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Halo 3 (draft 3) by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 10/07/2007, 7:05pm PDT
It's like Halo 1, but with HDR lighting. It is not enough like Team Fortress 2.

Things (some which are positive):

The graphics are good. Not as good as Gears of War though. One of the most frequently used new-fangled type of effects is when they do some of that tunnel vision insane stuff when Cortana or the stupid flood little shop of horrors plant use their telepathy on you for absolutely no reason. It's sorta like a Bioshock or FEAR kinda FPS whatever thing as seen in a ton of recent MORE ORIGINAL games, where the game stops so some characters can taunt you while you are forced to listen. Is that a pro? Team Fortress 2 is a pro.

They finally fixed the assault rifle, which wasn't even in Halo 2, altho it seems like it needs a few more games worth of development. The needler got changed AGAIN but now the needles are faster and less likely to miss, but you can't dual wield them anymore so there's no point in using them. The shotgun, which was amazing in Halo 1, and ruined in Halo 2, is slightly buffed so it's good against the flood but worthless against everything else, which really just makes it a gag item most of the time meant to be ignored, taunting you with the idea that a shotgun should be super fuckin powerful and awesome, but in this game for some reason it isn't. You can now snap a stationary machine guns and turrets off their mounts, giving you an extra temporary weapon that you carry in third person, with depletable ammo and making you walk slower but definitely good at fuckin shit up. Although Team Fortress 2's weapons are all better.

Most of the new weapons just do the same sort of things other existing weapons already did, like the Spiker (NOT THE NEEDLER, it's a totally different weapon, yep these guys sure are creative) which is just another SMG, and the Gravity Hammer (it's like the sword but a hammer). They also added a couple new grenade types, so they made it so you can only carry 2 of each grenade, and you'll almost never find the new grenade types anyway, in single player or multiplayer, so you really just get less grenades throughout the game period. Team Fortress 2 doesn't even need grenades and it's better. Well alright the grenade thing there is just a style difference and can't be compared, and the grenades in the Halo games are mostly satisfying and easy to use. But TF2 is a better game.

The new "items" are a lot like the camo and overshield pickups, except you can choose when to activate them and even trade one for another just like how you would pick up different weapons. They switched the reload/use button and replaced it with this new "use item" button, so for the first hour or so of playing you'll probably keep accidentally using your items instead of opening doorways, throwing down a grav lift which then pins you against the ceiling and you can't get down until the item wears off. Good going blizzard/bungie/ea. Also the flare is completely fucking worthless, it just blinds you, it's the dummy prize of items and the only thing you should do with it is recognize it's HUD icon so you can tell when you have one and get rid of it immediately. Team Fortress 2 doesn't have stupid shit like this. Also, it's better.

The objectives in most of the missions feel less like the arbitrary "reach the fucking map transition did we forget to replace this text with something more descriptive oops?" filler notes like Halo 1 and 2, or Doom 3. They feel more like real objectives. This is because they involve backtracking. Apparently that's all you need to make an area seem less like an endless snaking corridor, just create an area (even if it's mostly through more snaking corridors) and create a point you have to return to. It's a little cool, except their design is still pretty bland. They dress up their hallways with more garbage, busted vehicles, crates and cargo carts, but the actual layout design is still pretty plain, except for the occasional outdoor areas, which become a little plain too. It's just a line with turns. Sometimes there's a dead end because there's an easily missed doorway you were supposed to turn at. Sometimes there's a place you're supposed to jump down to which you can barely see because terrain, doodads, or just fucking walls are blocking your visibility. All of the maps in Team Fortress 2 (and also Half-Life 2 Episode 2 and Portal) will be creatively designed and imaginative. Too late for bungie to take note, though.

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Similar to the second map in Halo 1 where you are suddenly outside in the most amazing looking gaem EVAR running under the waterfall and riding around rolling hills and inside a giant metal tunnel, you actually get the feeling that you are doing something by completing the objectives, tooling around the country having adventures, more of a feeling than you did in the previous games anyway. Maybe you don't get to choose which ones you take and complete dynamically like an emergent sandbox Stalker ripoff I mean uh homage, but it's better than the previous Halo games. So it is SORT OF like they're really trying this time and we can derisively pinch their widdo cheeks and say aw or something, but I dunno that is kind of a gay way to express that. For Team Fortress 2, you don't need to express things like that, because it is a great game.

