Xbox games showcase 2020
- Thread starter FakeSympathy
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So they are just some offshoot faction of the Sangheili? Cause I'll be annoyed if they had the sangheili end up as enemies with the humans again just to bring back elites to the enemy roster.
Not gonna lie but when I saw Jack Black and Tim Schafer and their talk about a new song I was expecting Brutal Legend 2.
I'm still excited for Psychonauts 2 don't get me wrong but I kind of wish we'd also be getting wacky METAL hijinx episode 2 as well but what can ya do?
I'm still excited for Psychonauts 2 don't get me wrong but I kind of wish we'd also be getting wacky METAL hijinx episode 2 as well but what can ya do?
No, the Banished are led by jiralhanae. Some sangheili joined them after the Great Schism.
"Offshoot faction" is really a misnomer, because post-Great Schism there's no one single faction of sangheili. Yes, Thel leads the Swords of Sanghelios as something approaching a 'de facto' faction, but there's multiple splinter groups. The same goes for most Covenant species.
- Feb 7, 2011
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As a Halo fan, meh, not really.
Since I didn't care for Halo Wars and never played them (I tried the demo and felt horribly bored by the neutered RTS gameplay) I have no idea who the Banished are and why I'm supposed to care that they're the villains, but other people seem pretty excited about them.
The gameplay looks fine, like normal Halo gameplay. The grappling hook looks like kind of a strange and out of place addition but it doesn't really excite me.
The most interesting thing seems to be that they're really leaning into what made the original Halo unique, which was the huge maps, and it looks like this time they've gone full open world (or close to it), which could be interesting.
More importantly, I'm curious about coop, and the PC functionality. Those 2 things are going to determine whether I bother with this game at all. The fact that it's apparently coming to steam is a good sign though.
- Mar 13, 2020
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Halo Infinite looks fine. It's a return to form for the series, which is what fans asked for and what they're getting. They tried to make changes with 4 and 5, but it just didn't go over well with fans, and Infinite looks like pure comfort food and I'm totally fine with that. It's also a cross-gen title, not designed at the forefront of Series X, so I'm not expecting it to be that next-gen leap either. Definitely lots of polish work left to do though, the lighting was really bad, and enemy character models needs to be fleshed out, but the premise of the story seems really interesting having played 4,5 and Halo Wars 2 (which set up interesting events to come).
I'm sure by release it's gonna look up to snuff, we know 343 can make VERY pretty looking games via Halo 4 and 5, so I'm not overly concerned. The gameplay was what I was concerned about going into that showcase and they gave me exactly what I was looking for AND with a good sounding soundtrack to boot.
I love how varied the first party line-up is shaping up to be as well.
My main concern right now is the lack of any gameplay from either PS5 or Xbox Series X. I think the ONLY game we've really seen in action in any capacity thus far on real next-gen tech was the Ratchet and Clank demo.
Jack and I talk more about this in The Escapist Show, but I think they're saving all this stuff for a big marketing blitz towards the end of September / October to drive pre-orders. And, since we didn't have E3, they didn't take the time to make spiffy looking demos or "target" footage reels and are using all that extra time to actually get shit ready.
We'll see, but next-gen just doesn't feel ready right now. Pandemic definitely scaled things back and I'm betting "real" next-gen games don't start hitting till late 2021 / early 2022 at this point.
I'm sure by release it's gonna look up to snuff, we know 343 can make VERY pretty looking games via Halo 4 and 5, so I'm not overly concerned. The gameplay was what I was concerned about going into that showcase and they gave me exactly what I was looking for AND with a good sounding soundtrack to boot.
I love how varied the first party line-up is shaping up to be as well.
My main concern right now is the lack of any gameplay from either PS5 or Xbox Series X. I think the ONLY game we've really seen in action in any capacity thus far on real next-gen tech was the Ratchet and Clank demo.
Jack and I talk more about this in The Escapist Show, but I think they're saving all this stuff for a big marketing blitz towards the end of September / October to drive pre-orders. And, since we didn't have E3, they didn't take the time to make spiffy looking demos or "target" footage reels and are using all that extra time to actually get shit ready.
We'll see, but next-gen just doesn't feel ready right now. Pandemic definitely scaled things back and I'm betting "real" next-gen games don't start hitting till late 2021 / early 2022 at this point.
