/vr/ - Retro Games

Why do we keep having this thread every week?

Full 3D FPS that doesn't run at below 10FPS on the latest console.

this thread again?

>successfully delivered "PC-like" shooter for consoles
>had consistent framerate that wasn't awful
>played well despite being on a console and on a controller
>had a mix of gameplay features which, while not all novel or valuable for all things, left a good impression on players
>had LAN and splitscreen; Both easy to set up
>successful marketing campaign (why is Brian Wilson a genius again? [snark])

The tl;dr version is it had decent gameplay, was easy to get into, and had a successful marketing campaign. Most popular games are a combination of those three qualities. When they're missing the last one then we call them "cult classics" or something like that.

Anyway fuck off already this thread is overdone.
下げ

>>9730019
The music was also pretty good ong

>>9730015
oldfag cope

>>9730019
>>successfully delivered "PC-like" shooter for consoles
I'm not even big on PC FPS but I know UT and Q3A players are lmao @ this statement.

>>9730004
maybe people that didn't play many PC games that liked it or something. Because when I first played it I thought it was so boring and generic compared to anything on the PC that I've never played a halo game since

>>9730042
I didn't write that comment, but I played Halo before Quake 3 / Quake Live and I think it's a great game as an introduction to the genre. Quake 3/Live has a brutal learning curve which is why the player count has consistently been low and usually it's just elite players online.

That being said, once you play Quake it's hard to go back to anything else without cringing.

It was Goldeneye except not on a "kiddie" console anymore.

>>9730004
It just seemed really cool at the time it isn’t any more complicated than that. Literally can be explained as simply as this.

first console FPS that felt almost as good as a PC FPS

>>9730061
Same here. I still do Quake playthroughs to this day, infinitely better game overall.
Guess Halo kind of impressed a bunch of little kids in the US and that was it.

>>9730004
Not a lot of FPS games have enemies that dynamically respond to the players actions. Halo had pretty good AI. Most games today don't come close. Elites when their shields are popped will take cover, but if you're too close they'll charge up for a melee that can easily kill you, but you have just enough of a window to melee them back. Jackals try to pop your shields and draw your fire. If you're good, there's a small slit in their shield you can pop a headshot on. Once their shield is down they retreat. When you kill an Elite, Grunts panic and you feel fucking badass. Hunters have a plasma cannon that does big boy damage, but is easy to dodge. They charge up for a one hit kill melee that you can easily dodge, but if you fuck up your timing your dead. After their melee attack they're exposed for about 1 second for you to shoot their back with a sniper/pistol or melee/plasma grenade. They're a fucking cool miniboss. All this, mixed with the sandbox level design and the risk vs reward gameplay of trading a good weapon for a power weapon is extremely rewarding. The change of pace introducing a new enemy halfway through is really good. The flood are really fun to fight, the only problem is that most of their levels are a backtrack through levels you've already played, which gets tedious. The Library is the only one I'd say is actually bad though. I recently replayed it for the first time in about a decade. The game holds up remarkably well. I don't understand the anti-Halo contrarians. It's an entirely different animal than anything that was on the market at the time.

I'll add also the lore. Sure those Star Wars games on PC / N64 also had lore but LucasArts had built that up over decades. This was a new IP with an already-rich backstory.

>>9730042
PCfags opened the door to this when they embraced Half-Life, which would itself eventually get ported to the PS2.

>>9730290
Contrarians get the rope. Its a great game. Could care less what Quake has on it.

Best FPS or tied with half life 2 as the best FPS ever made

Fuck off with that unreal/quake faggotry

Halo 1-reach on legendary is the best run in gaming history

you retards will never convince me this game looked good at the time

>inb4 the usual copes

look at this fucking disgusting shit only brown people and blind people hail as the greatest shit. fucking xbox kids

>>9730749

>>9730290
You basically nailed it, throw in co-op, the best implementation of vehicles in an fps, very solid and fun multiplayer and you've got all that you need for a sure fire hit. Really anyone wondering why it as an FPS took off, go play FPS games on PC that came out in 2000-2002.

