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  • Subject: a serious talk about halo 2
Subject: a serious talk about halo 2
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actually i hope some of the makers of halo 2 read this, but for everyone else it might be nice to read as well. i do think halo 2 is an awesome game, however, not as awesome as i thought it would be, im actually kind of dissapointed by it which is very surprising for me. the multiplayer action is great, hands down, though the levels arent all as good as i thought theyd be either. but my main dissapointment that id like to talk about is the campaign for halo 2. now i know alot more people are into the multiplayer action than the story of halo, but there are still mnay of us who really are into the story, i have read all three halo books that are out so far as well playing fully through halo and halo 2. about the first half of the campaign in halo 2 is very good, its great and a lot of fun, but around after where you(master chief) kills that prophet on the new halo, thigns seem to jsut fall apart, like the makers got tired of thinking up the stry line and made a mess out fo it, its just crazy, i didnt hvae good clear idea of what the hech was going on, becuase it skipped raound too much and went fast as well. which is another thing, i thought halo 2's story would be longer than halo 1, but its actually only about half the length. i felt like during the second half of the campiagn, that the strategy, and real military like action and playing that makes halo halo, was just...gone. i didn feel like i was playing halo anymore, i was juts some invincible guy running around blasting the hell out of everything i saw, while everything was fighting everything, no one was thinking or anything like that, and thigns would just be there all the sudden with no real explanation, for example when the sarge gets into the scarab, how and when did he get in there??? and the amount of enemies isnt realistic at this point in the game, they are everywhere and in numerous places come almost nonstop, while your begging to find just a little bit more shotgun ammo or something that efficiently can fend off like a million freakin flood. and i hope i will get a better explanation on what that big monster thing is, with the big long tentacle things, if it was said in the game, then i didnt hear it, so here is a little tip, let people be able to actually understand the thing, the eliets have learned perfect english pretty much, so why not make this thign be able to talk a little better? instead of a low gurgling, rwagd baghs something something. in the second half of the levels, its just chaos, brutes everywhere doing killing everyone for who knows what real purpose, (which by the way, i never got to really fight anybrutes, everyone i came in contact with i had to immediately shoot the hell out of so again, no staregy in that, its like just some other stupid first person shooter game thats crazy, not our great halo) there is flood jusr absolutely everywhere, and that reminds me, it was kind of dumb to have the old prophet guy get killed by one little flood spore, if the brites were really protecting the prophets, why didnt they pull it oof or something? i dont know probably just yet another thing i didnt catch. me and all of my friends who are very inot halo as well, thought halo 2 was supposed to be about protecting earth, not playing on earth for like an hour then leaving to do all this other weird stuff jumping from one covenant place to another, and from those to another halo, and back to some covenant place where everyone is all the sudden fighting one another. i hope halo 3 actually does focus on the covenant(and hopefully only the covenant, persoanlly, i am just down right tired with the flood, also because many people i know think the earth or human like levels are the coolest, the whole city enviroment i guess is just a very cool and military like surrouning with many strategic options. but then again im not sure if this will happen cuz by the end of halo 2, the covenant sure seemed pretty ripped apart, so i dont know how or why thyed still be able to really launch an attack on earth when they are so messed up. if they do halo 3 right, they can still pull it back togeather and make verythign as great as it was supposed to be in halo 2 and then halo 2's campign will be fine and i wont have any real problem with it as long as i understand it better here soon, and then i probably just wont play it anymore, i dont know if i'll ever play all the way through halo 2s campign again, once was really enough. so yeah those are my thoughts on halo 2's story line. but here is a question for people whove played halo 2 that me and my friends have had quite a controversy over, i like the battle rifle and use it frequently, and some other of my freinds do as well, but the others think it totally sucks and only use it if they have no other options. do you think it is or isnt a good weapon?

  • 11.14.2004 7:29 PM PDT
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FINALLY SOMEONE SMART
i totally agree with u considering the story line. wat the hell r we doing defending earth in space? i will not go through halo 2's campaingn again.
i do like multiplayer... all of the new options and weapons.
the new maps are very well laid out and fun....but they loose their spark after maybe an hour of playing each one. i really miss damnation and hang em high and side winder and boarding action. THE STORY LINE IN HALO 2 IS WAY 2 FRICKEN EASY. i didnt mind the flood BECUASE I WALKED RIGHT PASSED THEM!!!! I DIDNT SHOOT ONE ROUND AT ONE FLOOD CREATURE THE WHOLE TIME.

about the assault rifle
it is not my particularly favorite gun....it would kick ass if there wasnt such a long delay between bursts......AND WAT HAPPENED TO THE ONE SHOT IN SCOPE AND THREE RND. BURST UNSCOPED? and why is the atv gone....it looks like it handles perfectly fine on the collectors edition.

