my hope. With Halo 5 surely coming next gen, I think that'll be the team's best chance to really try something new.

Also, while I'm used to it now, initially I wasn't a fan of the UI at all. Reach's menu system was much easier to grasp at first IMO.

Can't say I agree at all. There's no areas in Halo 4 that stick out as memorable to me. Nothing like the single Scarab fight or dual Scarab fight in 3, the last level in 3 where you have to escape the exploding Ark, New Alexandria in Reach, or the run to the Pillar of Autumn in Reach.

Sounds like he was talking about the MP and not the campaign.

 

[Rangers]

Can't say I agree at all. There's no areas in Halo 4 that stick out as memorable to me. Nothing like the single Scarab fight or dual Scarab fight in 3, the last level in 3 where you have to escape the exploding Ark, New Alexandria in Reach, or the run to the Pillar of Autumn in Reach.

The Mammoth level is quite memorable off the top of my head. Though in general I dont wholly disagree.

Another issue that I didn't really think about till I heard or read it somewhere else, but I tend to agree with, is that the forerunners and promethean knights are not as fun to fight as the covenant.

the promethean knights can almost be deemed annoying in retrospect. certainly they are mostly an enemy fought only at long range. they are borderline annoying on normal, hearing a friend describe them in legendary (almost impossible to kill) sounds horrible.

though being negative in many of my writings on it, i still liked the game mind you. also an audiovisual spectacle, which makes the experience much better.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

I dunno, I find that trying to fight Knights from a range has problems similar to engaging Elites - they can usually take cover to reload their shields, so you end up wasting a LOT of ammo until you get lucky and the AI makes a wrong call.

Especially because unlike the Elites, you usually can't just headshot them with a BR, DMR or Magnum when their shields drop. And I think the sniper rifle isn't as efficient against them either, it certainly can't two-shot them.

But if you get close, they have melee attacks and some pretty powerful weapons like the scattershot or that exploding rocket launcher type stuff. So there's a lot of risk vs. reward thing going on with them.

Now them Watchers getting into cover, that really is annoying though
It's also interesting how most weapons have decreased ammo supply, I'm in chapter 6 and I have to abandon my UNSC weapons about 1/3 the way inside the structures... but the DMR is so good against the Prometheans...

 

[kagemaru]

I dunno, I find that trying to fight Knights from a range has problems similar to engaging Elites - they can usually take cover to reload their shields, so you end up wasting a LOT of ammo until you get lucky and the AI makes a wrong call.

Especially because unlike the Elites, you usually can't just headshot them with a BR, DMR or Magnum when their shields drop. And I think the sniper rifle isn't as efficient against them either, it certainly can't two-shot them.

But if you get close, they have melee attacks and some pretty powerful weapons like the scattershot or that exploding rocket launcher type stuff. So there's a lot of risk vs. reward thing going on with them.

Now them Watchers getting into cover, that really is annoying though
It's also interesting how most weapons have decreased ammo supply, I'm in chapter 6 and I have to abandon my UNSC weapons about 1/3 the way inside the structures... but the DMR is so good against the Prometheans...

Yeah I actually don't think the Knights are bad enemies to fight. I think some of their abilities are pretty cool, such as teleporting or that speedy dash they use to swipe at you. It's just their visual design that lacks clear features to tell which version you're fighting that kind of bothers me. Seeing what weapon they have is another issue at times. It would be nice to know I'm approaching a Knight with a scattershot equipped before I got too close.

 

[Billy Idol]

Finished the game. Great experience! I really liked it and doesn't have that much problems with SP as most of you guys.

For instance, fighting the forerunner was way better than the Covenant. Covenant are easy mode imo. First I always take out those flying things from a far, than kill the forerunners. I have one issue with those enemies: there is one type (Jumper with the spikes amor) that often rushes at you and takes you out with one single shot of there forerunner shotgun. But I learned to live with that by scouting the battlefield before rushing in. I love the USNC weapons (DMR), but also appreciate the forerunner rifles.

With respect to story...I just love sci fi and I love the Halo universe...the franchise seems to go in the right direction imo, can't wait for thenext installation and the Spartan Ops missions. What really surprises me, but in a negative way, what other people seems to like: Cortana is modelled and animated as a sexy women...really really does not fit...this is sick. Cortana showing more emotions and feelings in her facial animation than most other games combined...ultra does not fit imo, she is a AI. All people around the world seem to have forgotten about this little but important fact...


Graphics are good, I like them. Weird: what impresses me the most is the section where you ride the Mech the first time. Somehow, the Mech looked super good and I constantly had to watch it only downside I can think of: particle effects, explosions are basically non-existant. That is a visual downer. An audio downer: music was to subtle, sound mix was wrong and could not be adjusted (how weird is that). On the other hand, sound effects are great imo. Oh, and btw: bloom is cool!

All together, the experience I hoped for.

Great.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

AIs in the Halo universe have personalities because the neural network is a copy of a human brain. In the case of Cortana, she's a copy of Dr. Halsey, the woman interrogated in the prologue and responsible for creating the Spartans including Master Chief. Another key difference is that every other AI was copied from a dead brain because the process would kill the subject; but Cortana was copied from a living clone of Halsey (which was illegal and one of the reasons for the handcuffs).

It gets a bit convoluted, yes, but the point is that Cortana is basically an artificial person, not just intelligent. She has a sense of humor as well, so emotions aren't that foreign either. Besides, the story wouldn't really work any other way.