>>9730004
Halo was effectively Goldeneye 3.

>>9730004
>master piece
No. Look, I like Halo 1, but I won't say its a masterpiece.

>>9730274
>Guess Halo kind of impressed a bunch of little kids in the US and that was it.
Pretty much this. Some kiddos in Steam groups I'm claimed they were in 5th grade when Halo 3 came out and they always talk fondly of the Halo franchise. I can see why. Said kids now inhabit /v/ and /vr/ when back in the late 2000's Halo was mocked at.

>>9730004
>Why was Halo considered a groundbreaking masterpiece?
it's a large, smooth, and well polished game with good controls. it still feels fairly modern to play because so many games ripped it off.
try and play any game that came before it and it will feel old and janky.

>>9730792
>back in the late 2000's Halo was mocked at
By nerds who attribute CoDs success to Halo, and Halo to Xbox Live "dudebros". Which I've never understood seeing as how games like Metal of Honor, Counter Strike, Ghost Recon and Delta Force are more responsible for CoDs game design than Halo. Literally the only thing I can think of with Halo is that it's a twin stick shooter with a two weapon limit. That's it.

>>9730797
Regenerative Health in CoD2 was due to Halo. Even back in 2005 when 360 came out, we blamed Halo for that. You're not going to convince us old folk kid.

>>9730796
>try and play any game that came before it and it will feel old and janky.
You mean on the PS1 and N64. Timesplitters on the PS2 felt smooth like butter.

Reasons why halo was (is) a masterpiece

Open world/ linear-
Combat evolved had arguably the greatest blend of open world & focused linear design ever in a FPS. Too linear and a game feels like ff13 or call of duty. Too open world and it becomes a boring chore like far cry. Halo nailed this perfect balance, which to this day hasn't been matched.

Great weapons-
Every weapon feels balanced and has great "feel". You will have a personal favourite.

Great structure-
Sounds common now but the healing armour was a game changer for FPS. Why does this matter, if the Devs know you will be able to heal shields, they can always challenge you. Every set piece becomes a challenge.

Only 2 weapons at a time-
Contray to the "give the player everything" mentality that exists now, limiting a player to 2 weapons and forcing them to use more on the battlefield, forced you to learn the quirks of every weapon and also you knew there was always a weapon available if you run out of ammo.

Enemy ai-
Enemies work in teams. Kill the leader and the grunts run away. Enemies actually challenge you. Contrast that to gears of war, or any modern FPS.... Halo ai really was a game changer.

Couch co-op
Smash bros is great as a multiplayer and sucks single player. Mario kart is great at multiplayer but shit in single player. Only halo combat evolved is great in single player and equally great with a bud. Alot of people who grew up with halo has treasured memories of playing it couch co-op.

>>9730805
> PS1 and N64
mmm i think top of the line PC shooters like unreal tournament, quake III and return to castle wolfenstein feel dated in compared to halo, and they were all from around the same time period
timesplitters is a great game though, the whole series was awesome

>>9730802
The health bar doesn't regenerate.

>>9730018
And it did so while also having big seamless levels that you could explore as much as you wanted, with both interior and exterior areas in them. Not many other games could match that sense of scale when it first released, though it's no longer impressive these days when everything is a massive open world whatever.

>>9730042
>I know UT and Q3A players are lmao @ this statement.
you mean boomer contrarian try hards
there is no large and respectable UT and Q3A community. It doesn't exist. Never did. 99% of kids who played arena shooters also enjoyed Halo and never thought twice about it. PC Arena shooter elitism is a meme. It's fake history. Just like /v/ elitists who will say God of War was always bad and never respected. Yeah; never respected by them. The boom autistic contrarians. Not exactly the loud minority anybody should be paying attention to.

>>9730736
Agree with 99% of this post except I think Half-Life - Alyx is better. And it isn't over yet, unlike Halo.

