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Back to the party: ODST

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A nice example of a typical Bungie human.

Beyond that little issue, I really enjoyed ODST's campaign. The soundtrack was incredible, and most of the missions were memorable and well built. I would put it above Halo 3 in terms of enjoyment. The lack of matchmaking killed firefight for me though. I only played maybe 20-25 matches.
 
Dani said:
Hub aside, it's like a set up of brilliant Halo scenarios and engaging win moments.
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I'd agree with this for the majority of levels, the three I wouldn't agree with this on are the last two levels and Oni Alpha Site.

The last two levels, I've already explained why I dislike them, but I don't like Oni Alpha Site because it's essentially two Firefight maps stuck together without a single interesting encounter (aside form the bridge scene).
 
szaromir said:
The mission was ugly as hell, but I actually liked the battle scenarios there.
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Aside from the bridge part, there's not a single interesting encounter in that level. It's two Firefight maps stuck together.
 
Mojo said:
Short, repetitive, ugly. Half-assed hub world. Crappy Firefight netcode. Worst Halo game of the series IMO. I did get 1000g, but I'm never going back to it.

Music was great though, so there's that.
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I disagree especially since for me the worst Halo game was Halo 2 by far, ODST was fun and was definitely worth playing.
 
Dax01 said:
Aside from the bridge part, there's not a single interesting encounter in that level. It's two Firefight maps stuck together.
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While true, I hadn't played a Firefight game before, so it didn't affect me. I only played ODST once (on Legendary), so I also didn't grow tired of that.

I'm saving my Halo series playthrough until a week or two before Halo Reach releases, it should be epic! It'll be also the first time I'll play these games on my new 50' HDTV:D
 
I played ODST for the first time May 2nd -- the day before the Reach beta launched :lol. I wasn't expecting much from the campaign (heard a lot of mediocre impressions on GAF), but it was fucking brilliant. I was able to beat it in one day on my first go (on Legendary, too), but every moment was amazing.

For me it's probably ODST > Halo 3 > Halo 1 >>>>>> Halo 2 >>>>>>>>>>>>>> Halo Wars. (lol).
 
The moment after you finish Romeo's level, with the music and the low hum of the dropship, running down the silent empty streets...

Man, first time I had one of those "wow" moments since Bioshock.
 
Why don't some of you like Halo 2's campaign? Cause you had to play as Arbiter? Not many Earth levels? Cliffhanger ending?

I just played through it again on PC, thought it was still good. Most varied enemies/levels in the series. Plus the shitty Brutes are kept to a minimum
 
Mojo said:
Why don't some of you like Halo 2's campaign? Cause you had to play as Arbiter? Not many Earth levels? Cliffhanger ending?

I just played through it again on PC, thought it was still good. Most varied enemies/levels in the series.
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Because its incredibly boring. Yes not many earth levels.
 
I don't agree. Most Halo levels always seem pretty plain and sterile. And honestly most of them I couldn't tell if they were really alien worlds or not except for some weird architecture.
 
Rahxephon91 said:
I don't agree. Most Halo levels always seem pretty plain and sterile. And honestly most of them I couldn't tell if they were really alien worlds or not except for some weird architecture.
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There isn't anything sterile about "Halo (1 and 3)," "The Silent Cartographer," "Assault on the Control Room," "343 Guilty Spark," "Delta Halo," "The Ark," "The Covenant," or "Two Betrayals."
 
Mojo said:
Why don't some of you like Halo 2's campaign? Cause you had to play as Arbiter? Not many Earth levels? Cliffhanger ending?

I just played through it again on PC, thought it was still good. Most varied enemies/levels in the series. Plus the shitty Brutes are kept to a minimum
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Some folks found it hard to tell enemies from allies as some aliens you fight with on one mission, you fight against on another. And that ending.
 
Dax01 said:
There isn't anything sterile about "Halo (1 and 3)," "The Silent Cartographer," "Assault on the Control Room," "343 Guilty Spark," "Delta Halo," "The Ark," "The Covenant," or "Two Betrayals."
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Agree to disagree then. Halo's universe to me seems pretty boring and uninteresting. Nothing stood out as really unique in most of them. Most seem like generic sci fi worlds that don't have any detail that hint at a history or actually place in a world.

ODST actually felt like an interesting place.
 
