Halo Wars

[snwbrdr435]

Im going to be getting a copy later today, So far the demo ended up being pretty fun to play. Hopefully it doesnt suck. Anyone else on here going to get a copy i'll give a review tonight.

[MinisterofDOOM]

I didn't realize it was out already...or that there was a demo.

I'm a big RTS nut, but Halo Wars looks a little too dumbed-down for me. Then again EndWar was intentionally dumbed down to make it more accessible and it's still fun.

I'll have to check it out, but I doubt it'll do much to distract me from my crusade in the name of Kane.

[hsckris]

I bought it not realizing it wasn't like all the other Halos.

So far I'm not all that into it, but I'm going to give it some more time.

[snwbrdr435]

The demo was rather easy. Hopefully it wont be that bad.

[BusyBadger]

The demo was rather easy. Hopefully it wont be that bad.

Like all games its only as tough as the opposition.

Buy the full version and play on XBL against humans.

[bmike818]

I can't believe I forgot too. You know this means the new Halo 3 maps are out as well

...yes I play Halo 3

[MinisterofDOOM]

I played a little of the demo but got bored. Not necessarily a reflection on the game...I'm just bored right now.

Initial thoughts:The game's take on base building is interesting. Limited building slots means you have to be strategic in your base focus. Could be fun.

Units are STUPID. Warthogs can't figure out how to drive away from and back to the target they're supposed to be ramming. You have to manually direct them away, then command them to ram. Pretty sad.

The rotary menu system is nice, but the fact that the menus are "permanent" and must be backed out of with B rather than something like "hold RT for menu" makes them a little bit tedious. Using the triggers to bring up and drop circle menus would be much smoother and integrate more nicely with the flow of battle.

The game needs some sort of unit grouping system. Right now, unit selection is crude and limiting.

Why even bother with costs if your currency/resource magically appears from nowhere as long as you have the corresponding building? No harvesters, no real risk to income aside from the destruction of the building itself.

[krimsonviper]

I played a little of the demo but got bored. Not necessarily a reflection on the game...I'm just bored right now.

Initial thoughts:The game's take on base building is interesting. Limited building slots means you have to be strategic in your base focus. Could be fun.

The game needs some sort of unit grouping system. Right now, unit selection is crude and limiting.

Why even bother with costs if your currency/resource magically appears from nowhere as long as you have the corresponding building? No harvesters, no real risk to income aside from the destruction of the building itself.

[krimsonviper]

I can't believe I forgot too. You know this means the new Halo 3 maps are out as well

...yes I play Halo 3

I thougth the new maps weren't available to purchase to those who haven't bought halo wars, yet. amirng?

[MinisterofDOOM]

More thoughts:

The population caps are just TOO low. I mean, I can understand capping it to retain the intended scope, or to improve performance. But a unit cap or 30 is WAYYYY to low. Look, I have 16,000 credits sitting unspent. Let me crank out some second-line units with that money and have them waiting to throw on the front lines when they're needed.

The game needs a Blizzard-style "leader" unit system. When I have my fighting force of a variety of units selected, pressing Y unleashes a hilarious s***storm of confusion as they all try and do their completely contradictory special attacks at once. I want my tanks to unleash their anti-infantry shells, that's it. But to do that I have to select a tank, target, press y, then reselect everyone. There's got to be a better way to do things. The game's ultra-simple interface is way too limiting. I mean, there's even an "Endwar"-style dashboard at the bottom...let me use the d-pad to highlight at least a unit TYPE from the dashboard to restrict special move usage without having to reselect units.

This game is genuinely fun, and it looks spectacular. But the as a long-long-long-time RTS player (my first real PC gaming experience was C&C LAN parties) the über-friendly control scheme is far too limiting. I'll stick to Obelisks of Light and Stealth Tanks, thank you very much.

[krimsonviper]

What this game really needs, is a f***ing keyboard.

And tits.

[MinisterofDOOM]

What this game really needs, is a f***ing keyboard

You effing nailed it. A game designed from the ground up for the 360 only and it STILL needs a keyboard.