>>9730809
good post.

>>9730824
Holy mother of SOVL

>>9730004
Basically Half Life for consoles.

it showed everyone how bad and boring games like quake are

No one's mentioned the narrative and set pieces, either.

-Starts in a moment of extremely high action (ship boarded and almost instantly overrun, fight your way out). This tells you almost everything you need to know without awful exposition (humans VS covenant, weird structure of unknown purpose).

-Flood level is still excellent. Lengthy build-up, sudden reveal that recontextualises the situation, realising you've come miles down into a labyrinth you now need to escape ASAP. Radical shift in how combat works (GTFO rather than kill everything).

-Final level given appropriate stakes and spectacle.

-Halo design was novel and visually compelling.

Shallow AF with clear plot padding, but on the whole a pretty tight narrative that keeps you engaged. Compare to, say, MWF II ten years later, where it never feels as though there are stakes.

>>9730042
Yes it's far from being an arena shooter but it delivered what it could and it do quite nicely.

>>9730830
What do you mean by "boomer contrarian try hards"? It's just a different preference on video games.
There was an arena shooter community in the early 2000s and there still is. Smaller as ever probably, but it still exists and Quake tourneys are a thing till this day.
I remember playing Halo 1 on PC and simply not getting why they would make it so you can only carry 2 weapons at a time. At the same time, I really liked the game and playing it online and LAN.
Not everyone is an edgy contrarian as you apparently think, and you shouldn't deny gaming history anon.

>It's fake history
>Just like /v/ elitists who will say God of War was always bad and never respected
What the heck are you talking about son?

>>9730785
Look at what they took from us

>>9730792
only fucking retards mocked halo
>tell me you didnt play system link in 2001/2 without telling me

It has the OoT touch, the game is not hardcore or innovative but it is well balanced and fun, fun in the best sense of the word. How the ai works is the most important factor in my opinion as some anon remarked, FPS at the time were all about fast reaction while Halo gives you more time to enjoy yourself in part by putting you in a squad that can absorb part of the damage. Compared to other fps of the same period, it feels very arcade.

Alright boys, you convinced me, woke up my biggie boi 360 from a decade of slumber, he fired right up surprisingly in all his horrific thermal glory. i got Halo for like a dollar at a garage sale years ago, never got around to it. it's up and running in beautiful 480i over component on the ol trinny. playing on heroic cuz im not a faggot.
what am i in for?

>>9731375
A solid 8/10 game. Have fun.

>>9730749
The geometry was simple but the normal maps and lighting were pretty spectacular. You'd need a graphics card that basically didn't exist to replicate it with Xbox's performance at launch.

>>9731848
to correct myself a bit, you'd need something like a Geforce 3 to do Halo at 640x480, which was a cutting edge card. PC games weren't really pushing the card with a bunch of normal maps like that yet as most people had lesser cards.

>>9731848
>>9731852
Why was Halo PC considered a bad port?

>>9731852
I remember throwing a plasma grenade at some stone wall in the first level and being amazed at how the blue light showed the details on the rock.

>>9731848
>>9731862
This game was the reason I had to buy a new GPU because the one I had didn't support the needed DirectX version. The game needed a very powerful machine and it didn't look optimized at all code wise at the time. At least that's what my friends and I went through.
And if I remember correctly, the game didn't support coop through LAN.

>>9730004
Play any FPS from that time (on console) and you will immediately see why.

>>9730939
>Basically Half Life for consoles.

About that..

>>9730004
>Iconic art design
>adaptive Ai
>epic adventure
>amazing physics
>unique storyline
>use of scale still not seen in most games today
>10/10 soundtrack

how can you not understand that it's easily one of the best games ever made.

>>9731883
>This game was the reason I had to buy a new GPU because the one I had didn't support the needed DirectX version. The game needed a very powerful machine and it didn't look optimized at all code wise at the time. At least that's what my friends and I went through.
>And if I remember correctly, the game didn't support coop through LAN.

