Halo 2 World Tourney Finals - Aussie Champ's View

Remorhaz writes "Some of you may be aware that the finals of the Worldwide Halo 2 tourney over Xbox Live was held on Friday night (10th June) with the 24 Xbox Live Region winners duking it out for ultimate glory. I was there with Cabel (the Australian representative), his brother and Pidge from Microsoft Australia to play the finals - Cabel made it to the grand final round - but didn't take first place unfortunately (congrats to King Tuur from the Netherlands) - but he's done us Aussies extremely proud :) Here's Remorhaz' "writeup of an insider's view of Australia's Halo 2 representative - Cabel's progress to the finals and the night's events at Australian Microsoft HQ."

Comments

Halo kills children

[Anonymous Coward]

Lets talk about Jon Carmack. Jon is the legendary programmer of such classic PC games as Wolfenstein, Doom, Duke nukem 3d, Quake 1, 2, and 3, unreal, and the upcoming doom3. Jon has single handedly created the genre known as the first-person-shooter. He has also popularized the OpenGL 3d format over Microsoft's competing Direct3d format, as well as caused public interest in 3d cards when he first released accelerated quake for the s3 virge chipset. Jon carmack has redefined gaming on PC's.

Now stop for a moment and think, What would have happened if Albert Einstein had worked creating amazing pinball games instead of creating the theory of relativity? Humanity would suffer! Jon carmack is unfortunately doing JUST THIS, using his gifts at computer coding to create games instead of furthering the knowledge of humanity. Carmack could have been working for NASA or the US military, but instead he simply sits around coding violent computer games.

Is this a waste of a special and rare talent? Sadly, the answer is yes.

Unfortunately, it doesn't stop there. Not only is Jon carmack not contributing to society, he is causing it's downfall. What was the main reason for the mass murder of dozens of people in columbine? Doom. It's always the same story: Troubled youth plays doom or quake, he arms himself to the teeth, he kills his classmates. This has happened hundreds of times in the US alone. Carmack is not only wasting his talents and intelligence; he is single-handedly causing the deaths of many young men and women. How does he sleep at night?

Carmack is a classic example of a very talented and intelligent human being that is bent on total world destruction. Incredibly, he has made millions of dollars getting people hooked on psychotic games where they compete on the internet to see who can dismember the most people. I believe there is something morally wrong when millions of people have computerized murder fantasies, and we have Jon Carmack to thank. Carmack has used his superior intellect to create mayhem in society. Many people play games such as quake so much that their minds are permanently warped. A cousin of mine has been in therapy for 6 months after he lost a 'death match' and became catatonic.

It is unfortunate that most people do not realize how much this man has damaged all the things we have worked hard for in America. Jon has wasted his intelligence, caused the deaths of innocent children, and warped this country forever. To top it off, he got rich in the process and is revered by millions of computer users worldwide. Perhaps one day the US government will see the light and confine Jon Carmack somewhere with no computers so he can no longer use his intelligence to wreak havoc on society.

Re:Halo kills children

[Rii]

Aye, but sometimes 'wasteful' diversions like that make life worth living.

Re:Halo kills children

[conna01]

Not sure if you were serious in your post but you complain that he could have worked for the US military. How would that be good for humanity? And the cop out blaming games/music/movies for death is just crap anyway. Blame you cousins lack of supervision and not a game. Hell the games have warning labels on them for people like you...

Re:Halo kills children

[master0ne]

ok first off, doom 3 has been out for some time, not to mention its recently released expansion pack, so that leads me to beleave this is a re-post by a troll of another thread. anyway ill still take the time (because im bored and find this post comidicly innacurate). First John Carmack (not Jon Carmack) has had a major role in coding fod ID software, he had nothing to do with the development of Unreal (by epic games) or duke nukem (also by epic games i beleave). The shooters at Columbine which every body points to when referencing how violent and bad videogames are hadpre meditated the killings (for those trolls out there, this means they planned them!) and playing violent games like doom was mearly ment as a "practice run" not that it would have dont much good, as most these games pit you aganst demons from hell, not Danny from third period. As far as target practice, i do not see how playing a video game can improve that by itself, as there is no recoil from a mouse, you do not hold the mouse in the same way you hold a gun, nor do you get any expirence aiming with the "targeting" system in all FPS's, no the killers at columbine had access to real guns, and were practicing with them long in advance of the killings. And if you want to blaim their psycho killings on the video game industry, who not blaim the paint ball industry aswell, that is a more realistic and less seperated form of "killing" people. Or for that matter the gun industry who made the guns which the kids used? or even the school system for not having metal detectors, or the cops or their parents for not checking out their weird behavior leading upto the day of the shooting. The fact is that the role violent games played in that incident (if any) is no more than the roll the teachers played for not asking more questions. Hell the bullies who pushed these kids over the edge are more to blaim than the games they played.Now as to your cousin who "became catatonic" after losing a death match, not only do i not beleave it (and if it is true it wasnt the game that caused it, it would have been a chemical in balence in the brain that caused obsessive cumpulsive tendencies, in which case you are as much at fault as the game is for not picking up on this and trying to get him help), but im willing to say if your not making it up, its more your fault or whoever was with him or closest to him for not stopping him or trying to get him help. anyway i dont know why im replying to this AC troll, i guess just because i havent seen a good responce to posts like this in the past so ill take the time to respond as best i can.

Re:Halo kills children

[noisymime]

agreed, I remember reading words very simlar to this before.... I can't find another posting with them tho.

Re:Halo kills children

[Anonymous Coward]

It's been posted before as can confirm a quick search on Google:

http://games.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=134637&t hreshold=-1&commentsort=0&tid=204&mode=nested&cid= 11238017

Re:Halo kills children

[hxnwix]

Haha. Therapy for six months... for catatonic stupor induced by (note the quotes) losing a "death match".

