Halo Master Chief Collection [H:MCC] [XO, XBSX|S, PC, XGP]
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SenjutsuSage
Newcomer
Don't get the Halo 4 hate, personally. I think it's the best game in the franchise. Speaking strictly about the awesome singleplayer campaign, I enjoyed it a whole lot more than I did the other Halo titles, and I really enjoyed those games. Not all longtime Halo fans are MP players (I get Halo for the SP campaign), and not all longtime Halo fans think Halo 4 was a disaster.
In order of best to worst, I personally label them as follows.
Halo 4
Halo CE
Halo 2
Halo Reach
Halo 3
I haven't played ODST.
I totally second you on weapon balance. I enjoyed the balance of weapons a lot more in this game, and I thought the prometheans were a fantastic addition to the sandbox. I also like the way the campaign levels were setup. I thought the art was the best yet, the levels I feel had more purpose and felt more believable. It enhanced the experience of playing the game because it was easier to imagine myself being in the various locations, and it was easier to see them serving some kind of purpose. I think next gen Halo was partly losing its way. It's not always about massive, wide open spaces, although the fight spaces in Halo 4 are plenty big enough. The art has to help tell a story, too, imo, and I found it pretty difficult at times in Halo 3 and Reach to actually feel like I was actually apart of an environment that served an actual purpose. This wasn't an impression I got all the time, of course, but I certainly had this feeling more than enough times to know I didn't like the impression I was getting at times, and I felt Halo 4 didn't force larger and larger levels down our throats just for the sake of it. I thought the levels made more fictional and artistic sense, and that the encounters felt better as a result, exactly as it was done so well in Halo CE. It didn't feel like some cookie cutter place that you were just dropped into to just start killing enemies that were shooting at you. I thought Halo CE and 2 did a pretty good job of this probably because those games were better designed within their technical limits, some parts of Halo 3 and Reach (mostly Halo 3) just felt like playspaces used for testing, and not really something that was thought out. I know that isn't truly the case, but it's how I felt. It didn't feel interesting enough to me at times. I love some of the battles in Halo 3 and Reach, and all the best ones had a strong aura of planning around them, and were all the better for it. They felt carefully setup and orchestrated, beyond just sending in a new wave. Take firefight, for example, the mode feels like something used purely for playtests, but with nothing really interesting happening around you besides more waves of enemies. That's how I view many parts of Halo 3 and parts of Reach, but Halo 4, to me, just felt right, and the art and design played a huge part in that. It's the 360 Halo title that did the best job, to me, of remembering that Halo is also about taking in your surroundings and often being in awe of what you're looking at, and Halo 4 totally nailed this. It really did.
Halo 4, I feel, is a more tightly (and skillfully) directed and designed game than the others in the franchise, the best since Halo CE, and combined with enjoying the weapons and the fights so much, along with the awesome story and character development for the Chief and Cortana, it made me come away thinking it was the best game in the series. And the icing on the cake? The incredible pacing of the game. I felt as if there was never a dull moment in the game. It kept me hooked the entire time. Even little things like the part where they had Cortana redirect the Chief's armor shields towards boosting the ghost so you could make that fast escape. That was a fantastic idea, and a nice change of pace from what I had been doing up until that point. There's so many things that makes me love Halo 4, especially the kind of hit detection I've been waiting to see forever, the chief being shown off in a way I've always dreamed of seeing, and so skillfully delving further into his humanity and his relationship with Cortana without totally screwing it up. That was a major missed opportunity in Halo 3, and I think we have to be willing to admit that much. That's enough from me, but I love Halo 4. 343i aren't ruining a thing. In fact, I think they breathed some much needed life into the franchise, and despite Reach being Bungie's best Halo game on the 360, Halo was losing its appeal, for me anyway. I have no opinion on MP, since I've never been too intrigued by Halo's MP.
You had to unlock grenades to use them? That doesn't sound like a very good idea at all, but, again, I'm not an mp guy. I'm into halo for the campaigns.
In order of best to worst, I personally label them as follows.
Halo 4
Halo CE
Halo 2
Halo Reach
Halo 3
I haven't played ODST.
I totally second you on weapon balance. I enjoyed the balance of weapons a lot more in this game, and I thought the prometheans were a fantastic addition to the sandbox. I also like the way the campaign levels were setup. I thought the art was the best yet, the levels I feel had more purpose and felt more believable. It enhanced the experience of playing the game because it was easier to imagine myself being in the various locations, and it was easier to see them serving some kind of purpose. I think next gen Halo was partly losing its way. It's not always about massive, wide open spaces, although the fight spaces in Halo 4 are plenty big enough. The art has to help tell a story, too, imo, and I found it pretty difficult at times in Halo 3 and Reach to actually feel like I was actually apart of an environment that served an actual purpose. This wasn't an impression I got all the time, of course, but I certainly had this feeling more than enough times to know I didn't like the impression I was getting at times, and I felt Halo 4 didn't force larger and larger levels down our throats just for the sake of it. I thought the levels made more fictional and artistic sense, and that the encounters felt better as a result, exactly as it was done so well in Halo CE. It didn't feel like some cookie cutter place that you were just dropped into to just start killing enemies that were shooting at you. I thought Halo CE and 2 did a pretty good job of this probably because those games were better designed within their technical limits, some parts of Halo 3 and Reach (mostly Halo 3) just felt like playspaces used for testing, and not really something that was thought out. I know that isn't truly the case, but it's how I felt. It didn't feel interesting enough to me at times. I love some of the battles in Halo 3 and Reach, and all the best ones had a strong aura of planning around them, and were all the better for it. They felt carefully setup and orchestrated, beyond just sending in a new wave. Take firefight, for example, the mode feels like something used purely for playtests, but with nothing really interesting happening around you besides more waves of enemies. That's how I view many parts of Halo 3 and parts of Reach, but Halo 4, to me, just felt right, and the art and design played a huge part in that. It's the 360 Halo title that did the best job, to me, of remembering that Halo is also about taking in your surroundings and often being in awe of what you're looking at, and Halo 4 totally nailed this. It really did.
