Halo 3 Co-Op Guesstimate

Originally posted at 07/11/2007 06:28 PM PDT

In the Halo 3 video for E3 here, I saw Arbiter fighting right beside MC in a lot of scenes, Does that mean a real co-op? By real co-op i meant two different characters, not just two Master Chiefs running around, you are this MC and I'm that MC, its fun but not "true" because in theory there is just one MC, so having Arbiter the co-op guy, and the whole game built around the concept that Arbiter will be controlled by a real player or the AI, makes it real co-op.

Marcus and Dom!

Remember co-op has always been an integral part of Halo since Halo 1 and if Halo 3 doesn't have online co-op, i think the game would be seriously lacking.
Anycase, here is the list of scenes with Arbiter:

1. MC and Arbiter running out with chainguns(detachable turrets), we see from behind, arbiter on right of MC, both firing at a common target.
2. MC and Arbiter coming out of a structure with chainguns, we see from front, Arbiter on left of MC.
3. Both standing infront of what looks like a scarab, they look behind up in the sky as two fighter jets fly by.
4. The man cannon sniper shot fingers look longer to me, might be arbiter.
5. Cortana scene, Arbiter standing right of MC, right next to Guilty Spark.
6. Arbiter and MC standing at an edge of rock/mountain looking at something, Arbiter makes like a war cry expression, MC looks at him.
7. MC shooting with pistol scene, we see from front, arbiter is behind the pistol to the right of MC, we just see the legs mostly.
8. MC holding gun to Arbiters neck, looks like a cut scene.
9. MC shooting rockets at a scarab, while arbiter is fighting on it, he jumps off the scarab just before the scarab exploded.

There might be more, i just don't have good video enhancing tools to check some of the dark segments.

Posted by naveeda @ 12:25 am EDT | Permalink | 0 Comments

Team 5 vs. Team 6 Intra-Clan War series recap

Originally posted at 06/23/2007 06:18 PM PDT

This post game carnage report was written by fellow 2old2playHalo clanmate GMan. He was subbing for another teammate who had to bail out at last moments. Thanks GMan.

Team 5: Hog, Hub, Boulder
Team 6: GMan, Naveeda, Lathe

---

I volunteered to sub in for Frank in these matches. I learned a few things playing in his place and I'll iterate them Letterman style. I'll call the list... top 10 things I learned/relearned last night.

10. 2old2playHalo has a lot of good players.
9. Never assume an appointed match time is E.S.T.
8. Hog is really good with a shotgun.
7. Don't over pursue, just let them go, otherwise you'll die. (Esp. with Boulder, Hog, & Hub)
6. Never charge the bomb guy with only an SMG, he'll pwn you.
5. Naveeda & Lathe get better & better the more they warm up.
4. Never, ever, drop the flag in the green room, else carnage & death will be assured.
3. If the enemy is coming straight @ you with an SMG, he probably has the Sword/Shotgun.
2. Getting beat down by the bomb guy before he scores is embarrassing, esp. twice.
1. We have a bunch of cool, good guys in our clan.


GAME 1 RECAP - Team Slayer on Lockout

The first match started out in a very scary fashion for Team 6 as we were down 0-3 and 10-4 in short order. We clawed our back to 30-33 at one point, but then Team 5 decided enough was enough and went on a 17-8 run handing us an ugly loss. We hung in and fought valiantly when it would've been easy to give up, but ultimately we couldn't get it going.

Team 5 wins 50-38
Team 5 leads series 1-0

GAME 2 RECAP - Single Bomb on Lockout

Continuing their mad run of domination, Team 5 again took it to our hapless selves with some 'sick skillz', our Master Chiefs just looked sick, with us that is. I got beat down by Boulder & Hog with the Bomb, while they were arming it, although thankfully, it only recorded one as Hub & Boulder sprayed me down with SMG/Plasma showers the second time. We put up decent defense but it was more Cleveland Browns type D instead of Iron Curtain type D. Which brings me to their Defense, we squeezed in the arming area a couple of times but they pretty much gave us 'Access Denied' every time the stupid message said 'such & such is arming the bomb'. Tattle-tale.

Team 5 wins 3-0
Team 5 leads series 2-0

Close, but not an actual game footage

GAME 3 RECAP - Oddball on Lockout

Facing a shutout, Lathe, Naveeda and I played our hearts out this game. Naveeda was so adept at juking and dodging while carrying the skull, he didn't log a single kill. He didn't have to, as Lathe had his back and I swordwhored myself all around Lockout. While Naveeda evaded and Lathe escorted, I continuously used every low sword tactic in the book to take Team 5 out. And it worked as Team 6 lodged a victory in our match, Yes, verily the Halo Gods hath smiled upon these poor souls. One final note, never stand on the sniper spawn and shoot at somebody unless you're sure the exploding barrels are gone, I did this like a noob and Hog made me pay.

Team 6 wins 2:00-1:00
Team 5 leads series 2-1

Game 4 Recap - Single Flag on Lockout

I, personally, was worried going into this game as we didn't do so well in the assault game, but as someone said just before we started, this is a totally different ballgame. And it was. Hog suffered a disconnect halfway thru the match and we spent a good 10 minutes trying to figure out who had host now. Not being able to figure this out, we did finally realize that all of us switching to the same team would end the game. Hog rejoined and we began the match anew. I think this match was the absolutely hardest fought to this point. This game probably would've been a tie but for a couple of well placed grenades by my teammates. Everyone brought their A game and it showed on Offense and Defense, and every second counted in this game. Team 6 would not have secured a victory in this match if it wasn't for Naveeda with 7 flag saves and Lathe bringing 4 more saves and doling out 14 assists. We couldn't stop Team 5 from stealing as they had twice as many flag steals as us (6 vs. 3) but we never gave up and won another hard fought victory. This was a very fun, competitive match.