*airquote gesture*
death
match
*airquote gesture*

Hhehehehehahahahah pure comedy gold. Can't you people recognize sarcasm?

just when i thought i could sleep.

[conna01]

No more sleep for me

Cool...

[Anonymous Coward]

I know somebody who knows one of the players on the team! How cool does that make me?

Re:Cool...

[Anonymous Coward]

Not cool at all. You are posting to slashdot after all.

First Comment on... Halo?

[internetjunkiegeorge]

I've heard somewhere that these things can be screwed with because of the programming foundation of the game. Is it true that certain players may be able to somehow take advantage of the game without anyone noticing?

Re:First Comment on... Halo?

[ROFLMAObot]

Not likely, I play Halo 2 everyday on Live and it just doesn't happen. Plus at a high-glory event like this I bet the games were very, very closely monitored. There was a problem with cheating that was recently fixed. So I would assume they'd monitor this prestigous event.

Re:First Comment on... Halo?

[cahiha]

You can screw with the programming foundations only after you kill Agent Smith.

Re:First Comment on... Halo?

[Anonymous Coward]

it still happens ... last nite, while playing, i kept killing an opponent who was crouching and had their back to me. the game would state that i killed them ... then the screen would flash 3 times, switching between me inside and outside a building on battlecreek ( even though i was nowhere near the buidling ). all of the suddent the flashing would stop and it said i was dead. this started to occur a 3rd of the way through the game when we were up by 15 kills in doubles, but because of this we lost the lead. i am done with halo ... it seems like a waste since i am level 25 in team slayer and 20 in doubles but in the last week, i have run into so many instances of people cheating, it is just not worth it anymore.

good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[lifo-fifo]

Before I am modded to the bowels of hell, I just want to say that, while many slashdotters' only expierience with FPS games has been with a keyboard and mouse, this doesn't mean that a dual joystick controller is nessessarily inferior.

The advantages of keyboard and mouse are as follows:
Can move mouse to shoot anywhere on the screen easily.

This is good, yes. But consider the disadvantages for a moment.

1) Out of mousemat error.
Sooner or later, your going run out of mousemat when your turning and will have to lift the mouse back onto the pad to continue. Meaning you'll simply stop turning while your doing this. On a DJC, you just tilt the right analouge stick right or left for continuous turning.

2) Out of fingers error.
With a keyboard and mouse, you aim with the mouse, meaning one hand, and all its fingers, can only access, 2-3 buttons.(Scrollwheels help with this a lot though) Usually these are shoot,change weapon and other. Meanwhile your other fingers, usually 2-3, are stuck on WASD for moving. If you want to crouch, reload, zoom, jump or perhaps change weapon reverse, you will need to do some keyboard gymnastics, look down, or (horror of horrors) stop moving to press other buttons. On a DJC, one thumb is used for movement, the other for aiming. Flipper pads mean four buttons are easily reachable by two more fingers, and the dpad and other buttons are acessable by a nimble other if required. Bottom line. You can keep moving while you perform on the fly weapon maitainance. DJC has a lot more buffer space for out of fingers errors.

3) Mouse Error, Error.
Most comupter mice are fairly cheap anyaway. Mice get junk in the wheels. Even optical mice glitch from time to time. Buttons sometimes get stuck, and of course hands may slip or be jostled from time to time. The average DJC is of a higher quaility than the average mouse and suffers far less from any of these problems.

4) Keyboard limitations
Open up a text editor. Press and hold E. Without letting go hold C. Now while holding, tap U. See the problem? Now try W,D and E. E will not register. Try WAQ. There are umpteen other combinations. Keyboards can't handle many multiple keydown combinations. DJC can.

OK, the disadvantage of DJCs will no doubt be blasted endlessly at me. Less precision, etc, etc.
But consider for a moment? Is a game filled with head shot hunting, rail driver packing, KBM gurus more or less fun than a game filled with DJC toting, ultra mobile, shotgun blasting, upclose and personal players?

And before you knock DJC, Try it out!! They're dirt cheap now, and are available anywhere. I know some will never budge from dogma, but if enough people follow me, then maybe I'll get more joypad support in Linux from now on.

1076-8149

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[HD Webdev]

1) Out of mousemat error. Sooner or later, your going run out of mousemat when your turning and will have to lift the mouse back onto the pad to continue. Meaning you'll simply stop turning while your doing this. On a DJC, you just tilt the right analouge stick right or left for continuous turning.

That's silly. Any experienced gamer uses a large mousepad and sets the sensitivity so that moving to the left or right edge of the pad == 180 degree turn. It's common sense. No lifting of the mouse is necessary. If it is, then the sensitivity is not set correctly.

2) Out of fingers error. With a keyboard and mouse, you aim with the mouse, meaning one hand, and all its fingers, can only access, 2-3 buttons.(Scrollwheels help with this a lot though) Usually these are shoot,change weapon and other. Meanwhile your other fingers, usually 2-3, are stuck on WASD for moving. If you want to crouch, reload, zoom, jump or perhaps change weapon reverse, you will need to do some keyboard gymnastics, look down, or (horror of horrors) stop moving to press other buttons. On a DJC, one thumb is used for movement, the other for aiming. Flipper pads mean four buttons are easily reachable by two more fingers, and the dpad and other buttons are acessable by a nimble other if required. Bottom line. You can keep moving while you perform on the fly weapon maitainance. DJC has a lot more buffer space for out of fingers errors.

Again silly. Good gamers don't usually use WASD. It's not the natural typing position and limits the number of keys that can be used without moving the hand. Gamers that need a lot of keys use ESDF because they never have to look at the keyboard because there's usually a divit on the F key to keep the person from losing position. Using the home typing position, 28 keys are available without moving the left hand out of standard typing postion.

