If only you would've asked us first. . .

You quote Billy Madison and I get labeled the idiot?

man...i just got to "Escape!", the part where the little spore creatures and the bigger daddy spore creatures come at you as you have to escape and freaked out i could not be more of.

Meet the flood

Just played Super Mario Bros. for the first time! I'll keep you all updated level-by-level.

So far the mushrooms are freaking me out, man.

Yeah, most people hate The Flood and think they ruin the Halo games because they just bum-rush you and there's no real strategy for killing them except for run and gun.

ahh, but you know what the quote is from... but it was a joke.

This type of shit is the reason blogs were invented.

Hmm, I myself haven't heard people say they ruin the game. They always freaked me out, but I did like squishing them with my rifle butt.

It just gets repetitive.

They don't ruin the game, but the certainly make it worse for me. I think the overall experience of the Halo games I've played would be greatly increased with absolutely no flood presence. They're just an enemy I cannot stand.

Scott : I have probably played thru Halo CE a 100 times on the original Xbox. I simply loved that game. What may be for some; several SPOILERS to follow.

You learn to how to get the Hunter to rush you, sidestep, and then shoot him in the back with the pistol. In the later part of the game, you can take them out with the sniper rifle. Or for a lot of fun, toy with them ( at a distance ), and then kill 'em with several salvos of the needler. You know that you are good, when you can take out a hunter with a pistol shot in the neck. Shooting them in the side just seems to make them madder. If you wound a Hunter enough, they will give you the bum's rush.

btw: You can pick up, and then throw ahead of you several weapons at a time, in order to have a cache of different weapons to use, and plenty of ammo. Repetitive, but very useful. This works for vehicles also. You will find that weapons (and vehicles used) that you have picked up and dropped stick around for quite awhile. If you have not picked them up and dropped them, they tend to disappear.

Elites do not like being hit with a charged shot from the laser pistol, and then one shot in the head from the regular pistol. The needler is great fun to use on elites also. Shooting grunts with pistol or rifle makes them drop sticky grenades. When you have a good defensive position, kill some grunts in the same general area, then wait for several elites, and throw a frag into the pile of stickies. If you are out of frags, just super needle an elite. His explosion will cause a secondary explosion of the stickies.

For the Flood, use the Melee on the infection (baby flood) or hose them down with the assault rifle or a grenade, pistol on the pregnant flood (or needle gun), and the shotgun reigns supreme on the Flood soldiers. Without the shotgun, you will be flood bar-b-que.

The pistol can be your best friend. It will easily take down elites with a few shots to the head, jackals with shots thru the notch in their shield or head shots, hunters, and banshees. Jackals can be dangerous, as they are they best shots in the game. It is great fun to sneak up on them and pistol whip 'em. The assault rifle, laser rifle, laser pistol, or sticky grenades will eventually take out the covenant tank, if you didn't bring a rocket launcher.

The Marines are basically canon fodder. Most of the time they act stupidly, and aren't very good shots. Once in a while, you will get a marine gunner who can hit almost everything he shoots at. I found it better to drive, as it is much easier to get "road kills". In the canyons, marines are worth more dead for their weapons you can pick up and stockpile. When you first use the covenant beam to enter the ship, and face elites and grunts coming at you from 4 different doors, the marines are worth their weight in gold.

By playing thru the game so many times, and changing my strategy, I found places and things I did not know I could go or could do. The AI for the covenant gets interesting, in that I found places where I had never seen covenant before, or they did something they never had before.

Learn the enemy spawn points. Don't be afraid to back track then, and use the environment. Learn which weapons to have on hand, for the upcoming fight. If you try to "run and gun" on Legendary, you will simply die, and never finish the game.

It really gets to be fun, when you get good enough that even on Legendary, you can play thru the game and leave no covenant or flood left alive to tell the tale. Sometimes I feel sorry for grunts, but the only good flood, is a dead flood.

wow. i didn't even think to melee attack them and at least save some ammo.

Agree 100%

Plus they make my skin crawl. Parasitic organisms are gross.

Game Informer has me taking a second look at "HALO: Reach".

what do you mean? you have an early build or something...

No. Many folks have dismissed Reach a little because ODST sucked. He is saying the write-up in Game Informer was intriguing enough that he was mildly interested in Reach again.

Wow, I really liked ODST.

I know many people really enjoyed ODST. I just thought it was a horribly dull game. It is the only game this generation i have bought and genuinely felt like it was not worth the money at all.


I've ranted about this before though so no need for me to go on again.

I never played ODST. I didn't really follow the reviews and I didn't know it didn't do well with fans. Anyway, I only read some of the article but what little I've read thus far has me wanting to see more about REACH.

so ODST wasn't a direct sequel, correct? what exactly is that about then? Reach is a sequel and starts a new trilogy?

I haven't layed ODST but from what I've heard it supposedly takes place during or after the events of Halo 2. So if you wanna play through the games in chronological order ;

Halo
Halo 2
Halo ODST
Halo 3

Not sure where Halo Wars fits in the timeline. Reach is a direct sequel i believe. Bungie claims that Reach will be their 'last' Halo game.

No. From what I understand, Reach is a prequel to the entire Halo series about a time when there was a group of spartans and not just one.

According to the Game Informer article, Reach ends "only days" before the first game begins.

And I'm with Giantrobo here--the article makes it sound really good. It seems to reestablish the Covenant as total badasses, and it's gonna be great being able to fight Elites again, which is what I loved about the first game, and the lack of which is what I hated about the sequels. And no mention of the Flood in the article, either, which is a good thing (I'm one of those who loved the first game up until they were introduced). And the whole squadron of bad-ass spartans thing reminds me of Gears.

Between all that and all the other various gameplay and graphical updates the article details, this sounds like it's going to be a much-needed refresh for a franchise which has, at least to me, gotten really stale over the years.

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