Halo 1 has aged like fine wine, and now with CEnshine, Custom Edition is no exception

Refined uses Bungie's uncompressed textures

>Every bitmap that was released with the Halo Editing Kit for Halo CE has had its source extracted and recompiled as uncompressed 32bit textures replacing the DXT compressed versions, invader-bitmap was used to do this. These bitmaps account for 860 of the 1488 odd bitmaps in the game. Note that explosions may look wrong without a current mod installed that fixes a bug in halo when using these textures in some places.

>Some fixes from the Refined tagset have been updated and included, like the shader replacements and Xbox music. unneeded workarounds intended to fix Custom Edition bugs that do not apply for the base game have been excluded.

https://www.proxeninc.net/Halo/Refined/V3RC%20Download/

>>9731131
>tell me you didnt play system link in 2001/2 without telling me
In terms of multiplayer FPS's, I playing U99, Q3, SSFE, BF1942, Tribes 2 in 2001-2002.

>>9730816
> feel dated in compared to halo
How? Halo is a sluggish feeling game with moon jumping that makes you a target. Even games like TF2 still inherit traces of the arena shooter like the Scout class's nimbleness. Nobody inherits the slow as molasses feeling of Halo's movement.
>>9730830
>no large
So what you're saying is if something is large thus its better? Damn, I guess Call of Duty truly is the best franchise of all time then.
> respectable
What does that even mean? There are plenty of UT and Q3A communities if you look for them. What defines "respectable" because my recollection of Halo matchmaking was nothing but hearing screaming children and stupid ass punks. Not very respectable.
>99% of kids who played arena shooters also enjoyed Halo and never thought twice about it.
No they didn't. This implies they went from PC to Console. With the exception of Gearbox Halo 1 port and the god awful Halo 2 port in 2007, PC gaming was far apart from console gaming. Also, notice how you said "kids" when in reality many who played Unreal and Q3A were usually teenagers or young adults. I guess the reason you say kids is because that's the first thing you hear when entering matchmaking.
Oh speaking of matchmaking; guess what particular FPS popularized it and practically influenced every other FPS to use such a horrid system thus killing community servers?
>PC Arena shooter elitism is a meme. It's fake history.
Let me guess; you only got into PC gaming when it became much more accessible and affordable in early 2010's. You never got to experience it (or were probably never born for that matter) in the late 90s and early 2000s.

Halo has pioneered the following in videogames:
-Dual wielding
-Recharging personal shields (every FPS today copies it)
-Dedicated grenade button
-Dedicated melee button (melee is actually useful in Halo)
-Complex characters (master chief, arbiter)
-Involving and deep storyline
-Saved the Xbox
-Made LAN parties cool
-Saving and sharing replays
-First ever console FPS to include a map editor
-Perfectly streamlined online play
-Vehicles
-It is so good that games nowadays are referred to as "Halo clones," and some, like Haze, try to be a "Halo killer"
-Orchestral music (before it everything was just bleepbloop synthesized music)
-AI that becomes more intelligent on higher difficulties instead of just having more health.

>>9730817
>The health bar doesn't regenerate.
The shield in CE mattered more than the health bar because it had a 75 hitpoints compared to the health bars 45 hitpoints, especially in multiplayer when the pistol could easily one shot a person with a downed shield. They got rid of it in Halo 2 because they realized how redundant it was.

>>9732348
>Halo has pioneered the following
Lmao...Nice shitpost.
>Dual Wielding
Existed long before. Even Goldeneye had it.
>recharging personal shield
Regeneration and its influence isn't a positive thing
>Dedicated grenade button
Shadow Warrior in 1997 came up with that idea first. TFC also had dedicated nade throws in 1999
>Dedicated melee button
Duke Nukem 3D in 1996 had a dedicated melee button
>Complex characters (master chief, arbiter)
Alright yeah this is definitely shitpost. nm

Definitive coop campaign experience.

