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Re: Points on your H3 review (long)
Posted By: Gravemind <kuukan_no_kage@yahoo.com>	Date: 4/23/08 12:10 a.m.
In Response To: Points on your H3 review (long) (Rockslider) I'm back. Sorry for the late reply. : Looks like I visited the forum at an opportune time. I've read through a good : deal of your review and have various comments, but let me say in advance : that I'm only concerned with campaign mode here. Yeah. If I recall, you only play Campaign, correct? : Yes, maybe you could just rename yourself 'Mindwoffle' and be done with it. : Plus it would stop us confusing you with that giant pot-plant! Are we allowed to change our usernames here? I've been meaning to ask Wu (I'll do so in a bit), since I've wanted to change my generic Halo character name to "ShadowOfTheVoid," which is my gamertag plus the username I use pretty much everywhere else now. : Consider it recommended! If you recall, I urged you to do that for your : voluminous H2 yammer critique. I don't know if you ever got around to : it, but I remind you that I had to do some work to create my own contents : table just so I could tackle that H2 article properly. With articles of : such length, the lack of any contents list that shows the structure and : allows you to jump to sections of interest is a nasty omission. So please, : do yourself and your poor readers a favour! It has been done. I've added a ToC to both my Halo 3 review and my Open Letter article. I know the latter update is waaaaay too late (the article is 1 ½ years old now), but I still get visitors, so I can at least help them out. : I don't know if you ever read my own H3 article (not a review as such), but : my biggest gripe was what I called the 'draw distance flaw', basically the : bizarrely low draw distances which so adversely affect my immersion in the : game (some places more than others), and which sometimes even give combat : hazards (when an enemy suddenly pops into view close enough to fire on : you). So I spluttered somewhat on reading your above words. You do briefly : mention the "phasing-in" of things in your subsequent paragraph, : yet you apparently consider it a minor issue. Any further comment on that? : I went into quite a bit of detail in my article and gave examples; maybe : you can respond to some of that to help me understand how this issue is : failing to irk you as much as it irks me? By "draw distance" I was focusing mainly on stage geometry. As you know, the backgrounds are mostly actual polygons rather than matte paintings. Many of these backgrounds are massive, and often encompass areas many times greater than the stage proper, even in multiplayer stages. I guess the "phasing in" of certain objects (mainly dead bodies) could be considered a draw distance issue as well. I remember you mentioning it in your review, which, IIRC, is what tipped me off to the flaw. I guess I wasn't paying attention my first couple of times through Campaign, but I did eventually notice it when playing through Crow's Nest and saw Drone corpses phasing in and out. In that particular case, it was pretty glaring, but for the most part, I only notice it on occasion. I guess coming after Halo 2's glaring texture pop-in issues, the phasing in of dead bodies would be harder to notice. : This brings to mind a general point I've been meaning to raise. In quite a : few places, actions are artificially prevented until you've done a : particular task. For example, when you get up the first tower in The : Covenant, you can't operate the control panel at the far end until you've : killed all the Brutes. That's a complete nonsense of course, and I find it : very annoying. I remember the first time I tried it. I did something nifty : to get past the Brutes, but did the control work? Hell no. Fat lot of use : my nifty bypassing technique was! Artificial things like this weaken the : illusion of reality of course. Care to comment on this shortcoming? I : can't remember how H2 fared in those respects, but how about H1? Nothing's : coming to mind; or at least, nothing as jarring as that H3 example (I'm : sure I've encountered others - maybe you can think of some). Not that I can think of. IIRC, every switch I came across could be activated even if enemies were still present. However, there were a few doors that wouldn't open unless you killed all the bad guys (e.g., the Truth & Reconciliation's grav lift bay). And as Stan pointed out, the grav lift to the T&R would work for you until you killed the two Hunters. Also, on Two Betrayals, you couldn't leave the first canyon until you deactivated the first phase pulse generator. If you try bypassing the second PPG, the big door at the end of the sloping tunnel won't