The Halo series isn't... bad per se... However it is suffering from what I would like to call, "Generic-FPS-Hyped-By-Media" syndrome. There are much, much better shooters out there. For example, The Half Life Series, GoldenEye 007, Perfect Dark, or Wolfenstein 3D to name a few.
The haters of Halo
- Thread starter Kaminobob
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I was hoping to see this thread show up.
So one group says Halo is "a shining monument to FPSs" and another says it's "really a bore." Who's right?
Well both, honestly. Halo is a shining monument to FPSs for the same reason that Dragon Ball Z is a shining monument to anime. Hear me out before that analogy makes you vomit with rage.
Any real anime fan "knows" that Dragon Ball Z sucks balls. It makes the same mistake that every action show makes (IE Stargate: SG1, et al) in that eventually it just runs out of ideas and in order to keep running it simply produces one exceptionally oversized dick of a bad guy after another, really just recycling the SAME bad guy but on the pretense that this new one is "more powerful" in order to provide the characters with some challenge. It also makes use of some of the most intense filler ever witnessed in a TV show, famous for the "five minutes" that destroyed planet Namek having been stretched out to three hours. For what it's worth the show was running alongside a manga and they had to stretch one comic book out over several episodes as the next one hadn't been written yet and the earlier seasons did have some merit to them. More to the point, though, DBZ opened the door, didn't it? This is the show that created the foothold anime needed in order to gain ground in the west. Its cartoonish style and humor translated easily to western cartoon terms, so it was comfortable, but it presented all the standard anime packaging at the same time, including episodes designed more to be part of a greater whole in the timeline rather than just disjoint episodes, a center on (slightly) more adult action and concepts, etc.
Halo did the same thing, not just for first person shooters, but for games in general. While anyone well-versed in first person shooters can look at it and say it's not the brightest lightbulb in the box, here are the facts. First, it was produced on a console, making it accessible to all people and not just overprivileged schmucks with nothing better to blow their money on than new parts for their PC every year or two. Second, it's easier to play than any other FPS that's had its guts jammed into an uncomfortable console-based control scheme. In all frankness no FPS belongs on anything other than mouse and keyboard, but Halo makes up for it pretty well by only allowing two weapons and a grenade to be equipped at a time and doing away with unrealistic, albeit fun, secondary fire; this design choice is a decidedly overlooked mechanic that throws a lot of balance into the game and dumbs the controls back enough that we aren't noodling for the needler after picking up a dozen weapons. It's easy enough at this point that virtually anyone can pick up the controls and start playing. Third, it's multiplayer. The ability to enjoy the company of friends through a game increases that game's value tenfold at the very least, if not more so; sports games THRIVE off this principle, being incredibly boorish to play otherwise. Halo actually provides a competent single player campaign on top of robust multiplayer options, including co-op, putting it head and tails above crappy EA sports titles. Fourth, it's adaptable; unlike some class-based multiplayer games I know it allows you to pick up weapons--but not too many weapons--on the fly to adapt to your situation, adding a level of satisfaction. Fifth, it's pretty; it's always been on the cutting edge of graphics right from the first game, making it equally as appealing as the inaccessible PC games that have been released alongside it. There's more to Halo's success than just these factors (if you look deeply it's the spiritual successor to Goldeneye in practically every respect), but these are undeniably the primary reasons for Halo's success.
Combined with the fact that it's at least competent as a shooter and that it was really the first decent one to be put on a console, Halo did an awful lot for gaming. In all frankness, though, I loved the first one to death and then got lividly pissed when the second came along and I found out there was not only more than one Halo in Halo but the Flood were also back. I didn't like them in the first place. I find zombies to be the tackiest excuse for a lack of creativity one can possibly employ. I was also hoping to see some new locales; instead I came to find a few levels in that they had dropped me in the exact same location that I started in during the FIRST game. To me those were reason enough to sell the second game and swear never to buy the third one, although I probably will wind up selling out as I desperately need something other than Viva Pinata to play on my Xbox 360.
