The haters of Halo

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CyberAkuma

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Nov 27, 2007
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Ghandi 2 said:
Fair enough, I can admit that the sequels are very very similar. And I don't think H3 or even H1 is the most revolutionary FPS ever. It just bothers me that everyone calls it mediocre without really giving many or any reasons why.
Like I said, the problem is not only that the sequels are ery similar - but like Yahtzee said - reviewers are throwing 10's at them in reviews and people are reacting as if them games were the next coming of Jesus.

Halo 1 was mediocre at times I have to say, using some of the same levels - but backwards makes the game a tad mediocre, and putting some Flood enemies here and there doesn't change the fact that you are replaying a level you already beat. If I recall it correctly, in Halo 1 - one has to replay 3 levels which to me is just next to inexcusable; and we're not talking about some minot bits and pieces - but pretty much the ENTIRE level again with a few new directions. If I could add some further proof to Halo 1's mediocrety it would be the broken ass PC port that was just a giant broken buggy mess that on top of that had stripped content. (no Co-op mode? wtf!)

Ghandi 2 said:
But about the sequel: what makes a "true" sequel? Because not too many of the gameplay elements can be changed, otherwise it's a different game. So what can developers do, what do you think exemplifies a true sequel? And please don't just say Half-Life.
I believe this is getting outside the discussion, but if I had to reply to this question I believe they are a lot of good examples and that it could end up being a very longwinded discussion out of topic. But to satisfy your curiosity I could mention like others already did - Quake.
Quake 1 and 2 where completely different games with completely different story and completely different enemies/stages etc. Quake 4 is an exception since it is basically a remake of Quake 2, but I think it still pretty much does the job fairly well.
The problem with Halo is that it is not even trying to bring new concepts to the game, but it relies solely on the same ideas and design.

One can only have fun driving around a warthog so many times

Another very good example I'd like ot bring up is No One Lives Forever. While there wasn't much difference between the first and the second game, it added up a lot of new concepts and ideas that where real fun and really entertaining. If there is one FPS-sneaking game I love more than any other - it's NOLF2.
 

alexrpgguy

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Aug 18, 2007
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I thought Halo was overhyped for what it was. A decent FPS. I don't hate it; I play it when my friends bring it over, but I don't bother buying it and I don't go ecstatic over it when people talk about it. When asked, I reply "It's just Halo." It's not all that exciting or innovative or astounding. I much rather prefer Half-Life or something similar with a story. I like enemies like in F.E.A.R. that move around you skillfully and attack you from all angles. I like the life system and flowing controls of COD2, where I can clamber up to rooftops, jump to prone, whip out my gun again, shoot some baddie across the map... that sort of thing.
And Counter-Strike, which employs a magnificent amount of strategy into team play when you're doing it right.
 

TheKittenStrangler

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Dec 9, 2007
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I personally think Halo is the most overrated game ever made. It's said to be the best game ever, and every freakin review site gives it the best scores so they don't get attacked by the countless fanboys. Don't get me wrong I like it, but I only like online. Single player is horrible, everything about it is just dreadful. The single player storyline is so overused that it has lost all of its appeal. I can summarize every halo for you. You try to kill aliens, but the flood comes and interrupts you, you have to work together to get rid of flood because they are just that cool, you end up killing all the flood(not really) and Master Chief is in a dreadful situation which makes it seem like hes dead and the game leaves you off with a question mark so that you'll go and buy the sequel. At the most halo deserves a 6.5/10 and thats only because of the online.
 

danimal1384

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Sep 18, 2007
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the Halo series isn't by any means untouchable (which the FanBoys will call me a heathen for saying so), but it isn't by any means shitty or even bad either. they are enjoyable, competant, balanced, and other words of encouragement. but what the series isn't, is new, innovative, or perfect. its all been done before, but then again everything has been done before. its been done better before, though this still does not make the series bad by any strech. and it isn't without flaw. sure, u find me a game without flaw and i'll show you a prostitute from Nantucket who can stick her arm up to her elbow into her fish market.

the biggest fault i have with the Halo games is that they are overall too short. short meaning not the time it takes, but rather the size of the playing field per level. i always feel like i'm couralled down a large series of hallways. the other issue i have with it is the flood. i'm not against the idea of the flood, just what they signifiy in the change of gameplay. once they show up, the game ceases to have any sort of skill and strategy to it and becomes an exercise in seeing how many bullets you can fire before you get caught by a sea of pain. you can't figure out whats going on, and there is no more need for aiming your weapon. you just shoot everything everywhere thats possible, and headshots or skill with a weapon leave you dead. it becomes a huge bullet festival and i don't find it fun. not to mention their annoying ability to take a whole clip of assault rifle ammo, fall down, only to get back up seconds later when your standing next to it, and then smacking the hell out of you without setting off your radar, then taking another clip and a half of assault rifle ammo, and only going down again and staying down after two shotgun blasts from zero range and five melee attacks. of course while this happend, fifty more identical looking flood fuckers have surrounded you.