I AM A HUGE FAN OF HALO....BUT PPL THINK THAT BECAUSE IT SAYS HALO ON THE COVER THAT ITS AUTOMATICALLY A KICKASS GAME.....NOT THE CASE FOR HALO 2. I LOVE HALO COMBAT EVOLVED....HALO 3 SHOULD TAKE PLACE ON EARTH THE WHOLE TIME AND NOT BE ON ANOTHER HALO.....AND HAVE A BETTER STORY LINE.


halo 2's story line reminded me of readin a half-assed middle school report.
it starts out fine but loses quality and appears to have been rushed and it doesnt seem like a completed game...let alone HALO.

excuse all the caps

  • 11.14.2004 7:50 PM PDT
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The United States of America-- STILL more rights than North Korea!
--New official U.S. motto.

Cronin's Law----The New Flood Drinking Game

You are dead wrong about the campaign, methinks. The chaos in the last few levels is very well-orchestrated and I love it... think about it, you are the master chief, a human superweapon, trapped in the middle of a huge covenant city which is rapidly disintegrating into civil war. if that isn't bad enough, the flood are adding to the chaos. I love it.
--
Oh and the ending isn't as much a cliffhanger as you think... The forunner are immensly powerful, so one ship could likely own the entire covenant fleet at earth (especially with the help of 300 orbital MAC guns... the 25 at reach gave the covies a run for their money), so the earth problem is resolved. Then when cortana blows up High Charity the flood, delta halo, and the entire covenant fleet will be destroyed. if that's not enough, the covenant leadership will be gone, flinging them into total chaos (especially with the new civil war going on). the tide has turned, and resoloution is assured.

  • 11.14.2004 8:05 PM PDT
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If anybody was paying attention you stopped the Apocalypse at the end of Halo 2.

  • 11.14.2004 8:24 PM PDT
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The one thing I didn't understand was, what was with the monster thing asking cortana a question at the very end? I just didn't get it.

I'm also a little disappointed that they took out the part of new mombaxa they showed @ e3 2003. The city combat was really fum, and I wanted to know what happened after MC threw the plasma granade @ the elites @ the end of the movie.

P.S. The battle rifle is good, if you can at least get the enemy from a distane tostart out, and I think they too out the 3 round bursts to make it more realistic. Real guns do not shoot single shots when they are zoomed and 3 rounds when not zoomed.

  • 11.14.2004 8:30 PM PDT
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If only it were in a Halo 2 Forum, I think I -blam!- about that too much, do I?

  • 11.14.2004 8:33 PM PDT
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I must agree, i was very disapointed at the story line in halo. It basically seems that you just redid the story for halo 1 theorecically, going back to another halo. I think i speak for everyone when i say we thought halo 2 was going to be all on earth. I think all they did was throw some stuff together so they could make a Halo 3. I did like the campaign, but i could have done without being the arbirator, i dont think we should have been anythign but the mc in this game. I also was disapointed that the 4 remaing spartans didnt make an apperance in this game, being the huge enthusiast i am with the books, its just a punch i nthe stomach to have your mind set on somthing and it not be there. Lets hope halo 3 comes out soon.

  • 11.14.2004 8:38 PM PDT
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shut up shaun that is bull-blam!-, you arent a big fan of halo you got an xbox a month ago and you dont even have the full version for pc

  • 11.14.2004 8:41 PM PDT
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for those who think the game is too easy--try it on a setting other then easy.

thank you.

  • 11.14.2004 10:21 PM PDT
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Posted by: XDaNoObX
for those who think the game is too easy--try it on a setting other then easy.

thank you.


It was easy, i beat it on heroic. Trust me, it wasnt as hard as the original, to many ways to get out of something...

