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Halo Infinite - Campaign Overview (October 25th - 6am PT / 9am ET / 3pm CET)

Sosokrates

Report me if I continue to console war
2JDSOzT.jpg


1AXh6m5.jpg


Infinite currently has a flat, smudgey, splashey sort of look, with a lack of granular detail. But it's also a case of the particles effects not having a great contrast between the core of the explosions/the hot area versus the edges of the effects, and they have very little colour variation.

The best example of that would be if you look at the inner core of a lightsaber versus the outer edge, the difference in light/contrast and colour.

Keeping in mind this (↓) is essentially the aim, where you have the bright core of the explosion leaning more into the white and yellows and then the outer edges/ the flames and smoke shifting darker and to orange and red colours:

DNp1hKT.png


I know people like to argue stylistic choice, but then if that's the case, you clearly have a problem where the rest of the game is clearly aiming for full on realism (see the chiefs armour, human faces, environment etc.) and then you have particle effects that, if it's a stylistic choice, are at odds with the rest of the visuals/ art.

I'm not trying to be nitpicky it's just a striking contrast between the games texture level, which is very high in parts, and then these sorts of flaw and low resolution effects that don't even appear to emit light on the surrounding area.

Oh looky lets cherrypick.

y4rscnA.jpg

unY2VXN.jpg


TLOU2 does not look great here, but its one of the best looking games there is.

You can find something to complain about in any game.

Somtimes the complaints are valid if lots of things are really bad.
But doing it in a thread and game like this is a bad idea. Halo infinite looks very good, it is making good use of effects commonly used last gen at a high res + framerate on current gen. Its geometry also looks good for a gen8 open world game.
 
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fatmarco

Member
Oh looky lets cherrypick.

TLOU2 does not look great here, but its one of the best looking games there is.

You can find something to complain about in any game.

Sometimes the complaints are valid if lots of things are really bad.
But doing it in a thread and game like this a bad idea. Halo infinite looks very good, it is making good use of effects commonly used last gen at a high res + framerate on current gen. Its geometry also looks good for a gen 8 open world game.
I mean did you read what I said?

All I was focusing on was specifically how the particle effects invariably (as in, not sometimes) look poor and not as good as they should, and I tried to explain why that might be.

The idea that you can look at any game and point out its flaws in certain scenes is true enough, but that doesn't therefore make the conversation or examples shown invalid either.

And while it could be due to the limitations placed upon it due to the nature of it being cross gen, its also possible that it is, in part, an artistic failing too.
 

YukiOnna

Member
Yeah, and expanded weather systems. Should be there day 1 imo.

edit: raytracing as well.
It is there Day 1 I think
Among other things, the studio revealed that Infinite has a dynamic weather system, which will feature wind and fog systems when the game is launched. Storms and snowstorms might be added after release. There's also a day-night cycle, which will change how enemies act towards you.
 
It is there Day 1 I think
Among other things, the studio revealed that Infinite has a dynamic weather system, which will feature wind and fog systems when the game is launched. Storms and snowstorms might be added after release. There's also a day-night cycle, which will change how enemies act towards you.
As said in your quote they mention maybe adding storms and snowstorms later.
 

Sosokrates

Report me if I continue to console war
I mean did you read what I said?

All I was focusing on was specifically how the particle effects invariably (as in, not sometimes) look poor and not as good as they should, and I tried to explain why that might be.

The idea that you can look at any game and point out its flaws in certain scenes is true enough, but that doesn't therefore make the conversation or examples shown invalid either.

And while it could be due to the limitations placed upon it due to the nature of it being cross gen, its also possible that it is, in part, an artistic failing too.

Whats it going to achieve?

Why not talk about the positive aspects instead?

It just takes the thread in a negative direction. When what was shown was overall very positive.
 
This fucking game looks like concept art, and I love it for that. The draw distance gets me every damn time. I can see so clearly out into the distance. That's something I learned to appreciate only after my Series X playthrough of Halo 3. First time around all of that totally escaped me, I didn't appreciate it at all the first time. With how addicting playing against bots were in the flight, which was literally the most fun gunplay I've had in a shooter in years, I can imagine a really well built Halo campaign that doesn't strictly force me down the main story path when I don't feel like, with apparently random banished patrols, really taking things to a whole other level. I love that it tells you what all the collectibles are in the specific zones and lets you know up front what they are in each mission you pursue. This will make collecting important story bits, such as terminals even easier, and most of all, fun.