Halo 4, I feel, is a more tightly (and skillfully) directed and designed game than the others in the franchise, the best since Halo CE, and combined with enjoying the weapons and the fights so much, along with the awesome story and character development for the Chief and Cortana, it made me come away thinking it was the best game in the series. And the icing on the cake? The incredible pacing of the game. I felt as if there was never a dull moment in the game. It kept me hooked the entire time. Even little things like the part where they had Cortana redirect the Chief's armor shields towards boosting the ghost so you could make that fast escape. That was a fantastic idea, and a nice change of pace from what I had been doing up until that point. There's so many things that makes me love Halo 4, especially the kind of hit detection I've been waiting to see forever, the chief being shown off in a way I've always dreamed of seeing, and so skillfully delving further into his humanity and his relationship with Cortana without totally screwing it up. That was a major missed opportunity in Halo 3, and I think we have to be willing to admit that much. That's enough from me, but I love Halo 4. 343i aren't ruining a thing. In fact, I think they breathed some much needed life into the franchise, and despite Reach being Bungie's best Halo game on the 360, Halo was losing its appeal, for me anyway. I have no opinion on MP, since I've never been too intrigued by Halo's MP.
You had to unlock grenades to use them? That doesn't sound like a very good idea at all, but, again, I'm not an mp guy. I'm into halo for the campaigns.
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Back of the envelope dumb calculations, if XBO has ~6x the flops of 360 (1300 vs 200), Halo XBO could struggle to differentiate.
Halve the XBO flops per pixel for 60 FPS vs 30 Halo 4
Halve them again for 1080P vs 720.
Leaves you with an equivalent 325 GFLOPS (yes I know this is all stupendously broad, and XBO is likely to get a lot more out of each GPU FLOP)
Could be an issue of "it looks like a last gen game in HD". We will see.
Halve the XBO flops per pixel for 60 FPS vs 30 Halo 4
Halve them again for 1080P vs 720.
Leaves you with an equivalent 325 GFLOPS (yes I know this is all stupendously broad, and XBO is likely to get a lot more out of each GPU FLOP)
Could be an issue of "it looks like a last gen game in HD". We will see.
Unfortunately that's what I'm afraid of considering Laa-Yosh has said it won't be using a new engine just the old one pushing higher framerate and resolution...it'd be ironic if it ends up looking worse than Destiny...
SenjutsuSage
Newcomer
Halo 4 already looked quite next gen in my eyes. Also, I think greater efficiencies and just plain much more capable hardware, which will make more impressive looking features easier to achieve, should more than take care of that. I personally don't think they should force the issue to try to hit 1080p. I really don't. Look at Ryse at 900p. It's nice to say you're running at 1080p, but that doesn't always make it a better game. As has been said, games are a largely visual medium, and I would take a more graphically impressive title at a lower resolution that is also hitting the 60fps target. Plus, the game's cutscenes, which were quite impressive in Halo 4, are something I can see being done at half the frame rate (30 fps) to make them look even more amazing. I just want the best possible game looking as good as they can possibly get it to look. I can see a lot suffering at 1080p, and I hope they don't go that route. There was a time when I didn't have to guess what was going to happen at 343
SenjutsuSage
Newcomer
Exactly the reaction I expected, but the game looks amazing. Probably not acceptable for a console as powerful as the Xbox One, but it did look incredible on 7 year old hardware, so I can only imagine what the Xbox One version will look like.
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The game actually looks much better than this at many points.
One more, and there's far prettier spots that I haven't even touched.
http://www.brokenjoysticks.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Halo4_2.jpg
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shredenvain
Regular
I think Halo 4 was a big step from Halo 3 and Reach in graphical and artwork quality.
Im not sure I would go as far as saying it looked like a next gen game. It did look to be pushing the xbox 360 to a graphics level that most didnt think it was capable of.
As far as his pics being bullshots, the top picture from the opening level looks spot on to the game to me. These shots are likely higher res shots from development hardware. The same thing they do with the pics on the back of game boxes.
I dont really understand all the hate towards halo 4 either. 343i did an outstanding job especialy considering that it is the studios first release.