I read one review of it that mentioned that since Halo Wars will see no PC port it doesn't have to make any of the "concessions" that other console strategy games do. Concessions, my a**.

And the ultimate Irony is that C&C3, a VASTLY deeper and more complex RTS, DESIGNED FOR THE PC, was ported to the Xbox 360 with a much more functional interface.

FAIL. No wonder MS closed Ensemble Studios.

[krimsonviper]

You don't agree with the tits part?

Must be the massive amounts of anime I've been watching, that's led me to believe that large mammaries in games make it 2 times better.

[bmike818]

I thougth the new maps weren't available to purchase to those who haven't bought halo wars, yet. amirng?

I have been fighting the urge to spend $80 bucks on a game right now....

too bad you can't go into to First person perspective and control one crazy unit....(Master Chief)

Then zoom back to RTS mode when needed.

Like how Sim City did with Streets of Sim City.

[bmike818]

I got the game, I like it. It is a very simple RTS game with a Halo flavor. I have spent a good 4 hours on it. Controls are okay, not as bad as I have read. The graphics are good. I will find myself in skirmish mode when I finish the game. Just like Warcraft 3, I actually enjoy playing the custom games as to playing through the missions.

I predict more maps for Halo Wars.

...not a bad last game from Ensemble studios....(I really enjoyed Age of Mythology)

[snwbrdr435]

Im a fan of the game. Playing online with a group of friends is awesome. One of my friends got taken out by the A.I. within the first 5 mins.

[bmike818]

Hit me up for multiplayer GT: mykill818

spent more time with Halo Wars yesterday.....I am hooked

[MinisterofDOOM]

Just like Warcraft 3, I actually enjoy playing the custom games as to playing through the missions.

Thanks to Blizzard ruining the singleplayer campaigns with that bulls*** pseudo-RPG garbage, custom games are pretty much all I ever bothered with in WCIII. My ents will eat your soul.

[bmike818]

this game has consumed me

I want to do it in Coop!

[SstCabinBoy]

sick snowboardin pics

[snwbrdr435]

YEAAA SPAM

[EpicNightMayor]

I didn't realize it was out already...or that there was a demo.

I'm a big RTS nut, but Halo Wars looks a little too dumbed-down for me. Then again EndWar was intentionally dumbed down to make it more accessible and it's still fun.

I'll have to check it out, but I doubt it'll do much to distract me from my crusade in the name of Kane.

Are you s***ting me?EndWar is the f***ing worst game ever.

[C-Kwik]

Finally got around to playing this. I actually bought the game a few weeks ago (I wasn't ready to buy it yet, but I got a hell of a deal on 2 copies) but didn't even open it as I was still playing through Lego Star Wars.

The game is pretty good. The controls are a bit odd, but not overly complicated. I wouldn't go as far as to say they are intuitive, but not hard to pick up on. I played it on co-op with the GF and its loads of fun this way. When things get really crazy, we split up duties between the fighting and building. The level where you have to protect the cargo ships is pretty cool this way. The healing circle is a pretty interesting tool as well and used creatively can really boost your unit's ability to handle a large group of attackers.

The game's take on base building is interesting. Limited building slots means you have to be strategic in your base focus. Could be fun.

Totally. And it also makes it imperative to actually try and seek out another site for a base for more reactors if you want to get better technology.

Units are STUPID. Warthogs can't figure out how to drive away from and back to the target they're supposed to be ramming. You have to manually direct them away, then command them to ram. Pretty sad.

Totally. I had a mixed group of infantry and warthogs selected and pressed Y with the intent that the infantry would throw grenades. The warthogs tried to ram it while the infantry lobbed their grenades. In a way, it made for some entertainment as I found it rather hilarious.

The rotary menu system is nice, but the fact that the menus are "permanent" and must be backed out of with B rather than something like "hold RT for menu" makes them a little bit tedious. Using the triggers to bring up and drop circle menus would be much smoother and integrate more nicely with the flow of battle.

