Escape to the Movies: Halo Legends

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Brainsaw

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Wow, this has gotten kinda off topic. Anyway in my own two cents, I personally think Movie Bob spent a little too much time bitching about Halo than actually reviewing the bloody thing. First off, Movie Bob, how about a little Reviewing 101. Rule #1: Check all bias and your ego at the door. I really don't care to hear your personal views on Halo and I definitely don't want to sit through watching you ejaculate your opinion on how Western games are all the same: Space Marines shooting shit and Japan is some amazing God-country that is so super speshul in what they make in games. It's almost as if you seem to forget that Japan is just a freaking landmass with people that are just as fallible as anywhere else in the world.

As to Halo Legends itself, I find it to be...polarizing at best. Some of the animation was kinda tired and boring which is not helped as Halo doesn't have the most energy filled of stories. I'll admit, I do like Halo and I especially like the lore of the universe it's set in. that being said, Halo Legends has a bad habit of disregarding canon in favor of pretty pictures. Some of it out right blatant. I'll give some examples.

If you've seen the Babysitter you were treated to Forerunner structures that look nothing like the familiar angular structures from the game. No instead, the forerunner where fond of making building in the same style as ancient Japan. Complete with a statue of Buddha. Pretty stupid huh? Guess what? The Babysitter wasn't the worst offender.

In the Duel, which was very artistic, but also very hard to watch (for me atleast. Something about the animation just made my eyes hurt) It had problems with Halo timeline. Mainly in that if it was supposedly set right after the Covenant had formed then the only members of it would have been the Elite and the Prophets. All the other races such as Hunters and grunts had yet to join. I did like how it did flesh out the Arbiter rank more and the elites in general, though the appearance of the elite female was so bad that is was declared non-canon.

The Package is one of the worst offenders. While a very cool episode, it just had little bits that left gaping holes in the universe's canon. For example the Booster Frames. In the Halo universe one of the things that made the Covenant so formidable was their immense fleets of extremely powerful warships armed by dangerous plasma weapons and protected by shield so powerful nothing short of a nuke or 2 consecutive blasts from a ship-mounted BFG would drop them. However in the episode the Booster Frames breach these shield which have given UNSC cruisers and destroyers immense problems with no trouble at all. If such tech was available to the human race why the hell were they losing? Also the whole blowing up the Covenant Seraph's which had shields capable of blocking missiles with a fucking Warthog gun was a bit of a wallbanger. Aside from that only minor details like all of the covenant having neon green blood really stood out. If you've played Halo to any extant then there as pretty good chance that you've looked behind you at the trail of destruction you just wrought and noticed it looks like a someone had a rave complete with the neon paint. From the Hunter's neon orange blood to the grunt's fluorescent blue blood to the jackal's purple blood and the Elite's blue-purple blood and the brute's dark blue blood, it's simply amazing the animator's managed to give them the one color of blood that non of them have. Also it was kinda sad that they couldn't even get the weapons shown on a spartans HUD to match the weapon they were carrying.

Still an interesting episode to watch even if your not into Halo as the 3D animation is top-notch. Resist the urge to pound the "Skip cutscene" button as it does evoke that kind of feeling even if you're watching it on YouTube. The other Halo Legend episodes I haven't seen so I'm not going to pass judgement on them yet.

As for the Halo hating, I find it funny and yet kinda sad so many people say it sucks completely disregarding the fact that a ton of people love playing it so Bungie must being doing something right. I always try to give games and their creators some credit because as long as people love what they do, it's pretty clear they're doing a good job at something. If I don't like something for some reason, I don't assume it sucks. I acknowledge that it just doesn't fit my personal tastes and move on.

As for those saying Halo rips off Aliens and Starship troopers, tell me. Does something having definate influences from other media make a game bad. If so I'd like to point out a successful, but little-known game with an immense amount of such influences including some from those very movies. It's name is Starcraft. If having such influences is bad then why is such a game tournament-played to this very day?
 

RUINER ACTUAL

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Vrex360 said:
CORRODED SIN said:
How do the Elites go from "WootWootWoot!" to Japanese/Samurai/English speaking culture???
They had always had a warrior culture and heritage based around honor and nobility. In Halo 1 humans had very limited access to technology that could actually translate what the elites were saying so it came out kinda.... distorted.
From Halo 2 and then onwards however the elites have been displaying more of the valiant warrior side that they always should have been showing, largely I think they speak english just so that people can understand what is being said.
Point is, part of me feels that Samurai fighting is actually quite fitting for the elites given their culture and background so heavily emulates that.