open. Those were the only things I can recall from the first game. : I discussed death animations in my own article (see Alien animation ) but : there a matter I only noticed later, which I see that you also have not : commented on, despite it being a rather bad aspect. A few seconds after an : enemy has gone into an initial realistic-looking pose on the floor, : there's a tendency for the body to then sort of pop up into a far less : natural pose, which sometimes makes it look as if you'd toppled a fairly : rigid plastic figurine. They're not lying flat on the ground any more. The : realism has gone, and the pop itself is distracting and frequently : audible. I first started noticing this when slaying masses of enemies on : the ground floor of the first tower in The Covenant (as described in my : 'Battles in the first tower' piece). Why on earth does this happen? It : seems a terrible shortcoming. Actually, I did mention that the only flaw with Halo 3's death animations is the way bodies go rigid after a few seconds when they get sent flying through the air. : Isn't it listed as the 'fuel rod gun' in the HUD? I thought that was the name : for it, not fuel rod cannon. But anyway, the main thing I wanted to say : was that I've noticed that when enemies use it on me, the shot exhibits : homing. And yet, I think I'm right in saying that when I fire it, there's : no homing at all. Not fair! Actually, I think it is "fuel rod gun" in Halo 3 (military designation: Type-33 Light Anti-armor Weapon). But wasn't the fuel rod cannon pretty much the same weapon? I always thought the names were interchangeable. : You were presumably thinking of Tsavo Highway and The Covenant. But in The : Storm there's an overturned troop hog in the first lakebed, which you can : right and use. Maybe also one at the start, that Marines jump out of? Hm. I'll have to check that out next time I play. : Surprised to hear you say that last bit, because you can board them, by : hijacking them. Other players will I'm sure be far more expert in doing : that than me, as I don't like the way they fly even when I get one, but : you can get one in The Covenant. I've got a bit about that which I was : planning to post at my site sometime, but I haven't been in any great rush : to post it because I thought most players would probably be even more used : to hijacking those things than me. Really? I've tried hijacking Banshees everywhere they showed up, and I never could manage to do so. I was close enough, but didn't get the prompt to board. Maybe I'm doing something wrong? : Sounds like you know quite a bit about this. I did some reseach specifically : on Warthogs, which I described in my piece on infinitely spawning : Warthogs. If you've got time to take a glance at that, I'd be interested : in your views on what I described, and in particular whether you concur : with my understanding of the situation. Maybe you can help me understand : the wider picture, i.e. in regard to other vehicles? I don't know if : you've done any research on this stuff. My latest article mentioned the : sport of rocketing a manned Mongoose into the sea again and again, and I : suggested that you could probably do it indefinitely. Would you agree? Yes. If the Mongoose is manned, so long as you don't kill the driver, you can keep blasting away at it and it'll never explode. Same for any other vehicle. If the vehicle is unmanned, however, it will explode after taking a certain amount of damage. I've done extensive testing on this, and I've never been able to destroy an in-use vehicle in Halo 2 or 3 without taking the health of the occupant(s) down to zero. It's impossible to destroy it otherwise. Ergo, thanks to the vehicle damage system in H2 & H3, a vehicle can potentially absorb an unlimited amount of punishment and never be destroyed, so long as the driver's health never reaches zero. However, the converse isn't necessarily true. If you can kill the driver directly (by sniping him out, for example), the vehicle will remain intact if it's still relatively intact. This happens more frequently in Halo 3 due to the more resilient vehicles. : But if you turn around and look up at where it's due to materialize, you'll : see it pop into view in somewhat unrealistic fashion! So, better keep : those eyes lookin' forward soldier! I've never noticed that before. I guess you have to go pretty far foward to see where the cruiser spawns. : I was under the impression that it had no effect whatsoever. Does anyone have : the definitive information on this? Have Bungie said anything? I don't think Bungie said if the jammer or flare do anything to confuse enemies, but from what I can tell, they do precisely jack squat. : Ah yes, flares. Whose bright idea was that