Man, I'm really not all that impressed with how Halo Infinite looks, graphically I mean. It looks kind of weird, like the texture quality is off for a lot of areas. Dirt mounds and mountain sides look like they have their texture quality setting set to 'low', and even the Assault Rifle looks flat, almost like it's missing its texture entirely? Like it's completely clean with no wear and tear.
Gameplay wise, it looks fun/on par with every other game in the series. One thing I don't really like is that they have the Assault Rifle and the Commando rifle which look like they fulfill the same roll (primary automatic weapon that's good for close-medium range). Idk, it just seems redundant to have weapons in the same class, like the Battle Rifle and the DMR. I'd much rather have a single weapon that fulfills a specific roll.
Edit: Yeah Nick, I thought that we would see more gameplay during this event, but it seemed like it was all CGI cutscenes for games that could potentially be a year or two away. I'm excited for the games, but I was hoping for more actual gameplay.
Gameplay wise, it looks fun/on par with every other game in the series. One thing I don't really like is that they have the Assault Rifle and the Commando rifle which look like they fulfill the same roll (primary automatic weapon that's good for close-medium range). Idk, it just seems redundant to have weapons in the same class, like the Battle Rifle and the DMR. I'd much rather have a single weapon that fulfills a specific roll.
Edit: Yeah Nick, I thought that we would see more gameplay during this event, but it seemed like it was all CGI cutscenes for games that could potentially be a year or two away. I'm excited for the games, but I was hoping for more actual gameplay.
Someone on reddit posted this pic to better show what I was talking about with the Assault Rifle textures
This felt kinda too safe. Like Microsoft were really not up for much risks.
Plenty of GC and cutscene heavy / no gameplay trailers.
Lots of sequels or stuff from studios who are known names.
I didn't feel like anything really wowed me.
Main draw of an Xbox Series X now for me would be the backwards compatibility and just how far it goes or how good it is. Like will I be able to import over my Old Xbox Live Arcade games or only the full price release titles?
So far the backwards compatibility thing seems to be the main draw for the Series X but I gotta say Sony's PS5 reveal did seem to wow more and take more risks with the games.
I don't normally move up to the next gen for about 1 year or more after launch anyway so I'll be seeing how they play out but so far Sony had he more interesting lineup. Which is a shame because I kind of hoped Microsoft would really come in hard and shake Sony from it's complacency in other aspects.
Plenty of GC and cutscene heavy / no gameplay trailers.
Lots of sequels or stuff from studios who are known names.
I didn't feel like anything really wowed me.
Main draw of an Xbox Series X now for me would be the backwards compatibility and just how far it goes or how good it is. Like will I be able to import over my Old Xbox Live Arcade games or only the full price release titles?
So far the backwards compatibility thing seems to be the main draw for the Series X but I gotta say Sony's PS5 reveal did seem to wow more and take more risks with the games.
I don't normally move up to the next gen for about 1 year or more after launch anyway so I'll be seeing how they play out but so far Sony had he more interesting lineup. Which is a shame because I kind of hoped Microsoft would really come in hard and shake Sony from it's complacency in other aspects.
See, I feel kinda the opposite about the Xbox vs. PS5 games event. I really enjoyed/want to play nearly every game that was announced (even if most were just CG cutscenes . . .), although this could be that I've never seriously played on Playstation before. The only two games from their event that I legitimately want to play are Spider-Man: Miles Morales and Ratchet & Clank. I've never played a R&C game before, so idk if I'd even enjoy the gameplay or not.
As a massive Halo nerd and fanboy, this wasn't necessarily the "Xbox Series X event" to me, but more of a "Halo Infinite reveal event", and to that end, I had a massive frown on my face about half way through the demo they showed, and I only really perked up again, seeing the new Warhammer 40k Darktide trailer, and the Fable trailer.
This needed to be a smash hit. This needed to be a home run. This needed to be "Hey, Halo 5 was a bad time. The Xbox One was a bad time. We can do better. We are doing better. Here is Halo Infinite in all of its glory, running on the Series X". Eurgh, what a mess.
I think from the very first frame, I realised that this game wasn't exactly pretty. Maybe the bar has just been set way too high, coming from The Last of Us 2, but that is a next-gen looking game on current-gen consoles, and it makes Halo Infinite look like a current-gen game from like, 2017.