This game is going to be pretty fucking big, i feel. I'm getting a really good sense from it beyond just my own excitement.
 

fatmarco

Member
Whats it going to achieve?

Why not talk about the positive aspects instead?

It just takes the thread in a negative direction. When what was shown was overall very positive.
I just wanted to bring it up bring it up because it personally irked me and it wasn't being discussed.

I don't intend to be negative so its certainly not coming from a place of wanting to see the game fail at all. I just that I want it to see it improve, so I see it that as more of a constructive criticism.

I mean if you look at what the criticism of the MCC brought up, the almost petty discussions of missing graphical features on the original games etc. and you see that it ultimately led to those issues being resolved and it slowly made the game achieve its true potential, so I think in that sense critiquing flaws is perfectly valid.
 

Sosokrates

Report me if I continue to console war
I just wanted to bring it up bring it up because it personally irked me and it wasn't being discussed.

I don't intend to be negative so its certainly not coming from a place of wanting to see the game fail at all. I just that I want it to see it improve, so I see it that as more of a constructive criticism.

I mean if you look at what the criticism of the MCC brought up, the almost petty discussions of missing graphical features on the original games etc. and you see that it ultimately led to those issues being resolved and it slowly made the game achieve its true potential, so I think in that sense critiquing flaws is perfectly valid.

Its not uncommon if you pause explosion on cross gen games for them it be just a fire and smoke ball.

Infinites explosions Look no worse then Horizon forbidden wests.
vBVmGyQ.jpg
 
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Still can't make this one out.

- The unload clip, melee, toss grenade cycle combat looks ancient to me.

+ The semi open world, player choice focus feels like a breath of fresh air. Hoping it's more than a bad version of MGSV.

- Visually looks rough. (WTF is up with that WASP dropping animation after it's called in?)

- The writing, tone, and performances are pretty cringey. Demographic seems to be 14 year old kids. Now trying to think back on if Combat Evolved was this dumb and I just didn't notice it when I was 14.

I guess I'm cautiously optimistic. Feels like it might be a fun romp you blow through and forget about a few weeks later. Going to be interesting to hear how much Microsoft will invest in this post launch. It doesn't give me strong 10 year lifecycle vibes.

That being said, Dec 8th let's go!
 

cormack12

Gold Member
I'm curious as to how weather fits onto the Halo lore. Surely, if you'd built a Halo tot sustain life, you'd have year round temperate weather/climate control for maximising the sustainability of life etc?
 
Still can't make this one out.

- The unload clip, melee, toss grenade cycle combat looks ancient to me.

+ The semi open world, player choice focus feels like a breath of fresh air. Hoping it's more than a bad version of MGSV.

- Visually looks rough. (WTF is up with that WASP dropping animation after it's called in?)

- The writing, tone, and performances are pretty cringey. Demographic seems to be 14 year old kids. Now trying to think back on if Combat Evolved was this dumb and I just didn't notice it when I was 14.

I guess I'm cautiously optimistic. Feels like it might be a fun romp you blow through and forget about a few weeks later. Going to be interesting to hear how much Microsoft will invest in this post launch. It doesn't give me strong 10 year lifecycle vibes.

That being said, Dec 8th let's go!
Can't say I'm in agreement with anything you wrote but would say the WASP dropping is not an animation its being dropped in using the physics engine. It would look better with a warthog obviously.
 

reksveks

Member
I'm curious as to how weather fits onto the Halo lore. Surely, if you'd built a Halo tot sustain life, you'd have year round temperate weather/climate control for maximising the sustainability of life etc?
I might need to go back and check out the Rama series to see how the ecosystem works on that fictional ship. Afaik there should still be a water cycle I think which naturally lead to some weather events like rain, not sure about fog.
 

MidGenRefresh

*Refreshes biennially
2JDSOzT.jpg


1AXh6m5.jpg


Infinite currently has a flat, smudgey, splashey sort of look, with a lack of granular detail. But it's also a case of the particles effects not having a great contrast between the core of the explosions/the hot area versus the edges of the effects, and they have very little colour variation.

The best example of that would be if you look at the inner core of a lightsaber versus the outer edge, the difference in light/contrast and colour.

Keeping in mind this (↓) is essentially the aim, where you have the bright core of the explosion leaning more into the white and yellows and then the outer edges/ the flames and smoke shifting darker and to orange and red colours:

DNp1hKT.png


I know people like to argue stylistic choice, but then if that's the case, you clearly have a problem where the rest of the game is clearly aiming for full on realism (see the chiefs armour, human faces, environment etc.) and then you have particle effects that, if it's a stylistic choice, are at odds with the rest of the visuals/ art.