while i have been complaining for a good minute now, i still remind the readers that i do enjoy playing the halo games. i think it is overall a good series, but i wouldnt give any of the games for their time the praises and awards the series has recieved. an FPS should never in my opinion win "game of the year" title, ever. the genre itself is rather one dimensional which i always assumed is too narrow of a perspective to say its the "game of the year". mindless slaughter-fests aren't that special. but its a good series, just not as good as most claim it to be.
 

shadow skill

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Oct 12, 2007
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If the previous Halo games were like 3 (I never got to the parts with the flood in Halo 1, got bored before that happened.) the trick is to just run up to them and punch them in the face, that seems to be infinetly more effective than using guns...........
 

soladrin

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Sep 9, 2007
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nah, the flood in halo 3 was infinetely easier then those in 1 and 2, in 1 i think you had to punch them like 5 times (on legendary, the only difficulty)
 

shadow skill

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Halo 3 reminded me of one of the things that always bothered me about fps' the ridiculously overpowered melee. Honestly in every game even realistic ones like COD4 you can take quite a few bullets and not die but heaven forbid you get knifed or punched etc. Sad thing is there hasn't beem a game that bothered to make the whole melee thing at least look cool.
 

TheKittenStrangler

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Dec 9, 2007
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shadow skill said:
Halo 3 reminded me of one of the things that always bothered me about fps' the ridiculously overpowered melee. Honestly in every game even realistic ones like COD4 you can take quite a few bullets and not die but heaven forbid you get knifed or punched etc. Sad thing is there hasn't beem a game that bothered to make the whole melee thing at least look cool.
I recommend you look at the new knife animations for Turok online. They look pretty amazing if you ask me.
 

Ranzel

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Oct 7, 2007
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shadow skill said:
Ranzel said:
One simple, undeniable fact remains:

Halo 1 must have been, to some extent, good. Why? It's made the Halo series what it is today. When Halo first came out, did it have millions of fans? Was near every player on it "A 13 year old who cried "noob" and fag"? Highly unlikely. Even if the original Halo was hyped, people played it, and people enjoyed it. A fanbase like Halo's has it's origins, and I find it unlikely that those origins were anything other than FPS fans looking for a new game to play. The enjoyed it, they told there friends, their friends told thier friends, and so on and so fourth. Heres the kicker- The friend of a friend of a friend, and no matter how far down that line you go, they must have ALSO enjoyed the game!

I just don't see any way of denying that the fanbase is justified, or that the millions of players who do enjoy the game are fools for such enjoyments.

When you get right down to it, whats the purpose in hating any game? What's the purpose of hate, in general? Love and peace, man. Love and peace.
This fails on so many levels, its like saying Internet Explorer is a good web browser because millions of people use it, in the case of IE the base can be attributed to IE being the default browser on computers running windows, and of course the fact that most computer users are ignorant of the existence of other browsers and the fact that IE actually renders some sites that use perfectly valid code incorrectly because IE is broken. In the case of Halo the game fails to equal the status of other console shooters within its own time period in terms of build quality and innovation yet it is held as a gold standard because much of the fanbase is ignorant of these other games/superior ways of doing things. (The gaming press does not help this either.) Further more these same ignorant fans expect everyone else to believe the fallacy that the game revolutionized the genre on consoles.

You know what its just like the hordes of Evangelion fans who ave elevated that show to the status of God simply because it was the first Anime they saw. (Rahxephon is so much better.)

The number of people that use a product has no bearing on whether that product is good or not.
So rather than think that millions of people have a legit reason for enjoying the game, you just assume everyone that enjoys the game is an ignorant ass? That's honestly how you come across. You've also made the assumption that every person that plays Halo thinks it's revolutionized the genre. Not true, at all.