  • 11.14.2004 10:37 PM PDT
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I fully agree with you shining elite, they really focused more on the multiplayer aspect instead of the campaign, I have just finished the game, and it really disappointed me, don’t get me wrong, the game is great, the graphics, the cut scenes well directed, the gameplay and the new additions to it, a work of art, but the storyyy, I found myself lost when I saw the last cut scene and then all of the sudden the end credits shows up, the game is wayyy tooo shorttttt, if the idea was to make a continuation of the game (a la Matrix Reloaded/Revolution), at least make the game longer by filling up the blanks that were left off from the story, as an example, the big thing with the tentacles, where in the world he came from, what is its purpose, why the prophets are doing what they're doing with the elites (the only excuse is because they have failed protecting them, but how???) all of the sudden you just see them fighting against each other and that’s it, why at the end they let one of the prophets die, what’s the point of their "Religion", I mean, I can just keep on going.. ohh, and one other thing, the cut scene after the end credits, cortana and the big tentacle thing...

The game also looses focus of what it was about, I mean, when you see the trailers or TV adds, its all about the covenants attacking the humans at our home planet earth, and we're suppose to defend it, you play for a little bit there, then you are in another halo in god knows where, then the covenants city, and at the end ( I mean end of the game in a cut scene only) you are back on earth to continue were we left of at the beginning of the game, the game practically focuses on the covenants the majority of the time, and that’s ok, its just that it gives you the wrong idea.

I just hope that Bungie knows what is doing with the game, and that if there is a "continuation" (I really really hopeee there is one and soonnnn) they take more into consideration the Story and fill in the blanks of Halo 2, so that it can make more sense, I have been waiting for this game for the longest and fully prepaid the game since we had a chance to do it, and also it was a reason for me to get an XBOX console since halo 1 came out.

Overall they did a pretty good job on the multiplayer mode, the maps are very very detail, and opens up many options to use different types of strategy, this is the game that Xbox live gamers have been waiting for, and a good reason to open a live account.

Well, we will have to wait god knows how long to see what finally happens to earth, the Arbiter, and CORTANA!!!! since she was left behind at the ring, meanwhile we have to take what we have and play live for now while we're waiting :).


  • 11.14.2004 10:40 PM PDT
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Posted by: ShAuNzY
THE STORY LINE IN HALO 2 IS WAY 2 FRICKEN EASY. i didnt mind the flood BECUASE I WALKED RIGHT PASSED THEM!!!! I DIDNT SHOOT ONE ROUND AT ONE FLOOD CREATURE THE WHOLE TIME.

about the assault rifle
it is not my particularly favorite gun....it would kick ass if there wasnt such a long delay between bursts......AND WAT HAPPENED TO THE ONE SHOT IN SCOPE AND THREE RND. BURST UNSCOPED? and why is the atv gone....it looks like it handles perfectly fine on the collectors edition.


If it's so easy, play it on legendary, that should solve your concerns.

Obviously Bungie changed their mine about the battle rifle behaviour, something which, yes, developers have been known to do in the past! Don't take the fact that a particular weapon is not strong as a sign of the game being bad - it's a balance decision, a gun being bad does NOT have anything to do with game quality!
You just said you have the collectors edition and have seen the ATV - so why didn't you listen?! It explains explicitly why they took it out - they couldn't work out how to integrate it into the gameplay well, so they removed it.

  • 11.14.2004 10:46 PM PDT
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i really agree with the lameness of the campaign. i think its really lame that they left out all these things the showed us in the lead up to the game. u think there is going to be all this cool urban warfare on earth but instead we're forced to prance aroung on another stupid older halo and never even see the scene in the one trailer we all saw. of course the multiplayer was a hit, it had everything we dreamed of in halo well except for the atv. that was a major let down, just because they couldn't fit it in the story line(which they could have they're smart) doesnt mean they cant put it in multiplayer.

and as far as the battle rifle goes, it all depends on what your doing or the map, its not good for close combat or small maps but is a good side weapon when your sniping and u run out of ammo or something. its solid for big maps because of the scope.

and on a side note, the sword is sick, tag teaming the sword and the sniper rifle is a killer combo, u snipe the hell out of some kid and them when someone gets close u just lunge attack them with the sword and it KILLS, let me tell u, solid combo right there.

  • 11.14.2004 11:15 PM PDT
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so im not sure why everyones talking about halo 3? they suggest that halo2 would contain downloadable campaigns, what better way to get people to download it then with a cliffhanger ending

  • 11.14.2004 11:28 PM PDT

Only Becausae I'm Awesome

Forum Tutorials --- WATCH THEM AND LEARN

OK, the story, of the elites fighting the brutes.

