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MIT Hacks Harvard For Halo, Game Prompts Lots of Sick Days
yonari writes "Early on the morning before the Halo 3 release, John Harvard donned a Mjolnir helmet and a beaver emblem, and carried an assault rifle on his left shoulder, apparently acquired from the UNSC Engineering Division." The Washington Post also points out that a lot of folks took sick days on Tuesday as a consequence of the game's release. "Some local workers won't have to skip out on the office to play the game. At some companies that offer video games as a break room activity, Halo 3 was pre-ordered months ago. The Motley Fool, the Alexandria investment advisory firm, is expecting its copy of the game to arrive from Amazon.com soon. Same for Platinum Solutions, a Reston software consulting firm."
Couple of my friends at work skipped work yesterday to play all day. Then came in for about six hours today and stood around and talked about it for five of those hours. Too bad there's a horrible support issue I have to deal with right now, I was still at work Monday night when it was released, and I'm still at work now when I'm supposed to be playing at a friend's house. Oh, woe is me and horrible timing.
Reviewing just the first hour of video games.
So, how many people are going to misread this that MIT hacked Harvard College (which is just across Cambridge) to get a copy of the game (which may or may not be legal)?
I am all for creative titles to create interest, and I know the pranks are called hacks, but this one is just a little too misleading.
Now MIT hacking an illegal share at Harvard (which is of course exempt from RIAA lawsuits [and therefore I assume game and MPAA by association], according to recent articles here, so they can get away with it...) in order to get the game early - THAT would be good reading. And maybe be counted as extra credit in a class.
It's called Halotosis.
Those with bad breath have halitosis halotosis, and this is characterized by a lack of people willing to play multiplay on the same Xbox.
of hacking at MIT.
"We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and by the depth of our answers." Carl Sagan
Wait, what? Doom's story is exactly this: "A gate to hell opens on Mars and demons appear. Kill them". And Halo's story: "Humans are at war against the Covenant, a conglomeration of several alien races following a religious prophecy that requires them to activate and fire the different halos spread around the galaxy/universe. Firing those halos will kill all sentient life in the galaxy, but they don't know it. The installations were setup by the Forerunners to destroy the Flood, a parasitic alien race that consumes all life forms. You are Master Chief Petty Officer Spartan 117, and you're thrown into the mix." Depending on the game, either you're trying to get off of a halo installation after crash landing and in the process learn about the Flood and what the halo installations do (Halo 1), stopping the Covenant from activating the rest of the installations and destroying all life in the galaxy while finding out why the Covenant are fighting the humans (Forerunner technology on Earth that can activate all of the halo installations) and at the same time converting a portion of the Covenant (the Elites) to the humans' side (Halo 2), or finishing that fight (Halo 3 -- Halo 2 stopped halfway through). Sure sounds the same as "kill the demons from hell, on Mars" to me.
Say what you will about the graphics, physics, multiplayer, fanboys, or whatever else, but I don't think anybody familiar with Bungie's work can say that they don't write a compelling and interesting story with a rich history and fully-populated world. See Marathon, for example.
Putting aside the misleading title, and the lack of understanding of why people wait for hours in line at midnight to get the first copy (I picked mine up like a normal human the day after at best buy, I'm a fan, not psychotic). That's just awsome. Very realistic looking, blending in and looking like was part of the statue. That had to take a lot of effort and coordination. Nicely done!
You're assuming console players don't also play PC games. Maybe I'm unique, but I don't think so. Prior to playing Halo, I played plenty of FPS games on PC, from Wolf3d to Quake 3 (around the time of Halo 1's launch) and everything in between. I've backed off a lot on PC gaming since, but I've played a few more recent PC games (Far Cry, for example). What's to like about Halo?
- Unique (at the time) gameplay mechanics
- Shields that recharge if you take a break from the action, which lets you focus on tactics rather than finding health and armor pickups. Pretty much everybody's copied this mechanic now, but Halo did it first. (I'm sure you can dig up some obscure title that actually did it first, but Halo was the first popular game to use this approach)
- The ability to carry only two weapons at a time (plus grenades), so you had to think about what to bring since you couldn't keep your entire arsenal in a belt pocket. Do you pickup the sniper rifle and rocket launcher, leaving yourself open to close attacks? Or do you grab a shotgun and assault rifle, leaving yourself vulnerable to vehicles? That mechanic allowed for some interesting scenarios.
- Grenades thrown via a separate button. To be fair, TF1 did this first, but Halo did it better.
- Well-implemented and -integrated vehicular combat.
- A compelling and interesting story. Half-life did that first, but the story is different from Half-life. It's okay to like both.
- A fun console experience. Relaxing on a couch in front of a 50" HDTV with a 5.1 surround sound speaker setup beats being hunched over a keyboard and mouse in front of a 20" monitor with 2-channel stereo any day
- A great multiplayer experience. Halo 1 allowed you to network consoles together and play with your friends locally. Halo 2 finally took that experience online. Of course PC games have done this before, and better (though Halo 2/3's party system and hopper matching mechanism is one of the best out there), but when you put this together with the last point (couch, HDTV, surround sound) it is very compelling.