They added a human made flying vehicle called a hornet or whatever, can't fucking remember. The point is, you get to fight those massive scarab walking tanks, in real time, from VTOL helicopter type gunships. The vehicle portions are even better in cooperuhtive, where you can usually find a whole lot of various jeeps and ATVs and tanks and alien transports and whatever. This was some of the most fun parts of the entire game, and you wish they could go on for the whole game. Also, the vehicle areas now have more vehicles driving around and shit at one time, as opposed to the Xbox games where you'd maybe see 3 max, you can now see 10 vehicles (in legendary difficulty anyway) all riding around, enemies and friendlies, all fighting it out. The scale of the battles is cranked up which makes the single player more fun period, so that is good. It's still no Mercenaries of course, where you drive around fuckin persistent dynamic uh uh whatever world with the various vehicles existing in the game, taking missions and blowing shit up all huge. But Team Fortress 2 is still better.

Cons (or other things, most of which have a negative feeling to them):

The motherfucking controls are as unresponsive as Battlefield 2142 when you are surrounded by 3 people and trying to set down some roller mines or health/ammo and getting shot at and pulling out your weapon-o fuck you just died because the controls are stuttering, NOT because you weren't reacting fast enough because you were. That should just never happen, ESPECIALLY as a super cyborg Marine asskicker from hell like the Master Chief. While playing on heroic, my top 2 causes of death were trying to wrestle with the controls and getting instasniped by the newer better beam rifles (which I never actually got ahold of in normal mode, ever). In PC games (which have superior controls) you can flip around and really keep an eye on all directions, and be like YEAH I'M EXTRA ALERT, I AM LOOKING BOTH WAYS BEFORE CROSSING A STREET BUT VIRTUALLY. In the Halo games, because they are on a console, you have to looooooooooook riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight............... then looooooooooooook leeeeeeeeffffffftuhhhhhhhhhh because the controls just move plainly. You can crank the sensitivity up, so that you'll never get an accurate crosshair shot on anyone because your aim will slide over all the enemies like they're made of butter. That's why they pour on the autoaim, because only a newb plays first person shootan multiplayer on a console. Team Fortress 2 doesn't need autoaim (except for the console versions perhaps).

One thing I can't figure out is why you aren't allowed to switch between a dual-wield setup and another weapon or even a second dual-wield set. It would be so nice to store a double plasma pistol AND a rocket launcher while I burn up some plentiful carby ammo before throwing it on the floor for whatever else is around in the giant pile of slaughtered enemies. Carrying a mounted weapon is a slight crutch, but they are rare in the end game maps, and you can't put them "away," but rather throw them on the ground with the rest of the fuckin mess of other shit. They give you tons of shitty ammo and weapons (thousands of plasma pistols) all over that do almost nothing to the enemies, and none of the good ammo/weapons which you actually need to kill enemies, so the game turns into a scavenger hunt for OH WHERE DID THAT BRUTE SHOT DROP I WANT THAT IT'S GONE IT JUST DISAPPEARED FUUUUUUUUUUCK. In Team Fortress 2................ fuck I dunno, Team Fortress 2 is just better. I'd mention episode 2 instead but it's not out yet.

This could be considered another control issue as well as a weapon issue, but I hate having the "reload/weapon switch" button be the same, but only depending on how long you hold it, and if you are standing in a heap of guns good luck picking up the best ones. Then if you try to reload your weapon, you'll probably be standing on a bunch of dropped plasma pistols, so you'll swap them if you hold reload too long. Halo PC let's you bind a key specifically to swapping weapons, Halo 3 needs to at least bind something else to the d-pad other than the flashlight (equipment or grenade selection). Just put weapon swapping on the control pad dipshits. Team Fortress 2.

One of the most disappointing negatives to me was the game's opening level. I was pretty excited about starting up Halo 3, THE FINAL HALO GAME FOREVER OF ALL TIME HULAGUAGUALA, until the first minute of gameplay. We followed some NPC soldiers around a fucking hallway-with-a-skybox. An ok looking one with plants and some water and a nice sky and HDR, but it's a fucking hallway with a fucking skybox. Crazy shit doesn't happen, paradigms are not changed, you aren't blown away by the first few minutes or really the first few entire fucking levels. The game that does have crazy shit happening with paradighgosdfhgms changing is Team Fortress 2.