The prophets, used to have elites as they're main protector. When the brutes came into the game, the elite were tossed away, and the brutes took over. Apart from the elite's just being jealous of the role, the brutes were also very racist against them. And that's where the covenant civil war started.

I hoped that cleared things up for you guys who were wondering why brutes and elites were killin eachother.

  • 11.14.2004 11:40 PM PDT
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All of you haters just leave!

The campaign does not suck. The campaign is there to catch you attention. If the games is to easy turn the settings from easy to legendary. When you beat it without dying more that 10 times come back and b!tch at me. The campaign in Halo 2 has a cliffhanger, just like Halo. Do not tell me Halo is not a cliffhanger ending "No I think we are just getting started."

The multiplayer is still the main concern of Halo 2, just like Halo. Tell me did you go to a Halo Fest and say lets all play coop? No! If you and your friends got together it was to system link.

Any other b!tching post it, I'll prove you wrong.

  • 11.14.2004 11:43 PM PDT
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I agree with pretty much everything Allan says. My only question is aboat that green plant thing:

Its underwater one minute, then sonehow reaches to the covenant ship to get cortana the next? Another thing that seems "rushed" in Halo 2. Bungie: slow down and take your time on Halo 3. You will get a better result in these forums. Waiting 3 years was a -blam!- but hey, if another year = a perfect game, go for it. Who disagrees?

  • 11.14.2004 11:46 PM PDT
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Guys, the bottom line on the campaign and the way it ended was that Bungie's upper management totally and completely blew it. If you watch the 'making of' and 'developement' videos that come on the extras DVD they pretty much admit that they screwed up, ran out of time, and the game just sort of ended.

The ORIGINAL plan was for, and I quote Staten here; "9 levels, you start on earth, go out, come back, and the story finishes". What happened was that they tried to shoe horn in the extra stuff "to show us the viewpoint of the Covenant", namely the Arbiter. They totally bungled their time management, and didn't get the game finished. It wasn't an intentional cliffhanger, and you can tell that by the fact that the game does not build up to it, it just abruptly ends.

Watching JJ talk about his seat-of-the-pants management style made me cringe. You can pull that sort of thing off when you're managing a small team, like what Bungie was for the original Halo. When you are managing a team of 70, it's a trainwreck waiting to happen.

Bungie has the creativity, they have the inventivness and the drive, what they are badly, badly lacking is a "Dr No". That's somebody with a position of authority who's job is to jealously watch the clock, and when somebody comes up with an too ambitious idea like adding the Arbiter he points and the calender and says "NO".

I mean, would you rather have the campaign we have now, or 9 levels, focused on the Master Chief, and a storyline that actually resolves?

  • 11.14.2004 11:57 PM PDT
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I completely agree with shining elite. I was pissed off by this cliffhangin ending, cuz I thought I was going to be defendin the last precious piece of human power, earth! Instead I'm on another damn ring, fightin more damn flood (are these things everywhere now???), and standin around like a moron tryin to figure out what just happened. Great start, bad finish. I understand the idea of tryin to make it dark and chaotic at the end, but it still didn't quite fit together. Tell that eric nylund guy to get writin another book so we can figure out just exactly what the heck is goin on around here!
PS: if you want a one shooter scope like the battle rifle, just use the covie one. its like another pistol! yee-ha!
-The Sarge

  • 11.15.2004 12:09 AM PDT
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You know, I have to agree. It seems as if Bungie decided to take too much input from the community and do too much loosing focus of what made HALO 1 - the best game ever.

The game play is great and some aspects of the game are great, but after you get going in the game you're the arbiter? I don't care about the covenant - I want to kill them!

Half the problem with the game feeling too short is that the gears were being changed too frequently. Technically, we received 15 levels of game play, but only 7-8 with the Master Chief and the rest with the Arbiter, or half the game we previously had with the Master Chief.

This is a game about the Master Chief and not to end it as the Master Chief is horrible - I feel robbed.

  • 11.15.2004 1:00 AM PDT

Been with this community since Marathon.

Please forgive me if I think that your appraisal of Halo 2's story is way off.

