RedStarRocket91

Why does it matter at all as long as you're getting balanced games? Seriously, if you want a skill indicator purely because you want to insult other players and show off, then you're everything which is wrong with modern online gaming. If someone does badly, why the hell is that your business? Prove you're better than them by PLAYING WELL instead of asking them to look at numbers. As for videos... I don't care how 'skilled' a player is according to some arbitrary system. If their videos are well edited and feature good gameplay, I'll watch them. If they're nothing but people getting Battle Rifle kills and not dying, I won't watch them. The fact that it's made by someone with a skill of 50 won't affect my decision to watch it any more than if they had a skill of 3. Wanting to do well and have your skill publicly recognised is a legitimate desire. By do it by playing well, not by pointing at numbers which can easily be manipulated.

Not true, the 'nades in Halo 3 would detonate a half-second after hitting ANY surface, and those in Halo: CE would only explode after they'd stopped moving altogether (though admittedly they didn't roll due to engine limitations). I think those in Reach acted a little differently, but then I also remember them being a little inconsistent with the ways they detonated. Besides, grenades have always been a legitimate part of Halo gameplay. If someone wants to waste an extra six shots from the Battle Rifle to kill a target, that's their own problem.

Happens with me as well. The best way to get around it is to highlight it once it's been written, and then alter it - for some reason, that means your cursor won't go jumping back and forth afterwards.

I've missed reading these, it's great to have you back Drizzy!

Mmm. That still could just be the loadout glitch though - it might be best to take down their gamertags, just in case they're innocent? Let XBL deal with it instead of risking getting in trouble for slander yourself.

Are you sure they were hacking? As in, did it happen across multiple rounds/games? If it was just the one game, they were probably just getting the loadout glitch.

Hmm. Maybe try uninstalling and reinstalling the second disc? It's just odd because my and my flatmates' Xboxes work okay, even when we're playing with 4 people on each, and I'm pretty sure we've played most of the maps now.

'True Halo fan' is just something people say when they want to insult people who don't agree with them, without actually having to think of an insult or back up their opinions with evidence. It doesn't actually mean anything on its own. In fairness, there are a couple of balance issues (needing to rank up to unlock items which can have a real, tangible effect on the outcome of games immediately come to mind) and problems with the game, and it's definitely not perfect. But most people seem to just be angry because 343i are trying to actually do new things instead of remaking Halo 2. Every new release since then has generated a lot of anger, that's worth keeping in mind. People hated Halo 3 because the Battle Rifle was no longer completely overpowered, because it had equipment, and because it reduced the number or grenades people could carry - all of which meant it wasn't a 'true Halo game' any more. People hated Reach because of Armor Abilities, visible weapon bloom, and the replacement of the Battle Rifle with the DMR - all of which meant THAT wasn't a 'true Halo game' anymore. It's just the same thing we're seeing with Halo 4. The people who claim to be 'true Halo fans' are just upset that they haven't remade Halo 2 again. I almost wish they'd just remake it and be done with it so that everyone would finally realise how bug-ridden, broken and imbalanced it really was compared to the newer games. That's not to say there aren't legitimate complaints about Halo 4's balance - there are - just that most of the anger towards the newer games isn't based on what it is, but what it isn't.

You gave a list of things you didn't like when playing custom games. I made some suggestions about how you could make your customs games better based on that list. Was there a problem with those suggestions?

Now that's something I'd like to see! Most Covenant weapons are already quite balanced toward close-quarters, though. They tend to do massive shield damage but have a weak effect on underlying health, which means they synergise with melee combat (which depends on depleting shields faster than the opponent).

It's only overpowered when I'm not the one using it - for some reason, whenever I use the Needler it doesn't track properly. It's probably due to my weak connection, but still. I think it's actually balanced okay, most of the time people are going to be using around one full magazine per kill, and even a really skilled players is unlikely to average two kills per reload: at best, you're likely to get perhaps five kills with it before ammunition runs out. Compare that with a Shotgun, which has the potential to kill fifteen opponents or more, or a Rocket Launcher, which can not only wipe out entire teams with a single well-aimed blast but can also wreck vehicles, or even a Railgun, which can wipe someone out with a single shot from halfway across the map. Compared to that, the Needler is pretty tame!