 

[dragonelite]

AIs in the Halo universe have personalities because the neural network is a copy of a human brain. In the case of Cortana, she's a copy of Dr. Halsey, the woman interrogated in the prologue and responsible for creating the Spartans including Master Chief. Another key difference is that every other AI was copied from a dead brain because the process would kill the subject; but Cortana was copied from a living clone of Halsey (which was illegal and one of the reasons for the handcuffs).

It gets a bit convoluted, yes, but the point is that Cortana is basically an artificial person, not just intelligent. She has a sense of humor as well, so emotions aren't that foreign either. Besides, the story wouldn't really work any other way.

I thought cortana is the only one based of a human brain?
Could be wrong.

 

[Onkl Bjorni]

I thought cortana is the only one based of a human brain?
Could be wrong.

All human/UNSC "smart" AIs are created using either actual human brains or a cloned human brain.

From Halopedia.. http://www.halopedia.org/Smart_artificial_intelligence

But Cortana is special because she is the only ai that's copied from a living brain. (As Laa-Yosh pointed out already)

Be warned that you can lose countless hours reading all the info here
And you will properly run into Halo4 spoilers, so read at own risk..

 

[dragonelite]

All human/UNSC "smart" AIs are created using either actual human brains or a cloned human brain.

From Halopedia.. http://www.halopedia.org/Smart_artificial_intelligence

But Cortana is special because she is the only ai that's copied from a living brain. (As Laa-Yosh pointed out already)

Be warned that you can lose countless hours reading all the info here
And you will properly run into Halo4 spoilers, so read at own risk..

I know that site and already lost a couple of nights on it.
I just wasn't sure if every Ai used a brain.

Because i lightly remembered cortana being special because of a living brain.

 

[kagemaru]

Cortana is modelled and animated as a sexy women...really really does not fit...this is sick.

I guess I can understand why you think she's modeled as a sexy woman, but how is she animated as one?

Honestly I never got the complaint of Cortana's look in Halo 4. Improvements in the rendering allowed more detail, so she looks.....better than she did in previous games.

 

[milk]

I never found cortana's look very apealing. To me she always looked a little chubby, style-less, busty and blue.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

Halo 3 Cortana was pretty slim actually, and none of them were chubby...

 

[Ruskie]

Finished the game in one breath. Great shooter, solid SP and great MP. Game looks very nice and sound is awesome, but for a game that resolves around shooting pink midget aliens with funny voices, they sure take it serious.

Compared to something like ME universe, it definitely comes of as uninteresting and kiddy. I just can't care about story, about orchestra music and pompous cut-scenes when the game comes of as "viva pinata the shooter".

 

[NRP]

It's only a "viva piñata" shooter if you enable the grunt birthday party skull.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

but for a game that resolves around shooting pink midget aliens with funny voices, they sure take it serious.

Actually the grunts aren't pink anymore, they look a bit scary and their voices aren't as funny either.

On the other hand some people complained that removing the bright saturated coloring from the Covenant armor makes them far harder to differentiate and assess threat levels. So the size and color variation had a very important gameplay function and it's kinda hard to replace with anything else.

Mass Effect hasn't got such big open battlefields and the third person view allows you to keep an eye on everything even when you're in cover, so there's no need for such a visual element. The number of enemies is also much smaller and you also have your team members taking some of the enemy fire away from you, giving even more time to just lazily look around and formulate strategies. Halo is a much faster paced game with greater enemy weapon variety so quick assessment is far more important.

Compared to something like ME universe, it definitely comes of as uninteresting and kiddy.

It's certainly not there yet but Halo 4, and the additional fiction like Forward Unto Dawn or the books, are IMHO a significant step in a far more serious and darker direction. But the groundwork was there from the start. The entire conception of the Spartans is a pretty grim story with completely immoral experiments and indoctrination performed on children forced into lifelong military service.

For some reason Bungie decided to leave this background info out of the games almost completely, but they still weren't kiddy at all. Basically the entire cast of Halo 1 dies by the end of the game, so Master Chief gets progressively lonelier, eventually having to kill his former allies who were turned into flood zombies. And until the very end of Halo 3 it's a slow but unstoppable apocalypse for humanity from the start, whereas in Mass Effect you can collect fishes and visit strip bars although I admit that isn't really a kiddy thing either.

 

[Gerry]

I never found cortana's look very apealing. To me she always looked a little chubby, style-less, busty and blue.

Chubby? You've got issues.

 

[Billy Idol]

Well that explains why Cortana is so emotional of course...still feels weird to me somehow.

'Sexy animations'...when she walks around and swings her hips like a table dancer...

I have the impression that the whole tone of the game got more serious...away from Viva Pinata towards Mass Effect. That is why I like the new part so much...good direction from 343 imo. All enemy designs are more gritty, and I still think that it is easily possible to distinguish the enemies...yellow elites are bastards and need to be taken out first with maximum force. But I only use scoped weapons...except the forerunner shotgun of course!

What I forgot to mention: vehicle sections where actually enjoyable for me and not overused imo to artificially break up the game.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

You can almost always chose to go on foot in the vehicle sections. The only exceptions are

Spoiler

mission 6 and 8

Even with the Mantis you can just shoot that door and then walk through it without the mech - I haven't checked if the enemies drop weapons but why wouldn't they. But good luck surviving the final part of that level without the big guns