On top of all this, Halo really is a cut back, standard first-person shooter, having no really outstanding gameplay mechanics or level design to qualify it as a brilliant gem of a game. To this day it baffles me that the Covenant battleship "Truth and Reconciliation" is more or less a collection of corridors with no rooms or equipment inside it. It does nothing more or less than what Doom or Quake did, except that it managed to look and feel a whole lot cooler doing it and brought the game competently to a huge demographic. Really, if I had to name a core mechanic for Halo, "accessibility" would be it. Still it deserves a great deal of praise for that being that nobody else but Bungee was smart enough to implement such an idea (although they were probably just lucky) and naysayers are generally just
A: angry that people bought this and not Psychonauts (which SUCKED; WORST PLATFORMER EVER, and take it from a guy who loves a good platformer AND who loves Tim Schafer), seeing this game as a representation of Microsoft's corporate dick thrusting into our lives all too successfully and the unfair advantage large corporations have in advertising and marketing,
B: angry that they suck at multiplayer because they don't care (like me; seriously, I have a life, I'm not gonna spend every day practicing this garbage),
C: angry that the single-player campaign isn't long enough for them to get their $60 worth,
D: angry that the second two games are exactly the same as the first one, or
E: angry that the series has practically no depth to speak of, either in mechanics or storyline, and has damaged peoples' sense of quality.
Although these are all valid criticisms of the game and there's probably a lot more, in the face of the good things Halo has done and continues to do for gaming they don't mean a whole lot. Claiming Halo lacks depth today would be a lot like claiming Super Mario Bros. lacked depth in 1988. As a designer I'd say we shouldn't ignore the lessons this game has to teach us just because it doesn't fall in line with our sense of taste, much as anime fans shouldn't ignore anime's roots in DBZ. There's reasons Halo is one of the most successful series of all time and we should learn what those are rather than immaturely insult everybody who likes it.
So one group says Halo is "a shining monument to FPSs" and another says it's "really a bore." Who's right?
Well both, honestly. Halo is a shining monument to FPSs for the same reason that Dragon Ball Z is a shining monument to anime. Hear me out before that analogy makes you vomit with rage.
Any real anime fan "knows" that Dragon Ball Z sucks balls. It makes the same mistake that every action show makes (IE Stargate: SG1, et al) in that eventually it just runs out of ideas and in order to keep running it simply produces one exceptionally oversized dick of a bad guy after another, really just recycling the SAME bad guy but on the pretense that this new one is "more powerful" in order to provide the characters with some challenge. It also makes use of some of the most intense filler ever witnessed in a TV show, famous for the "five minutes" that destroyed planet Namek having been stretched out to three hours. For what it's worth the show was running alongside a manga and they had to stretch one comic book out over several episodes as the next one hadn't been written yet and the earlier seasons did have some merit to them. More to the point, though, DBZ opened the door, didn't it? This is the show that created the foothold anime needed in order to gain ground in the west. Its cartoonish style and humor translated easily to western cartoon terms, so it was comfortable, but it presented all the standard anime packaging at the same time, including episodes designed more to be part of a greater whole in the timeline rather than just disjoint episodes, a center on (slightly) more adult action and concepts, etc.
Halo did the same thing, not just for first person shooters, but for games in general. While anyone well-versed in first person shooters can look at it and say it's not the brightest lightbulb in the box, here are the facts. First, it was produced on a console, making it accessible to all people and not just overprivileged schmucks with nothing better to blow their money on than new parts for their PC every year or two. Second, it's easier to play than any other FPS that's had its guts jammed into an uncomfortable console-based control scheme. In all frankness no FPS belongs on anything other than mouse and keyboard, but Halo makes up for it pretty well by only allowing two weapons and a grenade to be equipped at a time and doing away with unrealistic, albeit fun, secondary fire; this design choice is a decidedly overlooked mechanic that throws a lot of balance into the game and dumbs the controls back enough that we aren't noodling for the needler after picking up a dozen weapons. It's easy enough at this point that virtually anyone can pick up the controls and start playing. Third, it's multiplayer. The ability to enjoy the company of friends through a game increases that game's value tenfold at the very least, if not more so; sports games THRIVE off this principle, being incredibly boorish to play otherwise. Halo actually provides a competent single player campaign on top of robust multiplayer options, including co-op, putting it head and tails above crappy EA sports titles. Fourth, it's adaptable; unlike some class-based multiplayer games I know it allows you to pick up weapons--but not too many weapons--on the fly to adapt to your situation, adding a level of satisfaction. Fifth, it's pretty; it's always been on the cutting edge of graphics right from the first game, making it equally as appealing as the inaccessible PC games that have been released alongside it. There's more to Halo's success than just these factors (if you look deeply it's the spiritual successor to Goldeneye in practically every respect), but these are undeniably the primary reasons for Halo's success.
