I definitely resonate with what was said regarding development of the game, as what was said is sort of a converse to our PC port: originally, the developers were hindered by their passion and a focus on ideas over hardware realities; in OUR version of the game, the port team really and truly either didn't care or were artificially hindered creatively (and yes, even a port job can have space for creative developments. See Custom Edition), and focused only on the copy paste job...sort of, not counting the impressively bad optimization.
However, most of my bitching to come doesn't stem from the porting job. I disagree on many of his points, although my opinions aren't exactly common.
Firstly, the multiplayer. It sucks. Plain and simple. BTB/Customs is fun and fairly decent most of the time, but the competitive core of the game was broken. Not counting pre-patch gameplay, 4v4 competitive settings aren't good and are infamously boring. The "Super Weapon" system, as he noted, is hilariously bad and its system would be the worst way of spawning PW's in Halo history if it hadn't been for random ordnance in Halo 4. Out of all existing Halo's, 2 is the most divorced from any other in terms of PW's because there simply are so few that matter, and to compensate, competitive settings have to throw you on tiny atrium maps where you shoot BR's at each other until the end of the match. Aside from the infamously campy Lockout and an ok Creek remake, competitive settings primarily used Midship, Sanctuary, and Warlock, all very, very symmetrical and static. Oh, and about that...
What he said about the "symmetry" of multiplayer was downright wrong, CE is known for its asymmetrical gameplay and most of its original maps are distinctly asymmetrical in nature. Dammy, Chillout, Rat Race, and Prisoner are blatantly asymmetrical, and Derelict, Wizard, Creek, Longest, ect. have varying degrees of "symmetry", but none are perfectly symmetrical like maps in future games, definitely contrasting the obsession with symmetrical maps that started with Halo 2, as I stated above.
Although he touched on it, I feel like not enough emphasis was placed on just how bad of an idea SMG starts are. They weren't just a mild nuisance or abstract obstruction to good game design (which the SMG also is btw), they quite honestly ruined any match they were used in.
Dual Wielding did not contribute to the game on a non-technical level. Dual Wielding is universally clunky, useless and a waste of UI space imo.
BXR and Double/Quad Shot don't add to the game. Unpopular opinion, I know, but they're inherently flawed concepts which rely on some notion of "difficulty" to execute...but this "difficulty" is simply a hardware issue. Yes, Halo 2 on Xbox lived in a little bubble where this inherent issue wasn't apparent, but in the here and now, pressing buttons in a certain way in an absurd time interval is trivial. Anyone who believes otherwise should sobor up with all the Quad Shot macros on our platform, or perhaps take a look at the dark side of the ever present modded controller industry. Rocket Jumping in TF2, for example, is inherently impossible to automate without hacks because of the infinite amount of variation and precision needed to perform it an infinite amount of different purposes and contexts, and the closest you'll get are perfectly allowable jump+crouch binds. BLB from Halo CE isn't difficult and balanced by absurd input difficulty...its difficult, because, like Rocket Jumping, its a "glitch" that isn't always viable and has associated risks and rewards, because even if you "successfully" input the glitch correctly, there is a good chance you'll blow yourself up if you don't calibrate where you throw your waste grenade. It depends on nuance, context...putting BLB in a macro is no more helpful than manually doing a BLB, if not worse. Although I think we should ban them for the sake of sanity, any developer out there should see that Quadshot/BXR macros ARE NOT cheating, they're only optimizing input, and any "glitch combo" in the vein of these two glitches are NOT good ideas.
Anyway, onto Campaign...
Admittedly, I don't feel as strongly as he does regarding the plot. Most of his points make sense, sure, but as noted, the game is over a decade old and, just like with my feelings for Halo 4's story, my problems with the story have mostly decayed away into apathy and acceptance, and appreciation for what is actually good about the plot. The shock generated by the Arbiter/cliffhanger ending has pretty much gone away for me, and although I admit its shitty/poorly done at points, its been discussed to death and universally called out, so I don't have any strong opinions on anything that hasn't been said, UNLIKE with what is said about Halo 2's "great" multiplayer.
The gameplay of singleplayer itself is primarily what concerns me, as a person who enjoys modding and playing a game franchise that has essentially been frozen in 2004 on my platform of choice. And I'll admit, its flawed and hasn't aged gracefully, but I think his damning of most of the singleplayer is overblown. Firstly, Heroic is the "correct" difficulty, so I don't understand the complaints about Legendary being too masochist for his taste. Yes, the Jackal Snipers probably shouldn't one-shot you, but the point of Legendary is a challenge, and Halo 2 fucking delivers, unlike more recent installments.
I've listed most of my complaints about Halo 2 in my somewhat neglected campaign rebalance thread, which does sometimes align with some of his issues, namely sandbox issues, and I do like what he said about having "boring waves instead of boring rooms", which is an interesting and true point. I namely just like Halo 2 mechanically to the point that it overshadows the questionable level design, which is a potential that made me make that thread in the first place.
Overall, I mostly agree with the broad idea he's painting about the primary issues with Halo 2's campaign gameplay wise, I think we just differ in the...severity, I think.
I might have more to say, but I'm quite tired and I'm not entirely sure if what I typed makes total sense anyway, so I'll edit in any new stuff I think of later on.
However, most of my bitching to come doesn't stem from the porting job. I disagree on many of his points, although my opinions aren't exactly common.