Barely any games match it in that regard, and it is in that regard that I have spent 99% of my time with the game.

If you know any games that are comparable to Halo in this aspect, I would be happy to hear of them.

There was a Duke Nukem on the N64 that had couch coop and was a lot of fun, but that’s the only one I can think of. And if I remember right your buddy wouldnt respond in a level after dying which fucks things up. Halo coop isn’t “hardcore” since you can respawn easily but it’s way better coop than one person dying and just watching half the time.

>>9732354
>They got rid of it in Halo 2 because they realized how redundant it was.
I really disliked that. I liked how 1 had this balance of recharging and lasting health, it gave you a buffer to heal back to but it still felt like real damage had consequences since that carried over to the next fight. Full health recharge removes all consequence and degree of success, makes it just pass or fail and each fight feels a bit more disposable as a result.

Really wish games had copied halo 1’s health system instead of 2’s.

The original Halo game does a great job at making you feel like you were exploring an alien world.
I've been trying to make a 3x3 for /v/ and I noticed a lot of my favorite games have that premise: exploring a well thought out alien setting.

>>9732348
Star Wars: Dark Forces already did the useful melee and dedicated grenade button.

>>9732348
they have troon, spic, etc. other flags too

>>9732348
>-AI that becomes more intelligent on higher difficulties instead of just having more health.
This is easy to disprove since all the Halo games have tracers. On highest difficulty you can get one tapped by snipers before the models even spawn.

>>9732310
>Halo is a sluggish feeling game with moon jumping that makes you a target
Skill issue. The environments are designed to have you move around. God forbid an FPS game isn't a G-fuel railing ADHD shooter.
>guess what particular FPS popularized it and practically influenced every other FPS to use such a horrid system thus killing community servers?
Halo had a party up system and extensive community features. To a significant portion of players, local multiplayer and custom matches were what they played for. Especially with Halo CE and Halo 3. Don't blame Halo 2 for other franchises adopting it's systems and executing them poorly. At that point, you may as well throw out Counter Strike because CoD exists. What a retarded take honestly.
>Let me guess; you only got into PC gaming when it became much more accessible and affordable in early 2010's
NTA, but no. I was on PC well before I ever had an Xbox. I never really cared for matchmaking myself, but on PC you couldn't have 4 player splitscreen. I only ever went to 1 LAN party for Episode 1 Racer when that came out. Hauling your entire setup, plus a 40lb monitor was never convenient or fun. Halo was fun, and it was easy to play with 4 people. It was easy to system link 2 systems for a 4v4 game night.

>>9731862
It was an earlier unfinished build of the game with bugs, graphical glitches, and missing effects mixed with some of the worst netcode I've seen in an FPS. fuckin randy. Custom edition was still a lot of fun in spite of these issues

>>9732763
guess all that's left for you to do is cry your little eyes out

>>9731375
The last good Halo game

>>9730004
Because console kiddies are retards.

>>9732897
>Skill issue
What exactly is commenting sluggish movement have anything to do with skill? Oh wait, you're just parrot /v/ takes because you're incredibly unoriginal.
>The environments are designed to have you move around.
What's that even mean? You move around in every FPS.
>God forbid an FPS game isn't a G-fuel railing ADHD shooter.
In other words Arena shooters are too fast for you and you can't hone in somebody to shoot them. Halo isn't a "realistic shooter" like Rainbow Six 3 or ARMA.
>Halo had a party up system and extensive community features.
There were no community servers. It was plain matchmaking in Halo 2, you're not going to twist it differently.
>Don't blame Halo 2 for other franchises adopting it's systems and executing them poorly.
I will blame it because of its tremendous influence.
>you may as well throw out Counter Strike because CoD exists.
CoD was inspired by Medal of Honor, particularly Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, which the creators of Infinity Ward developed before forming their own studio.