Combined with the fact that it's at least competent as a shooter and that it was really the first decent one to be put on a console, Halo did an awful lot for gaming. In all frankness, though, I loved the first one to death and then got lividly pissed when the second came along and I found out there was not only more than one Halo in Halo but the Flood were also back. I didn't like them in the first place. I find zombies to be the tackiest excuse for a lack of creativity one can possibly employ. I was also hoping to see some new locales; instead I came to find a few levels in that they had dropped me in the exact same location that I started in during the FIRST game. To me those were reason enough to sell the second game and swear never to buy the third one, although I probably will wind up selling out as I desperately need something other than Viva Pinata to play on my Xbox 360.
On top of all this, Halo really is a cut back, standard first-person shooter, having no really outstanding gameplay mechanics or level design to qualify it as a brilliant gem of a game. To this day it baffles me that the Covenant battleship "Truth and Reconciliation" is more or less a collection of corridors with no rooms or equipment inside it. It does nothing more or less than what Doom or Quake did, except that it managed to look and feel a whole lot cooler doing it and brought the game competently to a huge demographic. Really, if I had to name a core mechanic for Halo, "accessibility" would be it. Still it deserves a great deal of praise for that being that nobody else but Bungee was smart enough to implement such an idea (although they were probably just lucky) and naysayers are generally just
A: angry that people bought this and not Psychonauts (which SUCKED; WORST PLATFORMER EVER, and take it from a guy who loves a good platformer AND who loves Tim Schafer), seeing this game as a representation of Microsoft's corporate dick thrusting into our lives all too successfully and the unfair advantage large corporations have in advertising and marketing,
B: angry that they suck at multiplayer because they don't care (like me; seriously, I have a life, I'm not gonna spend every day practicing this garbage),
C: angry that the single-player campaign isn't long enough for them to get their $60 worth,
D: angry that the second two games are exactly the same as the first one, or
E: angry that the series has practically no depth to speak of, either in mechanics or storyline, and has damaged peoples' sense of quality.
Although these are all valid criticisms of the game and there's probably a lot more, in the face of the good things Halo has done and continues to do for gaming they don't mean a whole lot. Claiming Halo lacks depth today would be a lot like claiming Super Mario Bros. lacked depth in 1988. As a designer I'd say we shouldn't ignore the lessons this game has to teach us just because it doesn't fall in line with our sense of taste, much as anime fans shouldn't ignore anime's roots in DBZ. There's reasons Halo is one of the most successful series of all time and we should learn what those are rather than immaturely insult everybody who likes it.
Lets put it this way. The damn game got soo much hype you figured that God himself made it. The games are good but no way, shape or form are they great.
I have no idea why people are so nuts over a game that is so average. Of course the online community is were the game is and that's the main part of what it has. Nothing else.
To those who like Halo, great. I'm glad you like to bath in the piss warm water of FPS's.
I'm sorry, that last comment was out of spite.
Either way, by the halo's at bergen, no more than $20, price.
I have no idea why people are so nuts over a game that is so average. Of course the online community is were the game is and that's the main part of what it has. Nothing else.
To those who like Halo, great. I'm glad you like to bath in the piss warm water of FPS's.
I'm sorry, that last comment was out of spite.
Either way, by the halo's at bergen, no more than $20, price.
