I know there's going to be a ton of talk on the Halo 3 Beta that's now live for the next 3 weeks, and I didn't want to clutter up the overall XBox thread with it all.

I played a game tonight with 5 other folks. I was lame to the max. It feels like slow motion and I just couldn't figure out how to do anything before I was killed, for the 15th or 16th time. Looking forward to draggin' down some of your guys' teams over the next few weeks.

I played a few rounds last night. It was pretty fun. It's slower than Halo 2, but I like that. The Spartan laser rocks, as does the Needler. The shotgun sucks though.

How does it look, graphically?

I think it looks pretty good. It doesn't have a lot of bells and whistles, but it's colorful, has clean textures, a good art style and overall is very pleasing to look at.

Also, I feel that it needs repeating: The needler is awesome now.

I played 3 matches of Team Skirmish over lunch, and I'm pretty impressed. I'm not sure I like this more than Halo 2, but I think the overall control scheme is bugging me more than anything. I outright despise the bumpers, and how much you have to use them to do things like pick up weapons, get on vehicles, and pick up flags.

It's pretty awesome, though. The Brute Shot got a significant upgrade by actually firing where you're aiming.

And I disagree on the # of gadgets. I think there's too many now. I don't even know what half of them do yet, and they're a pain to run into when someone deploys them. For example, someone in my first game deployed a portable man-cannon, grabbed the flag, and hopped over the fence. That kind of stuff can serve to annoy.

I think most of the franticity problems are due to the 4-player aspect. They ARE planning on doing games with 8-man teams again, right? Because I really miss having a full team behind me, so that no single person can dictate the match.



I dunno. I guess I was hoping for something a little closer to Halo 2 than this. This feels like a completely different game.


I have to sing tonight around 7:30, and then I should be home around 8:30 to play, if anyone wants to jump in and party up.

Sire and I were playing when I was on at lunch, and we had fun. But we got some hella lag.

I'm 10.

Personally I like the gadgets. They're not used a tremendous amount, but when they are it can be pretty cool. I've pulled some cool stuff off with the bubble shield once or twice. I'm getting blasted so I throw it down, and then jump out, shoot someone or throw a grenade then jump back in. It does work against me sometimes though, as I'll get mobbed inside.

The portable jump pad is really useful on High Ground and I always grab it when I can. It's invaluable for getting into the base.


... tee hee, man cannon.

*trips Spizzie*

*points* HA-HA!

*Plays Crackdown instead of Halo3 Beta*

I'm not in the beta either. I'm still on GoW, though.

I played for a couple hours last night. The control scheme is quite a bit different now. From what I can tell R-bumper reloads, X deploys gadgets (bubble shields, lightning ball?, etc), L-bumper swtches grenade type, and the bumpers are also used for getting in and out of vehicles and picking up weapons. Not sure what all the new things do yet. There's spiked grenades, and lightning balls (which I accidently killed teammates with while trying to reload). My favorite addition?...Detaching a turret and walking arround with it feels sweet. But in the end I had to go back to gears. I'm sure I'll play more later but it hasn't entirely won me over yet.

I played a little bit last night and enjoyed it. At first I sucked b/c I didn't realize I could change the control scheme... mainly I like to invert the up down look and I was having a hard time with it being the other way. Once I found where you could configure the controls though I did much better. My third game I think I ended up with 15 kills (11 of which were melee... who needs to shoot when I can just walk up behind people and bonk them on the head). I didn't really get a feel for the new weapons too much but I did play with the gadgets a little. The launch pad thing is fun. I threw one down and then just kept running across it. I also suck at driving vehicles. I'm sure I'll play it some more this weekend but so far I like what I see.

I gotta say, Halo 3 is worth it for me alone, just because of the detachable turret (Vulcan Raven, anyone?) and the spikey grenades.


For some reason I get a kick out of hearing the magnetic *clink*!!! as it sticks to the guys dome.


And the sounds are insanely realistic in this one.


I don't know guys, I love GoW, but I never had any illusions. Halo owns my heart.

And Fro: I don't care if you weigh my team down, when you swear I always smile and say "Oh that Fro"