When Halo2 arrives will you...

[Gique]

I think he's a great main character.

glad youre not a character designer mate.... I've seen more imaginative shootemup baddie sprites than that.

[Kryptonian]

glad youre not a character designer mate.... I've seen more imaginative shootemup baddie sprites than that.

Like what? give me some examples of these sprites please.

What don't you like about the Master Chief? Why is he so bad compared to any other FPS character?

[Beertiger]

but he's the last surviving member of his team which he led at Reach and were wiped out, the guy's been through a shit load and here you are dissing on him.

look beyond the suit to a boy being taken away from his child hood to be trained into a last ditch effort to save the human race. he led his team to doom on Reach and was left wondering throughout the whole of Halo wether any of them survived.

John is a great character, you just have to get to know him.

[Systemshock]

Sorry but I hate fucking threads like this, worshipping the ground on which an unreleased game walks on. In the last year I have looked forward to countless games but only about one in five were worth the wait. At the moment I can't wait for HL2, Metroid Prime 2 and Rome Total War but that hasn't yet convinced me that any of them will be great games. Lets wait and see.

[dan_tm]

Sounds like you've read the books then

So is it "Dr. Hasley" I've totally forgotten her name. Cortana is [virtually] Dr. Hasley disguised as a computer. I'm sure thats right.

John considered Dr. Hasley and Capt. Keyes as his 'real' parents, which would technically make Cortana his mum.

[Beertiger]

if you hate them than don't post.

also i can understand being unconvinced about new games but with the properties you mentioned and the teams working on them there is about 1/500 chance that they will turn out tosh.

pick some better examples like ohhh Duke Nukem Forever which no one knows anything about.

[Gique]

Like what? give me some examples of these sprites please.

What don't you like about the Master Chief? Why is he so bad compared to any other FPS character?

okay, lets take a look :

hmm take alook at anything produced by cave or treasure for example.

he's utterly unrecogniseable.. he has no visual personality, the design is unbelievably bland.. even the other ally soldiers look better than him.

as a silhouette, (a good way of defining unique character features) he's totally NOTHING... it's just bad character design, period.

It has nothing to do with FPS characters, just character design as a whole.

[dan_tm]

he's utterly unrecogniseable..

Hey... Who's this guy?

Hey! It's James Bond!

[Gique]

Hey! It's James Bond!

and he's fell off his motocross bike.

[dan_tm]

[Kryptonian]

Hey... Who's this guy?

Hey! It's James Bond!

I was gonna say that!

Surely the other points he raised are therefore the same for any robot-style character then?

[Alex W.]

GRRAGH!

It's one thing to post a wallpaper-sized image, it's quite another to quote said image in its entirety.

Edit that post, kryptonian!

[Beertiger]

i'm surprised they haven't shown off the other spartans yet, although i guess it's because they haven't even shown anything at all.

Samus Aran is shit as well then?

[Gique]

Surely the other points he raised are therefore the same for any robot-style character then

not really.. and besides, isn't he a human being?

he looks like he should be in THIS game.

Samus Aran is shit as well then?

actually, no.. the shaping of the armour is much more stylized, (look at the chest and underarm area). not to mention looking like the suit is made for a specific purpose. on top of that, you get to see the person inside (although as a reflection in prime) in the 2d iterations.

[Beertiger]

well then read the book's and get to know what John is like if you're that desperate. I could see why he wouldn't be that hyped up in Halo seeing how just before he'd lost everything he'd ever loved and cared for.

also it's just body armor, why should it have to look incredible in design, it's there to stop bullets.

on another note at the end of first strike we have 2 more spartans left and one who's been taken by the doc.

now in that orignal E3 demo we see two additional people in the transport with the sarge wearing MJOLNIR style armour. one already has their helmet on and the other is just suiting up.

are these just ODST's are are they the other spartans?

[Alex W.]

well then read the book's and get to know what John is like if you're that desperate. I could see why he wouldn't be that hyped up in Halo seeing how just before he'd lost everything he'd ever loved and cared for.

Yeah, but that would be me covering The Matrix: Reloaded's confusing bits by saying "watch The Animatrix and it'll all make sense".

[Gique]

well then read the book's and get to know what John is like if you're that desperate. I could see why he wouldn't be that hyped up in Halo seeing how just before he'd lost everything he'd ever loved and cared for.

i'm not talking about backstory. I'm talking about visual representation.

and why the hell should I have to buy a novel about a videogame?

sounds like some bullshit merchandising ploy to get fanboys to fork out more money simply because it turned out to be a big seller and they forgot to add character development in the game.

[Beertiger]

as i said though it's freakin armour. to stop bullets. that's maybe why he looks like a walking tank. think practical man. it was developed in a rush while the human race was being wiped out. i'm sure none of them stopped to think how it didn't look very pretty.

otherwise you'd be complaining that his wafer thin armour wouldn't really be able to stop bullets.

In Halo, the player—taking the role of the last surviving SPARTAN, an elite unit of supercommandos—wears a powerful suit of powered-armor: the MJOLNIR, Mark V.

MJOLNIR armor is constructed in overlapping layers. It is a sealed system, capable of extravehicular activity or operations in toxic atmosphere. It is hardened against EMP and radiation, and has environment filters that are completely effective at removing toxins and bacteria from local atmosphere.

The armor's shell is a multilayer alloy of remarkable strength and has been augmented with a refractive coating capable of dispersing a limited number of Covenant energy weapon attacks.

The battlesuit contains a gel-filled layer that regulates temperature and can reactively change in density. The inner skinsuit is a moisture-absorbing synthetic linked to an environment control computer and the "pilot's" UNSC-issue neural interface.