Halo was neither the first nor the best at anything it did. Goldeneye was what brought console FPS games to the masses, and a hundred other games pioneered multiplayer systems. Goldeneye didn't allow online gaming since there wasn't such a thing for console games back in the N64 days. Hundreds of other games, however, pioneered online multiplayers first, and most if not all of them offer an equally good (if not much better) experience, with more features. Xbox live, if I heard correctly, has no dedicated servers, that alone is a major strike against it.NickCaligo42 said:
The facts you listed (produced on a console, easier to play, etc.) are true (except for #2, it is no easier to play than Goldeneye). None of them, however, set Halo apart from other console FPS's in any way. You said "Third, it's multiplayer." Um, what game doesn't have multiplayer? Every shooter made since 1997 has multiplayer. It's "adaptable." So it is, so are a lot of games. Fifth, it's pretty. Um, what doesn't look great these days? Every game designer and their dog is pouring obscene amounts of money into graphics in their major titles, as a cheap substitute for actual depth.
And no, we are not "just angry because it sold more than Psychonauts." We are angry because, even when you yourself agree that it's not a perfect game, reviewers have been tossing 10/10 scores at it. Yes, we are aware that it's not a bad game. It is an average, competent game. It was not the first of anything, nor did it "do anything for gaming" that hadn't been done before. We don't like it because so many people who DO like it are holding it up as something new or fantastic. It is neither. It's not bad, but it doesn't even begin to deserve the heaps of praise being lavished upon it by the mainstream critics and legions of fanboys.
I sincerely hope you're kidding.fantomspower said:
So for the skinny on this thread
Halo 3 was good fun, but not revolutionary
People are becoming too polarized on this topic
Don't be a mindless zombie. You need to make your own opinions about games.
And finally for some flamebait
Goldeneye beat the hell out of Halo on every level. (See the two above statements)
Halo 3 was good fun, but not revolutionary
People are becoming too polarized on this topic
Don't be a mindless zombie. You need to make your own opinions about games.
And finally for some flamebait
Goldeneye beat the hell out of Halo on every level. (See the two above statements)
I thought the first one was pretty fun for when I played it (May 2003, when I got my Xbox), but both the sequels have been, as both me and my friends have agreed, 'forgettable'. The first was fun because it had some new ideas for the time (Recharging Health, Drive-able Vehicles that could be used by multiple players, Large enviroments, etc.) and they were executed well, plus, it had Co-Op - which is in my mind the best feature in any of the games. Come the first sequel it was hyped to all hell and turns out to be a generic FPS with its major 'innovation' being the online play that *should* have been in the first game. The third redeemed it somewhat by trying to return towards what the first game did, but given how many good games are on the 360 and not to mention how many great ones came out this year it was overall pretty forgettable.
I don't hate Halo, it can be a fun game and actually manages to be better than most games that copy it. The problem I think is that it was the first worthwhile game to own on the Xbox, which ended up building a huge hype machine for games that fail to live up to what the original was for its time.
Also, trying to play any of the games on a PC to me is laughably bad. Mostly due to the fact that its pretty much built (Pacing and Control Wise) for a console, which ends up making it feel so sluggish and slow-paced.
I don't hate Halo, it can be a fun game and actually manages to be better than most games that copy it. The problem I think is that it was the first worthwhile game to own on the Xbox, which ended up building a huge hype machine for games that fail to live up to what the original was for its time.
Also, trying to play any of the games on a PC to me is laughably bad. Mostly due to the fact that its pretty much built (Pacing and Control Wise) for a console, which ends up making it feel so sluggish and slow-paced.
