Halo: Campaign Evolved

[Nag]

There's still rumours floating about that Horizon Zero Dawn is going to get an Xbox release (announcement at the Game Awards was the last one I saw) and to be honest that would be more of a jaw drop moment than Halo on PlayStation. 

[Maryokutai]

I think it defies the definition of being a shock because MS have been crawling in this direction ever since that infamous '4 games' podcast special. It's the expected end point for their multiplatform strategy, especially as they mentioned earlier in the year that no IP was off the table. Is it super weird to see? For sure. But we also saw it coming a mile away.

 

Same thing with SEGA, honesty, because what else would they have done without a console? I think the crossover olympic games back then were a bigger deal than releasing Adventure 2 on the Gamecube.

 

Edit: thinking about it though, it's interesting how time distorts the impact of these things. For example, I just got a bunch of Tomb Raider games for my Switch, the last of which came out after Halo 1 and Sony paid top dollar back in the day to have these either as timed or complete exclusives on their platform. But today Tomb Raider is multiplatform, no questions asked, that's just how it is.

[Maf]

As said on the other page I’m not surprised with it. But there might be younger people who grew up Xbox die-hards and to them this is just crazy. Even though the writing was on the wall

 

If Horizon came to Xbox that would be insane. 1) because PlayStation is not in the same position/pursuing the same strategy 2) Xbox would have a great looking game 🫨

[one-armed dwarf]

DHS in America is retweeting Halo stuff with 'Destroy the Flood', and the composer is retweeting them. Pretty depressing stuff but then again probably not even the nadir of MS right now I suppose. 

https://www.pcgamer.com/games/us-government-uses-halo-images-in-a-call-to-destroy-immigration-microsoft-declines-to-comment/

 

[Maf]

They probably look at it as free marketing 

[one-armed dwarf]

If they want to corner the shithead demographic, sure, I guess. 

[Maf]

So the majority of Americans right now

 

I was joking before. This right wing shit is just too pathetic for words

[DANGERMAN]

Tbf that was traditionally the Xbox demographic. 

 

I don't really know why developers get involved with stuff like this. I've no issue with them supporting a cause they believe in, even if it's a shitty one, but this is just going to generate pressure on him 

[Maryokutai]

O'Donnel being an asshat is something I completely missed. Makes me feel better about him getting fired from Bungie all these years ago though.

 

Also, for the record, the tweet he shared was the one with Trump wearing the Master Chief armour. Not sure if that makes it better or worse.

 

This timeline really needs to end, it's exhausting to stumble over this crap everwhere you go.

[one-armed dwarf]

To be clear by composer I meant Marty O'Donnell, I don't think the current dev team are tweeting any of this stuff

[Sly Reflex]

This is coming from the sort of people that would scream "KeEp PoLiTiCs OuT oF gAmEs!!!" when the main character wasn't a straight white dude. 

[one-armed dwarf]

One of the key designers up to Halo Reach spoke up on it, while MS put fingers in their ears and pretend not to have noticed when they wasted no time in responding to neogaf rumours a while ago

 

https://www.eurogamer.net/trump-administrations-use-of-halo-ought-to-offend-every-halo-fan-regardless-of-political-orientation-says-key-series-designer

[Nag]

Sitting at 83/81 for Xbox/PlayStation respectively on metacritic...

[Maf]

Wow, ok. Completely turned around and sold in 1 trailer. I could see myself spending a lot of time with this game. 
 

I’m much happier now there’s more content, missions, challenges, remixes and actual design in it other than a port to UE5. 
 

Which even in fairness to that, looks fantastic, too.

 

Just went from “prove it” to “oh, ok. Day one? Sure thing”

[Maf]

Bit confused by Skillup’s review. He starts by saying they would have done better to recreate it 1:1, then goes on to say it needs a reason to exist because Halo 1 is still very easy to access/play. The only criticism I agree with him is the art design inside the covenant ship and how gaudy and effects heavy it is. I think the rest of the game looks really good 

 

I’m also glad they changed a lot of the game from health bars, weapons and some levels. It makes it more interesting to go back and have a different experience than the same one. 
 

Maybe his deeper point is that the remake misses some of the texture or flavour of some of the original, but I get bored of this excuse with remakes. If you want the exact, immaculate original without a texture out of place, go download MCC. It’s made by a different team at a different time with different tech. I start to think people pull this card to prove how artistically in tune they are but it comes off pompous and immaterial most of the time 
 

Downloaded it yesterday and will play it soon. Not trying to to argue with the reviewer when I haven’t played it, but the points seem a bit off to me. 

[Nag]

I've seen the inclusion of map markers complained about... for me they're are fucking godsend, the original game is sometimes way too vague as to where you're going and it's pretty easy to get turned around completely and head back the way you came.

[one-armed dwarf]

I like old games, but watching that footage of Halo makes me think it's really a game just for a specific moment and is very hard to appreciate now, graphical uplift or not. 

 

H3 is the one I remember being most into

 

On art design stuff, cause I caught the bit now where he describes it as double edged, I felt this with Snake Eater, which looks stunning in its environments, especially in first person, but also made its characters look botoxy. Though it's probably the best of these UE5 remakes I've played, above Oblivion (awful) and NG2 (poor)