Each SPARTAN has a molecular fiber network within his brain, an upgrade to the standard "Command Neural Interface" (issued to all UNSC troops). This network translates electrochemical signals to digital code and routes them through an interface connection at the rear of the skull. His thoughts could now command the armor's movement and weapons, and input from the onboard sensors could come directly to his mind. The synthesis of machine and mind is so fast that it is almost impossible to chart—reaction time is more than five times faster than of an unaugmented human.

Sandwiched between the external armor and the internal padding is the most devastating weapon the suit carries: a layer of crystal. Woven by molecular tools into a superdense optical computer memory, this crystalline layer forms a network capable of supporting the kinds of artificial intelligence usually reserved for starships—a "piggyback" system. An AI's personality and processing matrices can be carried by the armor and delivered to the onboard storage in a crystal data chip no larger than a personal currency chit.

With such a powerful computer in a mobile package, the SPARTAN-II / MJOLNIR combination is designed to be the most devastating intelligence tool ever created.

[Gique]

QUOTE (xbox.com)

In Halo, the player—taking the role of the last surviving SPARTAN, an elite unit of supercommandos—wears a powerful suit of powered-armor: the MJOLNIR, Mark V.

MJOLNIR armor is blah blah blah pseudo startrek waffle

i don't really care what the technojargon is, i'm saying the character art is BAD.

ack, forget about it

because his MZXJDVLRINBO armour is made from hyper mega kevlar made from freshly pressed arcturan gigasquirrels, it justifies him looking like that.

sorry, what was I thinking.

[Beertiger]

if you look very carefully in Halo you will see John remove his helmet.

i personally like his rugged tank like, born out of neccessity not to look good as a bright orange/red/blue suit ala Samus wouldn't do good when fighting the covenant and trying to remain unseen. that's just me though i can accept why it looks like it does and how logically it fits in with the story.

probably why the covenant look so sleek is because they've had an age to perfect it while dominating the galaxy.

[Kryptonian]

not really.. and besides, isn't he a human being?

He is a genetically modified Human yes. I was refering to your point about how the suit looked not what was in it. I think he's a good character for the game through his voice, how he acts and how the other characters act towards him.

[Wintermute]

The first time I saw a grunt waddling across the landscape, I clearly remember thinking 'My God, aren't they sleek!'

[Number 28]

Yup, I like it too. There's a believable consistency amongst all the human designs, Master Chief's suit is similar in style to the Pelican and the Warthog. Same applies to the convenant. The human designs are meant to be down to earth, otherwise the convenant wouldn't look especially foreign in contrast.

[Gique]

The first time I saw a grunt waddling across the landscape, I clearly remember thinking 'My God, aren't they sleek!'

I thought "my god, they have english classes for aliens!" *cringe*

[Kryptonian]

Yup, I like it too. There's a believable consistency amongst all the human designs, Master Chief's suit is similar in style to the Pelican and the Warthog. Same applies to the convenant. The human designs are meant to be down to earth, otherwise the convenant wouldn't look especially foreign in contrast.

Yeah, like worn and made for battle. Built to kick the fuck out of people rather than to look good.

[Kryptonian]

I thought "my god, they have english classes for aliens!" *cringe*

Yeah cos Halo is the only game ever to have the aliens speaking some English. My, you must hate every film and TV program out there where people speak english instead of their native alien / foreign language.

What do you think about Halo's gameplay though?

[Gique]

Yeah cos Halo is the only game ever to have the aliens speaking some English. My, you must hate every film and TV program out there where people speak english instead of their native alien / foreign language.

What do you think about Halo's gameplay though?

i just thought it was done rather cheesily, is all..

playability? i played it through to the end.. thought it was fun.

[Ktw]

actually, no.. the shaping of the armour is much more stylized, (look at the chest and underarm area). not to mention looking like the suit is made for a specific purpose. on top of that, you get to see the person inside (although as a reflection in prime) in the 2d iterations.

OMFG IT IS A WOMAN!!!!!1!!!!!!!11!!one IT IS TEH BEST CAHRCTER EVAR!!!!!11!

As for her suit, you'd think the colour scheme was born out of necessity due to hardware limitations. Something that has then been brought into new iterations lest fanboys everywhere should whip up a shitstorm of complaints.

I'm with Beertiger regarding Master Chief's looks. Actually, the entire art direction of Halo is quite clever. Everything human looks like it's evolved from our current design philosophy. No railguns, cell ammunition driven weapons etc. Same colour schemes as those used today. Same sort of projectile based weapons. And so on. Makes them all the more believable.

The Covenant, on the other hand, have a different background which explains the differences in design, weapon types etc. The strong colours, odd designs etc make them seem far more real than the run of the mill "evil aliens."

And as for Master Chief, I don't even think you have to read the novels. The thing about the character is that he is an empty shell for you to step into. You are MC in the game. Hence the character is kept as neutral as possible. With a don't-you-fucking-dare-mess-with-me voice (which is incidentally exactly how I sound...).

[Lucky Gonk]

i just thought it was done rather cheesily, is all..

Out of curiosity, how would you have handled it?

Totally agree with Ktw about the whole "empty shell" thing. The back story is almost irrelevant. You're the Master Chief, you know what you've got to do - no further elaboration is required.

And for what it's worth, I think he looks cool as fuck, especially in his Halo 2 incarnation. He won't win any beauty contests, sure, but I'd certainly think twice about spilling his pint.

[patriot]

e) ill probobly get my friend to come over to my house [he has an xbox] so we can play the 2 player campaign...