Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn

[Pr0nogo]

Hawki - I don't get how you can dish on every single piece of media in existence yet still excuse and actually enjoy the travesty of a storyline in Wings of Liberty. It's the ultimate oxymoron. I mean, I haven't played Halo 4, but if it doesn't treat the player like a child, take a piss over the original lore, make each character lose 40 IQ points since the last game, and reek of all-around negligence....then you should be extolling its virtues to the masses. And if it does, then you should be ok with it anyway.

I had this thought the entire time I read Hawki's post.

HALO 4 has a lot wrong with it when it comes to its storyline, but it's not even close to the poor writing and poor character development that Lings of Wiberty had.

I'm pretty sure Zeratul lost 400 IQ points.

[TheEconomist]

Best picture ever.

[Hawki]

Hawki - I don't get how you can dish on every single piece of media in existence yet still excuse and actually enjoy the travesty of a storyline in Wings of Liberty. It's the ultimate oxymoron. I mean, I haven't played Halo 4, but if it doesn't treat the player like a child, take a piss over the original lore, make each character lose 40 IQ points since the last game, and reek of all-around negligence....then you should be extolling its virtues to the masses. And if it does, then you should be ok with it anyway.

...Sigh.

Okay, let's go through this:

1) You need a better definition of "every" and/or stop having a selective memory in regards to the instances of praise/criticism I heap on medias. The "your top character deaths" thread would be an example.

2) As you said, you haven't played Halo 4, so you can't really play the oxymoron card. And certainly I've found it strange that people dis(like) x while dis(lik)ing y (you included), but personal preferences are hard to quantify. Usually it's pointless to bring them up.

3) Back to WoL, there's another key difference. With WoL, even if I disliked the story, I could fall back on the gameplay. In H4, I don't have that luxury.

SC2 gave enough opportunities for "Jerry x Kerry" abominations to satisfy him.

Brownie points for rhyme, face-palm for the suggestion.

Lets just say, I wouldn't have alluded to Phazon corruption if I didn't know that was one of your berserk buttons.

Phazon, I don't have a problem with. Using it as it was in the faux article I would.

The result is a sandbox of visually similar weapons (Can you tell a Storm Rifle apart from a Carbine? Or a Light Rifle apart from a Binary Rifle? There will be a quiz on this, and it will be in the middle of a firefight when your shields are popped.),

Know what you mean. Not too much of an issue personally, as I found myself using Promethean weaponry whenever I could...which was a downside, but that's another kettle of fish.

Sound design is meh. They completely overhauled the sound effects of the weapons, so there's not a good distinction between conventional and plasma weapons. Not a big fan of making the Covenant incomprehensible... again.

I wasn't too put off by it, but yeah, you make a good point as to the similar sounds, especially when comparing the storm rifle to the assault rifle. Actually liked the Covenant sounds though. There's nothing inherantly wrong with "run away" or "wort wort wort!" but...well, it can get old.

I guess I'm getting tired of saving Earth. She's getting to be the eternal damsel in distress.

Think of it this way. Earth's our mother. 4.6 billion years old. Come the future, she's in the nursing home. And like all good children, we have to look after her. Or just leave her in the nursing home and go to another part of the galaxy.

John did. Cortana said "A lot can happen in four years".

That he does. What I meant was that they don't ask the question when it has a chance of being answered, as in, after meeting up with the crew of the Infinity.

I always thought that ME3 did too much to bring in the new guys. Hell, they had an entire character who was an idiot, just so he could ask the questions that newcomers to the franchise might ask.

Having played Halo 4, I now know it's possible to be too inclusive, and I'm a longtime fan who's read the books.

It's funny you should mention that. Having come from D3 to H4, I had a similar experience, going from "assume the player knows nothing so tell them everything" to "assume the player knows everything so tell them nothing." Neither's perfect, but honestly, I think I might prefer the former. Something I never thought I'd say until recently.

Halo 4 is more or less on par with Reach on my scale. Maybe a little bit under, because though Halo 4 is grander in scope, the personality and characterization we were promised was lacking, while Reach delivered on this in spades.

How would you scale the games as a whole? Not being snide, just wondering.

Personally I'd put H4 at the bottom right now, overall. Even ignoring the story, the gameplay felt like too much of a step back for my tastes and/or half-hearted homage to the previous games.

never understood him in the game. In all the media leading up to Halo 4, Didact revealed a grudging respect for humanity. In the pre-history presented in the Terminal videos, he even shows respect for his opposite number, the Lord of Admirals.