The biggest disappointment of all is that Halo did not turn into a deep and meaningful third person RTS squad based combat sim using revolutionary AI and high tech futuristic weapons and vehicles. I didn't even want to play as Master Chief, I wanted to be one of the fuckin mooks running around following orders as they updated IN REAL TIME (OOO) and suppressing the enemy flanks with covering fire until reinforcements arrived with air support drop ship jeeps with chainguns hitting their heavy armor while we flanked with the panzerfaust and got a clear shot at their engine sections. The game was dumbed down for the motherfucking jocks who will all skip singleplayer to play slayer and then do something latently homoerotic (like high fiving each other after taking phone calls from Norm Macdonald). Halo 3 probably sold about a billion copies, more than Orange Box will sadly, but Orange Box (and Team Fortress 2 which is included in Orange Box) is the superior game, and that is just based on Team Fortress 2. Even TF2's single player (none and/or commentary mode) is better than Halo 3's single player.

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It's almost funny how hard they worked to dress up the interior maps. The result is that Halo 3 still has some of the worst indoor levels in game history since fucking I don't know what. The amazing outdoor areas look better than ever which just exaggerates that problem. Just like Halo 1 and 2. The vehicle portions are over before you know it, because it's such a relief from the usual gameplay that you seriously enjoy the game until you return to slogging everywhere on foot as usual. Then it's time for a break to play Team Fortress 2 instead.

During the vehicle portions which are fun already joh would be leaning on the mongoose horn, which sounds like the Faggio from Vice City. Then we would all laugh at the stupid ass horn sound as jhoh machine gunned it like it was some kind of weapon. He was determined to kill at least a brute with the Mongoose horn. Team Fortress 2.

You can toggle crouch now finally but if you get hit you stand up again, basically making ducking behind cover totally fucking pointless. :( Ditto for zooming with any zooming rifle such as the carbine or battle rifle, if you get hit you unzoom, which makes trying to zoom to shoot any enemy in the game completely pointless. Fuck this game and fuck blizzard and double fuck night elves. But do not fuck Team Fortress 2.

Dual wielding is almost a good idea, ruined by incompetence (as a result of age combined with dreeeeenk). But when you have your weapons all akimbo with whatever combination you have chosen, if you melee you drop the offhand weapon. If you get in a vehicle you drop it, if you jump you drop it, if you duck you drop it, if you throw a grenade you drop it, if you switch weapons you drop it, if you explode you drop it, if you hope that you don't drop it you drop it. Apparently, someone was ignored when they told bungie developers, "hey make it so you don't drop your dual wield offhand every time you do something, that's not even necessary to have in the game." They were ignored, probably because for every one of the people who said that, there were 5 or 10 other people saying ANYTHING YOU DO IS PERFECT, JUST DO ANYTHING YOU WANT (NO MATTER HOW DUMB). They may not have put it like that, but they might as well have because that's what they did. The design and development decisions are as incompetent as blizurd's. They FUCKED it up those stupid motherfuckers. Just like they fucked up online coop by not lessing you browse coop games, all coop games are by invite only or some retarded shit. And again, other companies did it better previously (Gears of War just lets you browse coop games easily, WHAT AN AMAZING IDEA BUNGIE HUH?), so there is no excuse for bungie to fuck these things up, but they still manage to yank defeat out of the jaws of victory, because they are a bad company with bad people. Team Fortress 2 is better.

Story:

Remember the TV commercial where the kids are talking about outer space or some shit and then Master Chief wakes up in the middle of a battlefield? That doesn't happen. Once again, the yappity version of Gordon Freeman is given a voice and yet no personality at all. I had hope for something actually interesting to happen, ANYTHING AT ALL BUNGIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEE. Nope, nothing At the very least I wanted one of these things in the main character, in descending order:

1. a real personality with a real soul (and not the gay kind of soul like in a Robin Williams movie, but more like the souls in Castlevania Aria of Sorrow where you can shoot fireballs)
2. some back story
3. more badass one liners

Bungie and Halo 3 strike out with a whopping NONE OF THE ABOVE. It's a fucking shame. It shows the obvious superiority of Half Life 2's characters. Despite the fact that you are mute, to immerse you into the game's universe, all the other characters have well developed stories and personalities. You can feel what that person is like just from the dialog.

When playing the single player game, it keeps stopping you to have a ghost or something of Cortana interrupting you (making you almost unable to move) to say cryptic shit which sounds like it doesn't mean shit. Sure enough when you get to the end, it doesn't mean shit at all. Eventually, the giant piranha plant flood guy will start IMing you like this too, to send stupid taunting messages about I SHALL EAT YOUR BONES or some shit. It's like a comic book level plot, so the story quality is above fanfic level, but not by much. All of this is way below Team Fortress 2. Just............. just Team Fortress 2.