I'd prefer a press and hold function as well. Or at the very least, make the menu go away after I selected something. I'd rather bring the menu up again than to have to seek out "B". What I do think the Halo Wars control scheme is though, is easy to learn. Advanced RTS players who are used to being able to run through commands quickly on a keyboard will likely find a lot of fault in this system. But I tend to believe that the game tends to be focused on a broader audience than the typical PC RTS player anyways.

The game needs some sort of unit grouping system. Right now, unit selection is crude and limiting.

The game needs a Blizzard-style "leader" unit system. When I have my fighting force of a variety of units selected, pressing Y unleashes a hilarious s***storm of confusion as they all try and do their completely contradictory special attacks at once. I want my tanks to unleash their anti-infantry shells, that's it. But to do that I have to select a tank, target, press y, then reselect everyone. There's got to be a better way to do things.

There is, sort of. While not as good as having "preset" groups, you can either select all or select local and then use right trigger button to scroll through the individual types within the group. Then you press "y" to select them. However, for the most part, it seems fairly slow as targets seem to be destoyed by the time I pick one type out to use a special attack if I'm rolling with a group large enough to have to single out one type of character. We'll see how this pans out as I progress through the game.

I think my biggest complaint at the moment is simply navigating around the map. It tends to feel slow and the only 2 shortcuts are the left and right on the D-pad which only work well when you are trying to get to a base or want to go to where an alert just occurred.

My other complaint is that I wish there were a better way to manage the control of units in co-op mode. Basically, the person who builds them controls them. In one level so far, it was easier to have one person build while the other fights. Problem is the person who builds has control of the new units. While the control of units can be transferred to the other player, it requires a tedious process where you select the option, which brings up large cursor which you place in the area of the units you want to transfer control of. And since the cursor has a limited radius, you may need to do this more than once for each group. Add in multiple bases and it can get a bit more complicated. I can think of a couple of strategies to try and help with this, but there is still some requirement to be actively involved in doing this.

Other than that though, the game has been pretty fun in co-op so far.

[bmike818]

I've been stuck on Halo Wars the past week, 3 vs 3 nevar gets old. Cwik did you know you can hold down the left trigger when navigating, this will make your screen move 4 times faster.

[C-Kwik]

Nice. Online multiplayer RTS left a bad taste in my mouth after Starcraft. I was never very good at it, but the one time I was doing really well and built up a huge army, my 2 teammates (random matchup) switched sides and ambushed me. Part of the problem was they did so while I was attacking the other team and got all their troops in while we were still teamed up, so they basically took out anything I would need to build more troops. By the time I realized what was happening, it was way too late to do anything about it.

Thanks for the tip on holding left trigger. But I'm still missing the ability to just point the mouse at the map and click where I want to be able to see. Or to find a "preset" group of units simply by pressing the corresponding number. I was never a huge fan of RTS, but there are certainly things that made certain actions simpler. But to be honest, had I never played a good RTS on a PC, I may not have known any better.

[snwbrdr435]

Halo wars is fun again!

New content is just game modes. capture the flag keep away and reinforcements. Reinforcements is my favorite.

[C-Kwik]

Halo wars is fun again!

New content is just game modes. capture the flag keep away and reinforcements. Reinforcements is my favorite.

I saw that the other day. But I just started playing Halo 3 again as I hadn't played on the Mythic Maps yet. I may revisit it later as some of it sounds like a whole lot of fun. Though, I've never been much into RTS...especially against real people. I still have a lot of bitterness about it from previous experiences.

I did play against AI bots to get through many of the achievements and unlock all of the timeline and I have a few gripes. I wish they would allow you to set up an uneven match, say 1 vs 3 or 2 vs 4, etc. It can be a fun challenge to see how many bots you can take on as it challenges your abilities. It would just be another dimension to add to the game.

[jtjohnny102]

i like halo

[snwbrdr435]

^ Thats great.

[bmike818]

http://www.halowars.com/

New game modes for 800ms points

I am fighting the urge to purchase them.....they do look like fun

i like halo