Then we (MC and Cortana) come along, unleash him from his Cryptum, and he goes on the rampage as though humanity didn't defeat the flood, and as though humanity destroyed Forerunner colonies just yesterday. The only thing I could think of was he knew of some threat that we don't, leading him to forge a new army from the human population of Earth with the Composer. But I don't believe there were any hints towards this.

I doubt it. If there was a new threat, I think it might have been hinted at in the epilogue. Granted, I think there will be, namely the Precursors at some point, but still, I'm not sure how Didact could know about them. Not in the immediate sense after being released at least.

To say that an ancient evil has been unleashed in the form of the Didact just seems... out of place. At worst he was misguided and prideful, but not necessarily evil evil.

Maybe it's because "new evil" doesn't have the same ring to it.

(Not my joke, but too good to pass up.)

I'm pretty sure Zeratul lost 400 IQ points.

So if a few lines results in the loss of that many IQ points, does that mean that by the same scale, the majority of videogame characters are brain-dead?

You know, I can understand people getting hung up over Mengsk even if I don't agree with them, but the whole Zeratul thing feels like making a mountain out of a molehill.

[Gradius]

make each character lose 40 IQ points since the last game

Another poster on the b.net forums described this process in action:

BW Jim Raynor: I'm the one who's going to KILL YOU Kerrigan.
SC2 Jim Raynor: I can save Kerrigan let's all go to Char, where the whole God damn Swarm operates from, and use an Artifact that we don't even know will work. I can save her! T_T

BW Zeratul: "But while we wait for word from them, we must reconnoiter the surrounding area and find a suitable location for a more permanent settlement. Once we're situated we can begin to search for the Dark Templar."
SC2 Zertaul: PROPHECY! ARTIFACTS! SHE'S THE KEY. PROPHECY!

BW Kerrigan: "It is certainly within my power, but you're not a threat to me, Jim. Be smart; leave here now and never seek to confront the Zerg again. "
SC2 Kerrigan: Swarm. SWWAAARRRM. I'ma INFEST YOUUUUU! OOGIEBOOGIE BOOGIE.

BW Tassadar: "So long as you continue to be so predictable, O Queen, I need not face you at all. You are your own worst enemy. "
SC2 Tassadar: Ha ha im not really dead and i will never be dead ha ha ha

Everything cool about the original dialogue, story, and character development fell flat on it's face in SC2. The only interesting, compelling character in Wings of Liberty was Tychus. And he DIED.

...Sigh.

Okay, let's go through this:

1) You need a better definition of "every" and/or stop having a selective memory in regards to the instances of praise/criticism I heap on medias. The "your top character deaths" thread would be an example.

2) As you said, you haven't played Halo 4, so you can't really play the oxymoron card. And certainly I've found it strange that people dis(like) x while dis(lik)ing y (you included), but personal preferences are hard to quantify. Usually it's pointless to bring them up.

3) Back to WoL, there's another key difference. With WoL, even if I disliked the story, I could fall back on the gameplay. In H4, I don't have that luxury.

Hey, I'm just saying:

It's incredible how John or Cortana never think to ask "why are the Covenant our enemies again" or "Spartan-IVs? When did they come in?"

Cortana said "A lot can happen in four years".

Where have I seen this before? hrm...

[Quirel]

Then we (MC and Cortana) come along, unleash him from his Cryptum, and he goes on the rampage as though humanity didn't defeat the flood, and as though humanity destroyed Forerunner colonies just yesterday.

This here bugged me, in a way. Didact hates us, because we're the Forerunner's eternal enemy. The Librarian claims that we were the Forerunner's most tenacious foe.

I'm sorry? Us getting our teeth kicked in during a border conflict makes us a greater threat than the eldritch abomination that consumed most of the galaxy, including the Forerunner's seat of government?

The only thing I could think of was he knew of some threat that we don't, leading him to forge a new army from the human population of Earth with the Composer. But I don't believe there were any hints towards this.

Which which would mean that Lord of Admiral's... 'reasoning' for not warning the Forerunner about the Flood is common sense in the Haloverse.

Actually liked the Covenant sounds though. There's nothing inherantly wrong with "run away" or "wort wort wort!" but...well, it can get old.

The lines themselves can get old in a hurry, but they're not just there for entertainment value. They're a part of what brings the Covenant to life.

The best parts of Halo are when I get the feeling that the Covenant have their own reason for standing between me and my goals. Or when an Elite sees me across the map, watching with a sniper rifle. We meet eyes, and then he does his darndest to stay alive.