Your IE example has no connection, at all. IE is, as you said, standard with windows. People don't buy windows for IE. They bought windows for windows and got IE, so they used it. Xbox does not come with Halo standard. Considering how much you enjoy assuming thing, I know you'll assume that EVERYONE that BOUGHT Halo 3 had no thoughts going through their head than-"This was on a commercial."
 

shadow skill

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Oct 12, 2007
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My point was and is that just because many people buy a given product does not mean that the product itself is actually high quality. What you are saying could easily be turned around to say that because only 100 or 200k people bought game xy that the game is of an inferior quality. In other words to use the fanbase as an argument for the game doing something right or wrong does not follow logically. I would urge you to think about what you are saying which of course really just boils down to "Millions of people can't be wrong." as opposed to "Numbers of people who buy a product do not determine whether a product is good, or even functioning properly.

Let me give you another example Xbox live in reality offers a very, very bad online experience. Xbox Live games in general do not use dedicated servers and instead use what is called player connect which is really nothing more than p2p. What this means is that typically the host of a game will have an advantage over everyone connecting to his or her machine to play an online match. Let's also face facts here most people probably are not running the badass connections you would have for dedicated servers in other console games let alone pc games. In short the most important feature for which people pay for Gold membersip to Live is inherently broken because most games do not provide dedicated servers which would help level the playing field for everyone playing a match!

Futhermore many of the games have started to remove the ability to explicitly filter for games and see things like host connection quality etc. Instead the software uses an algorithm that picks what it [the computer] thinks is appropriate for you as the player. Of course many times this falls flat because at the end of the day these software algorithms do not always work. Hell there are times when I cannot connect to a game in COD4 and I have no real way to simply override the computer with my own specific criteria for a match.

That kind of thing simply is not what I would call a good online experience but developers have been able to get away with it because there are many people who are ignorant of the fact that in the case of Xbox Live they are paying for inherently flawed at best and down right unfair at worst player connect rather than dedicated severs, and are ignorant of the amount of control they should have as players when it comes to selecting a game.

Here is another example: The only Console shooter I ever played and had any fun was Goldeneye on the 64, I did not like to play the games that came out later because for the most part I could never really aim properly because I was stuck using the right stick to aim and I am left handed. Then I came across Black for the ps2 and I discovered that there was indeed a way for me to play these games with some level of accuracy and comfort. I discovered Southpaw stick layout and full face button mapping just like on pc. I finally saw done what should have always been done, giving users total control over how they play a game.

I was no longer ignorant of the fact that there in fact were console games with comparable control options that are all but a given in every pc game since at least Doom on Windows 95. Now I pretty much refuse to play any game that expects me to aim with any kind of accuracy if the game does not have southpaw stick settings at the very minimum. (I much prefer full customization.) After having seen what was done in Black I cannot say nor can I be told that a shooter on a console is really good if it insults the players basic intellect by only half providing controller customization. If you are going to bother giving people stick options you should go all the way and give players full control of the buttons.

The reason you have games that still do not offer things like alternate stick layouts and full buton mapping is again because there are people ignorant of the proper way to handle things, ignorant of who to complain to, and tend to just take whatever bs is shoveled in their face, or simply do not play game types where this is most likely going to be an issue for them.

Oh and where did I say all of these people think Halo is revolutionary please go tell me where I said they all thought this? Honestly you come across as someone who doesn't read what someone actually says before trying to put words in their mouth.
 

Danimal3K

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Dec 5, 2007
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Halo 3 is good, clean fun, a blast to play, and cuts through a ton of the BS that plagues most FPSs. You log in, get matched and are shooting people in a matter of a few minutes. Halo is easy to learn but difficult to master, although anyone can progress enough to compete effectively online with Bungie's topnotch matchmaking.

I am by no means a fanboy, the campaign is downright boring and frustrating at parts but still fun to play. I don't like the health-based melee BS or the host-serving but they are small complaints for an otherwise awesome game.

And PC gamers are socially-inept retards who only download barnyard porn from their parents' basements. All of them.
 

Ranzel

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Oct 7, 2007
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shadow skill said:
....because much of the fanbase is ignorant of these other games/superior ways of doing things. Further more these same ignorant fans expect everyone else to believe the fallacy that the game revolutionized the genre on consoles.
much. I guess you didn't say every single person, but when I think of much, I think of at least 70%, which is certainly NOT the case. I honestly think the majority of people who play Halo are not idiots, they are just overshadowed by the minority that are idiots. The largest argument people have when they talk about Halo's downfalls, and the reasons its so terrible, is the community. People don't even give the game a CHANCE because they just "know" the community is terrible. I own Halo 3, I play it online, not ONCE have I played with an extremely immature child.

