Kills_Alone

Naw, Twin does excellent work. H2v takes forever to light a map, sometimes days. I had a few maps take a week, and if one thing is wrong you get to start over. Fun, such repetitious fun to be had! Most likely, Gemini's Twin is using a lower lighting level to provide these previews within our life time and to continue working on them at a non-maddening pace. When the lighting render level is set to a lower level it will look kinda shoddy and the shadows will be terrible, not that H2v ever had amazing shadow tech in the first place. Last, Twin has a few missing/mislabeled textures. The rainbow print textures are thought by many uninformed users/players to be a graphical glitch, such as on H3 Sandtrap. But in truth that is the engine working as intended.

If they allowed that then how could they sell you the same game again, and again, and yet once more?

I think Microsoft is a pretty cool guy. Eh ignores PC Gamers and doesnt afraid of anything. Lets review, shall we? -Microsoft loves PC Gamers but cannot be bothered to sell us new games. If we are lucky we are rewarded with terrible ports that run slow, even on modern hardware, they really care about us guys. They've been telling us so for the last seven years, any day now... -Microsoft loves us so much they will port old games to Steam! Games we already paid for are ready for us to purchase again! -Microsoft understands that we want Halo on PC: (...but we do not deserve it and the time is not right, nor will it ever be) Introducing Halo Combat Evolved PC; a game that will run like molasses on pretty much any PC at time of release. Introducing Halo Custom Edition; we apologize for getting your hopes up, it was actually Gearbox who created Custom Edition....without them we never would have released such an awesome Editing Kit, in fact we never would have provided any HEK what-so-ever. They really made us look bad by giving the player so much power and we are very sorry for it. The fan should never be able to make his own encounters, what were they thinking? How are we supposed to charge for DLC when the fans can just make thier own assets? No, this will not fly, next time we will lock that Editing Kit down, we promise. Introducing Halo 2 Vista; such an amazing port it requires hardware from the future to get a decent frame rate. Now you can pay more to play online, now you can make new maps and weapons and, oh wait, we decided to lobotomize the Halo 2 Editing Kit because reasons that we will never speak of publicly. Ah but we did include nudity in the final code, thats right, now when you try and learn how to make a map you will be rewarded with a Microsoft employees behind. Another satisfied customer. The fun doesn't end there, we vow to shut down the team behind the game almost immediately. And when the game crashing starts, we will straight out ignore it, we won't even patch it out even when you supply us the exact details on said crash. That is our guarantee to ignore you; the customer. Never thinking towards the future; we put Vista in the title so as to further confuse our customers. Now users of Windows 7 & 8 will not even think the game works on their OS, genius! Then we limited the amount of activations per PC so you have the option of buying the game again, weeee! Then we broke Mic support, and we swear; we will never fix it. When you call our support line you can talk to an automated voice, neat-o! AND, if you get a real employee to talk to you they will lie to you, making up stories about future Halo PC titles that will never really come out, we are so classy. Introducing Halo: Spartan Assault; a Halo game lacking the Master Chief, a decent story, any connection to previous Halo PC releases, or FPS mechanics in general. Co-Op? Who needs that garbage? PC gamers don't play local or online co-op...why would they want this feature, co-op is the kind of thing that can only be done on inferior hardware with a TV and a sofa. PC Gamers lack sofas and TVs, everyone knows that. Psssh, a PC Gamer with friends and a gamepad...?...noob please. We put XBox on the PC, but minus the games! We know you want the games, but no! Just no. -Microsoft loves us so much they want to keep G4WL around, not in any usable condition mind you. Now, for the first time ever, you will be able to connect to the G4WL Marketplace and not have the ability to download any of our Halo PC games because we never bothered to make digital download versions of them. No, that would make it far too easy and make too much sense. Here at Microsoft we are committed to over-promising and under-delivering. Have you ever heard the phrase, "to pull a Molyneux."? We owned that guy until even he could not stand the intoxicating levels of incompetence, pandering, and double-speak leaking from our collective mouth piece. Even our own studios are jumping ship to Steam, but you wouldn't know it if you just listen to what our Marketing Team has to say. We are into PC Gaming for the long haul, new game releases to be announced....eventually....perhaps in a few years. Clarity is only for Xbox users. Nothing but misdirection and shadow puppets for the PC Elitists! "When 343 says that the have no plans for releasing it on pc they mean microsoft doesnt let us because halo is the only thing that sells xbox. It aint gonna happen, stop asking go play your other pc master race games." -A real anonymous Halo (XBox) Fan -Microsoft is so into PC Gaming, like whoa, its so cool, we made XBox 360 Gamepads work with Windows! A gamepad on a PC, its unheard of! Good luck finding a first party wireless dongle sucker. Hey, remember that SideWinder line of PC gamepads, joysticks, and other gaming accessories we used to make? And then we discontinued support for most of them and the drivers? Yeah that never happened, don't talk about it. But look, we took all that research and made the XBox gamepad (AKA the Duke). What an innovation! -Microsoft is proud to introduce the XBox One Gamepad drivers for Windows PCs! Enjoy your games like never before; wireless support! Who needs that? Games to play, who needs that? Look if you want games we have all the games on XBox, why would anyone want to play games on a PC? Behold an enigma A wireless gamepad that cannot be used without a mini-USB cable thus negating the entire point of a wireless controller. A Surface PC without Disc Drive running Halo 2 Vista: Super Cool Guy Edition (aka ******* Child Edition) Who needs wireless? Who needs a playerbase? Who plays on PC anyways? No, the only reason for PCs is to hide at E3 and pretend they are consoles. It is known. They hide in the back of the building where they belong. -Microsoft is amazed with PC Gaming and has reaffirmed their commitment for the last seven years. Thats a long time and shows they really care, it is also Bungie's magic number and not ironic at all. Not even a little. -Microsoft is severely (insanely even) proud to announce.....nothing for PC gamers at E3, like ever. You see, PC Games are not welcome at E3. E3 is for consoles, didn't you get the memo? -Microsoft is going to release a remake of a port of an update to the first Fable. Thats right; you can re-buy and replay the same game from 10 years ago! Now with more random crashing and glitches that were not even in the original. Who needs sequels? Cowabunga dudes! Enjoy playing with your old toys, oh and PC Gamers, no new presents for Christmas, but....maybe next year, or even the year after. Bungie co-founder: "Nobody wants to" play FPS games with mouse and keyboard "We limited players to two weapons, we gave them recharging health, we automatically saved and restored the game -- almost heretical things to first-person shooters at the time. We made the game run without a mouse and keyboard. And now nobody plays shooters the way they used to play them before Halo 'cause nobody wants to." -Jason Jones of Bungie The wrong way! The right way! “Hardly anyone plays first-person shooters on the PC anymore.” -Kudo Tsunoda of Microsoft’s Kinect Team This seems like a good time to remind you that...I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't let you do that. Where do you want to go today? Hey who likes ads everywhere? We know you do, so we put more ads in our ads so you can enjoy our ads even more. XBOX / XBOX 360 / XBOX ONE / XBOX 063 / XOBX? It seems pretty obvious when you think about it. This Public Service Rant brought to you by the fine people of H2MT.