First of all, how could you really have thought that all of Halo 2 would take place on Earth? Bungie only ever said that the early portions of Halo 2 would take place on Earth. This kind of implies that the rest of the game will take place somewhere else. How could you not expect another Halo to be involved? It is quite clear that the rings are pretty central to the overall plot arc of the series. Otherwise they would not call the game "Halo" would they?

I do not see why you felt that the plot got worse after the encounter with the Gravemind (that tenticaled thing.) I found that to be quite revealing. In the first game I assumed that the Flood were simply instinct driven, taking knowlege from their hosts and applying it mindlessly. I was surprised to find out that the Flood had an intelligence behind it. In case you did not gather, the Gravemind is the "brain" of the Flood, the part of it that actually thinks. If you were having trouble understanding the Gravemind, then try turning on the subtitles and just reading. And speaking of Flood, why did you find the second portion of Halo 2 worse than in the first Halo game? Pretty much the same thing happened. Flood got loose, chaos broke out, enemies fight each other, all similar to the first game. You cannot really say that Halo 2 was worse because of it. If anything I enjoyed it much more than the first game because of the new AI features, such as the Flood driving vehicels, strategically retreating from the player, and actually sounding like they have a little more personality.

The enemies coming in hordes is nothing new. If you cannot find enough ammo for the shotgun, then toss it aside and grab a different weapon. The game forces you to make due and try new things, both in campaign mode and in multiplayer over XBox Live. I find this nice, it keeps everything fresh. Otherwise stuff would quickly get boring. I do not see what the battle rifle has to do with the story in your post, but I will comment anyway. The battle rifle is a good general perpose weapon. It is not the best at long range and it is not the best at short range, but it is decent at short, medium, and long range. This alone makes it well balanced, since the game only allows you to carry two weapons at a time. Say I wanted to carry a rocket launcher, what should I use as my other weapon? An SMG? Nah, then snipers would kill me before I could close the distance. A sniper rifle? But then the short-ranged enemies would rip me to pieces before I could get more than a couple shots off. Have something like the battle rifle as your other weapon though, and you can mount a good counter to snipers and still pop enemies that get too close.

Oh, and about the Brutes. In case you did not notice, they have a large rivalry going on with the Elites. The Elites wish to protect their station as the Prophet's protectors, and the Brutes wish to assume that station. After the Prophet of Regret (who was one of the three highest leaders of the Covenant) was killed the other two Prophets believed that the Elites had failed in their job as protectors and had the Brutes take the Elites' place. Naturally the Elites, their pride and honor insulted by this, resisted. It was not long before the animosity between the Brutes and the Elites exploded and they began fighting. Once the Flood was loosed the confusion only intensified the problem. And about the Brutes not taking the Flood Infection Form off of the Prophet of Mercy, you will notice that Tarturus (the chieften of the Brutes) was reaching down to remove the Infection Form, but then the Prophet of Truth ordered him to stop and leave the Prophet of Mercy behind. The Prophet of Truth seems to clearly outrank the Prophet of Mercy, thus Tarturus follows the Prophet of Truth's orders and leaves the Prophet of Mercy to his fate.

Are you really a fan of the Halo books? Because one of the reasons that I loved Halo 2's story was because of the way it was told. The story-telling felt more like it did in the books. Halo has always been a space-opera inspired by the works of great science fiction authors such as Larry Niven and Ian M. Banks. In this regard I greatly approve of Halo 2's story-telling as it feels more like something that I would read in a science fiction book, yet it kept and expanded upon the original Halo's great gameplay. I approve of the parts of the game where the player is in control of the Arbiter. I got a much better feel for the Covenant this time around. In the original Halo the Covenant seemed like generic alien villians. In Halo 2 I got a good sense of the Covenant's society, beliefs, and motivations. They are much more interesting this time around. And the decision to end the game on such a high note without resolve was really bawlsy. Was I disappointed at the lack of resolution? Sure, but at the same time it made me thirsty for more. It kept me wanting to play the game again and again. I suggest that you do so as well, if only so that you get a better sense of things.

Oh, and please seperate your posts into distinct paragraphs. It makes it much easier to follow.

  • 11.15.2004 1:10 AM PDT
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remember this is not our age so space near earth is actually part of the earth empire or whatever

  • 11.15.2004 1:32 AM PDT
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  • still hates toast

Halo 2 topics belong on the New Mombasa forum.

  • 11.15.2004 1:38 AM PDT