The Covenant in Halo 4 don't have that sort of charm. Their AI has been dumbed down slightly, and their battle chatter can't be discerned above the gunplay.

Promethean Knights are the worst, because they literally exist for no other reason than to be killed. And no, a flaming skull doesn't count as character. Ghost Rider proved that beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Think of it this way. Earth's our mother. 4.6 billion years old. Come the future, she's in the nursing home. And like all good children, we have to look after her. Or just leave her in the nursing home and go to another part of the galaxy.

Well, Earth is only in danger because we live here, and therefore all evil aliens what hold a grudge against us are going to attack her to hurt us. It's high time we implemented the Spiderman Solution and left her, for her own good.

Its time we boarded our ships and left for the void between the stars, leaving Earth to lie fallow and renew herself.
Imagine, in tens of millions of years, another intelligent race might rise up from the apes, or perhaps from another branch of the animal kingdom. Imagine them slowly building civilization, their archaeologists discovering the faint remains of our once-proud cities, speculating upon what kind of meteor impact must have killed us off.

And we'd return to harvest them and the refined resources that went into building their own societies, right at the point where they were at the cusp of achieving space travel...

...Suddenly, it occurs to me that we aren't spending remotely enough of planetary defense.

On a more serious note, the Spiderman analogy is pretty apt. Movie after movie, game after game, the bad guy of the week threatens to invade Earth or raze her with some sort of beam weapon.

Maybe threatening Earth, like abducting Peter Parker's love interests/Aunt May, is easier to write than alternatives. But because it's been done so often, there has to be a bigger reason for me to care than "You were born here."

That he does. What I meant was that they don't ask the question when it has a chance of being answered, as in, after meeting up with the crew of the Infinity.

True. I guess my point was that 343i wasn't really all that interested in the answer anyway. The Covenant are here to shoot, we've got a weak backstory to explain it, and we don't expect anyone to care about it.

How would you scale the games as a whole? Not being snide, just wondering.

It's funny. I dislike Halo Wars almost as much as Halo 4, even though I think that the latter is objectively worse.
I guess that's what disappointment does to you. I had high hopes for Wars, and it failed to deliver. I had few hopes for Halo 4, and it failed spectacularly.

[Hawki]

This here bugged me, in a way. Didact hates us, because we're the Forerunner's eternal enemy. The Librarian claims that we were the Forerunner's most tenacious foe.

I'm sorry? Us getting our teeth kicked in during a border conflict makes us a greater threat than the eldritch abomination that consumed most of the galaxy, including the Forerunner's seat of government?

What, didn't you hear? Humans are just that awesome. We've gone from the days of it taking over two decades to reverse Covie shield tech to reverse engineering Forerunner tech in a manner of months. We're the dominant species now. The "greatest threat in the galaxy." The...

...you know what, just watch Lasky's monologue to Spartan Ops. If you get through it without getting a kick in the balls, then you came out of it better than I did.

Well, Earth is only in danger because we live here, and therefore all evil aliens what hold a grudge against us are going to attack her to hurt us. It's high time we implemented the Spiderman Solution and left her, for her own good.

I'm missing something with that analogy.

Its time we boarded our ships and left for the void between the stars, leaving Earth to lie fallow and renew herself.
Imagine, in tens of millions of years, another intelligent race might rise up from the apes, or perhaps from another branch of the animal kingdom. Imagine them slowly building civilization, their archaeologists discovering the faint remains of our once-proud cities, speculating upon what kind of meteor impact must have killed us off.

And we'd return to harvest them and the refined resources that went into building their own societies, right at the point where they were at the cusp of achieving space travel...

Provided the Reapers don't beat us to it.

On a more serious note, the Spiderman analogy is pretty apt. Movie after movie, game after game, the bad guy of the week threatens to invade Earth or raze her with some sort of beam weapon.

Maybe threatening Earth, like abducting Peter Parker's love interests/Aunt May, is easier to write than alternatives. But because it's been done so often, there has to be a bigger reason for me to care than "You were born here."

Wouldn't that be New York?

But Earth aside, it's especially grievous in Halo 4. It seems the Didact's plan is to go through every city of every continent, hoping that humanity doesn't take out his ship in the meantime. Which despite their uber powers up until now, they've suddenly become incapable of doing.

...you know, I don't know what's worse. The Didact's 'plan', or that the UNSC's firepower seems to shift in accordance with the demands of the plot.