I have no idea but considering I played everyday since 2004, I'd say its a lot.

PRESENTS Cairo Station ODP Campaign Mod by Kills Alone of the H2MT Crew Released - February 20th, 2014 YouTube Video Preview ABOUT ===== In this mod I expand on Cairo Station by adding one variant of Brutes & two variants of Jackals. There is a new Banshee encounter, & a section where you will find two empty Banshees. The Longsword has been added & is flyable. Other tweaks include a higher Field of View (FoV), darkened MJOLNIR Powered Assault Armor. Player character starts with a BR & Shotgun. Extra friendly NPCs have been added (Marines & ODST), along with extra enemies. Assembly was used for this mod as it provides more consistent results, is easier to use, faster, & has not broken any of my maps unless it was something that should break said maps. Additional applications where used with source tag files, xbox .map files, & PC .map files to verify the settings. -Entity (H2x) was used to study the original map in its unmodified XBox incarnation. http://www.h2mt.org/tools/2_XBox/Entity/ https://xboxdb.access.dyn-net.com/0000000001/files-DB/web/Default.asp.net?act=category&id=2 -The unlocked Guerilla New (H2v) was also used to study original & rebuilt tag source in its PC incarnation. http://www.h2mt.org/tools/2_Vista/H2EK_Unlocked/H2MT_H2EK_Unlocked_-_Enhanced_Edition.exe ALTERATIONS =========== -Some Marines are now ODST -Some Marines have human heads -Most Marines have various helmets & clothing -NPC weapons have been reallocated but not edited; so the weapons are as you know & expect them to be -Player starts with a BR & Shotgun, full ammo -Longsword is now a flyable vehicle & fires Pelican Rocket Pod projectiles -Various Banshee have been added -Additional enemy AI such as two Jackal variants & one Brute variant, this can be affected by difficulty settings & the Thunderstorm Skull. I suggest playing on Normal the first play round, then increasing difficulty on the next INSTALL ======= 1) Before copying the file to your Halo 2\maps default maps directory you must backup the original. 2) The filename is 01b_spacestation.map, so make sure you backup the original by either renaming it or by moving it to a backup sub-folder. I rename the original file to 01b_spacestation.map.ORIGINAL so I know what it is at a later date. 3) Copy the new file to the same location then start Halo 2 Vista. 4) Select Cairo Station from the Campaign selection screen. TOOLS ===== -Ambiguous Alpha v2.5 - for Third Person/Still Cam http://www.h2mt.org/tools/2_Vista/Ambiguous/Ambiguous_Alpha_2.5.exe -Ambiguous Beta v1.0 Pre-Release - for Real-Time Editing http://www.h2mt.org/tools/2_Vista/Ambiguous/Ambiguous_Beta_1.0_Pre-Release.exe -Assembly 1.0.4817.30869 - for Meta Edit/Swap http://www.h2mt.org/tools/2_Vista/Assembly/Assembly_1.0.4817.30869.exe -Gravemind v1.6B - for Meta Edit/Swap http://www.h2mt.org/tools/2_Vista/Gravemind/Gravemind_1.6B.exe -H2V Blu Trainer vK2 - for Third Person/Still Cam/Fly Cam http://www.h2mt.org/tools/2_Vista/MOD/Blu_Trainer/Blu_Trainer_K2.exe -HUD Removal - remove HUD and on-screen text http://www.h2mt.org/tools/2_Vista/MOD/HUD/HUD_Removal/ -Mr. Mohawk v1.2 - for Meta Edit/Swap http://www.h2mt.org/tools/2_Vista/Mr._Mohawk/Mr._Mohawk.exe DOWNLOAD ========= H2MT Cairo Station ODP Campaign Mod SPPF Only Version ~4.22KBs compressed (~1.63MBs extracted) notes.txt