Firstly, the multiplayer. It sucks. Plain and simple. BTB/Customs is fun and fairly decent most of the time, but the competitive core of the game was broken. Not counting pre-patch gameplay, 4v4 competitive settings aren't good and are infamously boring. The "Super Weapon" system, as he noted, is hilariously bad and its system would be the worst way of spawning PW's in Halo history if it hadn't been for random ordnance in Halo 4. Out of all existing Halo's, 2 is the most divorced from any other in terms of PW's because there simply are so few that matter, and to compensate, competitive settings have to throw you on tiny atrium maps where you shoot BR's at each other until the end of the match. Aside from the infamously campy Lockout and an ok Creek remake, competitive settings primarily used Midship, Sanctuary, and Warlock, all very, very symmetrical and static. Oh, and about that...
What he said about the "symmetry" of multiplayer was downright wrong, CE is known for its asymmetrical gameplay and most of its original maps are distinctly asymmetrical in nature. Dammy, Chillout, Rat Race, and Prisoner are blatantly asymmetrical, and Derelict, Wizard, Creek, Longest, ect. have varying degrees of "symmetry", but none are perfectly symmetrical like maps in future games, definitely contrasting the obsession with symmetrical maps that started with Halo 2, as I stated above.
Although he touched on it, I feel like not enough emphasis was placed on just how bad of an idea SMG starts are. They weren't just a mild nuisance or abstract obstruction to good game design (which the SMG also is btw), they quite honestly ruined any match they were used in.
Dual Wielding did not contribute to the game on a non-technical level. Dual Wielding is universally clunky, useless and a waste of UI space imo.
BXR and Double/Quad Shot don't add to the game. Unpopular opinion, I know, but they're inherently flawed concepts which rely on some notion of "difficulty" to execute...but this "difficulty" is simply a hardware issue. Yes, Halo 2 on Xbox lived in a little bubble where this inherent issue wasn't apparent, but in the here and now, pressing buttons in a certain way in an absurd time interval is trivial. Anyone who believes otherwise should sobor up with all the Quad Shot macros on our platform, or perhaps take a look at the dark side of the ever present modded controller industry. Rocket Jumping in TF2, for example, is inherently impossible to automate without hacks because of the infinite amount of variation and precision needed to perform it an infinite amount of different purposes and contexts, and the closest you'll get are perfectly allowable jump+crouch binds. BLB from Halo CE isn't difficult and balanced by absurd input difficulty...its difficult, because, like Rocket Jumping, its a "glitch" that isn't always viable and has associated risks and rewards, because even if you "successfully" input the glitch correctly, there is a good chance you'll blow yourself up if you don't calibrate where you throw your waste grenade. It depends on nuance, context...putting BLB in a macro is no more helpful than manually doing a BLB, if not worse. Although I think we should ban them for the sake of sanity, any developer out there should see that Quadshot/BXR macros ARE NOT cheating, they're only optimizing input, and any "glitch combo" in the vein of these two glitches are NOT good ideas.
Anyway, onto Campaign...
Admittedly, I don't feel as strongly as he does regarding the plot. Most of his points make sense, sure, but as noted, the game is over a decade old and, just like with my feelings for Halo 4's story, my problems with the story have mostly decayed away into apathy and acceptance, and appreciation for what is actually good about the plot. The shock generated by the Arbiter/cliffhanger ending has pretty much gone away for me, and although I admit its shitty/poorly done at points, its been discussed to death and universally called out, so I don't have any strong opinions on anything that hasn't been said, UNLIKE with what is said about Halo 2's "great" multiplayer.
The gameplay of singleplayer itself is primarily what concerns me, as a person who enjoys modding and playing a game franchise that has essentially been frozen in 2004 on my platform of choice. And I'll admit, its flawed and hasn't aged gracefully, but I think his damning of most of the singleplayer is overblown. Firstly, Heroic is the "correct" difficulty, so I don't understand the complaints about Legendary being too masochist for his taste. Yes, the Jackal Snipers probably shouldn't one-shot you, but the point of Legendary is a challenge, and Halo 2 fucking delivers, unlike more recent installments.
I've listed most of my complaints about Halo 2 in my somewhat neglected campaign rebalance thread, which does sometimes align with some of his issues, namely sandbox issues, and I do like what he said about having "boring waves instead of boring rooms", which is an interesting and true point. I namely just like Halo 2 mechanically to the point that it overshadows the questionable level design, which is a potential that made me make that thread in the first place.
Overall, I mostly agree with the broad idea he's painting about the primary issues with Halo 2's campaign gameplay wise, I think we just differ in the...severity, I think.
I might have more to say, but I'm quite tired and I'm not entirely sure if what I typed makes total sense anyway, so I'll edit in any new stuff I think of later on.
I don't have time to watch the video right now (It's on my watch later list!) but I need to say this: I had never seen what a party on original xbox looked like until now. That shit's weird. I have this empty feeling inside, since I missed out on those early days of xbox live, but I guess there's no going back anyway. <3 you Teddy!
Teddy is this video your doing? If so, a lot of that stuff is really inciteful. You come at us with a bunch of well thought out ideas but the vid is too long. Consider splitting it up into eps that cover 2-3 similar ideas and provide video clips that are relevant to it, if possible (I know how hard that could be though). The double shot section was great at this! Add more halo music!!!! I'm gonna go back to watching it now.
Edit: Because I haven't watched the whole thing yet.
Edit: Because I haven't watched the whole thing yet.