Dani said:
Some folks found it hard to tell enemies from allies as some aliens you fight with on one mission, you fight against on another. And that ending.
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I thought the game did an okay job of showing you which enemies to fight and which not.

I loved fighting alongside Hunters. Sucked they reverted back to enemies in Halo 3.
 
I still wonder who the fuck thought of Dares character model. Most hideous thing ever. Its like a 5 year old made her. Makes me cringe...


Firefight is insanely fun but i can never get 4 people. I did once and it was a 1 time thing. I just need 2 more people usually since i can count on my friend hoppin on but 3 is really needed atleast.
 
ODST is the only Halo game I own so it was worth $60 to me. It also has the best Halo campaign, so that was nice, too.

Every other Halo campaign has boring, repetitive level design. ODST's level design is much better.

My biggest complaint is that the cutscene animation looked bad.
 
Loved the ODST campaign a lot. Underrated. Constant beeping on low health fucking drained me though.

Also, Firefight is a neat idea with a serious flaw. It's fucking boring. Really needs an 'end point'. Same way Gears 2 has level 50.

We played Firefight on Easy just to see how far we could go, it seriously got so boring we just started commiting suicide until the game was over.

But campaign was great.
 
Firefight needs 'drop-in, drop-out' support. Someone quiting or lagging out 30 minutes into it shouldn't end the game for everyone.
 
I cannot describe just how awesome the combination of the soundtrack, the setting and the gameplay made this the second best Halo game in the franchise. I was very underwhelmed by Halo 3 and this game was a return to glory.

Halo 2 > ODST > Reach beta (lulz) > Halo > Halo 3 > Halo Wars
 
So, As if by some strange twist of fate, After just completing Halo 3: ODST, I stumbled on this thread. I guess I'll type up my overall opinion of the game to add to the discussion below:

The Good:
  • Atmosphere during rookie sections - This games atmosphere is brilliantly crafted during the rookie section exploring the city, making you feel like you're truly the only thing left alive that isn't hostile in the ruins of a long since abandoned city.
  • The Music - The music in this game is fantastic, with subdued, sad music during the quiet rookie parts, and epic music during the battles.
  • No Flood - Enough said.
  • The Skyboxes - Standard Halo fare, absolutely breathtaking.
  • The Storytelling - Although it's used in a variety of films and the like nowadays, I found the shifting perspectives between the rookie and the rest of the ODST squad really well done.

The Bad
  • BEEP BEEP BEEP - Just thought I'd get this out of the way
  • Lack of pause when viewing the map - This is not a goddamn survival horror game. I should not have to crouch in some corner cowering like a baby when I want to check the map. Especially considering it is so easy to take a wrong turn.
  • Bullet Sponges - I'll be honest and say that this is more of a personal peeve that I have with Halo than a problem with ODST itself. Playing on normal mode, using whatever the handgun is that shoots spikes (the spiker...?) by the time I had killed a standard brute, his face was entirely obscured by spikes. It just looks goddamned stupid.
  • The Characters - Not sure if this is just me, but with the story being so short, I did not feel like I got to know the characters. I mean,
    Buck literally turned around his relationship issues in four hours
    . Also, I just found most of the cast felt like they had artificial personalities and were plain unlikeable.
  • The Audio Logs and their story - These things seem like an utterly pointless waste of time from start to finish. I mean, the tale was well written, and gave a brief glimpse of the evacuation, but I really don't get the point of them. Were they there for some novel tie-in or something?
  • Data Hive and the Highway - Ugh. These two chapters go on way too long. The data hive is literally the same corridors copied and pasted several times (that you have to go through one way, then back the other as well), and the Highway goes on way too long and is even worse than the data hive for repetition.
  • VISR Mode - I know the game is meant to be solemn, but turn up the brightness a bit. Don't make my game look like a child with a set of crayons got too close to it.

My overall opinion of the game is that it is a decent game that needed to be a few hours longer in order to fully flesh out the characters and the story, and it is full of little annoyances that probably could have been fixed with a little while longer in development
 
Why all the GAF hate for the Halo 3 campaign?

Favorite cutscene:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xooMVzW4-w

0:00-1:40

I actually didn't like the hubworld in ODST. It felt too slow and boring for me. Absolutely love the music though. Marty is definitely a crafted music composer in the gaming world.