3) Mouse Error, Error. Most comupter mice are fairly cheap anyaway. Mice get junk in the wheels. Even optical mice glitch from time to time. Buttons sometimes get stuck, and of course hands may slip or be jostled from time to time. The average DJC is of a higher quaility than the average mouse and suffers far less from any of these problems.

meh, I don't want to bite on that hook.

4) Keyboard limitations Open up a text editor. Press and hold E. Without letting go hold C. Now while holding, tap U. See the problem? Now try W,D and E. E will not register. Try WAQ. There are umpteen other combinations. Keyboards can't handle many multiple keydown combinations. DJC can.

More trolling. Cheap keyboards only register 3 keys pressed at one time. You know that. Spending more than $15USD more often than not gets a keyboard that can handle more than 3 keys at at time.

{SNIP REST OF BS}

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[Anonymous Coward]

I 100% agree with you.

A keyboard + mouse is 10x better than a silly x-box controller for FPS games.

More accurate, faster, better ability for custom controls, and just all around better.

I use a nice mouse and keyboard... but quite honestly I'd take a $10 mouse and $10 keyboard for a FPS over an $80 x-box controller anyday.

1.) With a high sensativity you can still aim perfectly and you won't run out of mousemat. Winner: Keyboard and Mouse
2.) Not counting my movement, fire, and primary fire buttons: I have 5 more buttons on my mouse, a scroll wheel, and probebly 3-5 that I can easily reach on my keyboard. That is considerably more than an X-box controller.
Winner: Keyboard and Mouse
3.) I have never had an optical mouse 'stick' or 'glitch' during a game, ever. I have had a PS controller, a PS-2 controller, and an x-box controller have controller issues (loss of sensativity).
Winner: Keyboard and Mouse
4.) Spend more than $10 on a keyboard and you don't have this problem.
Winner: Tie

So lets look at the 'keyboard/mouse weaknesses' that were pointed out, and see who came out on top.

Keyboard and Mouse: 3
X-box controller: 0

It's pretty obvious to me which is better... and unless you've got some bias in favor of the x-box then it should be obvious to you as well.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[Anonymous Coward]

HAHAHA BITCH FELL FOR THE TROLL

Even at a young age I knew of my sexual power over men. I would dress sexy for my babysitter, flashing my panties, griding into his lap. Finally one day I demanded that he touch me 'down there'. He played with by balls and penis: my first ejaculation.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[Highrollr]

Any experienced gamer uses a large mousepad and sets the sensitivity so that moving to the left or right edge of the pad == 180 degree turn. It's common sense. No lifting of the mouse is necessary. If it is, then the sensitivity is not set correctly.

I would be interested to know how you turn more than 180 degrees without lifting the mouse, for example while circle-strafing.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[dedazo]

I think you're kinda feeding the troll, but

Any experienced gamer uses a large mousepad

As a fairly experienced (and ranked in UT at one time in 2001) gamer, I can tell you that any gamer worth his tag uses a trackball. There is nothing better for FPS. The control you get from one by simply moving your fingers is far superior than what you'll ever get by moving even just your wrist, never mind the whole arm.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[HD Webdev]

I fed it but then again, I was Trolling the Trolls back when A.S.T was in it's infancy so it's more hungry than it was before I posted.

There are plenty of trackball players that I personally know that are well matched up with mouse players.

I didn't mention it because the Bridge Fellow was talking about mice and I have been a mouser since the Doom mouse patch (IIRC, v1.2).

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[Anonymous Coward]

You sir just rocked my world.

I was about to say "THATS CRAZY TALK" when it came to shunning WASD, but when you mentioned the divit on the F key, sure enough I look down, and there it is. I'll be using ESDF now I think ;)

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[HD Webdev]

I would be interested to know how you turn more than 180 degrees without lifting the mouse, for example while circle-strafing.

I don't circle-strafe in the same direction for very long. Otherwise, I'd be dead because of my being predictable.

Keep 'em guessing.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[Anonymous Coward]

oh FUCK you sure trolled that troll

replying to every one of his troll bullet points with a detail explanation as to why his troll is wrong sure shut him up

I've never seen such an utter destruction of a troll

I bet your asshole is nice and loose considering how often your head must be up it

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

Gamers that need a lot of keys use ESDF because they never have to look at the keyboard because there's usually a divit on the F key to keep the person from losing position.

And I thought itw as just me and Thresh who used ESDF for movement in FPSes(although I've never met him, or played him, an article he wrote on keyboard/mousing got me into using the mouse)...

Everytime I see the default setup for an FPS, it's always WASD. What the fuck is up with that?

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[drsquare]

Great, more moderation abuse on Slashdot. You know, just because you don't agree with something, doesn't mean it has to be censored. Funny how this is on the same day with a discussion criticising Microsoft for censoring things in China.

I actually agree with it, mouse and keyboard are horrible. You need about thirty fingers to manage to play it. With consoles you can concentrate on playing the game rather than obsessing over the controls. Also you get to play with normal people rather than obessesive gamers who spend 30 hours a day practicing, and the other 5 configuring the keyboard/mouse to give them optimal speed/accuracy. It just a game people!

Also in online play the keyboard is used more often than not to spout racist/sexist abuse to other players.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[e03179]

Good gamers don't usually use WASD

Yes, they do. I've been to the CPL to watch them play. Most FPS gamers at the CPL use the standard WASD. As a matter of fact, I've won at CPL using WASD to play HALO.

I knew my keyboard well enough that I didn't need a "divit" to orient my fingers. Come on. A good piano player doesn't need a "divit" to find keys on the piano.

