Twinreaper

halo Ball is my absolute fav! I am starting up an official Hub for this gametype. hokey is the best especially when you get paired with a bunch of guys who share the same passion. I mean killing once in a while is ok, but spamming the crap out of everyone just for the sake of killing is boring and mindless. I love to play with my son. he get's the true play and feel of the experience and has a great time coming up with attack plans. Sadly he always sticks me in goal cause I rock at goaltending.

conscider it squashed Capwn3d. It would help, and I am unsure why they decided after Halo 2, to rely on player hosting for multiplayer matches. My guess is that becuase most of the time when you play, you are more likely to be paired with people who reside in the same country or even timezone. using a player host based system for those particular types of matches are ideal, but only if the host has a great upstreem bandwidth as you said. My best guess would be because of all of the innovations within the multiplayer game they made, required more resources to be freed on the server end. It does take quite a bit of time for their servers to collect the data, shift it to the right sql style data table, reparse it, then transmit it thru the API's in real time. But then again, they got tons of dough to invest in equipment. Then again, using a dedicated game setup would benefit only people with low ping, or those close to where the servers are based. But it is rather annoying to have the game crap out on the score screen and hold there for what seems to be an infinity while host negotiations with the server go on. I'd trade lag and leading shots for getting rid of that crap for sure. Could you have imagined the chaos if halo 1 and 2 had that host shiz? This and the annoying issues plaguing the game are prolly a good reason why 75% of the people on my friends list are always playing custom games. At least you know who you are playing with and what kind of connection to expect.

Actually both are correct but overlooked another issue that has been plaguing the Live system since Halo 2....... connection and host. The wat Live determines host is not a very well thought out component of the logistical Live operations. Live in matchmaking picks hosts based on their current at the moment connection speed and stability. Majority of the time,.someone with a half assed connection gets host. This leads to horrible lag or said host being kicked from the match. Same goes with other players. Quite a few times in the past month I was kicked from Live and trust me....my connection is as stable and fast as it gets. When I am not on Live my home server hosts 3 dedicated servers for Halo.1 pc, 1 Halo 2 PC server, a Crysis 2 server, MW 1 server and a teamspeak channel. None of my server regulars have ever reported an outage or lack of service. So if my simple home server can do all that at once on a phenom x3 platform, why is the Live service struggling to keep up? They put tons of money and hardware behind the service and matchmaking. Really makes you wonder....

And I am the one sounding like an ass? Just because you do not understand how to load a Halo title map, display string ID tables and display meta data in a "meta editor" style container.... do not talk down to me, or insult my work and progress that I do in terms of modifications to a great game. I really don't understand what you are trying to accomplish. All I do is provide proof for those who have questions or comments about game engine related items. I am sorry that you are too short sighted to see that and have dedicated all 8 of your posts this far, to nothing more than flaming a respected member of this community. You sir will not make many friends here acting in this way. I'm done. Please lock this thread Twam or Spectral.

I'm assuming that was meant as sarcasm.

I'm actually glad to hear that. I may have to come up with a cool MLG style icon for HaloBall and start posting up stuff like top ten "Best Scores" and stuff like that. I'll see what i can come up with in the next few weeks and post up some relevant info when I get the chance.

Wow really? What does my lacking of skill as I get older, have anything to do with the fact that I have superior proven knowlege base with all halo games and their respective Blam! engines? I have been modding and writing map applications since early 02, what have you done that can prove your worthiness with the halo community? Oh wait, these lame ass half baked accusations and flaming is about all you can muster. Everyone like you, has stated before their opinions...but where is your proof of certain things you claim to be true about what you are trying to pass off as fact about "bloom"? As usual, when you can't prove your right and someone has spanked the **** out you when it comes to game mechanics and simple tag operations....you resort to calling people out on their skill or lack of skill with gaming. It's ok, keep deflecting to another subject other than the one your losing at.....I won't think any less of you.

Just wanted to get some feedback regarding the greatest underated gametype ever! HaloBall!!!! I love haloball especially the hockey variant. IS there any official tourny or league for Haloball around anywhere? I really want to get some type of team for this going or possibly start up some sort of Haloball vid gallery. Kinda like what we have now for grifball. Anyone interested or have any information on all this?

I'm happy now cause I have fellow old farts to game with!! Win Win! And I am also happy becuase Twam actually made a rare appearance above there! Been some time Twam....all is well I hope?