The first two missions were soooo boring, and the game slowly got better after those few. However, I just thought the game in general was a lump of firefight missions together. Perhaps if I had played the campaign co-operatively, I would think of it differently, but man, even on heroic, this was a hard frustrating game.

I hated the low-health beep and red-colored screen. Ugh. Absolutely annoyed the shit out of me.

The AI teammates didn't do shit still.
 
Rahxephon91 said:
Agree to disagree then. Halo's universe to me seems pretty boring and uninteresting. Nothing stood out as really unique in most of them. Most seem like generic sci fi worlds that don't have any detail that hint at a history or actually place in a world.

ODST actually felt like an interesting place.
Click to expand...
What is not unique about any of them? I've seen a lot of science-fiction, and Halo's universe is pretty damn unique. Especially the Forerunner constructs.
 
Hey y'all, have you heard? An ODST is more agile than a Spartan III!

But in all seriousness, I really liked ODST. The base player traits were modified in a way that made the enemies tougher and more formidable than they were in Halo 3's campaign but they were still fun to fight. I also didn't feel like my abilities were hampered in anyway and didn't miss dual wielding at all. I've been meaning to go back and play more Firefight and restart the campaign too but I haven't because of the Halo: Reach Beta. With the Beta's end in sight, I might just get back to it soon.
 
Wrapped it up on Legendary yesterday - the "ending" is as mehtastic as I recall, but am I wrong in thinking there was a few extra seconds of ending tacked on for beating it on that difficulty, as in Halo tradition? I didn't recall that final bit the last time I played. Still, it was fun taking out Hunters by sniping their orange-flavored core from the other side of the map.
 
I liked a few of the levels and really loved the music but that entry really killed the mood for my friends and I for Halo. Luckily the Reach beta feels like more of the older games. Sadly, a good chunk have moved on to CoD.

My main problem was the cast. I wouldn't be able to match each character to their name and they didn't give me any incentive to like them. Would have been better without putting the emphasis on them but still giving us a similar story.

No Elites! :(
 
The setting was the best part of the game to me, I also liked the way the story played out, much better than Halo 3. All I could have really hoped for was more time put into it so we could have gotten a fully realized game, I want the whole pie, not just a slice.
 
Clockblockers said:
I like the tone of the music while you were walking through the city as the rookie. For some reason it stuck with me as I was wandering through the city trying to start the next mission.
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This.
 
I thought ODST was an interesting extension of the series. I really liked the more open-ended structure of the hub world, which felt like a natural evolution of the series' combat. The visual style and the night vision mode created a fantastic atmosphere. And for all the struggles Bungie has had with their story telling in the Halo trilogy, the ODST story - while at times trite - was told in a complex but surprisingly compelling and coherent approach.

The core combat, many of the flashback missions and especially the music - as has been said, one of the best soundtracks ever, period - were superb. It was richly evocative and helped define the hub world as a unique experience in the series.

Sadie's Story was wonderful: the writing, the acting, the art, the way the environment would clue you in to the next unlock, and ultimately how it tied directly into the main story. I thought it, along with the music, was the standout element of the game.

The level design went downhill toward the end of the game, I suspect simply due to resource constraint; a small team on a one-year schedule can only crank out so many assets and create so many unique situations. Too many loops through too many of the same corridors, an escort mission of all things, a trench run sequence that's oddly broken up by a series of big doors, and a climactic round of Firefight that's anything but climactic.

But for much of its run, ODST was a nice iteration on everything that made Halo 3 - and the series to date - so great. And looking back, is a kind of preview for the direction the story and combat is taking with Reach.
 
MNC said:
Someone explain the beeps. I don't have ODST.
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If your health takes any damage at all, it starts to beep. And because the health does not recharge, it will beep until you pick up a health pack. Which means you spend a large portion of the game with that beep going off, hunting for a health pack more to shut it up than to fill up your health. I can only assume it was an oversight of some sort.
 
I really liked ODST. I might be my favorite halo game, and I am glad to see I am not completely alone.

I liked how it was moody, told a story in a different way, and showed that halo games can branch out and have some variety.

I don't remember the beeping, or getting annoyed with the beeping at all.
 
Hilbert said:
I don't remember the beeping, or getting annoyed with the beeping at all.
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I don't think it annoyed me as much as most folks, but there definitely should have at least been an option to turn it off. Same as every Zelda game in existence needs such a toggle.
 
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