I'm not trying to be nitpicky it's just a striking contrast between the games texture level, which is very high in parts, and then these sorts of flaw and low resolution effects that don't even appear to emit light on the surrounding area.

It's just 1 frame out of 60 that you will see every second. I'm sure it will be super bothering during gameplay and will ruin the immersion. :messenger_grinning_sweat:

If you're not trying to be nit picky then you're failing miserably. Try harder.
 
I might need to go back and check out the Rama series to see how the ecosystem works on that fictional ship. Afaik there should still be a water cycle I think which naturally lead to some weather events like rain, not sure about fog.
If there's rain then fog is possible.
 
It's just 1 frame out of 60 that you will see every second. I'm sure it will be super bothering during gameplay and will ruin the immersion. :messenger_grinning_sweat:

If you're not trying to be nit picky then you're failing miserably. Try harder.
I'm sort of in agreement that the explosions could be better but alpha transparency effects are performance intensive and Halo has a lot going on.
 

MidGenRefresh

*Refreshes biennially
I'm sort of in agreement that the explosions could be better but alpha transparency effects are performance intensive and Halo has a lot going on.

Everything can always be better but please remember that we're talking about cross-gen open world game that runs at 60FPS with a lot of physics. It looks more than good enough.

Shame that RT is not there on day one.
 

Helghan

Member
Can't say I'm in agreement with anything you wrote but would say the WASP dropping is not an animation its being dropped in using the physics engine. It would look better with a warthog obviously.
I also didn't like the way it was dropped and the effects it had on the ground. The scratching, and the sparks coming off it. Didn't really look that good. Btw this was the only issue I had with the whole trailer. Can't wait to play it, it looked amazing.
 
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DavidGzz

Gold Member
I'm curious as to how weather fits onto the Halo lore. Surely, if you'd built a Halo tot sustain life, you'd have year round temperate weather/climate control for maximising the sustainability of life etc?

Some people on Earth love the changing of seasons(freaks). I'd prefer 70 and sunny year round, but my wife loves Fall. Maybe the ring is broken up into sections of different weather for the people who enjoy the changes of the season. Just a thought, I haven't read more than a couple of the books. so idk how it works.
 
It's just 1 frame out of 60 that you will see every second. I'm sure it will be super bothering during gameplay and will ruin the immersion. :messenger_grinning_sweat:

If you're not trying to be nit picky then you're failing miserably. Try harder.
I'm sort of in agreement that the explosions could be better but alpha transparency effects are performance intensive and Halo has a lot going on.
 

fatmarco

Member
It's just 1 frame out of 60 that you will see every second. I'm sure it will be super bothering during gameplay and will ruin the immersion. :messenger_grinning_sweat:

If you're not trying to be nit picky then you're failing miserably. Try harder.
My point was that it was the entire animations. It was already an issue in the multiplayer but it was more forgivable there.

Again I don't see why we can't criticise things. I get that people are excited, and I still am too, but I'm just not in the camp that they've completely turned the visuals around.

And where else am I allowed to convey those feelings lol?
 

Ozriel

M$FT
Improvement over last year but still short of a big tent pole game. It felt like a 7.5 type of game better than the 6 of last year. Keep Joe Staten fire the rest of the studio management and get better people. I'll play it I'm hoping it has interesting missions that makes or breaks sandbox games.

You know how a game feels to play just by watching a trailer?
The trolls can't seem to stop coming out of the woodwork
 

kikkis

Member
One thing that worries me is the time to kill. I am playing gears 4 now and it's not all that great there either with enemies taking almost a clip to kill. I mean I understand that it's tough position since you would have to add more enemies to counter shorter time to kill so you wouldn't make the game trivial. But obviously more enemies has its own can of worms.
 

Mr.ODST

Member
You know how a game feels to play just by watching a trailer?
The trolls can't seem to stop coming out of the woodwork
I would just put them on Ignore, 90% of the people who are concerned over this are all known PlayStation fanboys who cant stand xbox having something positive.

Back to the topic - Campaign looks great so far hope they add more variety in terms of the environment but I'm excited to see the palace of pain, the lore around those buildings alone is amazing
 

Concern

Member
I would just put them on Ignore, 90% of the people who are concerned over this are all known PlayStation fanboys who cant stand xbox having something positive.

