Halo 2, Now On Speed
This edition of Narc's Retorts isn't as long-- I promise. This one is on how XBL could be used to make speedrunning a more popular gameplay mode in Halo 2.
Rampancy
Death by intelligence.
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Rampancy Podcast
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| Let's Play Mass Effect 3 #27 Final... | 06.02.17 |
| Anger, Sadness and Envy Ep. 27: Craig Ha... | 05.08.13 |
| Anger, Sadness and Envy Ep. 25: Destiny... | 03.05.13 |
| Anger, Sadness and Envy Ep. 24: Halo Ann... | 04.21.12 |
| Anger, Sadness and Envy Ep. 23: Halo Ann... | 06.26.11 |
| Anger, Sadness and Envy Ep. 21: The Wint... | 04.18.11 |
Macworld Goes To Bed Early
The 2003 Game Hall of Fame article is up at Macworld, but it doesn't mention Halo outside of its "upcoming games" section, as they say Halo was released too late to be considered this year.
Good grief, what was there to consider?
Mac Halo Faster Than PC Halo?
Well, maybe Stuntmutt will have to modify one of his new characters in One One Se7en, as it appears that Mac Halo doesn't suffer from the same performance bottlenecks that PC Halo does-- at least not according to Corey Tamas of Macgamer, who rated Mac Halo 99 out of a 100.
The bad news? Tamas drops a note that "Alas, Mac Halo lacks the Xbox's cooperative mode and no plans exist to add it in the future." Actually, last we'd read coop was still a questionmark for a future patch for the PC version, which would then open up the question of putting in the Mac version, but perhaps that's already gone by the boards.
Thanks Louis Wu of HBO.
Halo Armor Ready For Order
Well, it wouldn't arrive in time for Christmas, but you can now order Halo armor from the Nightmare Armor site by Webshift. Before you pull out the wallet, a full suit, unpainted, costs $1700. With paint... $3500. For the truly dedicated fans only. Thanks Louis Wu from HBO.
The Player Will Explore This Entire World... Ouch!
A quick viewing of the Bungie-related clip from Inside the Xbox by Film Oasis, as shown on the Discovery Channel and now available for download, reveals a few points about Halo 2, the sequel:
- Everything in Halo 2 will be bump mapped, not just some things.
- Part of Halo 2 will take place during an attempt to repel Covenant invaders from a space station they are attempting to take over.
- Part of Halo 2 will take place in the "wreckage of the previous Halos". (Jaime "Case" Griesemer definitely says "Halos" in this case, intended or not.)
- Halo 2 will feature a space station that functions as a giant weapon, which can be controlled and fired by the player. (This one again comes from Lead Designer Griesemer, and there's nobody around to kick him under the table.)
The documentary has been out a while, so this information isn't new, but these are the solid bits about Halo 2 that occur in the film if you haven't seen it so far and can't manage the large download.
Fly The Unfriendly Skies With Vector40
Brandon "vector40" Oto has written a tutorial on flying the Banshee called Banshee Handling in our Halo Articles section. Maybe this will help me a bit; frankly, I've been on the side of the argument that says that Banshees are unbalancing Halo multiplayer, but that may be because of lag... or lack of skill. Yeah, definitely lag... or lack of skill.
HUDless Halo Screenshots At Been Mawed
Dolbex from Been Mawed has put up a post that he's been able to make screenshots of Halo without the heads-up display, just like those that Bungie makes using the Xbox Devkit. A tutorial on how to do it may be forthcoming.
A Community And Its Games
The last couple of rants on community, statistics and player rankings in Narc's Retorts prompted longtime Bungie fan and Rampancy reader Bullseye (author of the compendious tome known as the Myth 3 Buglist) to go look up a History of Bungie he wrote that touches on the idea of what the Bungie community is, and the relationship between a game and its community. Max "Yeroen" Hoberman sent him a short reply, which in part reassured him that in Halo 2, there will be a lot more community-related features that Halo 1 couldn't have because XBL wasn't ready for launch yet.
[xeno] Wins CPL 2003 Winter Championship
SketchFactor has put up an admirably detailed account of the Cyberathlete Professional League's 2003 Winter Championship held last weekend in Texas. 35 5-man teams competed in the Halo event. Team [xeno] battled back to win in the championship game of Assault on Blood Gulch against Demise, the same team that had bumped them into the loser's bracket in an earlier round. Team [xeno] took $9,000 of the $30,000 prize pool. Next summer's event will also feature Halo and will have an even larger prize pool-- $50,000.
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