I agree with the concept but pulling it off would be no fun in any way for the developer. While it may seem simple, there are many vertices, faces and edges that the engine would have to calculate to make fully scalable items without any type of aspect lock. It's one thing to just adjust the scale of an item, but it is a completely seperate beast to be able to adjust different isolated sections of geometry. Having something like this would resemble a 3d application blended with the Sapien object placing tool. Both would be way to memory consuming for a console to pull off viably. But then again with the advancement in the MegaloScript engine and or any other direction 343 decides to head in engine wise...it may be possible. Though i dont sensibly see it being available on the current hardware limitations of the 360. Overall very good concept. It would definatly add to the Forge experience and really give forgers a new dimension of playability. What are your thoughts on a Forge type variant involving certain aspects of the campaign?

yes you are correct. There is no "bloom" reticule on the BR. but the BR does have a firing spread. As I stated before bloom is just a widget function in the HUD tags. It has no relatrion to how or does it at all control the weapon or how it fires.

I'm happy because now I don't feel like I am all alone in my old age around here.....TY Spectral!!!!

Well more to the specific point, it's actually more about how the game engine was designed to handle the formats in terms of memory flow. Yes the 360 is quite capable of more. For example look at Crysis 2. The amount of poly's rendered on the screen at one time can well exceed 1,200,000. Yes that's one million two-hundred thousand polys. But that is also because the Crytek team designed the engine to handle this and be memory efficient enough to properly utilize the 360 hardware. Same goes for BF3 and MW3. In terms of rendering detail far and close, the other game engines have Blam! beat by a mile.

Wow, glad to know there are more retards like you who do not understand one damn thing about a game or it's mechanics. Games do not contain luck. Luck is a common human belief that something other than a series of events lead to an unpredictable result. Luck is non existent. DMR battles with the TU will not require more skill, but less skill to get those headshot kills. Because of the tweaks to the weapons, the firing radius (spread) of the DMR is trimmed down to that of the old H3 Battle Rifle. Now whether or not they are adjusting the weapons projectile speed has yet to be seen. Really iCapWN3d, you should understand things first before trying to spout off about them. It just makes you look stupid. And for the last time...BLOOM HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH HOW THE WEAPON FIRES OR HOW ACCURATE IT IS. IT IS ONLY A VISUAL AID USED TO HELP PLAYERS. BLOOM IS NOT RECOIL. BLOOM DOES NOT CONTROL ANYTHING. My god people really?!? How many times must I state this, as well as others. Can we make a new rule? How about after now, after all the data and examples I have provided, anyone else wishing to insult others about bloom or give out stupid ass comments about what bloom is or isn't, said people get banned from the site, or have Ungoy feces thrown at them. Anyone here want to officially challenge me on the specifics of the Reach Blam! Engine, MegaloScript or tag data and fields in regards to this idiotic thing called "bloom"? No? GOOD! Case closed. Please lock this thread Spectral.

And that's what matters most. They created it, not us. Learn to adjust to new game mechanics. Adjust your tactics and teamwork. Constantly complaining about things never gets you anywhere in life.

You know slightly how the BR works. Bloom is nothing more than the visual effect of the HUD reticule letting you know when it is safe to fire a shot again after a certain time period has elapsed since your last shot. This feature has been in all Halo games and is more specifically firing radius. Depending on how fast you shoot, effects the radius in which your shots can land. The blooming reticule is just showing players on screen the value that is in the weapon tag itself. Does anyone read what i write when I try to explain these things?!? Reach is just simply the first Halo game to give players a visual representation of real time firing radius via the blooming reticule. Bloom itself is nothing more than a HUD bitmap widget with a shader function. The BR had a toned down radius to the effect of something like 0.015 or something like that. Even when pulling the trigger rapidly or pacing shots, the amount of space you could expect the br to land shots in was very small. Go way back and think about the BXR hack people used. Even when firing super fast like that, the shots stayed on target. That is due to the weapon tags value settings, not bloom or lack there of. Bloom was only added likely because of a large amount of the community wanted a way of knowing where exactly they could expect there shots to land as they pulled the trigger each time, rather than have a giant reticule radius that was fixed, and have to guess where in that space even paced shots would land. TO wrap it up nicely for you, bloom is a visual aid, nothing more.

I assume you are referring to the albatross tags that you can use to place them in Halo 2 and Halo 1 for the PC? If so, there are many authors. Too many to count. Extracting models from Halo 3 has been possible for a while now. Because the models can be easily extracted it is always easier to just give credit for those things to the author of the application you used to extract them. In which case, it would E3po for his application Xtraction. If you are referring to the actual artist for Bungie who made it...good luck getting that info!