I'm sorry but you fail, completely and utterly. It's not about how many things you do, it's about how many things you do well. Halo certainly doesn't do everything at once, nor does it try to. You can only do two or three things at a time in Halo. Run and shoot. Drive and shoot. Run and melee. Throw a grenade and drive... no, you couldn't do that. Sure, you might get these experiences faster than a meal maybe, but you certainly don't get them all at once, every time. So why is taking a bite of McDonald's here and there so hard for you to grasp? Even though it works well, as I just showed, that's not what the analogy is about. It's about taste. Why can't you address this? Halo seems to be adored by gamers that haven't developed a taste for FPS games. Anyone that spent the decade before Halo's release playing FPS games seem to feel otherwise, as do I.Cheeze_Pavilion said:
righthanded said:
Seriously, do you have any proof? A link perhaps? Anything that says that Halo was the first game to be designed specifically for a TV. Don't you think that this is something Atari, Nintendo, Sega, Sony, every arcade cab, and so forth for the last 20 years of gaming-3-feet-from-the-screen have been doing for the last 20 years? (GoldenEye supported 16:9 wide screen back in '97.) Like I've said, if Bungie took this knowledge a step further, especially if they were the first to do it, thats neat. I'd just like to see some evidence to support this claim. And that Wired article was about Halo 3, not Halo. And it seemed to have a lot more to do with dumbing the game down for, as Yahtzee so eloquently puts it, the console Tards rather than optimizing the game for a certain distance from a certain screen. By the way, do you really think there's that much difference between playing 2 feet away from a monitor and 3 feet away from a, presumably, bigger TV? It sounds a lot like a blend of self-congratulatory nonsense and hype to me.Cheeze_Pavilion said:
Pavilion even I can't find anything on Halo being the first shooter designed for playing on (an sd) tv. Frankly I can't imagine that the Goldeneye/PD team some how missed this when creating their own games. Why would you even bother to make such a claim in the first place?
Righthanded your analogy really does suck even though it really wouldn't make sense to me for anyone to refer to refer to a Mcdonalds as a restaurant in the same vien as a place that serves Sushi either.
The thread was started in such a way that could be interpereted as "If you don't like Halo, you don't know a good game."
Righthanded your analogy really does suck even though it really wouldn't make sense to me for anyone to refer to refer to a Mcdonalds as a restaurant in the same vien as a place that serves Sushi either.
Cheeze_Pavilion, I don't know where you get the idea that I hate Halo. I just think it's a mediocre game. Why you can't understand that, well, that's your deficiency. I see no evidence that it's not a mediocre game. It's not original. Everything that the game does has been done before, in a lot of cases, better. Halo was probably the 30th or so FPS I played. Did I think it was a bad game when I played it? No, everything seemed to work fine. Did the game wow me in any way? No, there was nothing that stood out about it. Single objective at a time? Open spaces? Vehicles? Co-op? Multi-Player? Friendly NPC? Quick draw melee? Quick draw grenade? Limited weapons? I've seen it all before. What am I supposed to think? Gee this game that's collection of ideas I'm quite familiar with is great. I can't wait to play this game, with it's generic cast of characters, enemies, and locations. Along with with a lousy weapon set-- oh wait, the Hive-hand from Half-life is in this game but it's called the needler? Cool! The story's about aliens destroying Earth and stuff? Awesome! You can get shot a lot but if you just sit still out of harms way for a few seconds, you're good to go? Finally, I can play as brainlessly as I want to. Online? Great, I've only been playing online since Quake.
Why would anyone that started playing FPS when they started being made think Halo is great? I doubt most of Halo's champions had played 30 FPS before playing Halo.
Why would anyone that started playing FPS when they started being made think Halo is great? I doubt most of Halo's champions had played 30 FPS before playing Halo.
Hate to repeat myself here, but my point is being ignored: All the critics and fanboys are insisting that Halo is much better than other FPS's out there (as evidenced by the 10/10 scores beign tossed at it), but nobody can give any coherent explanation as to what exactly makes it so much better. No defenders of Halo have answered the question of what Halo does that thousands of other games have not already done.
Yes, I'm starting to sound like a broken record, but nobody has answered the question. NickCaligo42 brought out a lot of "Facts" about what Halo does, and most of them were correct, and valid points in its favor (never once have I said it's a BAD game), but then he proceeded to ruin it by actually claiming that Halo was the first to do a lot of the things it did (he actually said that!), which is absurd, as many examples that he himself cited were pointed out. He calls it "the spiritual successor to GoldenEye in almost every way" and then claims that it was "the first decent FPS to be put on a console."
