ODST: Halo Evolved Comments by Richard Leadbetter

It's clear to any moron that Killzone 2 is obviously much better visually and technically than Halo 3, however, it's Halo's art style and overall presentation value that makes it the better looking game (Covenant enemies > Nazi soldiers with red glowing eyes/ Beautiful and lush forest environments > Dark grey boring shit).

Still, I shouldn't be too generous toward Halo, since if Halo 3 were anything like Halo 2 then any comparisons to Killzone 2 would be completely ridiculous. But I wouldn't expect that to weigh in on your comparison meter, since you idiots here at Eurogamer seem to think obvious flaws like texture issues and pop-up are completely acceptable in a game.

Looks like the Halo 3 engine holds up OK today, not brilliantly but OK.

I do wonder how much extra work will be done on it for ODST, will it be Halo 3.5 or Halo 3.1?

The suggestion that Killzone is designed around the PS3's deficiencies is an interesting revelation, but is it not also the case that Halo 3 is designed around the 360's, they just had less time to do it in?

TBH, Halo 3 looked fine in screenshots. It's only when I actually started to play it at home that it started to dawn on me that it looked a tad crap compared to a lot of other 360 games. Of course, a lot of people seemed to have a problem with admitting this at the time...

Halo 3 is still the best looking game on 360. Wonder why more games don't let you record your progress like Halo 3? You'd be watching texture pop-up most of the time.


That said; Killzone 2 is in a class of its own at the moment. There's nothing to touch it graphically on console.

Pure genius Eurogamer. 200 comments guaranteed. And Crofto as first post makes that another 50 bonus comments.

Cant say im all that impressed. To me, a lay person, Kz2 looks to shit all over this visually. I don't care for the technicals behind it nor will the vast majority.

Kz2 is pure eye candy; this is the same, but just not as sweet. Then I will admit that ive hated every Halo game ever released. Probably taints my view somewhat

:/

Halo 3/ODST look very nice, although clearly not up to Killzone 2 levels, but good enough to engender some 'ooo' moments (via art direction) and not detract from the sheer fun of playing the game. The effects are sweet too.

N@, surely there's a difference between technical capability and 'best looking'. Halo is *very* smooth, but other games *look* better, and aren't riddled with bugs that detract heavily from the overall quality.

Killzone 2 looks absolutely miles better than Halo 3 (or ODST) but Halo has never really been about the visuals anyway. The thing that set Halo (the first one) apart for me was the unfeasible amount of fun we had playing the split-screen campaign.

Jeez, it's not ALL about the graphics...

'I don't care for the technicals behind it nor will the vast majority. '

Those 'technicals' allow the rest of the game to function. Not speaking in reference to KZ2/Halo 3, but in general terms: You're essentially saying you want good looking fluff.

Funny how this article deals with AI, lighting and sound, yet people have already jumped to using only straight up visual prowess as the marker of discussion.

Will it be a better game than Killzone 2 though? That's the important thing.

Killzone 2 was fun but certainly not the best fps shooter i've ever played.

As long its god big open levels with a shitload of covenant (like Halo 3) I dont really care if the graphics are better than H3 TBH.

What has KZ2 to do in an article that essentially compares two Halo Games with each other? Leadbetter never fails to make you look like a site scraping the bottom of the fanboy-barrel. And yes, 'quincunx anti-aliasing' is really an important thing to know about. I shall base my purchasing decisions on it from now on.

"And yet, analysis of the gameplay footage revealed at E3 shows that the self-same two-year-old technology with apparently only minor modifications is powering Microsoft's biggest first-person shooter of the year: ODST. Does the Halo tech have what it takes to regain the advantage in the FPS arms race? "

Killzone may have the tech but halo has the art style and the fun factor, this is why it continues to outsell killzone.

I like how they try to dress this up as a serious graphics article but really it was just written to entice the fanboys into a killzone vs halo argument. Poor show.

TBH I do not think that MS/Bungie is worried about competing with KZ2.

Halo is doing a lot more in the background... what you gain in one area you lose in another.

I'm not exactly a massive fan of Halo. I played H1 and was somewhat underwhelmed (this was on the PC though) and never got around to H2 as a had a PS2 and not a Xbox.

With Halo 3 I was determined to not be pulled into the hype, and yet on launch day I found myself in Zavvi in London with cash in hand picking up a copy. This was around 2pm and the queue was still huge.

On playing the SP game I enjoyed it. It didn't blow my mind, but it was very fun. I've never played MP Halo and have never touched the MP portion of Halo 3, so maybe I don't really understand the staying power of the game. However, a few months back a friend came round and we played the campaign in co-op, and we just couldn't put it down. That, to me, is where the game really shines.

Except, actually, where is really shines is that it doesn't look like any other shooter out there. Call of Duty, Killzone, Resistance, Socom, Ghost Recon, Medah of Honor, Rainbow Six, etc all pretty much fall into the same visual style. Halo games are out there on their own. I'm not saying they look better, but at the very least they look different.

For me, that is pretty much a major achievement in itself.

Halo 3 had a scene two Scarabs, good and friendly AI on board both, on the ground in vehicles and in the air - the lack of AA was forgiven given the scale of the battles. Also, no respawning enemies = winnage.

Also that you could play this in co-op and then watch your game back afterwards... it's just a great package, all told.

Funny how people forget.