- Did I mention an excellent story? Bungie are masters of storytelling
- A great musical score. Marty O'Donnell is a musical genius
I totally understand that Halo, or FPS games on consoles in general, may not be to some people's tastes. That's fine, we all have our opinions. I'm just listing some reasons why I enjoy Halo.I've seen a few hundred "Can somebody please explain the appeal of blank" posts and usually just dismiss them as flaimbait. In fact, the "worst than Wolf3D" jab basically guarentees you are trolling. But since I am one of the people who picked up Halo3 on launch day I figure I may as well try to explain the appeal of it, for the benefit of anyone else reading if not you.
First, the Halo universe does have some depth to it. If you think Halo 2 had the same story as doom then you probably weren't paying attention. It would take too long to explain the story in depth, but I'm sure it's all on wikipedia anyway. Certainly I don't find the Halo games as engrossing as some of the great PC games (thinking of Halflife, Deux Ex, System Shock, and most recently Bioshock) but I would definately say it's above average. At the very least the story is not a negative point. Halo 3 in particular ties up nicely the plot of the first two games.
Secondly the gameplay: I am definately a keyboard/mouse kinda guy. I think a console controller is far inferior. That said, the Halo games basically set the standard for how FPS's should be played on consoles. In this sense the original Halo stands among games like Mario64 and Goldeneye for having great control schemes (for the time). Certainly a keyboard/mouse would be better, but I don't want to use those while sitting on my couch. For the equipment it has, the Halo games have as good control as you could ask for.
Moreover even after having played just about every fps I can think of on PC, I have never found a game that had vehicles that were as fun to drive as in Halo. Halflife 2 came close, and other games may have more realistic vehicle control, but the vehicles in the Halo series are just FUN. However Bungi accomplished that, they did it damn well.
Third the graphics. I freely conceed that Halo 2 had shitacular graphics compared to computer games of the same time. After all Halflife 2 was released at the same time and was far prettier on a high-end (for the time) PC. However Halo 2 did have some of the best graphics for the xbox at the time, and for that console generation on the whole (off the top of my head I can only think of RE4 on the GC having undeniably superior graphics) For Halo 3 that is much less of an issue - the graphics are great. They aren't as gritty as Gears of War or as atmospheric as Bioshock, but they are not meant to be. They're rich, colorful and detailed, and the draw distance is impressive.
Finally I will end with the main point of Halo - MULTIPLAYER. Completely disregarding the story, the graphics, or the lack of mouse control, you still have one of the funnest multiplayer games around. Sitting in front of a big tv and playing with a few friends is an experience that cannot easily be matched on the PC, and is definately not matched by any other console game. It's like a Counterstrike LAN party but you don't have to lug a computer all over the place. In a word: awesome.
God made me an atheist. Who are you to question his wisdom?
I hide in my apartment for a month, because I can't stand everyone telling me one thousand reasons why I should like it on a daily basis, and then receiving their ridicule when I reveal I don't particularly care for it.
I hate Master Chief as much as I hate Santa Claus. And Jesus.
I really liked Halo 1. Can remember many of the levels very well, played it through a bunch of times and played multiplayer with friends locally many, many times.
I also liked Halo 2. Story wasn't perfect, but some decent settings and some new things (dual-wielding, etc) that really added to the game. Have played it through a few times, played absolutely shitloads of games locally with friends and a few hundred games on Live which I got this year. I like some of the multiplayer maps (e.g., Lockout) so much that it would concern my girlfriend if she knew.
I got Halo 3 on the day it launched and have started playing the campaign. We had a few people playing online to test out the multiplayer on opening night and it was pretty decent - no less fun than Halo 2. A few "This isn't like Lockout?!" complaints, but we all gradually came around due to some hilarity with the Gravity Hammer, bubble shield, flares, etc. One friend has bought a 360 today so he can get in on the action.
The graphics aren't the best shown by a FPS, no, but are very, very good. The map designs, IMO, are up there with say Half-Life 2 which I was really impressed by - terrain, lighting, everything looks excellent. The characters are great, though not quite Gears of War (in which the characters were awesome). The atmosphere is fun. Everything comes together really well - the fluidity is far superior to other FPSs IMO - everything is to scale as opposed to some of those FPS where you feel too close to the ground, or you don't seem to jump more than 15cm. The audio is really good. Grunts saying stuff about how they're going to work together to kill you, or marines complaining about you stealing their kill (as in the previous versions) are good fun.
As a product, the value for money for someone like me and many others is exceptional - I'll play through the campaign a few times solo, maybe a couple of times co-op. Then I'll play with friends locally or on Live once every week or so. Then a few hundred games on Live in match-making. Plus muck around with Forge, and try out the Theater mode which is really interesting.