Faces don't look great. Textures definitely dont look great. The outdoor lighting looks flat, and shadows don't even look like they are appearing half of the time. Armour looks like it is made out of plastic, and nothing looks "real". Not to mention the incredible level of pop-in with the grass and clouds. This just doesn't look like a game from "the world's most powerful console". I think this is a perfect example of why "4K/60FPS" is just a bit of a buzzword, because games are a lot more than just how many pixels are on screen, and how often they appear. Halo 3 looks more visually appealing, and that is a game from 2007.
Not to mention stuff like this.
Right, Halo Infinite, 2020 (Xbox Series X)
And then there are the new guns, and every single one of them look like they are ripped straight out of Destiny. Hell, even the HUD looks the same.
As for the gameplay, sprint and clamber/climb are back, so boo. The grapple hook looks fine, and apparently it is going to be a pick-up in multiplayer, so I guess that is okay. The sound design is pretty meh - again, coming from DOOM Eternal, where literally every weapon was BOOMING, everything just sounds pretty weak. Oh, and it is apparently an open-world game, at least to some extent - so yay if you like open world games, but a massive boo for if you dont (like me).
Ultimately, I don't get 5-years of AAA development time from the demo we have just seen, and the whole thing just looks rough. If this demo was shown last year, after the Discover Hope trailer, I would have been hopeful that they could iron out all of the problems that we have just seen. Here, though, with the game less than 6 months away? I just have a feeling that this is going to be a really rocky release.
I can't help but just feel grumpy.
This needed to be a smash hit. This needed to be a home run. This needed to be "Hey, Halo 5 was a bad time. The Xbox One was a bad time. We can do better. We are doing better. Here is Halo Infinite in all of its glory, running on the Series X". Eurgh, what a mess.
I think from the very first frame, I realised that this game wasn't exactly pretty. Maybe the bar has just been set way too high, coming from The Last of Us 2, but that is a next-gen looking game on current-gen consoles, and it makes Halo Infinite look like a current-gen game from like, 2017.
Faces don't look great. Textures definitely dont look great. The outdoor lighting looks flat, and shadows don't even look like they are appearing half of the time. Armour looks like it is made out of plastic, and nothing looks "real". Not to mention the incredible level of pop-in with the grass and clouds. This just doesn't look like a game from "the world's most powerful console". I think this is a perfect example of why "4K/60FPS" is just a bit of a buzzword, because games are a lot more than just how many pixels are on screen, and how often they appear. Halo 3 looks more visually appealing, and that is a game from 2007.
Not to mention stuff like this.
Left, Halo Reach, 2010 (Xbox 360)
Right, Halo Infinite, 2020 (Xbox Series X)
And then there are the new guns, and every single one of them look like they are ripped straight out of Destiny. Hell, even the HUD looks the same.
As for the gameplay, sprint and clamber/climb are back, so boo. The grapple hook looks fine, and apparently it is going to be a pick-up in multiplayer, so I guess that is okay. The sound design is pretty meh - again, coming from DOOM Eternal, where literally every weapon was BOOMING, everything just sounds pretty weak. Oh, and it is apparently an open-world game, at least to some extent - so yay if you like open world games, but a massive boo for if you dont (like me).
Ultimately, I don't get 5-years of AAA development time from the demo we have just seen, and the whole thing just looks rough. If this demo was shown last year, after the Discover Hope trailer, I would have been hopeful that they could iron out all of the problems that we have just seen. Here, though, with the game less than 6 months away? I just have a feeling that this is going to be a really rocky release.
I can't help but just feel grumpy.
You've got more faith in the game than I do.
I loathed Halo 4 but liked Halo 5, but okay, I'm in the minority. Fair enough. But apparently 343's idea is to "go back to the roots," which is code for "we've run out of ideas." Halo, even if it's lost a lot of its lustre, should be more than comfort food in my eyes. Here, it's trying to ape Combat Evolved. And okay, fine, Combat Evolved is my favourite entry in the series, but even now, a few months from release, what has it added? Because the gameplay looks mostly the same. And we still know next to nothing about the story. I can infer that it's focusing on a UNSC-Banished conflict with the Created either lurking in the background or brushed aside, but even so, it seems intent on moving on from Halo 5. Except you can't really do that considering that it upended the status quo and ended on a cliffhanger.
I think the game just looks rushed.
I can think of three possibilities.
1) 343 are just inept this time around, and have spent the last 5 years twiddling their thumbs. For what it is worth, I dont think this is likely.
2) They started making a sequel to Halo 5, but then following that game's reception, and the positive reception to Halo Wars 2, they scrapped it half-way through development, and had to come up with something new.