eh? Ho ho. I hate those things! : They hurt and I usually just close my eyes and put a hand over them for : good measure. My link with the game is broken and I'm suddenly just a bozo : holding a controller in despair, waiting for normal service to be resumed. : I kept having to do that in the factory in The Storm when experimenting : with setting up AA gun megabattles recently. I came to dread the sound of : a Brute whipping out that piece of equipment. Not fun, and I consider its : inclusion a terrible decision. Did all the game testers love flares or : something? I don't get it. Who could possibly have thought they would be a : good idea? Well, they certainly can change the flow of an encounter, that's for sure. : Well, not quite suicidal , but I'm completely with you on the horrendous : overpowering of enemy vehicles (their resilience and weaponry), which was : one of my major complaints against H3. You can tackle them on foot, : which is something I'm pretty well versed in by now as an ardent : practitioner of foot-based soldiering, but it takes serious and careful : work that a lot of folk would probably have a hard time considering as : 'fun'. Yet if you consider say AOTCR from H1, you could do that whole : glorious level on foot and it was lots of fun. I hardly ever do that : level using vehicles! It thoughtfully gave you a nice supply of rocket : lauchers to help - though you can even do without - and you thus had a : nice alternative to tackling things with vehicles. But the H3 designers : don't seem to have given any thought to the idea of tackling certain : sections on foot. And thus it feels much less flexible. If you do : attempt to tackle things on foot, there's a definite feeling of going : against the grain, and unless you're prepared for some serious dedication, : you're likely to end up very dead and very annoyed. I've been meaning to tackle AotCR on foot for a long time, but never bothered trying to break from my routine. However, I finally did so yesterday. I had it set on Heroic, and it still took me about two hours. Just when I thought the stage couldn't get any cooler, doing the whole thing on foot was the most grueling, epic challenge I've faced in the trilogy. Now to try it on Legendary. Back to vehicles. In Halo 1, the Ghost's plasma cannons were not very powerful. Assuming standard damage (MP or Normal difficulty), it took 8 two-shot bursts (16 plasma bolts) to kill someone, and their rate of fire was relatively slow and took a second to "warm-up" to the max RoF, which was by my estimates around 5 or 6 two-shot bursts per second (this isn't exact, and I don't have any game data that gives the actual RoF). In Halo 2, it took only 9 individual bolts to kill, once again assuming normal damage. The plasma cannons had a rate of fire of 10 shots per second, so they did more damage over time than the Halo 1 Ghost's. I haven't tested Halo 3's Ghost yet to see what its damage over time is, but I'm going to go out on a limb and assume it's even higher than in Halo 2. Even on Heroic, a Ghost was able to kill me with only a tiny burst. Next time I play, I'm going to do some testing to find out the Ghost's base damage. : Then again, I think it's worth suggesting that some AI shortcomings can be : beneficial, in terms of the fun they provide. If enemies always went for : cover and were as good at using it as you are, ok that's more realistic, : but wouldn't you also lose the pleasures of whittling them down at will? : Depends on what sort of combat experience you're looking for, but in H1 : I've always enjoyed being able to stand back and take down enemies at : leisure, thanks to them being so obliging about exposing their assorted : ugly noggins to the business end of my pistol or whatever. I disagree. The enemy should be smart enough to not simply be target practice for the player. In Halo 1 and even Halo 2 (whose AI fell just short of H1's IMO, due to enemies occasionally doing extremely stupid things they didn't in H1), the enemy didn't just stand out in the open and let you shoot them (except for extreme ranges, at which they didn't seem to notice you). They were always on the move, and they frequently took cover if it was available. They didn't always stay under cover and came out to attack, thus allowing you to whittle them down as you say, but they at least demonstrated an understanding of the concept. The Brutes in Halo 3, however, are bloody fools when it comes to combat. As you could see in that video in my review, even on Legendary, they'll just stand there and let you shoot them to death. They're so slow-moving and slow-witted that if it weren't for their superior numbers and firepower, they'd be no worse a threat than the Grunts. Go back and play Halo 