FunWiki: HaLo

You are not ready to understand the HaLo.

Winter break is almost up, and I am beginning to experience proper withdrawl. Jimmy, we are going to have to get some all-nighter on when school starts again. And Mac, look out behind your base.

  -CABAL "The Silent Stalker" Maindi

Well, even a non-updated wiki page is right once a year

It should be noted that the Library sucks unbelievably less ass on a mouse and keyboard. And the music is the r0x0r?. --WillShipley

While it is undeniable that fps on console SucksRoyalMonkeyBalls?, this game is strangely addictive (what did we calculate our average HaLo time per 24 hour period to be? around 4.5?). - the 'Gregolas'

Actually, I'm going to have to deny that--AlexBobbs

Which? The console, the MonkeyBalls?, or the addictive nature of the game?
- Depends on whether we are talking about regular MonkeyBalls? or those of the SuperMonkeyBall persuasion. But I think I originally meant to deny the bit that is claimed to be undeniable, that being "fps on console SucksRoyalMonkeyBalls?". I mean, really, I spent half my senior year of highschool playing Goldeneye for the N64, and I don't recall sucking on any MonkeyBalls?. I guess I denied them.
  - Goldeneye's controls are a lot easier to use. Partially because aiming doesn't have to change the direction you're facing, but mostly because of autoaim.
    - I agree. GoldenEye?, Perfect Dark, and the subsequent ('read crappier') Bond games got it right with the whole precision aiming thing. HaLo's weapons are not particularly conducive to it's control setup. I think RedFaction? for PS2 works with a similar control setup because most of its weapons perform adequately with minimal accuracy (also, let us not forget GeoMod?).
    - There's nothing wrong with HaLo's aiming. Autoaim would be completely cheap and make the game extremely noobish. If you can't aim, that's your problem, not the game's. I've never had any trouble with it despite being an ardent supporter of keyboard-and-mouse fps. HaLo's weapon set is also probably about the most balanced I've ever seen, especially given the 2 weapons at a time system, which is excellent.
    - I'm not sure what any of you are talking about, since Halo *does* have autoaim; try aiming at someone in multi and having him move. Also, Halo lacks precise (read: long range) weapons except for the pistol and the sniper rifle, both of which have scopes. Maybe it's just me, but I've always found autoaim in GoldenEye? and Halo to be rather annoying, since it often neglects to properly lead moving targets. (Yes, I do much better in GoldenEye? with autoaim off, using the 1.2 control setup and aiming almost exclusively without using the "precise" mode.) Halo is intended to be a close-up fighter in most regards; you can club someone over the head with every weapon and the assault rifle has an effective range of maybe 20 meters at best

Despite agreeing that fps on console SucksRoyalMonkeyBalls?, I think I prefer playing HaLo on console, as the fps of HaLo SucksRoyalMonkeyBalls? on a computer unless you have twice the recommended system (which I sadly don't). Also, 4.5 average sounds about right, since we make up for the days we don't play much by playing for 10+ most weekends. - Eric a.k.a. 'Macavenger'

It ran okay on my computer, and I'd have to say that it's much better on a Mac than a console. FPS just needs a mouse and keyboard. But still, it's nothing special. --JonathanBeall

Isn't your Mac an oldish iBook, and if so, how did you get it to run okay? I've got all the settings at minimum on a 1 GHz TiBook?, nothing running in the background, and it's still laggy at times. If I could get it to lag less, I'd definitely agree that it's better on the Mac. --EricBerglund

No. He got a new shinier laptop. So did I, but it still doesn't meet the min requirements. I can run it in safe mode, but it keeps crashing my computer and doesn't seem to be able to save. Since I don't have a usb mouse, playing with the trackpad also SucksRoyalMonkeyBalls?. --VictorWang

Now I've got a 1.25 GHz AlBook?. My guess is that the difference is mainly the newer graphics card. With most settings at High or Medium (and resolution at either 640x480? (I figure it was made for TV screens)) it runs just fine. Except for the one time, just as I was doing the time-limited driving away thing at the end, that a big cron job I'd forgotten about started up. Big bursts of lag, leading to repeated death. Sigh. And especially on a Mac, Halo does need a mouse with lots of buttons because it (grumble) doesn't let you use modifier keys in the controls. Bah. --JonathanBeall
- And to clarify what I meant about the modifier keys not working (in response to some off-wiki confusion), you can't use the modifier keys at all the controls. You can't bind shift, shift-<some key>, or shift-click to anything for values of shift including shift, control, alt, command, and enter. --Jonathan Beall
- Jedi Knight II had a problem in the initial Mac release where you couldn't use a simulated right-click to remove points from force skills in multiplayer setup, but that was patched. Maybe an upcoming Halo patch will fix the modifier key thing. Not that I'd hold my breath for it or anything like that.
It runs fine as long as you don't crank the resolution over 640x480?, which is better than you're getting on the X-Box anyway.