However as you were suggesting, a keyboard and mouse does have many advantages over a standard console control. Simply put, the console controllers aren't made with buttons that can be used by 8 or more fingers. Keyboards and 5,6,7-button mice leave you wishing you had extra fingers to issue more commands.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[HD Webdev]

Keyboards and 5,6,7-button mice leave you wishing you had extra fingers to issue more commands.

That's why shifting over to the right one key feeds that wish. With WASD, your pinky can move to the left without you moving your whole hand. And, that pinky is then hanging over empty space when it could be used for more key presses (informational binds to alert teammates about {whatever} for example).

Come on. A good piano player doesn't need a "divit" to find keys on the piano.

Yes, but if you changed the notes that played when he hit keys he'd have a slight hinderance to his playing. People who type very well do so because they use the home row position. To then have them switch to something else for playing games doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.

The default WASD is a throw-back to DOOM when many keys were not necessary. It won't go away in the foreseeable future.

Also, I was not implying that WASD players weren't as good. OTOH, those WASD players could open up more possibilities if they shifted one key to the right and used the extra keys they'd then have readily available.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[HD Webdev]

replying to every one of his troll bullet points with a detail explanation as to why his troll is wrong sure shut him up

No, the moderation system took care of that.

Correcting misinformation from Trolls is a good idea, especially when it is disguised as 'very informative' on a user moderated web forum.

By highlighting such information from a Troll (at least on Slashdot), you give moderators much more of an idea of what to do even if they aren't experts on the matter being discussed. Moderators didn't even need to be gamers at all to see the stark contrast of that post compared to the replies.

The Troll was not moderated down as one until a while after others posted a general disagreement with what the Troll said.

BTW: Welcome to Slashdot where the Trolls are pistol-whipped into submission.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[Zangief]

The most important thing to me is this:

-Can you play from four bed or couch?

Keyb/Mouse: Hell, No!
Control Pad: Yes, of course.

Control pad = absolute winner.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[Mozk]

I type very well (up to 100 WPM with no errors), and I have never used the home row position. My hands are usally around a, w, r, g, space, and k, semicolon, apostrophe, and shift. Not that my hands are always on those keys, which they hardly are.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[Anonymous Coward]

Awww, lifo-fifo's troll piece got owned, and to boost their already low self-esteem they have to post this drivel.

People love to point holes in flawed troll pieces, and you would be jerking off about your post whether or not someone replied to it.

Your troll failed, maybe you can do something else with your pathetic excuse for a life instead of posting these replies talking about you pent up sexual frustrations and homosexual fantasies.

Re:good PC UI not alwasy == good game UI

[Anonymous Coward]

Again silly. Good gamers don't usually use WASD. It's not the natural typing position and limits the number of keys that can be used without moving the hand. Gamers that need a lot of keys use ESDF because they never have to look at the keyboard because there's usually a divit on the F key to keep the person from losing position. Using the home typing position, 28 keys are available without moving the left hand out of standard typing postion.

I'm an ex QuakeWorld TeamFortress junkie trying to find my way in Halo2 on XBox Live, and the other thing i miss about PC FPS games was the scripting. Being able to create a custom zoom script with 2 or 3 levels of zoom, then bind that to a button was awesome.

Also, this might sound a little excessive, but for the grenades, me and a friend timed out to the 100th of a second how long it took a grenade to explode once the pin was pulled, made a wav file that played the "ding" sound from ICQ 2 times spaced out at correct intervals, then played out the "uh-oh" sound from ICQ when the grenade blew. We then created a script for grenade throwing that played this sound before 'priming' the grenade. In QuakeWorld TeamFortress, the game let you hold a grenade as long as you wanted after you 'primed' it, even to the point of it exploding in your hand. So this timer we made let us hold on to the grenade, then time our throw so that it exploded right when it got to the opponent. Great stuff.

This gives me faith in gamers

[hobotron]

I've long since been burned out on the incessant stream of racial, sexual, and downright lame spoutings of the usual "gamers" in every online game no matter what the genre.
It really is a nice sight to see what real gamers around the world can come together for actual GAMING
Hats off to you guys.

Re:This gives me faith in gamers

[dewfish]

I was about to comment on this very same thing. I experience this a lot playing counterstrike and i'm sure the same goes for people playing quake or unreal. I try to go to the foreign language servers because the american ones are always full of racists.

Re:This gives me faith in gamers

[coopex]

L0L!!! UR 4 pH49 |\|00B!! U 907 p\/\/|\|3D U 91RL!!!!

Halo2

[Anonymous Coward]

Halo2 is impossible to beat multiplayer. It's crammed with 10 year olds who have some sort of unnatural advantage over me. I empty whole clips at them, and they kill me with 1 or 2 shots. What is it, does wireless have lag?

Re:Halo2

[conna01]

Yes it does.

Re:Halo2

[HD Webdev]

What is it, does wireless have lag?

Of course. Especially if you have the transmissions encrypted as they should be.

Encoding, transmission, and decoding in both directions takes a significant hit on your latency.

Not to mention that the compression schemes that wireless often uses increases the delays in what you see and react to.

If you want to do better in online FPS gaming, you need to ditch wireless.

Re:Halo2

[bullitB]

Well, most games can't really be "beaten" in their multiplayer component. Keep playing, play some practice rounds. The idea is that essentially there will always be someone better than you, but getting a few kills now and then are fun.

Like real sports, I guess.

Re:Halo2

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm glad a nation can be proud of someone winning a game.

So let me get this straight

[Espectr0]

In true /. form, i haven't RTFA. An aussie fights the final against a dutch guy, the dutch guy wins, and the article is done with the looser (just kidding! loser)?

fuck progress

[benna]

Western society is obsessed with progress, to the point of neglecting happiness.

Can you use your own controller?