Most of this crappy story is actually the Halo supplemental books and shit. Nice not putting your game's story in your actual game. You suck. Team Fortress 2 does not suck.

The final post-credit cutscene in Halo 3 defines the game's "story." This might be considered a spoiler, if it was at all important to the "lore" of the Halo universe, but the only substance to be found is how astoundingly little substance there is to the plot of the whole series and Halo's 3 most primary characters. [SPOILER BLOCK/WARNING?] MC and Cortana arrive somewhere in the middle of the empty vastness of space, unharmed but alone. Everyone on Earth thinks they died. It will be years before they are discovered. Master Chief enters a cryo chamber and says "wake me up when you need me." Cortana: "I'll miss you." Chief: "SHUT UP BITCH DON'T WAKE ME UP UNTIL SOMEONE ELSE IS HERE." [SPOILER END] That perfectly captures the emptiness of the game's story. Team Fortress 2's story has less pretense, because there is no story, so TF2 wins the story war here.

Multiplayer:

Multiplayer doesn't allow browsing for fucking coop games. FUUUUUUUUCK!!! FUCK YOU BLIZZARD FUCK YOU EA. Team Fortress 2 is great.

I don't even have to mention how well made multiplayer is (because I don't care about it much, especially after years of TeamDM and Battlefield Awesome now TF2 being out overshadowing everything else in existence), but it is very quality and decent (no wait it SUCKS). One of the best ideas was stolen from the UT of old, where the server host could add mutators to change the entire game style, without having to load different mods or anything. This isn't really a great idea, it's just one of their best, because they are so creatively bankrupt (I mean really, deathmatch and team deathmatch? I think even Barbie games have deathmatch now and it's all the same run around unable to turn accurately because you're playing on a console controller, who gives a shit). The vehicles don't even fucking work, trying to run someone over with the faggy ATV is just a death wish. Your best chance of success is on foot, just like fucking Goldeneye or Doom, OR ANY PLAIN OLD DEATHMATCH GAME FROM THE PAST 10 YEARS. Halo deathmatch is way behind the times. Team Fortress 2 is the correct multiplayer game to be playing as opposed to an incorrect game to be playing which would be any game that isn't Team Fortress 2.



Multiplayer is mostly the same old deathmatch since Quake 2, except a couple maps have vehicles that are basically pointless to use because everyone just runs around shooting anyway. That is what deathmatch is, a bunch of people running around shooting. Only the biggest newbs in the world haven't gotten tired of this, and all of them are playing Halo 3 right now. Team Fortress 2 is better in every way possible and even in some ways that are essentially impossible.

Built in voice chat would be convenient for a game that can use it. In Halo 3, voice chat fits the stereotype to the end of a bunch of lisping angry white nerds calling everyone nigger faggots and saying you are a faggot for dual wielding or someone is a faggot for using grenades, and they become very upset. Also, go back to Europe. Sometimes it is surprising how you can hear a stereotype about something, like Halo players on voice chat all sounding like little girls just repeating the words "faggot" and "nigger" over and over again, and you think well there might actually be some non retarded people if I go play, but if you right now put Halo 3 into an Xbox 360, go on live and join a game, you will indeed hear swarms of living breathing stereotypes over the voice chat, any time of the day, any day of the week. Team Fortress 2 doesn't really have this problem because it's not as easy and intuitive to get a headset working.

The scoring system for Halo 3's multiplayer sucks. You get a point per kill. That is it. So you don't get recognized for doing anything else other than the final shot. Team Fortress 2, the better multiplayer game that makes Halo 3's rinky dink small time deathmatch obsolete, has the scoring system that all other games should/will be ripping off. In TF2, the scoreboard just says "score," (!!!!!!!!!!!!!) and you get points for doing things. That is it. It is simple but correct in every way possible (and even some ways that are essentially impossible). But to fuck things up even more, Halo 3's score system is even worse for the boring unplayable and unplayed "team objective" modes, where one team gets a bomb which a player has to pick up, making them slower and completely unable to use weapons or grenades OR VEHICLES(!!!!!!!!!!!!!) to really suck any last bit of fun possible out of their concept, and then you're supposed to "plant" this bomb at the enemy base, and only after you do this successfully without the other team defusing the bomb do you get one singular dinky little fuckin point on the scoreboard. Okay so it's like Counter-Strike, but not as good. Except this mode makes CS players look competent because if you grab the bomb, your teammates (all 3 of them, wow 3 whole teammates what an online blitzkrieg this Halo 3 multiplayer is, PSH) will just continue running around, bunny hopping and shooting randomly at other people, while you get killed easily from running at half speed unable to attack. Shit even Counter-Strike did this mode correctly, IN CS BETA 4 LIKE 6 YEARS AGO. Also, Team Fortress 2 is a pretty good game.