Quick overview: You're the masterchief, this cyborg-soldier guy, and you run around and kill aliens on this ring world (kinda like from Larry Niven's Ring World series ... hmmmm...). That's about it. Oh, I guess there's a plot, but you'll not be finding spoilers here! Go to Jimmy J's room and play it (or, if you agree that fps on console SucksRoyalMonkeyBalls?, pester someone to get you a cracked computer version).

Plot overview:

: The year is 2552, and the human race has unified through the UN (sounds like StarCraft, doesn't it). Overpopulation has forced humans to colonize other planets. With the backing of the UN Space Command in the colonisation effort, millions now live on extrasolar planets. One of the key colonies is the planet Reach. Situated close to Earth, Reach is an intersteller naval yard and also a hub of scientific research.

: 32 years ago, contact with the outer colony Harvest was lost. The UNSC sent out a battle group to investigate, but only one badly damaged ship returned. The crew told of alien warships so powerful that they easily obliterated the entire fleet.

: This new alien threat, known as the Covenant, is actually several alien races united in their hatred for humanity (i.e. religious fanatacism). Humanity has been declared an affront to their religion, prompting a holy war meant to wipe out humanity (kind of like the YuuzhanVong? in StarWars)(Kind of like in StarWars how?).

: Humans attempted to fight back, but suffered defeat after defeat. Their strategy turned defensive as Admiral Preston Cole of the UNSC established the Cole Protocol: no vessel may inadvertently lead the Covenant to Earth. Any ship forced to withdraw must avoid Earth-bound vectors, and any ship in danger of capture must self-destruct.

: Meanwhile on Reach, a secret military project, the Spartan II project, takes on newfound importance. The bioengineered cyborg super-soldiers of Spartan II rack up impressive battle records against the Covenant, but there aren't enough of them to turn the tides of war.

: Spartan II soldiers are recalled for further augmentation. A plan is developed to board a Covenant ship with the enhanced super-soldiers and learn the whereabouts of the Covenant homeworld. But two days before the operation commences, Covenant forces attack Reach. 32 of the 33 Spartan II soldiers are sent down to defend the colony, but they are overrun and the colony is obliterated. The only surviving ship, the Pillar of Autumn, escapes with last Spartan II soldier, Master Chief. With the Covenant at Earth's doorstep, the Pillar of Autumn makes a blind jump into deep space, hoping to lead the Covenant away.

: But the onboard AI, Cortana, has other plans. Just before the Covenant had arrived at Reach Cortana had intercepted and decoded a Covenant transmission from the second battle of the Sigma Octanus conflict. This transmission translates into a set of coordinates that Cortana kept secret. These are the coordinates of the ring-world, Halo.

: During the jump, Cortana secretly substitutes these coordinates as the ship's jump coordinates. The Pillar of Autumn exits its jump to find Halo. But before the crew can figure out what's going on, the Covenant armada bears down on them.

: The battle for Halo has begun

Where does this part about Cortana deliberately leading the ship to Halo come from? I've read the manual and seen all the games cut scenes and never saw anything to that effect.
- It was on one of the gamefaqs walkthroughs. I think it may be taken from the book (yes, there is a book series based off of Halo).
  - This is all very funny, because I've played and beat the game, and all I knew was that master cheif was the last cyborg dude (never heard of spartan II...) That's whack.

VideoGame RedVsBlue

Played During HaloNight from 8:00 pm saturday evening till we drop (usually around 4:00 am sunday morning, where upon whe make a trip to DoughnutMan)

On March 23, 2004, what shall be known as the "temporal draw anomoly" occured on the map "longest". It was a team slayer with a kill limit set to 50. NORMALY only one team wins. The TDA was caused by simultaneous kills by Macavenger (EricBerglund) of the blue team and Logan5 (LoganGordon) of the red team. A roster of the game is as follows:

Red: Logan5, Jimmy J, Walk Man, TurdFergesn?, Antiwank

Blue: Macavenger, Warp Burn, Legolas, Coldfire, Silent JAK, WAXOR

I believe this is sufficient evidence to prove that perfectly balanced teams are possible.

Just for the record, I really miss Halo. Also for the record, do you all remember watching the halo 2 multiplayer preview with the guy who had a supposed tattoo of November 7, 2004 on his arm? Well, I don't know what provoked this, but they decided to delay the release of Halo2?. Noramlly this would really piss me off, but they only delayed it two days! Just a wierd thing I thought we should all be aware of. Some guy out there has a tattoo of a date that is now meaningless, ha!

Halo roster available at HaloFrosh.