Hooray for me I was able to make a post about the elites without reminding everyone how godly and holy they are and without telling the humans that they inevitably face doom at the hands of the elites and.... oh... never mind.
Added to the list of things I already knew...
 

paragon1

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nightwolf667 said:
paragon1 said:
nightwolf667 said:
paragon1 said:
If you think Gears of War and Halo are the only Western games out there Bob, then I think it's time you payed a visit to ANYWHERE THAT SELLS VIDEOGAMES. If you do, you'll see a wide range of titles with a wide range of characters in a wide range of genres that you appear to have missed.
Let me name a few that break your stereotype that are sitting on my shelf right now.
Brutal Legend
Mass Effect 1 and 2
Assassin's Creed II
Dragon Age
Uncharted 1 and 2
Bioshock
So...yeah.
You know, there are Western video games out there that break MovieBob's stereotype. You haven't named one yet. Actually, you've proved his point.

So...yeah.
Yeah nothing. Almost none of the main or supporting characters in those games fit his description of western game characters. Hell, half of those let YOU pick what the character will be like.
WORLD"S LARGEST SNIP
So yeah...
Leaving aside the fact that I disagree with just about everything you just said regarding Mass Effect and Dragon Age (and yes, I'm a shameless fan of those), it seems to me that your basically arguing that masculine(or at least what western society views as masculine) characters are the most common type, and that this isn't the case in Japanese games.
I disagree.
Mario: You fight a bunch of dudes to rescue a princess
Legend of Zelda: You fight a bunch of dudes to rescue a princess (and the world).
Metroid: Space marine fights aliens.
Ico and Shadow of the Colossus: You fight a bunch of weird ass shit to rescue a girl (who looks an awful lot like a princess).
Notice a theme here?
 

Nomanslander

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Edthebed said:
I was disappointed by MovieBob's close-mindedness here.
That's because when it comes to video games Bob can be very veryyy bias, he's pretty much one of those Nintendo nostalgics that still thinks Super Mario 3 is the pinnacle of what to expect from games.

You mention any number of great games that have come out in recent years like Mass Effect 2, Fallout 3, or Uncharted 2, and he won't have much to say unless he hates the franchise like MW2, GTA4, or Halo in this case.

I prefer listening to what Bob has to say about movies because as we all see he's a lot more open minded towards them. With video games he's still stuck in the late 80s and early 90s.

I mean he likes movies like Crank or Transporter and those are pretty much the movie equivalents of macho gun-totting wankfests that you see in western games mentioned in this vid.

Maybe it just has something to do with Jason Statham...??

LoL
 

dollface

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Honestly I found the shorts to be exceptionally boring, my wife actually fell asleep watching it. My friend, who really enjoys Halo, thought it added a lot more depth to the games and were very well thought out and creative. The overall format was just like the Animatrix, it didn't really add anything special to the Halo universe, it just kind of felt like they were just trying to cash in on the waning popularity of this franchise. While our friend was in to it my wife just fell asleep half way through the third episode and I just found myself struggling to get through it while it seemed to go on forever. Honestly I was pretty disappointed in it and I came into the movie with fairly low expectations to begin with.
 

TornadoADV

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I love how he digs on somehow the US just being flat one-dimensional military characters while just before that, showing the entire line-up of American created marvel super heroes. Somebody needs to stop eating lead paint.
 

cyxz

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Oh may gawd halo anime pewpewpew !
So yeah watched it , have to agree with Bob on this one , the dbz'esque one was pretty cool , all in all it was a nice transition from US to JP keep em' coming :D
 

YukoValis

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I must say... I love Japan lol. Taking the piss out of Halo fanboys is a worthy cause by anyone.
 

Woem

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MovieBob said:
Halo Legends

This week MovieBob takes a look at the animated Halo Legends.

For more from MovieBob, check out Intermission [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/moviebob/7217-Five-Great-Movies-About-Videogames].

Watch Video
Hmmmm super-powered teen heroes with a pet dinosaur huh...

 

Crazy_Bird

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If you know bob a bit longer from his game overthinker series on Youtube you'd know that he really likes the Japanese culture and retro gaming in particular. I am not stating that I know good ol' Bob better than anyone else around these parts but this is a clear consistency I noticed which was not so clear in earlier escapist review. Hence you should take his reviews and opinions with a spoonful of salt. Like everyone's else.