Verdict: I dunno. I always liked the Halo series, but I was disappointed the moment that I found out it wouldn't be a tactical squad based third person combat and command game for the PC. It looked good on the ecksbawks and they had a lot of good ideas, but it's ultimately just another run and gun shooter not far removed from the FPS genre's infancy of Doom and Quake. Actually wait, this game sucks, fuck you, fuck bungie, fuck halo, fuck night elves, fuck oranges, fuck squirrels, fuck the moon, fuck electronic arts, and especially fuck blizzard. The single player has SOME cool shit with vehicles and riding around blowing up shit and bigger battles. Then they fuck it up with more bland areas. Multiplayer is inferior, just play Team Fortress 2 instead because it's the best multiplayer game currently in existence until Left 4 Dead comes out.

Overall: 5/10

Orange Box and Team Fortress 2: 10/10!
PREVIOUS NEXT REPLY QUOTE
 
Halo 3 by Grumah 09/28/2007, 11:22pm PDT NEW
    might need a few extra drafts before front paging it NT by Grumah 09/29/2007, 1:26am PDT NEW
        Writing reviews is hard. :( NT by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 09/29/2007, 1:37am PDT NEW
            Jso and I just played coop legendary with toom and friend, more updates later. NT by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 09/29/2007, 6:16am PDT NEW
                Mongoose horn: positive!!! NT by Horrible Gelatinous Blob 09/29/2007, 3:29pm PDT NEW
                    That needs to be in the review by Grumah 09/29/2007, 3:34pm PDT NEW
                        More multiplayer notes. by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 09/30/2007, 9:47am PDT NEW
                            Re: More multiplayer notes. by Ethan Steele 09/30/2007, 10:52am PDT NEW
                                Re: More multiplayer notes. by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 09/30/2007, 10:59am PDT NEW
                                    This game shall be mine! NT by Ethan Steele 09/30/2007, 4:35pm PDT NEW
    Halo 3 (draft 2) by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 09/30/2007, 1:19pm PDT NEW
        I woulda put the verdict at the end again but yano it doesn't matter NT by Grumah 10/01/2007, 4:29am PDT NEW
        I would've given this another draft by now, BUT I AM VERY BUSY WITH IMPORTANT TH NT by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 10/04/2007, 1:29pm PDT NEW
        extra important cons by diet Coke/Grumah forever 10/07/2007, 5:42pm PDT NEW
            Rogers Sportsnet (Cable 54) shows Halo 2 DM when bowling gets rained out. by Jerry Whorebach 10/07/2007, 7:19pm PDT NEW
        Halo 3 (draft 3) by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 10/07/2007, 7:05pm PDT NEW
            http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99Hg6Ukcn3Q by diet Coke/Grumah forever 10/07/2007, 7:29pm PDT NEW
            Re: Halo 3 (draft 3) by ME 10/19/2007, 2:34am PDT NEW
                Dawn of War and Sacrifice? NT by Mischief Maker 10/19/2007, 6:28am PDT NEW
                blizzguzzling ensues NT by diet Coke/Grumah forever 10/19/2007, 8:53am PDT NEW
            Re: Halo 3 (draft 3) by Anonymous 10/29/2007, 7:21am PDT NEW
                more like meme torture-ess NT by diet Coke/Grumah forever 10/29/2007, 1:49pm PDT NEW
                    By the way the Halo 3 review is basically done. by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 10/29/2007, 6:06pm PDT NEW
    Zero PUNX beat us to it (off?). by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 10/03/2007, 2:34pm PDT NEW
    Re: Halo 3 by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 10/07/2007, 11:10pm PDT NEW
    Re: Halo 3 by Cannibal Dave 10/19/2007, 9:58am PDT NEW
        Re: Halo 3 by Jhoh Clbbl O_____O 10/19/2007, 11:29pm PDT NEW
 
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