News Archives - February 2007

A Great Question
Posted by WatchWood on February 27, AD 2007 @ 12:23 PM

If you've been frequenting the forums much, you may have noticed that I've got a bit of free time on my hands. Not a lot, but enough that I've managed to get these humble pieces done in the past couple weeks:












You get the picture. Check by the forums regularly for more of these dubious works of art.

Yay for Balance
Posted by WatchWood on February 21, AD 2007 @ 10:26 PM
In a recent blog entry by Bruce Shelley, we learn some interesting things about Halo Wars. It seems that they recently had a bit of an open house to bring people up to speed on the game's progress. Food, beer, a really big TV, and a lot of 3v3 goodness were all there as they laid waste to teams throughout the building.

It was also revealed that the team is making good use of SQL tables and some really neat software to make their balance testing a lot more effective; thus letting them pick up on issues like overpowered defenses defenses resulting in a game feeling like "a World War I attack by infantry against machine gun emplacements." Their new tool (called Tableau) lets them make much faster calls about tweaking balance and the like, since they have to make fewer test passes to isolate problems in the balance. This means more productivity, a better end product, and maybe even a sooner release date if we're lucky.

(Like I'm that lucky, eh?)
Bungie's Weekly Update
Posted by WatchWood on February 17, AD 2007 @ 3:15 PM
There's a big Weekly Update out from Bungie this week, full of all sorts of interesting goodies. Sounds like they've been talking to Microsoft's marketing and PR division in order to create a 'brand identity' for Halo 3. Not that they need to do anything, the way their franchise has grown. While they announced the game last spring, it is only now that the official marketing campaign has begun, all centered around a truly amazing image. (similar to Halo 2's golden campaign)

Naturally, hey have the whole thing available in a number of resolutions for your desktop background convenience. Seems they're also going to be redoing the site soon, which'll be something to see. They claim it's nothing to do with the Halo 3 stuff, but I think I prefer my conspiracy theories, thank you very much.

They're working on the combat dialog (still), and it seems it's slowly coming together. Given the sheer volume of lines that need to be recorded though (and in how many language variants it needs to be recorded in), it's really not all that surprising that it's taking such a long time. But let's do some math.

Assuming it takes about 5 minutes to get a single line of dialog that's used in the final game, and that there are 10,000 lines of dialog, that works out to just over 830 or so hours of recording time. And since last time I checked there was a wee bit more then that in the English language variant alone, that works out to be a lowball estimate. Now, assuming they can get in 8 productive hours a day dedicated to dialog, 5 days a week, then it *should* take them about 21 weeks to do it. And that's not counting who knows how many bajillion hours put into the sound effects and music there are to be found in the Halo games. The moral of the story is that it takes a lot longer to do the audio portion of the game then you'd think it would.

More and more details are going into the game, with props being scattered about like empty coke cans on my desk, or something. And it seems that those pesky Covenantsniper towers are now a destructable item. I'll admit that this pleases me to no end, since I just love things that go boom. It's the underlying philosophy behind the tactics I use in just about any game that I play.

There's now an FAQ out with all kinds of answers to your Halo 3 Beta questions. Except, of course, the obvious question of just when the beta is going to be, since they still have yet to decide. And sadly, it seems that trying to make use of the Whaaambulance isn't going to get you in if you thought that you should have made it in, either.

And finally, there's an update in there on the controls for Halo 3. Most of it is about what you'd expect from previous updates, though there seems to be some interesting possibilities for the D-Pad, and there's still no useful data on the X-Button. My bet is that it's either the long awaited Run function that got cut from Halo 2, or some sort of shield overcharger that lets you go off like a plasma grenade, and probably without the negative side effects of actually being a plasma grenade.
Rule of 3 Update
Posted by WatchWood on February 13, AD 2007 @ 1:13 PM
Just a heads up, the last of the confirmarion emails for Phase 2 of the Rule of 3 to get into the Halo 3 Beta have gone out, so if you didn't get one, then you're probably not getting in through the phase two option.

Now all that's left for the beta goodness is the Beta invite in Crackdown, for those of us who are hardcore enough to get in that way.
Forum Games
Posted by WatchWood on February 13, AD 2007 @ 1:08 PM
What with the Fan Fiction Contest judging and the Gears of War Mafia winding down, several forummers have seen fit to start up some more forum games.

IND Master Chief has started a Doom Mini Mafia (spaces limited, sign up fast)that's looking like it will be very fun indeed.

Brandon Rebuga has started a Halo Knowledge test game, which looks like it will be an interesting read, and even more fun to participate in.

And Lazer X7 has got a Character Creation Contest going, to see who can come up with the most original and interesting Halo universe character.

Check them out.
Halowars motion capturing!
Posted by Bendak on February 1, AD 2007 @ 2:54 PM
Ensemble Studios posted about motion capturing in their new update in the official Halowars forums. It's the first time we'll see motion capture in Halo games. Check the pics on their forums!