Simple answer.... you can't. So far to date, the most we have been able to do is simple campaign save and forge edits. Even with the editing we can do, we are limited to the palette of items that is already inside the maps. To add vehicles to a map that does not have them already would require you to decompile the tag data into a usable debug format, then require you to inject the new data into a map. problem is, that the data then would get shifted and throw off pointers and string id table. Also keep in mind that resigning an entire map file would require a public and private key pair set to provide the proper encryption hash...which we do not have or close to having at all. All that aside, I would love to see a dedicated space combat scenario. Perhaps make a 2 of them. One focused on out in space jetpack man to man combat. Hopping around the outskirts and structures of a space stations. The 2nd one a vehicle dedictaed map. Longswords, Seraph's, etc... Wicked fun all around!

Quite the opposite there Jhorse. You have no idea how anything in the game works from a programmers perspective. Did you even go and read anything that has to do with bloom that i posted before? I get all my tech data and know-how from actually diving into the games data, I don't just sit around and look up stats online and stuff. I actually do real programming work to shift thru meta data, string id's, encrypted tag data, etc. Everything I have posted about bloom and other game mechanics is spot on and is actual hard coded game data fact. I could care less if you do or do not voice your opinion. But what i will not accept, is someone voicing an opinion that tries to sell people on what they say is true and fact. You are entitled to your opinion at all times, but do not go around saying what bloom does or does not do. You have no skill or knowledge to back up a view like that.....I however do. And whether I am good or bad at reach or multiplayer does not have anything to do with this thread topic anyway. What's the matter, baby can't take being spanked about game mechanics so now he is going to try to make me look bad by calling out my gaming skill? Really? How sad..... This topic thread was entitled "Solid reason of why bloom is good/bad", yet I have not read anything close to being an actual game data fact as to why it is. All I have read is a bunch of whiny opinions about it. Opinions are not solid reasons...just saying.

on the Pillar of Autumn.

Your New car, you and people like you are the sole reason Reach has lost players. Constant whining and crying about how you do not like things and refuse to adjust to them is just a sign of weakness not only as a player but as a human being. Tolerance is a virtue as is patience. With every new game you play you must adjust play style and tactics. Simply calling it quits because a company or game division throws you a curve ball once in a while is very immature and petty. Perhaps you and the following like you, should put all their rage into a more productive effort to make the Reach populous a much better place. It's always easier to cry fowl and ***** than admit things and adjust. I suggest you learn to deal with life and take a good hard look at yourself before you blame others for shortcomings. Nothing in life is ever going to be designed to your exact liking. there will always be flaws or things you do not like. Learn some tolerance.

The easiest and most viable solution would be to make the flame a permanent armor permutation and have the flame color adjustable to match the secondary and primary armor color. Much easier and space friendly to hard drives for that extra content.

Agreed. During pre-production when the Reach Engine was being coded, they were solely focused on supporting everything they ever wanted to throw into a stand alone Halo title. Hence foregoing the traditional Halo feel we were all familiar with. But that aside it turned out well given the above information. I suspected as much that people would be too overhyped about the changes to support a classic feel. I said it all along that it wouldn't feel the way people were expecting. But then again it is still too early to tell. I have to admit though.....the Timberland map looks fricken awesome! It's almost identical to a Timberland remake I did for Halo 2 PC about 9 months ago. I had bridges spanning the creeks along the sides of the bases and tons of various trees and fallen trunks to lurk around in. I even added an additional waterfall. Perhaps the 343 team took some inspiration from the modding and map making community?

If I knew we were doing japanese greetings today I would have brushed up. Welcome Tina. Always glad to have another member of the female gender around here. I think I'm about as geeky as things get when it involves game talk so if you have any tech questions about Halo, seeing me, Serene, Vore and G00n is a must. Welcome again!

I could not agree more with having no remakes. Halo 1 was only remade because it is now the 10th Ann of it's release. They didn't decide to remake it because it needed an overhaul. By most standards, Halo 1 is still pretty much the bees knees when it comes to playing anything Halo. The story alone without tweaks was phenomenal. It was the first game I played that actually made me feel like I was there and sucked me in 100%. The engine itself has also stood the test of time. Even today you can always find large groups of people still developing new techniques and modifications using the basic tool set that was provided. Show me any other title that still has the fanbase Halo 1 has. Any future Halo title remake would not hold the same sentimental or reminiscent value that Halo 1 brings. Hell, there is even a project going on from Kornmann called Open Sauce. With it, he has been able to post process the graphics of Halo 1 to match Halo 3. Show me another titles game engine from 10 years ago that could do that! These are all just some of the reasons that only Halo 1 deserves a remake. Halo 3 graphically and story wise wa pretty solid. Despite what most players will say, I enjoyed it very much, and if I still had the game disc or digital download, I would still play it today. Help me help you by saying NO MORE REMAKES!!!!!! Spread the word!