I would have thought everybody would know the stuff I'm about to list here, but it looks like not all of you do. I was going to post this here a while back but forgot
Here's what I snatched from Battleground Halo...
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This is my summary of the EGM Article; a top 20 of what I read. Here it is, in no particular order:
1. halo.bungie.org was listed as the top Halo site. I'm not sure if I expected a little clippet after it that says 'and Battleground:Halo is pretty neat too' or what, but I felt a little sting for a half-second. Then I took pride in the fact that I was going to HBO before it was listed, so I must be incredibly awesome. Yep.
2. Something that has nothing to do with the game, but they have crude little drawings of Halo 2 that must have been made in Basic or some such simple program.
3. Halo 2 had less polygons than the original. There are two responses to choose from:
a) What? How?
b) What?? WHAT???!!! (angrily)
I chose 'a'. How? It's the magic of bump-mapping, my friend. Even with less polygons they can display hyper-realism in ways that would otherwise require thousands of polygons to create. Screenshots don't lie. Lower polygon count will also mean faster loading times and little, if any, slowdown.
4. Prophets. I got to see them. Or at least a concept drawing, but that's still rad.
5. The Flood are returning. It says we have a %100 chance of seeing the Flood make a comback. Why, Bungie, why?? There must be some plot significance, better AI, larger enemies, or other such hidden concept that I'm missing here. Bungie wouldn't just mindlessly torture us, right?
6. The Brutes are officially the first new race to be added to the line-up. They look like gorillas crossed with Hunters, complete with lynching stick. Actually it looks more like a scythe, and I don't quite know what a lynching stick is, if it exists at all. But if I had to lynch somebody I'd use that melee weapon.
7. The next Halo will be fully interactive. That means you can blow up all sorts of things be it pillars, tables, or perhaps lights to put your opponents in the dark. You can also flip over tables, as can your allies and opponents.
8. Marines will have rocket launchers. I remember a long time ago in the forums me and other members debated about the idea of Marines with rocket launchers. On one hand, they could blow things away from the Warthog side seat, not to mention the ruckus that would be raised in foot battles. On the other hand, most of us considered them to be stupid. Really stupid. They would blow us up in an instant. We generally reached the concensus that Marines are really just too dumb to be trusted with rocket launchers, as harsh as that may sound. But Bungie promises to up the AI, so who knows, we could get all of the benefits with all the negatives minimized.
9. Marines and squads as a whole will be revamped. There will be distinct personalities and roles. Snipers and mortar crews will hold back while assault troops storm recklessly into a hail of gunfire. Other Marines will hide their sorry tails until you give them support fire, while still others will bunker up and warn you of snipers. (Dissecting the sniper idea: Does that mean a plasma sniper rifle is in the works? The dissector strikes again!!)
10. Jason Jones now says that Halo 2 is Halo on fire, wrapped in bacon. Has bacon defeated the flaming ninjas? More on this, as it develops...
11. The Covenant will be able to scale walls? That about sums up the animation situation. Covenant will be able to shimmy up pillars, leap over boundries, and the like. Elites will act more like leapords, Jackals will act more like birds, and Grunts will act more like...drunken, biped mice? I don't know. All I know is that when I get this game I'll mix in the interactivety and fry a pillar that an Elite is shimmying up.
12. Online play. We all know the basics. X-Box Live, Communicator, Like Single-Player, blah, blah, blah. This is elaborated upon. First, flying vehicles WILL be in multi-player! Banshee dogfights are pretty much gauranteed, but will we be able to pilot a Pelican? Or a Longsword Fighter? Or a Covenant dropship, for that matter? Only time will truly tell...
13. If you zoom in on a spent shotgun shell you will see a hippo smiling at you. That's a new one on me.
14. Stealth is good. There will be stealth actions integrated into the X-Box, mostly using the D-Pad. You will now be able to peak around corners, hide in shadows, shoot at lights. Hinted add-ons to the Battle Rifle (it's not called an assault rifle any longer, and the hints aren't in this particular article) could mean a silencer. Bwa-ha. But perhaps more intriguingly, that could mean a grenade launcher. Hardly silent, but honestly, which one would you rather have?
15. Low gravity battles? That's right, a demo showing level concepts shows play on a moon (wether it's Earth's or not is up for debate) and floating around. You can jump three times your height. Everything moves in slow-motion. If you wanted bullet-time in Halo, this is as aclose as it's going to get, and perhaps better. I can't wait to fight in these levels.
16. Kung-fu chicken! Minus the chicken, actually. But combo melees will be in Halo 2! In the demo shown to EGM, Master Chief beats an opponents head in with a three-melee combo from his battle rifle. For those of you who wanted to fight hand-to-hand with your enemies, this is your lucky day. Because with Halo 2, you can! Kind of!
17. Squad battles between Spartans and Covenant. I'm not talking about in the regular game (foo'), I'm talking about multi-player. Online in particular. How'd you like to be a Grunt? Hopefully X-Box Live will be set up to support downloads. Then people will hack in and create new skins. So we could have Spartans vs. Cartmans. Or not. At any rate, I hope this means that I get to play as a Grunt. It would be an excellent perspective on the game, and when you work your way up to Elite you can smack around your Grunty followers. Fun, fun, fun!
18. The single-player game will not focus on Earth. In early levels, yes, you will combat on Earth. But Bungie hints that in later levels you will combat on other battle-fields, perhaps even the Covenant homeworld. So Earth won't be as pivotal to the plot as previously assumed.
19. You thought the Flood returning is annoying? 343 will not go away. He is very likely to return to the sequel. He's gotten a bad rap for being annoying, and I agree. But I still like to have him around. He adds a very interesting, if kooky (oh no, I said kooky, I must be losing it...) character to the Halo line-up.
20. The game will end. I don't mean an ending cinematic that leads to the next game, it will end. Bungie promises that you will have closure at the end of Halo 2. I'm freaking out, man... Does that mean that there will be no Halo 3? If there isn't a Halo 3 I'm not sure what I would do. Hopefully it's just closure, not curtains for the story. They should leave at least a little more to expand upon. Must...have...sequels... That about sums up the article. But remember, summaries are just that, a summary. It's not the full thing. I suggest you buy the magazine for yourself and check it out. Until tomorrow...
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And if you may want to check this out too...
http://www.computerandvideogames.com...y.php?id=81367
You may have to sign up to read it, and it is October 3rd news, but not alot of people know about it and it is well worth reading if you haven't.
