Halo: Reach

[A Hen]

Just occurred to me that the fates of your teammates are a little unfair:

'kay, so Jorge blows up a pair of huge warships, one of them miles long.

Carter spends ages in the air as bait, still outperforming his persuers even with a belly full of plasma, before kamikazi'ing into the giant enemy crab.

Emile dies the way he fought, in close combat, and takes one with him but not before some pretty cool last words.

Even 6 goes down swinging after giving up a ride on the last boat off-planet to cover the retreat.

But Kat?

She gets a bullet in the back of the head while running away, mid-sentence. Did her voice actor piss someone off, or what?

Just seems a very un-spartan way to go.

LOL at giant enemy crab.

But I liked Kat's departure. I don't get it when everyone wants every death to be heroic. For me, it can be just as moving when someone has a pointless death (I thought Tasha Yar's death in Star Trek was awesome!); it also makes it more real, rather than everything being epic - it helps sell the epic stuff, and makes the heroics more impressive. And it's not like it made me think anything less of her - she would probably have sacrificed her life in the same situation as, say, Jorge.

Edit: that said, I agree with Snowman's point above, that the way they did it was a bit contrived - a ship flies over, shoots her and flies off. A bit half-baked, that idea, really. Come to think of it, I often think Bungie's story ideas are a bit half-baked - like they have a cool idea, and rush off to implement it, rather than working out how would be best to do it.

[Mars]

Took me almost 3 hours to clear the next level on heroic this evening and I just can't get enough. Legendary seems both intimidating and inviting, this is the most fun I've had with Halo in single player, never gone above a normal run through before (noob, lol) and I finally see what I've been missing.

You may mock, but I've got a CE (never actually completed it) playthrough on Legendary lined up next and I'm a virgin

[Vulgar Monkey]

Christ, the last level has a couple of bastard hard bits, eh?

Had to do the special assassination 3 times before the achievement popped, then spent ages fighting those crack white elites in the docks. Made harder because I was down to my spartan laser (which I've been carrying right the way to the end in case I need it) and standard ass. rifle because I used all the good stuff. Eventually cracked it by stashing the laser, grabbing a plasma pistol, and swapping out my sprint for the awesome holo. Then went down low under the maintenancey area and played total recall among the vats.

'Think this is the real me? Hahahahaha....it is!' *blam*

Now on the final diamond hard bit on the landing pad. No, not the mac, the pad.

Eventually held off the brutes, just to find a second wave turns up seemingly comprised entirely of chieftains!

If I time it perfectly I can sprint across the pad, ducking into a doorway to grab a pistol before diving out a window, and then leg it to hook up with a pelican full of odst's, but then we're cornered and the boss chieftain clobbers me with his big mallet.

Still, if I can drop him, I have a big mallet. That'll help.

Might ditch the laser again too if I can find a safe spot. Disappointed it's useless against dropships.

[Mars]

This might sound wet but I've always enjoyed reading those sort of anecdotes (Kerraig's CE tales were always rad) but now I am playing through them myself. Fucking awesome.

[A Hen]

Well, my trials at the missile station are over. Took me bloody hours.

I tried everything - blowing up the remaining Wraith, jacking it, sneaking into the main building, approaching from the beach, picking off the enemies one by one from afar... and in the end I did it by jumping onto a planter, then a ledge, up onto the floor where the button is, and hitting it. End of level, no need to fight the Brute bosses.

But... the good bit is that I got my sweet, sweet revenge on the Brute with the fuel rod gun, who'd killed me instantly more times than I could count. I managed to melee him to death before I hit the switch.

Sweeeeet!

Funnily enough, after all that, I managed the next level (the city flying level) pretty easily - did the entire level in less time than I spent on that missile station bit, in fact.

NB: I've given up using spoiler tags, because it seems like open season in this thread now. Anyone reading it will be well and truly spoiled anyway.

[Kevvy Metal]

I've been playing Reach on the 'Mythic' difficulty.

NOT the impossible variation of Legendary plus ALL skulls.

Just Legendary plus the Mythic skull. It's absolutely thrilling. All enemies have far more health, which also inc. shields. A fully charged plasma blast will not take down an Elites shield! instead it's left at an almost deplete state, about 3 more DMR shots is what it takes to take down the shield after plasma charge. Headshot are unaffected thankfully.

[Vulgar Monkey]

and that's meant to be fun?

What happens when you get to the numerous really hard bottleneck setpeices? Like defending the bomb with Jorge, for example?

