O Brave New World

“a culture of reflection” … looks to me like a culture of the basest, most degrading, psychopathic, diseased parts of humanity

If there was any moment in my childhood I would like to relive, it would most likely start at the day I first popped Halo 1 into my Xbox. What a beautiful memory and an incredible series.

Half-life definitely has a better campaign and story line, but overall I still believe Halo beats it out. The multiplayer was the result of all the pros of the pre-existing PC FPS games. Console LAN gaming had its popularization with Halo and probably paved the road that led to online gaming for the consoles, or at least let us know that it could be done well.

It seems that you are quite the gamer, but you have to take into consideration Bungie’s point of view. They desired to create a game that will appeal to the largest demographic and still be fun and somewhat challenging. Maybe to you it was not hard enough and there were too many handicaps, but for many consumers, FPS was brand new and this was the first one they played. Bungie created a game that brought unexperienced players (probably as young as 9 years old) into the FPS world that was previously too complex or difficult for them. To my knowledge, this was one of the most clever and innovative marketing techniques in video game history and that is where much of my respect for Bungie lies.

I understand, but disagree on fundamental issues. The only real issue I disagree with you on is the “appeal to the largest demographic” my only issue with this is it lowers the toughness of the games, even COD on hardest setting was a breaze for me, I dunno, maybe it’s because I’ve played so many FPS’s that they just really aren’t a challenge anymore, but that can’t be true, because loading up HL1 for some nostalgia still catch myself reloading fight scenes over and over due to simply being overwhelmed or outgunned in certain fights, those fights, once mastered, lent to a feeling of “wow, I finally beat it!” and a victorious sense of pwnage, when I play Halo, it’s almost like from the start of the level I’m just concentrating on getting to the next level and constantly bored with the predictable waves of enemy troops, where in HL I find myself trying situations differently, sometimes even reloading a checkpoint I beat just to see if I can make it more interesting. I mean, ya that can apply to Halo, but I never felt that “pressure and excitement” where I’m like, running around reacting so fast that I seriously lose myself in the gameplay.

I’ve also noticed that most Halo players or console gamers in general, that I challenge to matches, even though I’m a native PC gamer, I can still whoop most people on their own console with a controller I’m not even used to using. Guys will be like “oh, i decimate on Halo or COD” so I go over, we fire it up, 10 minutes later they don’t even want to play me because score is 12-0 or w/e. I guess what I’m saying is that the “mass appeal” resulted in less challenging gameplay, I mean, most 10 year olds can cruise through COD or Halo with ease, and then if they bump up the difficulty, can master that in no time as well.

Not saying Halo doesn’t requires skill or anything, but that whole power shield just makes it so kindergarten in my book, I realize it fits the story, and tech like that may one day exist, but it just turned the game into a duck and cover till shield rebuilds type of game… I prefer having 3 hp and winning without the shield! : )

Just my 2 cents, good gaming to all : )

My wish list for halo 4,5,6,7,8,9…..Aliens still speak English but like a funny foreigner, body Armour comes off as you get hit with bullets, you physical appearance resembles your current health status. cool stuff you can buy with Microsoft points. flaunt your real world wealth