I don't think Halo is a 10/10 game. I don't think it deserves 5 stars. But I do know this without a shadow of a doubt- It does NOTHING wrong to make it anything less than average. Because of it's hype people compare Halo to every FPS under the sun and run through a list of its inferiorities. That's all well in good, but what's the point? Halo is average and doesn't DESERVE such treatment. If the people who hate it this much had any sense they'd realize this. What Halo does right is what it has it's fan base for. You think it does NOTHING right? You're wrong, seriously. You can call the fan base idiotic as much as you like, but its numbers are not going to dwindle as such.
 

righthanded

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Dec 5, 2007
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Let's forget Halo for a moment.

Imagine that one of your friends tells you that McDonald's is a great restaurant. He loves it. He says it's great because it has so many menu options-- Burger, fries, fish, chicken, salad, ice cream, and so on and so on-- and they're all equally made well for a cheap price. Well, that's hard to argue with that because there are a few things your friend is right about-- there are a lot of menu options and they're all equally edible and of about the same quality for not that much money.

Now let's say that you and your McDonald's loving friend go out to dinner one evening. Your choice? A sushi restaurant. You tell your friend that the restaurant is great and for about the same price as a burger and fries at McDonald's, he can get a of roll of sushi. After dinner, your friend tells you that while the sushi was pretty good and it was the first time he had pickled ginger, he thinks McDonald's is a better restaurant overall. Sure, the sushi was better than a breaded cod sandwich, but he couldn't even get chicken nuggets or a shake there.

"What? how can you think McDonald's is better?! That restaurant had amazing sushi! you said so yourself!" you say. "You had never known about pickled ginger before tonight."
"Yes the sushi was better than the fish sandwich at McDonald's, but I couldn't even get fries! And pickled ginger is too weird to eat regularly." states your friend. "McDonald's a great restaurant, face it."
"McDonald's isn't a great restaurant. Nothing about that restaurant is great. It's adequate. You just like it because it has foods your comfortable with having." you reply. "You even admit that the sushi restaurant had better fish than McDonald's, I bet I could find a better burger and better fries elsewhere too."
"Yes," says your friend, "but we would have to go to a couple different restaurants, right? McDonald's gives me everything I ask for in one place. The food isn't bad, is it? It's just not spectacular. If the sushi place were so good, shouldn't it at least have fries?"
"I don't know. What I do know is that the sushi is awesome there and I like pickled ginger. If I want a burger and fries, I'll have to go somewhere else, but that's o.k. because the sushi is that good." you retort.
"You just don't understand. The food is good enough and there's a lot on the menu. You think that I don't know what I'm talking about just because I don't like pickled ginger. Sushi is good but so is the fish sandwich." replies your friend. "Also, everyone eats McDonald's."

At this point, you realize that your friend probably has no taste in restaurants even though he's willing to eat sushi. You might never need to go to a McDonald's because you're aware of more individually satisfying options available. Your friend is satisfied by choice alone, regardless of how poor all of the choices might be. The curse of this is that the people who enjoy sushi are far out numbered by those that would rather go to McDonald's and that this ends up smothering the market for sushi. It's hard not to blame McDonald's and it's fans when they're the main reason why good restaurants don't want to set up in your town.

Later that month, your friend calls.
"Hey, I got to take you to a great restaurant. The foods better than McDonald's, too. It's called Denny's!"
 

Ghandi 2

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Dec 5, 2007
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And yet your metaphor makes no argument against Halo other than proclaiming it is mediocre, like everyone else in this thread.
 

Hamsocks

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Oct 31, 2007
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Short and simple. People don't hate the games themselves. It's a mediocre-to-OK series. People hate all of the unneccessary hype and all of the fanboys. The less people talk about it like Jesus and Buddha skipping through a field of daisies, the more the hate will die down and everyone will get on with their lives.
 

righthanded

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Dec 5, 2007
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What can be said about mediocrity? Isn't that it's hallmark?

Blandness leaves a bad taste in MY mouth. My criticism of the game is as big a criticism of the people that accept or champion it. People that like Halo have no taste in games. These games shouldn't be getting made in the first place let alone sell in the numbers they do.

Does it surprise me that a mediocre video game is hailed as an achievement in a society that allows C students to run their lives, spends itself into endless debt, and popularizes scumbags as heroes? Not in the least. Does it bother me enough to speak on it and it's fans? Absolutely.
 

fantomspower

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Dec 11, 2007
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I'm surprised anyone would reply to such an incoherency written post. There is no structure. When the point is finally made there really is no connection to the first part of the post. My point is this: is it really that hard to press shift before referring to yourself in the first person? It is I, not i. Also, after a period the first letter of the next word is capitalized. Simple things such as capitalizing letters will make you post actually look well thought out. I could easily not post this, but for me I can't see why so many people would reply to such a post. Even I, myself, couldn't resist.