[Chewylegs]

I've not been that impressed with the single player so far, however after an hour and a half multiplayer tonight, I enjoying it much more than Halo3....much more!

Loving Firefight.

[Michael J Glocks]

Having fun with the target locator and a couple of friends (including rllmuk's very own Straps)

Part 1

Part 2

More if and when we think of them, maybe!

[Straps]

I have no idea how those drop shields survived. We need to do a Kamikaze forklift too.

[Vulgar Monkey]

Heh, for some reason i can't help but think of mighty morphin' power rangers.

[angel]

Strangely enough, it's just a video, roughly two hours long, that covers the important bits of the campaign. It's available on Waypoint for those who purchased the Legendary Edition (and on YouTube for everyone else ).

Ive searched and searched and cant find it...any links?

[Michael J Glocks]

Having fun with the target locator and a couple of friends (including rllmuk's very own Straps)

Now on Youtube!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X03b2Gt2oTs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J99pqeluo88

I have no idea how those drop shields survived. We need to do a Kamikaze forklift too.

Assuming you can tag other players with the locator there's probably lots of fun involving sprint and drophshields to be had.

[Don Rosco]

Ive searched and searched and cant find it...any links?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFQxvH13jPE

[redman]

nice one!!

Fair enough. Is that based on the single player campaigns? Because that's what I've based mine on. I didn't factor the multiplayer into any of mine. Oh, and if it is based on the single player, what do you like so much about Halo 2. Genuinely curious.

i'm going by the campaign but based on my first playthrough. I dunno I wasn't caught up in any hype and i just really got into the story and the atmosphere. think it had my favourite music and apart from the ridiculous boss fights I really loved the fighting too.

and that's meant to be fun?

What happens when you get to the numerous really hard bottleneck setpeices? Like defending the bomb with Jorge, for example?

so glad this is a recognised spike. it gave me some real trouble, i think i turned it off in frustration

been playing loads of team objective: odd ball where the dropshield loadout is available isn't fun. 2 flags on asylum is

[Mr Ben]

Grrr, I've just spent the past 30 mins or more looking for the music that plays during the 1st mission when the zealots suprise you and take the girl. You know the guitar bit where you and Jorge have to "clear the hole". Cant find it anywhere other than on the end of the "Winter Contingency" soundtrack. Bloody annoying.

[DirkCrisis]

Spent some time on Gruntpocalypse last night. Really enjoyable stuff but I don't know how much I'd go back to it.

[Hitcher]

Spent some time on Gruntpocalypse last night. Really enjoyable stuff but I don't know how much I'd go back to it.

But it's great for the challenges - all of the daily ones yesterday in about 3-4 games.

[Distinct muttering]

nice one!!

i'm going by the campaign but based on my first playthrough. I dunno I wasn't caught up in any hype and i just really got into the story and the atmosphere. think it had my favourite music and apart from the ridiculous boss fights I really loved the fighting too.

so glad this is a recognised spike. it gave me some real trouble, i think i turned it off in frustration

been playing loads of team objective: odd ball where the dropshield loadout is available isn't fun. 2 flags on asylum is

This caused me no end of grief too. I eventually managed to do the last wave from the checkpoint I was on by...

Having to run towards the Elite in front of me, sticky him, and then no scope him with the sniper to take him down. I was then able to run into a room at the back of the room where you could hole up which had a needle rifle weapon rack. From in there I was able to let Jorge take on the Elites and I was able to snipe and needle rifle them while he kept them preoccupied. The odd one would make its way into where I was which resulted in afew annoying deaths and also meant I had to redo my sticky sniper routine before I could get back to that bit, which I was only having about a 1 in 5 success rate with as it was!

[BrerLappin]

Got my first Kill Frenzy last night

Defending the first objectives on invasion spire, i managed to take out 3 enemies on my own, then cloaked at the top of a rock overlooking the humans approach, and nailed them every time they tried taking the objective. 10 kills in a row, feels good man

Also up to the final level on legendary now, trying to get the damn 'if they came to hear me beg' cheevo at the start of it tho, so annoying, ive done the fall, and gotten the assasination, but no achievement. Overall tho legendary was a breeze, ive done it faster than i did on heroic. Tho i had a major headache last night when

defending Halseys lab, i ran out to re-activate the guns about midway, and of course it checkpointed me while im out on my own, miles away from the rest of the team, and about 10 elites and 2 ghosts had just dropped in in front of me, and all i had was a DMR and about 20 rounds got past it in the end with some judicious use of a palsma pistol and my remaining DMR rounds but it was a fuppin nightmare

[Lucky Gonk]

I've only just realised you can unstick yourself by going in to armour lock.