Team 6 wins 2-1
Series tied 2 apiece

Game 5 Recap - Team Slayer BR on Lockout

After the first 2 games, I didn't think we'd even play this game, so it was with iron will and resolve that we entered this game, and Team 5 came in with the same attitude. We all knew there would be no easy victory here as both teams wanted the win here to cap off an exciting series. Everyone played smartly and cautiously not wanting to give up easy kills, except for foolish me at the beginning. I kept pursuing when I shouldn't have, and time and again, Team 5 made me pay. I finally got some sense like my teammates and began to emulate their fine example, namely staying near my teammates and quit acting like a noobalicious wannabe hero. Naveeda led us to victory with 22 kills and a +9 spread with Lathe tacking on 17 more kills and 6 assists (i.e. bailing me out). Boulder and Hog both dealt out 18 kills apiece. Poor Hub kept spawning closer to us than his teammates and this made a difference for me as it was usually me he spawned in front of with his back turned and Lathe providing grenade support to me. While Team 6 won by a margin of 8, the game was far and away closer than the score indicates. It was another well fought match and fitting end to a Legendary series.

Team 6 wins 50-42
Team 6 wins series 3-2

Great Games and a lot of fun dudes!

Posted by naveeda @ 12:14 am EDT | Permalink | 0 Comments

First Impressions of The Halo 3 Beta.

Originally posted at 05/16/2007 02:22 PM PDT

I played some last night, thankfully it still has Halo written all over it, so anyone who was expecting a totally different kind of game than Halo 2 would be disappointed, I was for sure not one of them.

First Impressions The biggest WOW factor for me was the sounds, from the grenade cracking to the distant gunfire, it was really amazing to hear. Graphics are definitely sweet but not Gears quality, but still beautiful enough to stop and take a look at that thing. MC's looks are bit changed and the jumps seems a little higher to me.

Weapons The game is full of weapons now, there are so many of them it becomes a bit hard to choose from, the AR is the perfect starting weapon, you dont go looking for another one and can jump into the fight with just that and do decent damage. Still controlling the power weapons is important to winning the game. Needler is no more dual wieldable but much more powerful, about 10-12 hits and you're done. plasma charge doesnt track that much anymore, so its harder to pull off the noob combo. Auto-aim has been significantly reduced for BR and Sniper, makes it hard to do swipe headshots.

Equipment and Support Weapons Its hard to predict the impact of these, I havent played with them much to make an assessment, Shield Drain or whatever thats called, made some fun moments.

Vehicles I tried Mongoose quite thoroughly, its a lot of fun and you can pretty much take it anywhere, it goes into pipes to stairs to rooms to anywhere. I wasn't able to jack it though? Ghost seems a little slower to me.

Maps Between SnowBound and HighGround, i really liked HighGround, the map is perfect for any kind of game as long as the party size is smaller than 10. Valhalla is a BloodGulch/Cogulation derivative and as beautiful as Yosemite, its best suited for big teams, but 4v4 objective games will still work.

User Interface Options and a lot of them, from match making to voice output to Spartan armor, but the defaults kick in so that you dont get lost if you dont want to. Controller settings will take some time to get used to. i keep on dropping my bubble shield to board mongoose.


Posted by naveeda @ 12:09 am EDT | Permalink | 0 Comments

Same of the old, new thing

Originally posted at 05/02/2007 09:42 PM PDT

I hear a lot of commentary on Halo 3 being an HD version of Halo 2 with just some weapon changes (see the recent EGM interview of Peter Moore) and why people are so disappointed in bungie not giving them anything new to play since Halo 1. Infact I even get asked, as some of you I'm sure are, as to why I even care about Halo 3 when I have been playing the same game for such a long time already.

Here is the thing, for the hardcore Halo players, which I believe are in majority, these small changes are really big. I'm not just saying it, infact I pray that they don't change the game play too much for the fear of loosing something that I enjoy so much. Ever see how changing the roundness of the soccer ball creates a huge outcry as well as support rallies by the soccer world and months of debates on how game play is effected or changes to the tennis racket is equated to creating a new game of tennis altogether.

You might think these guys take the game too seriously, and some of them do, but most of them take it like a normal sport, if you change anything they play everyday, they'll get nervous. Just as I'm nervous about the new equipments that are being introduced in Halo 3.



Needless so say, I'm not asking them to release Halo 3 using Halo 2's engine, all the new changes to weapons and what not are really welcome and I look forward to them, as long as it doesn't alter the game play drastically.

I'm also very excited about the campaign and story ending, but my main agenda here is that I don't want bungie to make Unreal or FEAR or R6 or Quake or Doom, I want bungie to make Halo. If I wanted to play some other type of game, I'll go and buy it, but when I buy Halo, then that's what I want to play. So far it seems that Bungie understands this challenge, at least they say they do.


Posted by naveeda @ 8:11 pm EDT | Permalink | 3 Comments

Drum solos of my brother

I thought i'd share with you the drum solos of my brother, here is a bit older one:



and this is a newer one:



man he rocks!


Posted by naveeda @ 2:49 am EDT | Permalink | 0 Comments