Well, alien weapons aren't that good Halo 2 should look to improve alien weapons.

to those who get the reference.

As someone who has played the beta extensively, no I don't work for MS and I never signed the NDA, I can say that the game is much more balanced without the pistol. Yes, the pistol is in, but it's worthless now. Instead of a couple of good weapons, there are now many effective ones. I'll give a breakdown of what I've played.

The battle rifle represents what the pistol should have been. It's pretty good close range and pretty good medium to long range. It is not overpowered, but is satisfying to use. (can't dual wield)

Plasma pistol is a little underpowered now. It doesn't really hold people in place to much, but it's a nice if you have 2 of them.

Plasma rifle is an excellent weapon to dual wield with a human weapon.

Sniper rifle (human) now has recoil, so you better make those
headshots count. (can't dual wield)

Shotgun is about the same, but headshots are more important with it. I've been point blank and fired at someones chest and he walked away and I didn't. It looks a little cooler too. (can't dual wield)

Rocket launcher can track vehicles now. Tracking doesn't work on people. The shots now build speed as they go, so they start out kind of slow. They sound awesome now too.

Needler is better than before, but I still found myself avoiding it in favor of other guns.

Sub Machine Gun (SMG) are weak by themselves, but powerful close range while dual wielding. They have a recoil effect as well, so if you aim at there chest it will end up at there head.

Energy sword is friggin sweet. It is most effective as a defensive weapon because of the limited range. It's also excellent as an offensive weapon in small levels (Lockout) or small areas (bases). (can't dual wield)

Beam rifle is a covenant sniper rifle. It's about the same as the human rifle except it holds more ammo. It overheats really easily to compensate for it though. (can't dual wield)

Brute shot is a covenant grenade launcher, not plasma grenades, but just shoots grenade like bullets. They will bounce once then explode. It's pretty powerful, but only holds 4 shots at a time and you have to be fairly accurate. It has a bladed bottom so it has a cool melee attack. (can't dual wield)



There will be more weapons that that, but those are all the ones I played with in beta.

The levels that were playable in beta were Zanzibar, Ivory Tower, Mid Ship, Waterworks, and Lockout.

There is a new Live mechanic called the party system. It will make playing with friends so much easier. You can invite your friends to a lobby that you create. Your party is then free to join games and everyone will go together, so you can bounce from game to game with people very easily.

In summation, the game threw me off at first. There was so much changed, yet so much the same. The game feels the same, but you have to change the way you play in order to be badass at it. The more I played it though, the more fun it became. I did decent at first, but then won almost every game consistently (just like in Halo 1).

I can't wait for November.


I'll answer any questions I can.

Answer #1- Beta is over. No, you can't play it.

Wait a minute!?!? The pistol had a scope?!?!? Damn, how slow am I . Well I guess I won't miss it since I never used it unless it was a last option. Wow, I just never thought to push the scope button for the pistol...now to play through it again with the overpowered cheater skeater! Whoo hoo!

guess I was giving the outreach of the otter too much credit. *shrug*

Is there any flying vehicles in vs mode? That would be sweet...

You'll forever be known as the Moran of Video Game Talk

Short-range the pistol wasn't much of a chump either. Two shots to the body and a final shot to the head would take anyone from full to nothing. You could get this off faster than two shots with the shotgun, so unless you're really good at getting close up one-shot kills with the shotty, the pistol is the better weapon.

I agree that at looooooooong range the sniper rifle would be much better, but you can peg things pretty accurately from opposite ends of Blood Gulch width-wise with the pistol.

In beta the banshee was in multiplayer. It can now do flips and barrell rolls.

There might be more flying vehicles available as well.

Bungie revealed that there will be no bots for offline play, and that there will be no 4-player split screen coop. That kind of sucks.

The best thing to do with HALO 2 is not expect much. That way when it hits you can still enjoy it.

Wait, no four player split coop? Is that just coop, or versus as well?

Just coop. Versus is in there.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=4720

Bungie finishes work on Halo 2, may develop new IP next

Rob Fahey 09:56 04/10/2004

Final milestone for Xbox' biggest title; but Halo 3 isn't on the menu yet, it seems

Microsoft-owned developer Bungie has finished work on the hugely anticipated Xbox exclusive first-person shooter Halo 2, according to the latest weekly update from the team, with the game on track for a November 9th launch.

"It's finished and shipped to a nebulous region known as RTC (Release to Certification)," according to the update, "where it will be dumped from eight digital tapes onto a DVD and go through some final testing."

Bungie will shortly be discontinuing its weekly updates, since development on the game is now all but completed; while the title is not officially "gold" as yet, with some quality assurance work still to be completed, the actual development process is largely wrapped up.

This leaves the game right on track ("barring any unexpected shenanigans," as the update puts it) for its launch on November 9th in the USA, and 10th/11th in Europe - putting the game a couple of weeks ahead of Half-Life 2, if dates revealed to UK retailers by Vivendi Universal Games last week hold true.

Bungie started work on Halo 2 almost directly after finishing Halo, but with the company now considering its future plans, it would appear that Halo 3 isn't on the menu just yet - with plans to develop "something different" next.

"After Halo 2 we are planning to do something different," Bungie studio manager Pete Parsons told the BBC recently. "We will do something else and we have a few ideas."

This will, of course, raise speculation that Bungie may not be planning to do a Halo title as an Xbox 2 launch title, as had been widely expected, since for a new Halo game to be ready for the launch of Microsoft's next console - expected in late 2005 - work would have to begin right away.

It seems unlikely that the console would launch without some kind of offering from Bungie, which is the jewel in Microsoft's internal development crown. Rather than Halo 3, then, the firm may be hoping to create a new franchise of similar value on Xbox 2, just as it did with Halo at the launch of Xbox.


Chris

wtf is "new IP?"

- David Stein

"intellectual property?"

This isn't really a disappointment about Halo 2 but I didn't want to start another thread when it is still related to Halo 2.

I just got in this months XBOX Nation. I'm really REALLY looking forward to Halo 2 but this magazine has about 13 pages about the game. It's a big important game but about half those pages are fluff and filler. I just think they are missing a chance to talk about other games that could use some attention.

I have no problem with people who don't like Halo or Halo 2. I just think those people are getting ripped off with this issue. I'm just glad I don't pay for a magazine that pulls this kind of crap.

Umm what is a moran? Do you mean moron?

I don't have a problem with that. What I have a problem with is that 100% off all the photos are pre-rendered on a PC. There isn't an actual shot of in-game footage.

morans!

Come isn't that one of the dozens of running gags here on the forum? Get with the program.

New Halo2 Movie trailer.
http://home.comcast.net/~revitman/halo2.WMV

some people don't stray into other, I weep for them.

btw, Halo2 went Gold today

birrman54