Video

[Girth Certificate]

replaying Heroic with the upgraded enemies skull on, shitloads of fun, the hard grunts are ridiculously grenade happy. I tried to run over one of the hundreds of white elites yesterday, he went into armour lock so I parked on top of him, when it ran out me and my mates were thrown about a mile into the air on our spinning flipping warthog

[Lothar Hex]

Started my Legendary run now. Hate using vehicles on that because the friendly A.I. as always, is either horrible at driving or so slow on the damn trigger you're dead before they've even fired. Goddamn bastards!

Oh well, three levels down, seven to go. I feel there will be a bit of legging it through certain sections (done that on the sniper level when you meet the militia, would normally fight on Heroic/Normal)

[A Hen]

replaying Heroic with the upgraded enemies skull on, shitloads of fun, the hard grunts are ridiculously grenade happy. I tried to run over one of the hundreds of white elites yesterday, he went into armour lock so I parked on top of him, when it ran out me and my mates were thrown about a mile into the air on our spinning flipping warthog

That's Halo in a nutshell - unpredictable, cool, hilarious things happening with regularity. My favourite still has to be from the first game. On the second level, where you activate the light bridge, there's a ramp that goes up to the switch. At the top are two (IIRC) Elites. An Elite was above us on the ramp, and one of the players lobbed a grenade. The Elite must have jumped at the same time as the explosion, as he leapt really high over our heads, cleared the entire (long) ramp, and landed several metres away from the bottom of the ramp. The icing on the cake was that he turned around without missing a beat, and ran back to fight us, as if this sort of thing happened to him all the time.

[Pob]

That's Halo in a nutshell - unpredictable, cool, hilarious things happening with regularity. My favourite still has to be from the first game. On the second level, where you activate the light bridge, there's a ramp that goes up to the switch. At the top are two (IIRC) Elites. An Elite was above us on the ramp, and one of the players lobbed a grenade. The Elite must have jumped at the same time as the explosion, as he leapt really high over our heads, cleared the entire (long) ramp, and landed several metres away from the bottom of the ramp. The icing on the cake was that he turned around without missing a beat, and ran back to fight us, as if this sort of thing happened to him all the time.

Theatre mode is brilliant for seeing what the enemy AI get up when they're not directly fighting you. Elites seem to have intelligence roughly equivalent to dogs. I was watching one Elite on the very last bit (just before you get in the

MAC cannon)

. He was looking out of the building at me as I wandered around the landing pad, out of range, gathering supplies. For some reason he decided he was too exposed or something, and skulked back off to join his mates up on the mezzanine. Then later, the two remaining Elites were on the mezzanine, with me directly below them wondering how to take them on. Eventually one of them came down (not sure why - maybe he got bored), and clearly wasn't expecting a charged plasma bolt to smack into him - he definitely wasn't 'ready' for me to be down there as he just blundered in without looking over and seeing me.

[A Hen]

Theatre mode is brilliant for seeing what the enemy AI get up when they're not directly fighting you.

Oh man, I haven't really delved into Theatre mode yet, but I must do. I'd love to re-watch my scrap with the hated fuel-rod Brute (my mortal enemy) that I had last night. This game is so sweet - there's just so much there to explore.

[missingno]

Also up to the final level on legendary now, trying to get the damn 'if they came to hear me beg' cheevo at the start of it tho, so annoying, ive done the fall, and gotten the assasination, but no achievement.

There were 2 things that helped me get this one. The first one is make sure you are landing behind the elite and not on top of him. The second is to make sure you turn off your sprint before you land.

[wretcherd]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFQxvH13jPE

Ah, great timing, I just last night finished my Legendary run.

Best bit was

defending Halsey's lab on the glacier level, reactivating the turrets and running back to the racks full of assorted guns to tool up.

[MojoChin]

Finished the campaign, but have been reading people saying about the laser...Where was that?! Never saw it once.

Also, the whole bypassing the Scorpion happened me too. I got to the part where it is, never saw it and died about 10 times before I realised it was there and commandeered it. Thing is, it actually says that there should be a Scorpion lying about somewhere to use, but it just never clicked.

[Straps]

I do so love the Grunt's Birthday Party armour effect. It makes even the most ignominious of deaths enjoyable.

http://www.bungie.net/Stats/Reach/FileDetails.aspx?fid=2708397&player=Yonezzz