It's funny. I dislike Halo Wars almost as much as Halo 4, even though I think that the latter is objectively worse.
I guess that's what disappointment does to you. I had high hopes for Wars, and it failed to deliver. I had few hopes for Halo 4, and it failed spectacularly.

Pretty much ditto.

[Quirel]

What, didn't you hear? Humans are just that awesome. We've gone from the days of it taking over two decades to reverse Covie shield tech to reverse engineering Forerunner tech in a manner of months. We're the dominant species now. The "greatest threat in the galaxy." The...

Ok, what science fiction franchises out there have humans on the bottom of the totem pole? Because I feel like a change of pace.

...you know what, just watch Lasky's monologue to Spartan Ops. If you get through it without getting a kick in the balls, then you came out of it better than I did.

Eh, I'm probably going to have to watch that again. Only thing I remember about the dialog in Spartan Ops is "Eggheads, eggheads, eggheads, EGGHEADS!"

Yeah, plot armor aside, it's pretty sad that the paragon* of anti-intellectualism aboard the Infinity has a better track record of shutting down misbehaving Forerunner artefacts than the scientists who actually study them.

*Or would that be renegade?

I'm missing something with that analogy.

Other superheroes do it too, but a big deal has been made of how Peter Parker doesn't tell the people he cares about that he's Spiderman and tries to distance himself from them, lest they be targeted by his foes.

Judging from the original movies, it has a 0% success rate. I'm optimistic about how it'll play out with the new series.

Anyhow, if villains are targeting Earth because we live there, the humane thing to do is move out.

Wouldn't that be New York?

Wonder if there's some sort of tally as to which monuments have been destroyed on the silver screen the most. The Statue of Liberty would be my guess.

But Earth aside, it's especially grievous in Halo 4. It seems the Didact's plan is to go through every city of every continent, hoping that humanity doesn't take out his ship in the meantime.

That's part of what reminded me of Shinzon. To quote Stardestroyer.net...

Which despite their uber powers up until now, they've suddenly become incapable of doing.

...you know, I don't know what's worse. The Didact's 'plan', or that the UNSC's firepower seems to shift in accordance with the demands of the plot.

Yeah, that got pretty bad. I understand that a Forerunner ship can take a ton of damage (as we saw in Halo 3) but the UNSC should have at least tried SOMETHING.
And did they not rebuild the orbital defense stations? If not, they're lucky that the Infinity was in-system.

[Hawki]

Ok, what science fiction franchises out there have humans on the bottom of the totem pole? Because I feel like a change of pace.

In the realm of sci-fi, and keeping it to the bottom and staying there, Battlestar Galactica would be one off the top of my head. Other than that, I'd need some wriggle room with the totem pole.

Eh, I'm probably going to have to watch that again. Only thing I remember about the dialog in Spartan Ops is "Eggheads, eggheads, eggheads, EGGHEADS!"

Poached, boiled, scrambled, or fried?

Wonder if there's some sort of tally as to which monuments have been destroyed on the silver screen the most. The Statue of Liberty would be my guess.

If so, the Golden Gate Bridge is a close second.

[Visions of Khas]

I'm just worried right now about the Reclaimer Trilogy having some kind of Villain of the Day Syndrome. We've fought and beat the Didact, arguably one of the most powerful individuals in galactic history. Now where to from there, I wonder. Unless 343i whips out the Precursors, I don't see the trilogy going bigger and bolder, but rather "darker and deeper" -- more "character oriented."

I can see us dealing with the Arbiter's Secularists vs the Storm Covenant, and probably a division within the UNSC -- making US the next big threat to the galaxy.

The way the original trilogy was set up, there was a smooth story arc. This... well, I loved Halo 4, but I worry about the future.

[Turalyon]

In the realm of sci-fi, and keeping it to the bottom and staying there, Battlestar Galactica would be one off the top of my head.

This is debatable. Beginning with the introduction of the Pegasus, the humans go on to destroy a resurrection ship, several basestars and even the frickin homeworld colony ship at the end with what seems to be relative ease. Sure, they take casualties but by that time, no-one seems to care because they're actually no longer on the bottom rung.

Compare this to the first season where they literally agonise every time they lose one viper pilot over a minor engagement, are hardly a match for a single basestar let alone 3 later on the series and that, all-in-all, death is but a mere door-knock away. Granted that the series would have been short (ie: the death of all the colonials) had it taken the full logical course of its premise, but BSG is not exactly a good example of "humans being perpetually on the bottom rung" either.