Its a mislabeled variant of the model. They used different voice actors for some of the NPCs and the one that they are calling on was removed from this map, so this Elite is formed out of semi-random sections of the various Elites in that render model.

Sorry for the late reply but this is one of the many Halo forums I only visit every few months. This modification takes the existing scenarios of Old and New Mombasa and replaces the (male) marines with a slightly customized version of the ODST. Some of these NPCs have helmets, others have human heads and sometimes they might have the baseball style-cap seen on Johnson. I have included two versions, one where you play as an ODST and another where you remain the MC. It should all be explained above and in the included readme file. --- WARNING, I DO A BIT OF RANTING BELOW, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED...IN CAPS...AND NOW YOU HAVE BEEN YELLED AT! Besides that we (we being the H2MT: Halo 2 Map/Mod Team) are also working on our own custom campaign for Halo 2 Vista, along with a more open and customized edition of Halo 2. Unfortunately the tools that came included with the original H2EK (Halo 2 Editing Kit) were lobotomized just before release, and to this day Microsoft refuses to comment on the issue. They sold us a product with the promise that we would be able to do everything from making new working models (physics, collision, render_model), to completely new game-types, and beyond. But this was not to be, instead they gave us a program so locked down all you could really do was make a BSP and lay down the netgame equipment and settings. No custom models, no new variants, no custom anything besides BSP and textures. It truly was the saddest Editing Kit to ever be released, fast forward to today and the community has removed most of the ridiculous restrictions. Here is the video evidence: It has been a long process of fixing the H2EK tools and tagset (source files) to return it to its former glory. We have a working beta prototype of this new take on Halo 2, however there are still a few issues that we need to fix/circumvent. If certain representatives of 343i would respond to their tweets perhaps we could get some help from them. If 343i and Microsoft would just wake up, recognize, and emulate what Valve does in regards to their userbase and the mods that are made they would gain more in customer good will and sales revenue. Instead they are driving the game into the ground by CODifying it, but that is a rant for another thread. Seriously though, just imagine what Halo could become if we had our own sandbox version of it that was open and modifiable in the sense that Garry's Mod is. Accessible yet complex as you want it to be. For anyone who is interested in how I ripped globals.globals out of the mainmenu.map (allowing me to make my own resource maps such as mm and shared), or in some of the other progress related to such a find like new player HUDs and bipeds, you can follow this link: Take-my-globals.globals

I finally got around to updating this mod and the next map after; so now you can play as an ODST all the way through Old & New Mombasa. Don't forget to use the included Ambiguous Alpha v2.5 and Blu Trainer vK2 to play the mod properly in third person.* The downloads have been updated, and separate (much smaller) SPPF only versions are provided as well.** *Make sure you have the most recent Microsoft .Net, Visual C++, and full Windows Updates to use these apps. **The SPPF versions require the user to use the included Super PPF application to apply a patch to the appropriate map. Its a simple process but I always suggest making backups of the original campaign maps first. If it sounds confusing just download the full release. NEW CHANGES: -Improved the player's jumping -Increased the player's nade throwing velocity -Removed Dual-wielding -Marines cannot use Energy Swords -Various movement speed tweaks -Small camera tweaks -First Person mode no longer shows a biped (no hand, weapon, nor body remains) -Other minor tweaks For the next map in the series (Metropolis aka New Mombasa) go here: http://www.halo2vista.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=623

Its a bit messy, but I use both Ambiguous Alpha and Beta together, or rely on the Multi-Mod, or Kant's Blu Trainer vK2 for extra camera controls.

Hahahaha, thats a Heroes reference for anyone in the dark there.

Doesn't matter, this would remove most of the hacks because the people who made many of them did not release source code and are not playing the game anymore. Thus Kant might update Ambiguous if it happened and that would be great, I use Ambiguous for all kinds of mapping and Machinima purposes.

Why would they remove an optional Map Editor? Being optional, it wastes no space or resources whatsoever.

They could release a patch that offsets many of the games values by 1: all existing trainers and hacks are properly screwed then, easy peasy. But to do that a company would have to support said product with proper patches for a period longer then say four months.

Sign the petition if you care about H2V: Change.org - 343 Industries: Keep Halo 2 PC Online And this survey as well: Surveymonkey.com