I personally think that many people glorify anime and manga in general and do not watch and/or read their western counterparts. if you dwell long enough in the realms of japanese pop culture you can clearly see that the average anime and manga stories are as repetitive as their western equivalent.
I guess anime and manga is hailed the way it is because it brought something fresh and new to the western mainstream. But it can become equally as stale.
 

Stabby Joe

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Crazy_Bird said:
If you know bob a bit longer from his game overthinker series on Youtube you'd know that he really likes the Japanese culture and retro gaming in particular. I am not stating that I know good ol' Bob better than anyone else around these parts but this is a clear consistency I noticed which was not so clear in earlier escapist review. Hence you should take his reviews and opinions with a spoonful of salt. Like everyone's else.

I personally think that many people glorify anime and manga in general and do not watch and/or read their western counterparts. if you dwell long enough in the realms of japanese pop culture you can clearly see that the average anime and manga stories are as repetitive as their western equivalent.
I guess anime and manga is hailed the way it is because it brought something fresh and new to the western mainstream. But it can become equally as stale.
From a good chunk of his game over thinker videos, he's criticized Japanese culture a plenty, the most recurring one being the weird fetishes.

While I may disagree with a good few view points on the matter in defense of the West, I know he's not a Japanophile.
 

Crazy_Bird

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Stabby Joe said:
Crazy_Bird said:
From a good chunk of his game over thinker videos, he's criticized Japanese culture a plenty, the most recurring one being the weird fetishes.

While I may disagree with a good few view points on the matter in defense of the West, I know he's not a Japanophile.
I have to agree with you and of course the truth is in between. While he is not the classic japanophile I always get the feeling he thinks of Japanese culture as superior in many aspects (often rightfully so) but then again he sometimes overdoes his (equally rightful) critique of contemporary western game and story design.
Hence I think of him as slanted towards Japanese culture. Yet he does reflect on this and states clearly his preferences. in some reviews (like this one) he starts to ramble and fitting criticism 0borderlines on bashing the other alternative.
 

Withard

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No I dont believe it is nitpicky with the complaints you have. We all like to see things adapted faithfully but with a degree that they wont become stale. What struck me as the most annoying aspect was the claiming of culture through the animation. When the Anime kids stereotypes and their silent teenage girl spartan (who by the way looked like she had only seen battle via GI:JOE Videos) came across the ancient ruins that were unidentified by ship scanner why on EARTH (note earth) were they Asuka & nara based? I dont mean to whine but the research was very badly done in this department.

Just like the aforementioned Samurai feel. Honestly even the Elite was wearing a Conical Hat.

Spartan Pizza Cats more like :/

The problems continue. The voice acting is surprisingly bad for what is probably a high budget project. The Master Chief's voice is downright horrendous and I honestly could say the character voice acting is better in The Power Rangers. Scripts are awful and whoever wrote the dialogue clearly has no clue what they are doing; when the 12 year old DOA eyed female soldier is dying she asks her commander what she was to him and he replies "What do you mean? Your a soldier. A good soldier. *pause* Soldier" seriously...its that fucking bad.

The Spartans are actually depicted as quite pathetic creatures more than the Spartans of old they are based on. its ironic that they show King Leonidas and his Spartans looking terrifying and blood drunk before bringing us back to look at these sniveling, pathetic and utterly unconvincing "warriors". Some of the dialogue in the "Origins" episode section likes to hint at the children being augmented and trained in the methods of war but the whole thing holds water as well as a sieve does.

Now I dont hate Anime as I have seen some brilliant stuff of that familer style but it must be used correctly in reference to the source material. This is an example of it all being thrown out of the window.

Also I liked the first Halo, Halo 2 was laughable and the 3rd I didnt bother with so I dont really consider myself a fan of the series but I do like it when things remain a "little" faithful to the source material. Maybe the way it was build up in other media is that the Spartans being the MOST POWERFUL MILITARY ELITE TROOPER ULTRA DELTA TOP SECRET unit about would not basically act like little emo kids who cry when hearing someones voice but rather a game format version of Kurt Russel from SOLDIER (Crappy film but interesting idea) and or JCVD and Dolph Lundgren from Universal Soldier.

Just think the animation was stock and devoid of any type of smooth framerate, characterization was badly implemented and the overabundance of 12 year old kids was rather an eyesore.







