Having persevered through the crashing and dropping out, I’m a little underwhelmed by Halo 3 in multiplayer.

The weapons are OK, although the Spartan Laser is useless in my hands. As is the Missile Pod. But I’m a bit fan of the Battle Rifle, and the new Mongoose quad.

But until I see single player, the jury is out. Things feel OK in multiplayer, but they always did. And already the same old faces are grouping together in lobbies, both to hang out, and avoid any spawn killers, high-pitched kids, or trash-talkers (Mainly, but not exclusively American still).

I realise they couldn’t redesign the golden calf with hands and opposable thumbs, but the biggest change appears to be the fact you can’t chat to your friends in game, because every time you try and press the D-Pad to communicate, you get shot. So if you like sniping out from the distance, or you’re the VIP in ‘Protect the VIP’, then you spend 5-10 minutes at on your own.

On the bright side, I’ve managed to get another 50 Orbs in Crackdown, and killed some mroe bosses.

“It’s like Halo 1/2, but a bit sharper.”

Okay, so I haven’t been playing it for that long, but there’s more than a hint of familiarity when you first spawn. The map is a reasonable size, visuals are a bit less blurry than previous Halos, and there are one or two interesting new items, but it isn’t going to be much of a shock to the system if you’re familiar with previous Halo multiplayer things. No doubt extended play will reveal some interesting subtleties, but at the moment it seems like a bit of a remix of older Halo excellence.

Which, by the way, is no bad thing.

qazimod

There’s nothing better than getting to play Halo 3 a day late.

At least I’d imagine that’s the case. Unfortunately, having other commitments, I’d arranged for last night to be clear to indulge myself in gaming.

Now that I can finally download the thing, I’ve got so much stuff to do, it’ll be June before I get a spare night.

*insert swear word of your choice here*

Badger

Am I the only one?

Am I the lone voice that actually is more excited about the upcoming Forza Motorsport 2 launch, than the Halo 3 Beta tonight? And that’s assuming I can actually download the thing.

That’s despite me buying an Xbox for Halo, and being in a supermarket at midnight for Halo 2. And that’s even despite the fact a good friend even bought Crackdown for me today, as he didn’t want me to miss the Beta!

The reason? Look at any of the threads of Bungie.net… Those same guys will be online tonight, and I’ll want to strangle them all.

Badger

Mm…all gang members dead and nothing left but a peaceful city and a few hundred agility orbs…at least it felt a bit more productive than idle thumb-twiddling. Speaking of thumb-twiddling, my Guitar Hero II order is scheduled to be available for me to pick up tomorrow; here’s hoping it doesn’t suffer from the kind of delays plaguing Bungie’s endeavour…

qazimod

So I’ve been recently checking that my disc of Crackdown still works after many weeks of inactivity (because it went through a nasty period of freezing up all the time and so I didn’t bother trying to play it), mainly because next week sees the opening of the Halo 3 beta. Obviously, this is significant news for many people, and fingers crossed you’ll see some coverage of how good/bad it is somewhere in Disposable’s network of…stuff.

In the meantime, why not enjoy issue seven of the magazine? Launched only the other day and with details here:

qazimod

The other day I mentioned that I’d been playing Hotel Dusk: Room 215 for the Nintendo DS; well, that game has been completed now, so I suppose I might as well deliver a more substantial opinion.

Yes, it’s very similar to Phoenix Wright in places. For most of the game you will go from location to location examining the area and acquiring items and evidence. You’ll open up new locations as the story progresses. You’ll meet people at these locations and may be able to talk to them (some conversations opening up new topics to talk about, granting access to new areas, or resulting in new inventory items), and you can show these people any of the items you’ve already acquired in your inventory. Sometimes in these conversations you’ll have to show people the right item or say the right thing, or else you’ll be penalised. Any of this sound familiar?

If you think about it, the only real differences are that HD is a bit more technologically advanced (with 3D environments and many more varied interactive minigames), and Phoenix Wright has more wit, as well as “evolving” a lot faster - it’s not until the final moments of Dusk that the game throws up multiple “succeed or else” challenges containing many questions and generally being much craftier than it’s been in the other chapters; Wright’s difficulty curve is a standard 45 degree angle compared to Hotel Dusk, which stays near to flat for most of the nine chapters, then climbs very rapidly as it reaches the end.

If you’re willing to accept that the Phoenix Wright games are a decidedly hard act to follow, and can therefore forgive Dusk when it sometimes seems substandard, then it’s well worth getting hold of. Also, whilst the mechanics of the games are very similar, the writing is obviously completely different (a different cast, different character histories to learn…) and so it’s very important that you enjoy Dusk’s writing for what it is, instead of subconsciously comparing it to Wright’s.

Anyway, I’ve rambled on enough for now. Expect a proper review in the next DM, perhaps. Until then, see you.

qazimod