I definitely wouldn't hate Halo if the fanboys weren't so self-contradictory and the critics weren't so circlejerkish.
Yes, I'm starting to sound like a broken record, but nobody has answered the question. NickCaligo42 brought out a lot of "Facts" about what Halo does, and most of them were correct, and valid points in its favor (never once have I said it's a BAD game), but then he proceeded to ruin it by actually claiming that Halo was the first to do a lot of the things it did (he actually said that!), which is absurd, as many examples that he himself cited were pointed out. He calls it "the spiritual successor to GoldenEye in almost every way" and then claims that it was "the first decent FPS to be put on a console."
I definitely wouldn't hate Halo if the fanboys weren't so self-contradictory and the critics weren't so circlejerkish.
You can like Halo, love Halo, hate Halo, loath Halo. These are the facts that remain opinions aside:
-Halo was not and is not revolutionary. It did nothing for the genre, but what It did do it did right. Proof? Millions of fans. YES. Millions of fans DOES mean it's not a bad game. Millions of fans, other the other hand, doesn't make Halo an awesome game.
-The minority of people who HATE Halo can't call the majority of people who love it stupid, simply for loving it. And thats exactly what the Haters do.
-Halo is not and was never a "bad" game. You can't call it so and be right, because Halo does nothing wrong. It just doesn't EXPAND upon FPS's. You may call that a wrong in itself, but no other FPS has been judged on a bases of whether or not it made FPS's better, they're judged BASED ON FUN.(Or for christs sake, they should be)
Halo doesn't deserve a thread on this forum, honestly. These forums are, in my opinion, populated with well-informed gamers who have some sense. As such, everyone here should understand that Halo is average, in that it adds nothing but does what it does right. It's that simple and shouldn't be taken any further.
-Halo was not and is not revolutionary. It did nothing for the genre, but what It did do it did right. Proof? Millions of fans. YES. Millions of fans DOES mean it's not a bad game. Millions of fans, other the other hand, doesn't make Halo an awesome game.
-The minority of people who HATE Halo can't call the majority of people who love it stupid, simply for loving it. And thats exactly what the Haters do.
-Halo is not and was never a "bad" game. You can't call it so and be right, because Halo does nothing wrong. It just doesn't EXPAND upon FPS's. You may call that a wrong in itself, but no other FPS has been judged on a bases of whether or not it made FPS's better, they're judged BASED ON FUN.(Or for christs sake, they should be)
Halo doesn't deserve a thread on this forum, honestly. These forums are, in my opinion, populated with well-informed gamers who have some sense. As such, everyone here should understand that Halo is average, in that it adds nothing but does what it does right. It's that simple and shouldn't be taken any further.
Do you not see the inherent contradiction here, for some reason the numbers of people who play this particular game means that it is a good game, and it somehow makes it impossible for others to call those individuals stupid. An assload of people (still) think that Iraq had something to do with 9/11 guess what they are indeed "idiots" the fact that there are alot of them doesn't change this. I don't know if you heard of the experiment where a man was placed in a room and told to give the value of 2+2. Of course he answered correctly with four, but the other individuals kept saying the answer was five. What you are saying here is essentially the same thing here. Number of players proves dick when it comes to whether the product is quality or not. The quality of the product is not subjective either. Bad games (Bug ridden needlessly missing or contrived features etc.) can be fun (Which is subjective.) and Well made games can be boring as all hell.
Really good and fun games may only sell a few thousand units and bad games can end up selling millions and breaking records.
The problem isn't the normal people who like Halo its the tards. As far as doing things wrong Halo does quite a few things wrong it also does not help that it did not expand on anything. In many ways Halo has actually begun to destroy the console shooter which is a much more serious issue. I can't stand how Halo's method of selecting matches has infected so many other games to the complete exclusion of the proper method of doing things. It pains me to think see that people are really being sold a bill of goods when it comes to console shooters in large part because Halo was able to get away with it. I don't appreciate Bungie telling me and the rest of the console world that we are morons and can be handed any kind of crap and it will work out fine.