3) They spent the majority of the time making this brand-new proprietary engine, which has taken a lot longer than expected, so they only had a few years to bash this game together.
I truly do not feel like this game, in its current state, makes anyone at 343 remotely happy.
I can think of three possibilities.
1) 343 are just inept this time around, and have spent the last 5 years twiddling their thumbs. For what it is worth, I dont think this is likely.
2) They started making a sequel to Halo 5, but then following that game's reception, and the positive reception to Halo Wars 2, they scrapped it half-way through development, and had to come up with something new.
3) They spent the majority of the time making this brand-new proprietary engine, which has taken a lot longer than expected, so they only had a few years to bash this game together.
I truly do not feel like this game, in its current state, makes anyone at 343 remotely happy.
Those options aren't mutually exclusive, but 3 sounds plausible.
I'm going to address option 2, because I don't see that being the case, and I can explain why. First, I don't see 343 beginning work on Infinite before Halo 5 was released, and the reception to it was pretty quick. Furthermore, I don't see Infinite being a reaction to Halo Wars 2. If anything, 2 seems to have been made to be reasonably self-isolated (the narrative is confined to the Ark, focusing entirely on the conflict between the UNSC and Banished, but tying in with Halo 5 (given that Anders is confronted by a Guardian at the end of the game. Also, HW2 seemed to have a pretty lukewalm reception. So if anything, the plot of HW2 seems to come from Infinite, rather than it being the other way round. The existence of the Banished strikes me as being an excuse to give us 'classic' (Covenant-esque) enemies, allowing 343 to sidestep the Created.
Which, IMO, is silly, because I don't see how you can just sidestep Halo 5's ending and new status quo without some extreme contrivance. But what do I know?
So i thought about it and i think my big problem with Microsoft's showcase is that they all they showed was cinematics for the vast majority of titles. But they kept hammering on about how much better the games would look or be optimised for xbox series x.
But here's the problem. The games they showed off didnt look good. I dont mean the quality of the game, but visually they didnt look impressive. There were a lot of artsy games that had very watched out or cartoony graphics and that doesnt really show off your game's potential. Not to mention everything else was a cinematic and we all know that cinematics look way better than the games do.
Playstation 5 at least has shown, "here's this great looking game and watch how fucking fast it loads!" With ratched and clank. They pulled double duty in not only showing the console's power and capability but also showed off a game while doing so.
Halo Infinite looked like no big step in any direction graphically. And the play sequence was scripted, short, and didnt show me anything different than a Halo game. And maybe that's what fans wanted, just another bog standard Halo. Good for them I guess. Xbox does like to put out the same crap over and over considering State of Decay 2 came out with no fanfare and they already are dropping another one for some reason. Oh and their giving Ori and the Will of Wisps more spotlight. Oh and Forza Horizon 4 got more showtime.
Question, did the Playstation 5 reveal show any games that were already out? And have been out of several years.......they did? Oh fuck you Rockstar why you have to ruin my points?
But here's the problem. The games they showed off didnt look good. I dont mean the quality of the game, but visually they didnt look impressive. There were a lot of artsy games that had very watched out or cartoony graphics and that doesnt really show off your game's potential. Not to mention everything else was a cinematic and we all know that cinematics look way better than the games do.
Playstation 5 at least has shown, "here's this great looking game and watch how fucking fast it loads!" With ratched and clank. They pulled double duty in not only showing the console's power and capability but also showed off a game while doing so.
Halo Infinite looked like no big step in any direction graphically. And the play sequence was scripted, short, and didnt show me anything different than a Halo game. And maybe that's what fans wanted, just another bog standard Halo. Good for them I guess. Xbox does like to put out the same crap over and over considering State of Decay 2 came out with no fanfare and they already are dropping another one for some reason. Oh and their giving Ori and the Will of Wisps more spotlight. Oh and Forza Horizon 4 got more showtime.
Question, did the Playstation 5 reveal show any games that were already out? And have been out of several years.......they did? Oh fuck you Rockstar why you have to ruin my points?
They arent. Xbox doesnt have exclusives. Play them on pc and have all the xbox games and all the backwards compatibility you want.
That was my main complaint in a previous post. 2/3 of the stuff is just CG trailers or games that will appear on other consoles. The only thing that interested me were The Gunk, Tetris Effect Connection (a port with added multiplayer), and Psychonauts 2, PSO2 New Genesis (which is getting a PS4, PC, & Switch version).