1080p and 60fps could be a bit far-fetched. I don't know, it can happen, and I've seen what the Xbox One can do -I have quite a few games already and Forza 5, Ryse, KI, NBA 2k14 have some awe inspiring moments, technically wise, the console is much more capable than it was credited for-, but such a resolution and framerate -provided it is utterly stable- is going to put a lot of stress into the hardware.
It can be kinda a pain, we shall see.
Agreed.
Anyway I think 343 should target 60fps at a certain pixel fidelity level and then see what resolution they could get...vs targeting 1080P and then see what kind of pixel fidelity they could get. I'd be happy if it looks at least as good as Destiny or KZSF.
Also I wish they would tone down the use of colored lighting for areas and only use them in spots.
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To be fair to 343i, although the bullshots for Halo 4 have excellent IQ, they're mostly playing with legitimate in-game assets. If you're willing to look past the vaseline and shimmering, Halo 4 does actually look a lot like the promo material. Here's a direct (albeit unfortunately imgur'd) image of that famous room from the opening of Dawn, courtesy of Fyrewulff.
Complaining that Halo 4 doesn't look ridiculously technically accomplished in still shots is a very hard position to take, unless you're specifically targeting some of the larger gameplay areas, or talking about stuff like low-resolution skyboxes with insuffient geometry, or water (and even then, those are only particularly "atrocious" in comparison to Bungie's efforts).
Halo 4 responded to Halo player's demands for more colourful visuals by using plenty of saturation, but it doesn't really have much in the way of vibrant multi-colour schemes for levels, which is what a lot of people were really asking for (largely due to Reach's more subdued colours). When Halo 4 uses more than one hue, it's usually tron line highlights which don't fill out the scene so much as shimmer and try to burn your eyes out.
Halo 4's approach to colour looks bold, but it's neither pleasant nor interesting in its own right.
That SpOps map "Apex" looks a lot technically sloppier than most of Halo 4, but I remember not being the only person who thought that it managed to also look a lot better than most of Halo 4. Largely because it did things like use a balanced, healthy green/blue blend.
This pic you linked to is exactly what I'm talking about with regards to colored lighting...it's horrible. It's like a helmet visor with an ugly green/blue tint Metal Gear Solid style. Some people may find it "cool looking" but I think it's artistically horrible. It reminds me of old games like Quake and the overuse of colored lighting.
Also look down the corridor...it's all orange lighting...ugh.
Also look down the corridor...it's all orange lighting...ugh.
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SenjutsuSage
Newcomer
Well, I also have the game, and the game looks downright incredible, whatever your own personal opinion. Call them bullshots if you want, but save for the AA quality, the game matches the level of graphics quality easily in the campaign. In fact, there's parts of the campaign that I feel exceed some of the shots I've posted in terms of overall impressiveness.
Also, why wouldn't I also post cutscenes? They're all real-time and from the game, are they not? With the exception of the opening with Dr. Halsey being interrogated, and the ending when the chief is walking back onto the Infinity, they're all real-time. So, the cutscenes are, in fact, fair game, because they really do look that damn good. You don't have to agree, but as someone else already said, Halo 4's campaign pretty much achieves the visual quality as displayed in its promo material. It's by no means as far off as you seem to be implying when you call them simply bullshots. The artistic vision for this game was absolutely nailed in the game's real-time graphics, especially the impressive looking jungle location and plenty of others that I don't have the time to go into.
SenjutsuSage
Newcomer
So your argument ends up amounting to I haven't played the game. Pretty weak. It's one of my favorite damn 360 titles, and one of the games I've played the most. I haven't beaten or played any other Halo game this gen more times than I have Halo 4. I know the cutscenes look better. They are supposed to look better, but it still doesn't change what I'm saying. The game looks incredible in cutscenes as well as during gameplay, and there's simply no questioning that. Halo 4 is an unbelievable looking game, and is quite easily one of the most impressive looking games of the last generation.
If you're implying that Halo 4 looks nowhere close to the images, then you would be mistaken. And, for the record, that youtube video you posted of the cutscenes does not do the game any justice. Are the large majority of halo 4's cutscenes not real-time? I think they are, unless I've thought wrong this entire time. I can go into so much detail about Halo 4's campaign, and everything it did at every stage that it would seem almost crazy. I, of all people, haven't played Halo 4? Don't make me laugh. I don't think you realize how much I love the Halo franchise, and how serious I take the fiction and universe. Me missing a game in the franchise that focuses on the Master Chief and Cortana is the epitome of craziness.
I've played all Halo games except Halo ODST and Halo Wars.
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Nobody is disagreeing with that.
Heh... Either you're wrong, or SenjutsuSage has graced NeoGAF with some amazingly dedicated trolling.
Right, but can you completely toss cutscenes out in a discussion of a game's technical merits? They're still something the 360 is being made to do, even if they tend to be in a different location on the slidey scale of baked versus real-time than gameplay. There's absolutely a technical impressiveness argument to be had, whether or not you agree with it.
The sequence in the middle of Reclaimer looks pre-rendered as well.
SenjutsuSage
Newcomer
Oh yea,
. Yea, that bit was definitely not real-time.
the Librarian's story to the Chief