In that case, I hope you find these suggestions useful when playing customs! 1. In some gametypes it's possible to disable instant respawn altogether, or at least delay it. If you set the respawn timer to something like 15 seconds, I think pressing 'X' only shortens the respawn time, instead of respawning instantly. Alternatively, just turn the death camera off, set a respawn timer, and ask everyone to play with honour rules. It's customs, so they should be happy to do this. 2. Set Game Loadouts instead of Personal Loadouts and make the loadouts without anything you don't like. Alternatively, ask everyone to take the Boltshot out of their loadouts. You can then add it as a weapon drop by turning Allow Custom Odrnance on, and then customising the weapon drops to include whatever you want. 3. The motion tracker's range can be reduced, set to allies only, or disabled altogether either permanently or for a short duration after respawning through the Traits and Respawn Traits menus. 4&5. Forge can be used to customise initial spawn points, so that everyone will spawn exactly where you want. You can also use Forge to add and remove vehicles, whether they respawn when destroyed and how long it takes if they do. You can also customise vehicles via the game settings menu, so that only certain vehicles appear, certain vehicles don't appear, or that no vehicles are present whatsoever. Good luck, happy customs!

I really like making small, close-quarters arenas. I didn't get Xbox LIVE for myself until 2010, so for a very long time all I had to play was Splitscreen or LAN, which usually meant a very small number of players. Most of the maps in Halo are great for six players, eight players, and even twelve or sixteen players, but there are very few that are really good for just two to three people who want to play some Slayer or Oddball. So I started Forging my own maps in Sandbox, and then even though I'd gotten online by the time Reach came out, I'd found I really enjoyed smaller maps, so I just kept forging them. I also like making maps that work with standard gametypes, but subvert traditional gameplay. Most maps are generally quite large and open, with long sightlines and not a great deal in the way of cover: I try to focus on building things which are more focused around Assault Rifles and Shotguns than DMRs and Sniper Rifles, as I think it's nice to have maps that actually reward different playstyles. I also like trying to think of ways to get unusual weapons into the sandbox: it's a little redundant now thanks to random weapon drops, but it was fun while it lasted!

Their crosshair will track your motions perfectly - it won't move around with a little bit of error whilst generally staying on target (as with regular human players) but will move exactly as you do, usually even through walls and obstacles.

They work just fine for me - maybe you should get your console examined? It sounds like you have a hardware problem. OT: Great idea, would love to see this implemented!

I'd love to see something like this, perhaps pressing this button could automatically save a copy of the game in Theatre mode as well so that there's video evidence? Great post, BaDInTentZs!

He means because there's a smaller, fainter reticule inside the big one. The larger one is bullet magnetism range. If your target is in that when you fire and it's turned red, you'll hit it. The smaller one is precision. If the reticule isn't red (out of aim assist range) then the bullets will all land in that, or if this is passed over the body, that's exactly where the bullets will hit.

This pretty much sums it up. Plus, the Crimson DLC list is, I believe, currently the only place to play the Extraction gametype, so if you want to play that before it becomes a playlist in its own right, you might want to consider getting it.

Dude. Stop making sense.

If you put it in your fileshare and tag with something, and then post the tag and your gamertag, we can manually look it up that way. As for the Ghost... its collision damage is notoriously temperamental. I've been betrayed by teammates who weren't even going full normal speed while at full shield, and I've not even dropped the shields of opponents after hitting them head-on with full boost. As for cheating, I haven't really noticed anything that couldn't just be explained by extreme lag. There's been once or twice where my weapons have been literally useless (emptying clips into people at point-blank range without even dropping their shields), but even that seems to be more because of my connection that any outright cheating.

Much as this is really disappointing, it's good that they've at least said nobody's going to be permabanned for it - that would be horribly unfair.

That's the funniest thing I've seen all day!

...the Mantis can crouch? OT: I don't think it would be such a great idea, vehicles are so powerful that everyone needs to be made aware or their presence: even the smaller one show up while they're standing still, so to allow something as powerful and huge as a Mantis to sneak around seems like it would be a bad idea. And realistically, what chance do you have of hiding it anyway? It's enormous and incredibly noisy.

This is so misleading! PC gaming has ALWAYS had better graphics than console - try running something like Skyrim or Crysis on a PC at the highest graphics settings and you can immediately see the difference compared to the console versions. The only difference now is that we're getting close to the conventional limits of photorealism, so while graphics will be MUCH better, the difference won't be as obvious.