[Dancin_Santa]

I had this great idea for a glove-type of controller. It would allow for quicker movement (especially with caffeine).

It's so bad.

Re:Can you use your own controller?

[WordNA]

Or if you have to use their controller, can one attach an extra robotic arm with a direct neural link?
For enhanced high speed button pushing.

Re:Can you use your own controller?

[Armadni General]

...Kento?

WHAT?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who modded this fucking troll up?

WTF is this on the front page?

[Anonymous Coward]

Aussie Halo? Hadn't known Microsoft has its HQ in the land of criminals' sons.

Math is hard, so are console games..

[sinner0423]

Playing a first person shooter with a joystick is analogous to driving a car with your buttcheeks.

I've played PC games for over half my life and I still can't grasp controlling a FPS on a console. I'm sure any awards that were given out were well deserved.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[rudydog]

...driving a car with your buttcheeks.

I've tried that... Not as hard as you thing. I just feel sorry for the next guy that drives.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[AvantLegion]

Nonsense. Playing with a gamepad is easy. While you don't get the same lightning-fast speed, what some people just don't get is that everyone else has the same limitation too. It is a bit harder, but that doesn't make it unsuitable for a game, any more so than the limitation of not being able to use your hands makes soccer unplayable.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[Psykus]

Two words:

Dual Analog

Main stick controls actual movement (like the WASD on the keyboard), and the right analog stick controls turning left/right and aiming.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[Anonymous Coward]

My problem is that in that configuration I lose my ability to aim and jump, aim and switch weapons, or aim and pick up a new weapon. If I'm tracking a target and want to jump I can continue to move but I have to remove my thumb from the analog stick to use one of the other buttons. When I'm playing an fps on the PC I never have this problem because I have more total actions at my fingertips without having to take my fingers off of any keys. I'd have to actually play fps' on a console more to really decide if I liked it or not. I actually only discovered these problems last night when I played halo 2 for the first time.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[imsabbel]

SO its like car racing with EVERYBODY stearing with their buttcheeks.
I see. Now thats MUCH more sensible :)

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[IntergalacticWalrus]

That doesn't do anything to fix the lack of precision.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[rohlfinator]

"I've played PC games for over half my life..."

There's your problem. I've yet to see a dual analog hater that's been playing PC and console FPSs for the same amount of time. It's always hardcore PC gamers who can't seem to figure out how to use their thumbs. Not to say that dual-analog is better, but I've never seen anyone with an unbiased opinion. My roommate started out on Halo, and he can't stand mouse and keyboard.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[TLSPRWR]

You play it long enough, you gain precision. It's just a skill you have to learn. I bet you that a top ranked Mouse and Keyboard player and a top ranked Dual Analog joystick playerwould be nearly identical in terms of skill.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, do the experiment. Buy a PC joypad or a trio linker, set it up, and join a CS or UT game. You'll lose, likely very badly. Using a joypad you take 2 seconds to do a 180, with a mouse it's under 0.2 - of course you can't compete.

Not knocking console FPSes (timesplitters rules) but it really is a handicap playing that way.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[pbaer]

Yeah but consoles have autoaim so it basically evens out.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[toad3k]

It irritates me that some very good games have been changed to be more analog stick friendly. Because they tank on the consoles when not designed that way. Why can't they just put two stinking keyboard/mouse inputs into the xbox.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[rEdiM]

I also found using a controler hard at first, and it is a bit frustrating, as I'm quite quick with a mouse and keyboard, but after playing a few times, the controler feels much easier and more comfortable.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[rohlfinator]

"Well, do the experiment. Buy a PC joypad or a trio linker, set it up, and join a CS or UT game. You'll lose, likely very badly."
That's because CS and UT are designed for the mouse and keyboard, so they favor it. You can't compare PC controls and console controls using a PC game without being biased. The only accurate test would be to design a game that equally caters to the M&K player and the dual analog player, but that would be nearly impossible.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[elrous0]

I also found using a controler hard at first, and it is a bit frustrating, as I'm quite quick with a mouse and keyboard, but after playing a few times, the controler feels much easier and more comfortable.

Yeap. I started out playing FPS's on consoles. I've since played some on the Pc too and have had a hard time adapting to a mouse and keyboard.

I will say this, the PC FPS's allow for more accuracy. But I think that is due more to the much higher screen resolutions and frame-rates that you can get with a PC monitor vs. a NTSC TV.

Where the mouse and keyboard are really lacking though is in the lack of analog control (everything is either stop or go, no subtlety in-between). They just weren't originally designed for games, and have been woefully slow in changing over the years.

-Eric

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[iocat]

Dual Analog player would win if they both played DA, because it's a tougher control scheme to master.

Re:Math is hard, so are console games..

[Anti_zeitgeist]

Just pick up a smart joy frag....connects your mouse and keyboard to your console....viola!

No, this shouldn't be on front page

[aCapitalist]

Some of you may be aware that the finals of the Worldwide Halo 2 tourney over Xbox Live was held on Friday

Oh of course, loads of us. There was a world wide Rise of the Triad competition the other day too.

Timothy, don't turn into a Michael and put stupid shit like this on the front page.

Re:No, this shouldn't be on front page

[HD Webdev]

Oh of course, loads of us. There was a world wide Rise of the Triad competition the other day too.

Strangely enough, I still have ROTT on my gaming box.

Quake3 Arena was pretty much ROTT with better graphics.

Nothing to see here...move along, move along.

Re:No, this shouldn't be on front page

[aCapitalist]

My girlfriend still insists that I try and get ROTT to work on XP.....something about jumpads.

Of course, thankfully, she's addicted to Quake3 now.

Re:No, this shouldn't be on front page

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow ROTT. Flashback! Ludicrous gibbs!!! Woohoo!!!!!