P.S


Here right at the start of this clip is HOW (based on the source material and lore) the Spartans more or less would be trained and depicts how they would turn out. Obviously the Spartans would be MASSIVELY more aggressive and soldier like with the training in 500 years time. So no "ghey" Spartans please.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyMht6Xmh7c
 

Stabby Joe

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Crazy_Bird said:
I have to agree with you and of course the truth is in between. While he is not the classic japanophile I always get the feeling he thinks of Japanese culture as superior in many aspects (often rightfully so) but then again he sometimes overdoes his (equally rightful) critique of contemporary western game and story design.
Hence I think of him as slanted towards Japanese culture. Yet he does reflect on this and states clearly his preferences. in some reviews (like this one) he starts to ramble and fitting criticism 0borderlines on bashing the other alternative.
Ah but can you give an example of "often rightly so" since pretty much any aspect of another culture can be disliked.
 

Drakmeire

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I hate the halo series with a passion but those animes actually look very well done i might have to give it a watch.
Note: I hate Halo, not all FPSs several good FPS games would be Bioshock, Portal, Left 4 Dead, and I guess Fallout 3. (see and I did'nt say b-b-b-but Half-life, oh wait two of those are Valve games... oh well)
 

Hawkeye16

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I actually like how halos story is detailed and rich for those who want to get into it, and satisfing for those who dont. I also think its gameplay is fun and its community is (mostly) friendly. But I like halo, I must be an 8 year old homophobe.
 

DrEmo

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I didn't like the Anime re-imagining of Batman that came out a while back. It was too slow, it just sort of chugged along and all of the shorts were very bland. None of them packed any punch.

But this one looks interesting. I like Toei animation's stuff and that short looks like a nice jab at Halo/anime. It's, in all seriousness, what I expected to see in a Halo anime.

Now, if Shaft (the animation studio) had a short in this one, it would have been a 100% definite MUST watch for me. The action would have looked awesome, since their style is very fluid.
Example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caooYbp_rEE
 

nightwolf667

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paragon1 said:
Leaving aside the fact that I disagree with just about everything you just said regarding Mass Effect and Dragon Age (and yes, I'm a shameless fan of those), it seems to me that your basically arguing that masculine(or at least what western society views as masculine) characters are the most common type, and that this isn't the case in Japanese games.
I disagree.
Mario: You fight a bunch of dudes to rescue a princess
Legend of Zelda: You fight a bunch of dudes to rescue a princess (and the world).
Metroid: Space marine fights aliens.
Ico and Shadow of the Colossus: You fight a bunch of weird ass shit to rescue a girl (who looks an awful lot like a princess).
Notice a theme here?
Look if you're trying to start an East vs West argument with me you're wasting your time. I'm not a Japanophile and I won't go on record saying that Japanese games are better than Western games or vice versa. I believe I actually mentioned a couple Japanese games that fit the stereotype we were talking about: Metal Gear Solid heading the list.

Though you have failed epically with Metroid. It's actually a subversion of the trope and even names it's own. (*hint Samus is a girl.) It was an especially huge plot twist in the 1980s given the stereotype that we are talking about was also present then.

I won't put Japanese stereotypes of masculinity in the same vein as Western ones though because they are shaped by different cultural values. (Especially when it comes to the role of women, that usually being the helpless Princess in the castle. Suffice to say Japanese cultural values on the subject still resemble those of the American 1950s. If we want to be really simple about the comparisons.)

But you do seem to have changed gears a little bit, Japan and Japanese games are on an entirely different level but it's not the American and Western hyper masculinity. Learn about the culture the games come from before randomly picking things out of them to use in your argument, otherwise you're providing a deconstruction analysis that proves to be absolutely worthless.
 

MB202

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Canid117 said:
MB202 said:
Canid117 said:
You do realize that not all Halo fans are raging dickholes right Bob?
Yeah, but the vast majority of them are.
I could say that all anime fans are annoying Otakus and I would be just as wrong as you are now.
Well, actually, most of them all, just like the vast majority of Halo fans are dickholes.

My point is that NOT ALL of them are like the stereotype, but most of them are usually just that.
 

Canid117

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MB202 said:
Canid117 said:
MB202 said:
Canid117 said:
You do realize that not all Halo fans are raging dickholes right Bob?
Yeah, but the vast majority of them are.
I could say that all anime fans are annoying Otakus and I would be just as wrong as you are now.
Well, actually, most of them all, just like the vast majority of Halo fans are dickholes.

My point is that NOT ALL of them are like the stereotype, but most of them are usually just that.
No its just a small minority that you notice for two reasons. A: you yourself are a dickhole. And B: The jackasses are far more vocal than the rest of the fanbase.