1 & 2, and then play Halo 3, and just see how bad the H3 Brutes stack up to the Elites or H2 Brutes. Also, compare the Jackals while you're at it. They seem like little more than living shield generators in H3, especially during that little one-off where I had one just stare at me from 5 feet away. I wish I had made a saved film of that. : But there's also that Woss factor I mentioned in my article (Marines giving : lines voiced by UK celebrity Johnathan Ross), which has continued to be a : serious downer for me. I eventually noticed something else about that, : which makes it even worse. Basically, it seems like almost any male : Marine is able to spontaneously deliver a Ross line. For example, one : moment you've got an Aussie next to you, next thing he pipes up with a : Ross line and completely blows his identity. That's just terrible, ruining : the atmosphere and realism. At least if only particular Marines were : programmed to deliver Ross lines, I could learn which ones to avoid. But : it's become clear that not only can I not avoid them, I'm also going to : have Marines suddenly breaking out of character like this. This was a problem in the other games, too. Every now and then, there'd be a Marine that suddenly changed voices. For example, I recall a recently playthrough of Halo 2 where a David Cross Marine turned into an Andy McKaige Marine. I'm not sure why this happens. : Well, not for me they didn't - I don't even pick it up! I'm still pining for : the glory days of the H1 model... The H1 Needler might've been great in Campaign, but as Han Solo said, good against remotes in one thing, but good against the living is something else. I'm not sure how much multiplayer you've played of the Halo games, but the Needler was pretty much worthless in both Halo 1 & 2 in MP, unless of course you caught an enemy unaware from behind or in a narrow hallway and couldn't dodge (which was rare). It works wonders in Halo 3, however, due to increased tracking & Needle velocity. The "superdetonation" being instantly lethal adds to its enhanced efficacy. Personally, I think the perfect Needler would be the Halo 1 Needler, but with its tracking and Needle velocity improved to what it is in Halo 3. Well, thanks for the reply. I'm glad you liked my longwinded review.

http://shadowofthevoid.wordpress.com

Message Index

My Halo 3 review (finally).	Gravemind	4/19/08 11:04 p.m.
It was a nice read.	BlueNinja	4/20/08 2:32 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	zethren	4/20/08 2:50 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	onebitrocket	4/23/08 2:10 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	scarab	4/23/08 8:08 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	onebitrocket	4/23/08 11:20 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	scarab	4/24/08 1:53 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	Gravemind	4/25/08 12:58 a.m.
Comprehensive!	Jillybean	4/20/08 8:51 a.m.
I'll say...	stan	4/20/08 9:11 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	Louis Wu	4/20/08 9:38 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	UrsusArctos	4/20/08 10:01 a.m.
Well written but,	Spec ops Grunt	4/20/08 12:37 p.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	serpx	4/20/08 3:06 p.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	Vandle Valsher	4/20/08 3:16 p.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	Gravemind	4/23/08 4:14 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	Vandle Valsher	4/23/08 4:56 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	Louis Wu	4/23/08 8:07 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	Gravemind	4/23/08 10:21 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	Louis Wu	4/23/08 11:15 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	Cocopjojo	4/23/08 11:28 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	DiscipleN2k	4/23/08 11:13 p.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	Gravemind	4/25/08 1:21 a.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	DiscipleN2k	4/25/08 1:14 p.m.
Re: My Halo 3 review (finally).	Ragashingo	4/25/08 2:15 p.m.
The Melee Isn't All That Different!	Ragashingo	4/23/08 11:59 a.m.
Points on your H3 review (long)	Rockslider	4/20/08 8:46 p.m.
Re: Points on your H3 review (long)	scarab	4/21/08 7:42 a.m.
Re: Points on your H3 review (long)	Rockslider	4/22/08 4:26 p.m.
Re: Points on your H3 review (long)	scarab	4/23/08 7:52 a.m.
Re: Points on your H3 review (long)	Gravemind	4/23/08 12:10 a.m.
Re: Points on your H3 review (long)	Captain Spark	4/23/08 8:50 a.m.
Re: Points on your H3 review (long)	Rockslider	4/23/08 5:41 p.m.
Re: Points on your H3 review (long)	Gravemind	4/25/08 2:58 a.m.
Comment on the Covenant in H3	reprobate	4/21/08 6:23 a.m.