Re:No, this shouldn't be on front page

[Kirby-meister]

Chill out. Just because you aren't interested does not mean the rest of the world isn't. Some of us who play at game tournaments are interested in stuff like this.

Kinda Lame

[Saige]

A number of guys that made it to the finals boosted their way there. You can check some of the match histories for the gamertags and see the boosting that's happened.

Kinda ruins the whole thing when you can't trust that the people who should have been at the top actually were.

Re:Kinda Lame

[neye_eve]

Ok, I'll bite... got a good link that explains "boosting" in a Halo 2 context (or any other gaming ranking system for that matter)?

Re:Kinda Lame

[HD Webdev]

Ok, I'll bite... got a good link that explains "boosting" in a Halo 2 context (or any other gaming ranking system for that matter)?

Try the http://csports.net/ forums for example.

You can see how ranking is figured out there.

Once how the rankings are computed is understood it's easy to get to a very high ranking as long as you understand and implement it better than most other people. (tracking down higher rated players and catch them on a losing team and then joining the winning team is one of the most useful tactics to boost stats regardless of the specific ranking system).

As far as ranking, being the better player is more difficult than figuring out how to trick ranking systems into thinking that you're a better player.

Re:Kinda Lame

[Have Blue]

It's actually a lot harder in Halo 2 than you make it sound- the system is pretty resistant to being gamed, especially after the recent patch. In ranked play, you give up control over what you are playing and who you are playing against- the only choice you make is what category of game you want to play (deathmatch, objective, 1v1, etc). You don't get to choose your opponents either; you can't see who you are playing against until the game has started. If you leave after the game has started, it's counted the same as if you played through but came in last (and the game has "started" once you see the game settings and player list, so there's never a chance to "escape" a tough game). Finally, in response to the specific exploit you mentioned, you're not allowed to change teams during the game.

However, "boosting" had a different meaning in Halo 2 before the patch- it was the exploitation of a real bug in the ranking system (not just "find the best play pattern" like you describe). I never knew how it was done, though.

Re:Kinda Lame

[Saige]

Well, there are still ways to do it. I think one way is to get on at a time when fewer people are playing in your area (middle of the night, for example), and make sure to have a group of people together. If you were to, say, form two 4 person teams with the same highest ranking player, and manage to start looking for a game about the same time, the odds are much higher that you'll get matched up with each other.

If you can play around with switching people on teams and starting games at the same time when there are fewer people on, you can manage to consistently get paired with the same people.

I'm not sure of the exact details, since I haven't thought it out all the way yet, but it's still done. I ran into someone recently that boosted their Team Slayer rating from 25 to 50 in one sitting. Fortunately, Bungie has blacklisted him from the leaderboard, since the rating wasn't properly achieved.

Re:Kinda Lame

[startled]

Congratulations on being the only >= 3 post that isn't bitching about not being able to use a mouse and keyboard! Your brain must have been accidentally left in the "on" position while posting to /..

A glove controller?

[tod_miller]

Yeah, but you would end up bunny hopping around like a maniac, and everyone would know what you were doing, you sick puppy!

Seriously.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Article text - Server running slow

[Anonymous Coward]

A Day in the Life of an International Halo 2 Tournament - Cabel vs. the World!!!

An insiders view of Australias Halo 2 representative - Cabel's progress to the finals.

The scene was set - it was the day of the World Halo 2 Xbox Live Championship Finals. The 24 Xbox Live Region champions had been decided and it was game on for the final series.

This was the worlds first global Xbox Live Halo 2 tournament and the final series was being decided by a playoff on Xbox Live. The global championship rounds were played on Friday June 10th in double elimination rounds. The 24 regional winners were sectioned into four pools of six players each. The top three moved on to the next round, while the bottom three from each group moved into an elimination bracket. Once a regional champion lost twice, they were eliminated. Each round lasted 10 minutes with unlimited kills. All the final matches were played on the new Halo 2 map, Warlock as a Free For All Slayer with standard SMG spawn (what! no BR you say ).

More info at: http://www.xbox.com/halo2/tournament.htm

Earlier in April; Cabel had beaten out a very strong field (including his brother who almost snaked the win ) in a close fought FFA at the BigPond Halo 2 Tournament to be crowned the Australian champ and our representative on the world stage.

I arrived at Microsoft Australia's Headquarters at about 6:45PM with the trusty 'XboxZone Com AU' server in hand. We had thought that given our location in the world that we needed every advantage we could get to overcome the tyranny of distance (or network latency LAG for you simple folks ). Cabel may be playing on the 10Mbit link at MS HQ but nothing compensates for the 200ms delay to most other countries. I offered my server Xbox for Cabel to play on for the night - it was hoped that since this Xbox has been hosting Halo 2 games pretty much non stop 24x7 since early January on a 100Mbit link that its awesome Halo 2 host record/rating (300+ clan matches, 1500+ Big Team Battles, 2000+ large custom games, etc) could steal it host in some important games. Alas it wasn't to be so - each of the finals matches was hosted by a Referee (XboxLiveCommish the guy in white hiding in the corner ) at MS HQ in the states - I suspect Bungie rigged things up so he'd always be host for every round - which is fair I guess with no player getting direct host advantage.

Cabel and his brother Senyo were already there with Pidge and Kumar from Microsoft and after a bit of networking jiggery pokery it was practice time before the first game at 9PM.