>>9730004
>groundbreaking
>Masterpiece
Neither of these is true. Stop shitting up this board

>>9732941
Congrats, you planted your flag in a series everyone here was done with sixteen years ago. Though I suppose someone like you is used to sloppy seconds.

>>9734181
>Congrats, you planted your flag in a series everyone here was done with sixteen years ago. Though I suppose someone like you is used to sloppy seconds.

>>9734181
Wow, someone on this board likes an old game? That's crazy anon

>>9734181
Hey btw you still crying?

>>9734343
If it makes you feel better, then sure, I'm really sad a game I never bought has a troon flag in it.

Happy?

>>9731862
>Created using an earlier build of the game
>Runs like ass
>Looks like ass
>Missing a lot of the special effects that helped make Halo famous
>Buggy and glitchy if you don't use a gorillion community patches
>No co-op
>Ported by Gearbox Software so you know it's automatically not good of a vanilla experience to begin with

Why is it that discussion about Halo's mechanics is so vague? The two gun limit and regenerating heath impact the game more obviously, but it seems that the people who hate Halo only say that it "feels" slow, reactive, passive, or bad? I saw that "halo killers" video and came to the conclusion that many designers don't know shit about how Halo works.

>>9735687
Because no one cares to talk about how the movement mechanics play off the physics engine, with grenade chain reactions, vehicles and ragdoll. No one talks about how the shield system means and the movement means you can play the game like a cracked out Adderall junkie or you can take a more methodical approach. It gives the player a lot of freedom. Each weapon in the sandbox has a specific purpose. The limit on how many weapons you can carry means you engage with the sandbox more. You aren't going to hold onto a rocket launcher to find more ammo later in the stage or on the next stage. You're going to trade it for whatever you can find that has ammo. The levels are very open ended and allow for the a lot of player expression. No vehicle part is mandatory. I've done tank sections with the Warthog just because. I've done them on foot just because. That with the extremely complex AI that almost no games other than Bungie Halo have managed to create means the game has almost infinite replayablility. The game and the world reacts to the player so well that no two runs of a mission are going to go exactly the same. Yeah The Library sucks, and the Flood missions are mostly backtracks through levels you've already played which is tedious after a while. But the game holds up remarkably well where games like Rage, Half Life (sorry anons, the missions are linear as fuck, the AI is dumb as rocks and the only thing that holds up is the physics engine), or really any other FPS from the time.

/vr/gins hate it because it's not Quake, or because other FPS games ripped off features from it and implemented them poorly. That's it. It's like hating Ultima because it's an entirely different kind of RPG from Final Fantasy.

>>9734362
>crying over a game he hasn't even played
>tries to spin crying as cool
lol

>>9735871
based post

>>9730824
Except for the Halo outside the ship. It's so scaled down that you can see it from just moving left and right inside the ship.

>>9730290
>>9730770

yeah all of this. Basically, really good guns/sandbox, really good AI, really well designed and varied enemies, good level design, and beautiful environments/graphics in general

Combine that with coop and vs multiplayer that both are really fun to play and you have masterpiece.

>>9730290

Halo CE is well designed, especially for console the only drawback was some of the campaign maps with backtracking. And the Library. Fuck that level.

>>9732354
No, they both are 75. source: I mod the game.

>>9730824
>what is Turok on the N64 in 1997

Fucking zoomers shitting up my board.

>>9736172
Glad you're happy, fren

>>9736202
Having constant fog 5 feet from your face at all times does not convey the same sense of scale. You'd know this if you actually played the game back in the day. Even PC port suffered from it.

>>9736210
>>9731862
>>9735519
This is all true but this does raise a more general point. I think some of it wasn't gearbox' fault. A lot of it was that the Xbox was actually quite advanced in terms of its graphical capabilities, especially compared to PCs at the time. sure if you played on a super high end PC from 2005 or whatever it would look good, but if you're playing on an HP with a geforce4 mx440, it's going to look like ass. Plus gearbox had to downgrade the graphics a lot in order to support those shitty fixed function cards.