I'd be interested to see an honest breakdown of Halo-haters into categories:
- an Xbox vs PS thing
- tied to Microsoft
- console vs PC
- mouse/kb vs controller sticks
- simply didn't like it
'Thats they exact same thing a banana wrench monkey.'
personally i think halo is a cool series but people are just so into it it is crazy. People lining up at midnight and playing it all night is just a little bit over the edge for me even though that will probably happen to me when sc2 comes out. I think it is cool but don't think it is groundbreaking on any level. It was intended to be a cool FPS and it was the best xbox game made and probably generated the most money. Especially on live people are jerks when they play, its not everyone but a lot of people take to seriously and i'm glad it finally came out cause for the last 3 days all i have heard non-stop is people talking about halo. The game is cool but nothing amazing personally i think bioshock was cooler because it had the lightning and the cool textures. Halo has an ok enviornment but bioshock brought it to whole new level.
I still don't get what makes Halo so spectacular. I'm being dead serious. Every post tells how a different part of the game is unusually great, and mostly acknowledge the rest as decent/moderately good. I'll buy that it's an overall good game, but I really don't see why it's worthy of all this hype.
I've observed that most explanations come in one of these two forms.
They acknowledge the story was moderately good, but the multiplayer is what REALLY sets it apart from the rest, and the graphics are so-so.
Thats tough for many PC gamers to swallow. Dual wield and sticky grenades are neat, but I'm sorry, Tribes stomped it. These posts must come from players with very little multiplayer PC game experience. I'd even rank the original Team Fortress as better multiplayer than any Halo. Savage too. Halo is just a fun, _simple_ deathmatch / ctf game. It has basic multiplayer FPS elements, with the exception of a few vehicles, and the shield thing that could make one-on-one duels last longer than in most games of the genre. Those elements were not unique to Halo, see Tribes.
The other form exclaims Halo's AWESOME story, but admits it wasn't a very pretty game. I think these types of posts come from people at lest somewhat experienced with PC games. They think that having any background story at all, especially the decent one Halo apparently has, puts it a notch above most popular PC FPS titles. If they have anything good to say about the multiplayer, it's unclear if they ever ventured past the weak deathmatch modes offered by popular PC single/multi player FPS games. I agree, Halo is better than most cobbled together DM/CTF PC counterparts, but it stops there.
In conclusion, Halo seems to appeal to the lowest common denominator of FPS gamer through several different means, thus it garners a very wide audience that favors it for wildly different reasons. This would explain the greatly differing opinions on it's greatness. However, unless some solid evidence is given to explain why Halo is truly unique and worthy of all the hype it's getting, I'm putting it right up there with the likes of popular boy bands of the 90's and Britney Spears. Popular, not Great.
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Go ahead, mod this flamebait; I bet you can't do it without a guilty conscience though.
As a Halo-hater, I consider myself to be in three out of four of your categories. I think the 'console vs. PC' and 'mouse/kb vs. controller sticks' can almost be lumped together (for me, anyway), as that is my primary reason for FPS's on the PC. When Halo came along, it wasn't any better than other FPS's on the market. I felt that other games such as Rainbow Six, Delta Force, etc. had better physics, game play, and much better multi players (primarily due to online play). Halo 2 introduced internet game play, but the physics didn't change much, so the game just didn't appeal to me personally. What I find funny is that the in-game vehicle control is touted as a defining, trend-setting feature in online play... but whenever someone takes control of a vehicle, it almost guarantees instant death.
In my opinion (without playing #3), the Halo series is an overrated FPS due to poor game play, physics, movement, and controls. There are plenty of people who will disagree with me, but Halo just doesn't appeal as a platform-defining game.
Well, shit. If you want to break it down like that, every FPS has had the same story as Doom. You could probably even break down any game at all that way.
Wow okay so you have friends who have played enough that they can beat Halo 3 in 4.5 hours (actually Halo 3 I found is best played on the high difficulty levels since they made enemies total pushovers on the normal/easy ones...). Whooptee doo hell I can beat Ninja Gaiden for Xbox in 5 hours on anything below Hard as if that means the game doesn't have enough content.
Halo's multiplayer has set new standards for console FPS games. As for the "hype" being centered in by far the largest market for video games in the world, I fail to see how that is a shortcoming of the game or how it reflects on anything. Cups with a Halo logo is an even sillier thing to say and completely contradicts what you said earlier (not that you'd know), as the one big market that Halo isn't popular in is Japan, and if Japanese kids are fans of something you can be damn sure they'll be happy to have the corresponding character goods, whether it be a cup or a business card case or a ton of phone straps or whatever. Not that it's a bad thing, either.
Man they have a lunch box out there for Batman, too. You gonna rag on Batman for it?
Seriously if you could find more irrelevant and nonsensical arguments for why Halo is overrated please write them here because I'm always up for a laugh.
I like basketball!!1!
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Sincerely,
krog
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