It was then Pizza ordering time and since we had to plan ahead for a long night (if we made it to the finals they wouldn't be played till 5AM - so think positive and plan to be needing food for the long haul ). Senyo got to order a crapload of pizzas for the four of us on Microsoft's account - nice

In the first round Cabel's pool included:

ii CaBeL ii - Australia
l Kobegod l - Taiwan
Otcho Boy - Switzerland
ZpiKeY - Norway
Billykater - Austria
GermanFreak - Denmark

Pregame chat in the lobby was pretty friendly and discovering that GermanFreak was in fact NOT from Germany but from Denmark was a bit of a head spin - but hey - whatever makes you happy

Cabel had a slow start but picked up the pace as he went along to eventually catch the leader just at the end equaling on Kills but taking the win on Assists and lower deaths.

Full game stats at: http://www.bungie.net/Stats/GameStats.aspx?gameID= 201030311

Our next round wasn't till midnight so it was going to be a long 3 hour wait - time for some practice, customs and a bit of matchmaking.

Cabel and his brother Senyo also whittled away the hours with some head to head and double teams on the fast link at Microsoft - I couldn't believe how many people quit the games against them or worse tho

Yeah, because this is now slashdot.org.au

[Anonymous Coward]

Or at least it sure seems to be.

who gives a shit?

[Neotrantor]

since when is halo 2 considered a skillful game? someone pleeease remind me when constant indicator of game events on your screen wasn't considered something like a wallhack?

to me, a hard game has to consist of at least some combination of rail flicking and strafe running (at least).. what does halo have.. AUTO AIM.

need i go into more detail?

Re:who gives a shit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually in multiplayer Auto Aim is disabled.

Am I weird?

[eeyoredragon]

I've never used WASD. I just place my hand on the keyboard like normal: ASDF[SPACE].

• F: forward
• D: back
• S: strafe left
• SPACE: strafe right
• A: jump

I now have... six keys I can reach with little to no stretch with my little finger without letting off of the movement buttons. Of course, I don't strafe in two directions at the same time, so that leaves at least one additional finger to press a myriad of buttons at all times as well. Plus my fingers don't feel squished into a tiny arrow key configuration.

I'm not a professional gamer and rarely play anymore, but I've always felt that to be way more intuitive than the arrow key configuration.

Re:Am I weird?

[tek.net-ium]

Since when was WASD the standard?!? I always thought it was

• K: up
• J: down
• H: left
• L: right

Re:Am I weird?

[mr_snarf]

Think you're weird?!

My quake3 controls are:
z: strafe left
x: strafe right
a: back
space: jump
right mouse: forward
q: select railgun
w: select RL
e: select shotgun

Allows me to play one handed, which is useful for drinking [insert favourite beverage]. :)

All other games I use wasd though

Re:Am I weird?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have the same configuration with the mouse (right mouse forward and middle mouse secondary fire) but use:
right ctrl - back
. - strafe left
/ - strafe right
space - jump

quite a few other keys but I can't be bothered to list them here, it works very well

Re:Am I weird?

[imsabbel]

Well IMHO your config is suboptimal because you wast to fingers for farward/backward, plus the fact that giving spave to right isnt that good on most keyboards (because space usually has worse feedback when hitting non-centred).

With wsad, middle finger can easily hit both forward and backward, a and d for left and right each have their finger, the thump is resting on space ready to jump and the base if the little finger rests on control, ready to crouch, while the tip can activate shift for running without moving the finger a bit.

The "other" keys i have mapped on the buttons of my mouse (the 2 thump keys of the mx700 are perfect for reload/activate)

Re:Am I weird?

[Eric Coleman]

I don't see how any of you play games like that. It's not very intuitive at all. I use the following.
J: Jump
U: Up
D: Down
L: Left
R: Right
F: Forward
B: Backward
C: Crouch
Left Alt + S: Strafe Seft
Right Alt + S: Strafe Right

Re:Am I weird?

[drsquare]

I always used the arrow keys, seems more natural as my fingers can rest on the keys and the bottom of the keyboard rather than having to have them suspended over the rest of the keys if I were using aswd or something. It's a hassle having to move your finger tips everytime you want to change direction, with the arrow keys you just press down with different parts of your finger which are already lying over the keys.

Then I use space for jump and control for shoot or something. Apparently some people use mice to shoot/aim, but I don't how I could do that because I'm right handed and not ambidextrous and can't control the direction keys with my left hand. You don't really need to aim anyway do you, isn't it automatic if you're facing in generally the right direction?

I think it was easier with something like Goldeneye where you use a controller, it's easier using a direction pad.

Re:Am I weird?

[crs3210]

This is what I use. Relatively straight forward:
up: up arrow
down: down arrow
strafe left: left arrow
strafe right: right arrow
jump: middle click (though this depends on the game...for something like UT this works fine...but CS:S...)

Re:Am I weird?

[amliebsch]

Screw WASD.

MOUSE1: Forward
MOUSE2: Backward
MOUSE3: Alt Fire
MOUSE4: Fire
MOUSE5: Reload
Q: Strafe Left
W: Strafe Right

Re:Am I weird?

[Infinityis]

You may be modded funny, but in truth, I think us lefties have a natural advantage when it comes to such games. Although it bugs other people to use my computer, I always have the mouse on the left and use the numeric keypad for directional controls. It's pretty convenient not only because the buttons are nicely lined up, but it's surrounded by other buttons that are good for reload, jump, duck, etc.

Also, the keys that are further away (+, enter, and 0) are bigger, so they're pretty handy too.

Couple that in with the whole left-brain/right-brain debate, and I'd be pretty interested to see statistics on the winners/losers and their handedness...

Re:Am I weird?

[tek.net-ium]

It was a bad vi joke. I didn't intend for it to be interpreted literally.

Re:Am I weird?

[Mozk]

How do you turn around? With that, you're limited to facing one direction. o_0

Re:Am I weird?

[Anonymous Coward]

That can be sort of awkward because you either have your hand very close to your mouse, or you have to move your keyboard. Unless you're left-handed of course.