Back to the topic - Campaign looks great so far hope they add more variety in terms of the environment but I'm excited to see the palace of pain, the lore around those buildings alone is amazing


Was literally just catching up on this thread. People have been banned for less than some of the shit posts here. So what gives?

Campaign actually looks way better than I waa expecting and I was going to skip it altogether after 5's campaign. But im actually going to give it a run.
 

Data Ghost

Member
I am very excited for this game i won't lie. Unfortunately I will be sitting on a beach in an exotic location thousands of miles from my Series X. Do I go for cloud gaming and a cocktail, or just wait till I get home?
 

Sosokrates

Report me if I continue to console war
I wonder if that brute boss is like the valkerys in god of war, were they will be hiding away in less obvious locations.
 

Sosokrates

Report me if I continue to console war
I am very excited for this game i won't lie. Unfortunately I will be sitting on a beach in an exotic location thousands of miles from my Series X. Do I go for cloud gaming and a cocktail, or just wait till I get home?
Buy a seriesS and take it with you.
 
Do people pause frames from every bit of marketing footage for every exclusive? It's not something I've seen much of. Seems like people are desperate to spot flaws in this game.
I'm constantly seeing flaws in TLOU2 on my current play through, but it doesn't detract from what is a brilliant game IMO. At the end of the day it's the gameplay that is the most important and that is top level (talking about MP) stuff. I'm just happy the game looks really good graphically as last year it looked rough. 343 hopefully have made an epic campaign that I can immerse myself in over the holidays.
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
I seem to remember a lot of shit-talking in the God of War Ragnarok reveal trailer. This kind of stuff is going to keep happening. I think you guys are being a bit sensitive.

Ah yeah, good shout. I do remember the footage showing the recycled animations etc from god of war. That was also embarrassing.
 
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Assaulty

Member
I seem to remember a lot of shit-talking in the God of War Ragnarok reveal trailer. This kind of stuff is going to keep happening. I think you guys are being a bit sensitive.
And it made even less sense there as the game looks absolutely stellar imo.

When it's people that are actually caring about the game and having critique, that's absolutely fine. I personally think the biome and general foilage should look much better and would go a long way to make the game look WAY better, But fanboy numer 3 pointing out 1 frame of explosions not looking crisp just because it's the competitions biggest franchise then it's a bit sad really. Just like the people acting like Forza Horizon 5 looks avarage or "next gen starts now" even tho we've seen R&C and Demon's souls look incredible. I truly don't understand what people gain from acting this way
 

MOTM

Banned
I think the thing that still suprises me the most is just how bad the particle effects are. Of all the things the first gameplay reveal trailer did last year, the particle effects were arguably the worst.

Whether its fire or plasma, the effects look like paint cans exploding. The colours used for fire, plasma and energy look very garish and out of sync with the rest of the visuals too.

It's to me the thing that is really holding back the games presentation, and its bizarre because I can't remember any Halo having particle effects this "Wrong" looking.
I noticed that too. The particle effects look like they’re from a different game built on a different engine in 2010 and they just threw it into Infinite.

Besides that I think the game looks very good.
 
Still can't make this one out.

- The unload clip, melee, toss grenade cycle combat looks ancient to me.

+ The semi open world, player choice focus feels like a breath of fresh air. Hoping it's more than a bad version of MGSV.

- Visually looks rough. (WTF is up with that WASP dropping animation after it's called in?)

- The writing, tone, and performances are pretty cringey. Demographic seems to be 14 year old kids. Now trying to think back on if Combat Evolved was this dumb and I just didn't notice it when I was 14.

I guess I'm cautiously optimistic. Feels like it might be a fun romp you blow through and forget about a few weeks later. Going to be interesting to hear how much Microsoft will invest in this post launch. It doesn't give me strong 10 year lifecycle vibes.

That being said, Dec 8th let's go!
- That's every FPS, difference being there's more freedom than a game like Call of Duty, which could explain the lack of detail, but the massive draw distance.

+ The sheer size and scale of everything is jaw dropping

- I don't think the compression on the video is doing it justice. Just wait until users start putting out screenshots, the Multiplayer Preview looked much better than its videos

- It must appeal to a mass audience; I was 16 when I first played Halo. Others need the same chance I did.
 

MOTM

Banned
I am very excited for this game i won't lie. Unfortunately I will be sitting on a beach in an exotic location thousands of miles from my Series X. Do I go for cloud gaming and a cocktail, or just wait till I get home?
Unless your laptop is a nice to play on as your TV screen then just wait!
 
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