Re:Am I weird?

[mr_snarf]

How do you turn around? With that, you're limited to facing one direction. o_0

By moving the mouse...
When I say I can play one handed, I mean just for a little while, take left hand off keyboard to grab a drink, while changing direction + moving forward + firing with just the mouse :)

Re:Am I weird?

[banz23]

There will be zero correlation between the "handedness" and skill. It is all about practice, practice, practice. I am right handed and if I wanted to could use the numeric pad, it would be a matter of sliding my keyboard 10 inches to the left. Besides the letter keys aren't lined up perfectly because it is more ergonomic, which is needed for playing hour after hour to guess what? practice practice practice.

Re:Am I weird?

[initialE]

Up:Jump
Dn:Crouch
Left:Strafe Left
Right:Strafe Right

Nearly nobody does it this way but me: the benefit is that I can do all my running around with 1 hand, and use the other hand only when I need to engage something. :/ The setup was modified from the original Quake setup, which had fire and move forward as mouse buttons.

Re:Am I weird?

[Balerion]

You're almost as freakish as me...

Mouse1: Fire
Mouse2: Forward
D: Strafe Left
F: Strafe Right
Space: Backwards
S: Jump
C: Next Weapon

E usually gets mapped to "use" or something like that.

This is how I was taught to play back in the original Doom days when I switched from gamepade to mouse. I've become extremely good at it (although I'm not as competitive as I was back in the day) but I don't know if I'd go so far as to recommend it to anyone. The hardest part was learning not to "lock up" by hitting forward and backward at the same time, since they're on different hands.

Re:Am I weird?

[eeyoredragon]

Well IMHO your config is suboptimal because you wast to fingers for farward/backward, plus the fact that giving spave to right isnt that good on most keyboards (because space usually has worse feedback when hitting non-centred).

I would argue that I can naturally react and move more fluidly though. I've done the arrow key position (which is what WASD is if I'm not mistaken), and you have to lift your finger off the W and move it to the D to change directions. I don't have to do that. It's probably not a huge difference, but when you refer to a game as a "twitch" game, every little bit counts I imagine.

As to the SPACE, my thumb rests naturally in the middle when I play so no biggie :)

They aren't even that good.

[Anonymous Coward]

I've played against / with kids who are much better than these guys. It's a shame they don't pay enough attention in the gaming world to partake in such a competition.

Perhaps there's not enough exposure or perhaps MLG is their calling. In either case, I really wouldn't consider these guys the best of the best... or even that close :)

You've never actually played real sports, have you

[Anonymous Coward]

Holy crap, that chick on the tigerdirect.com banner that's up on my screen now is freaky. Refresh slashdot a few times till you get the banner and see what I'm talking about. She so wants to eat your face!

Tourney

[FidelCatsro]

Tourney means to compete in a tournament , it's is not a short form for tournament .
"Halo 2 World to compete in a tournament finals-Aussie Champ's view"

Re:Tourney

[FidelCatsro]

Tourneys is the short form of tournament not tourney

Re:Tourney

[ctid]

What are you talking about? Tourney is a valid abbreviation of tournament in English. What I say has been true for at least three decades.

Re:Tourney

[FidelCatsro]

Apologies , i was wrong its also acceptable :D well i just made a fool of myself nice way to start a Sunday , Well i blame it on lack of sleep.
But well done to the guy , It would be interesting to see how well he could hold up against someone with a keyboard mouse combo though.
Apologies again

Strange thing

[Enoch Lockwood]

What strange thing. No one seems to be objecting to the fact that the game was played on Xbox...

Goddamn kids stealing names...

[pidge-nz]

*sigh*

Mind you, I'd had the nickname inflicted on me before pokemon.

could have been?

[06metzp]

Carmack could have been working for NASA or the US military, but instead he simply sits around coding violent computer games.

Oh, but he was working for the government. He just didn't know it. If I recall correctly, various violent video games are used by the military as traning devices. I know it's an argument usually used by anti-violence folks, but in this case it just blows a hole in part of an argument, so.... all good, right?

Re:could have been?

[banz23]

Carmack could have been working for NASA or the US military, but instead he simply sits around coding violent computer games. Yes, he could work for the government, but instead he chose what he was interested in doing. I doubt he regets his decision while he is driving his ferrari to a company that he partially owns.

RE: Non front page material

[Anonymous Coward]

Damn it why do people always give these lower class Australians so much print space? These dolts couldn't tell their arse from their elbow - it's OK, you don't have to pretend you didn't notice anything unusual about them, in the name of not offending your friends in Freedom & Democracy around the world. That's how it works here. We have lower class whites, and lots of them. Please ignore them, and don't embarrass the rest of us by trying to be accommodating when they air their tabloid, trailer-trash views!

Sorry for being so extreme but a lot of people really need to learn this, even if it may not have been completely relevant this time.

180

[tepples]

Using a joypad you take 2 seconds to do a 180, with a mouse it's under 0.2 - of course you can't compete.

Shouldn't you be able to press in on the aiming stick (assuming ps2 style L3/R3 buttons) to do a 180 degree turn?

WSAD stands for

[tepples]

Everytime I see the default setup for an FPS, it's always WASD. What ... is up with that?

We Suck At Deathmatch.

Bunny hopping

[tepples]

Yeah, but you would end up bunny hopping around like a maniac

What's so bad about Jazz Jackrabbit again?

Einstein's Pinball

[MS-06FZ]

What would have happened if Albert Einstein had worked creating amazing pinball games instead of creating the theory of relativity?

I bet the man could've made some damn fine pinball machines, which could have led to many happy hours of pinball.

But since he didn't go with the pinball thing, he instead contributed to the development of nuclear weapons. Which do you suppose brings more joy to the world?