I can expect farticusmaximus in here anytime soon, Halo is like his wife.

Also - Halo 3 is not the best looking 360 game there is, I say Gears 2 is. Then again I don't own a 360 though.

This is interesting in that I know very little about what they were talking about but in how we have just seen a face-off between 2 high profile exclusives and now the PS3 won technical standards aren't that important.

I don't really give a shit but we are about to see a lot of people making hypocrites of themselves.

Very lame article.

What's next? an in depth comparison of Depth Perception Cameras vs Submilimiter Accuracy Recognition?

" ... that'll keep the trolls clickling during the weekend"

So.....what exactly has Killzone2 got to do with this?
Or is EG fishing for some fanboys to get some reader hits again?

"This is interesting in that I know very little about what they were talking about but in how we have just seen a face-off between 2 high profile exclusives and now the PS3 won technical standards aren't that important.

I don't really give a shit but we are about to see a lot of people making hypocrites of themselves. "

You compare 2 different games that do two totally different things. That doesn't make the rest hypocrites, that makes you an idiot. It's like comparing barbie's horse ride adventure to nintendogs. Also, speaking about a being a hypocrite: Claiming that you don't care while crying your hart out.

First of.. Do you remember when the first announcement for Killzone 2 came out and when it was released you tards..? lol Or you dont know that Halo 3 is OLD practically? cause its been like 2 years since it came out and i can guarantee you that Killzone 2 wont be as much as Halo 3 is 2 years from now. If this doesn't make sence to oyu read what i said a couple of times more. In 2 years from now lets see if u'll be talking about Killzone 2 lol.

Anyhow the article was very great and detailed. Thoguht it was another Halo related boring article but this was thorough and good. thnx. Question though. The trailers and Demo of E3 on OSDT is final stage or might be improvements on the engine etc..?

Already knew this wouldn't be up to KZ2 standards, it does seem that bungie really are pushing the engine in a different direction. If they should is another question.

To me this console war was lost by both when affordable PC's surpassed them both, but I can see why many would disagree.

Killzone 2 was a lovely shade of grey. With a bit of brown.

What is Killzone 2?

Xerx3s, idiot indeed. But the fact is that this article is showing how 2 high profile FPS's perform on a technical scale. If KZ2 was the game that was less technically impressive the comments section would be full of "MASSIVE FAIL SONY" from many of these claiming this kind of thing is irrelevant. Pretty funny if you ask me.

Didin't overly enjoy KZ2 if it must be said and from those my mates I've spoken to about Halo3 some enjoyed it some didn't.

Crying my "hart out", no they would be tears of joy so it would be my eyes.

As for them being totally different games, guns, aliens, space marines and FPS. Not really that different.

Killzone 2: Strong on eye-candy. Shite on multiplayer.

Halo 3: Just a very silly game. For bedwetters only.

Now you know my opinion. And yours.

No need to fight guys, Killzone an halo are BOTH overrated in their own special way

what was the point of that, its obvious killzone easily pwns Halo graphically, a match up against gears 2 would have been a bit more fair

What a pathetic article.

We all knew ODST would be a mildly polished version of H3. It is a H3 expansion, after all. And H3 never was a graphical showpiece anyway. It's not even full HD FFS.

For some real worth, how about comparing KZ2 to Gears2 to establish that, if approached wisely, the PS3 can kick the 360 into touch.

'Maybe not a graphical showcase to humble Killzone 2, but still a good-looking game with gameplay scenarios tailored to the unique properties of Bungie's proprietary engine.'

'Maybe not a graphical showcase to humble Killzone 2'??? - haha lay off the crack Richard, theres no maybe. Killzone is in another league.

"N@, surely there's a difference between technical capability and 'best looking'. Halo is *very* smooth, but other games *look* better, and aren't riddled with bugs that detract heavily from the overall quality"

Well indeed.

I appreciate technical proficiency a lot so for me Halo 3 is far more impressive than something like GoW2.

Both games are hugely technically impressive, but the difference comes down to what they are showing on screen. Killzone 2's levels are fairly confined affairs, moslty taking place over narrow strips of terrain which the player is funelled through, and even in the more extreme firefights there are rarely more than, say, 10-20 enemies around at any given time.
The scenarious faced by the player are strictly controlled set pieces, and the enemy AI only kicks in when you're around. Most firefights in Killzone 2 play out the same when you repeat them (with some exceptions, of course).

Halo 3, on the other hand, presents massive open-world environments in an almost sandbox style, and lets both players and AI teammates roam around. Certainly some scripted events are evident, but on several maps its not uncommon to find that an area swarming with Covenant on one play-through is devoid of enemies entirely on a different playthrough, because of how the skirmishes fought between AI combatants plays out. The visuals on Halo 3,whilst brimming with artisic merit, simply cannot compete with the technical brawn of Killzone 2's because of how much else is going on in the background.

A lot of people seem to forget that the reason consoles look so powerful on paper but can't always reach the bar is because of the various AI and sound processing that has to take place as well.

How am I supposed to get a fanboy rant out of this? Is there such thing as a Halo 3 fanboy that despises ODST?

Interestig article. I wouldn't mind seeing more same console comparisons, like a Gears of War vs Gears of War 2. I know there's a tech video of Live, but it'd be nice to see an article anyway.

Halo was all about great coop and vehicles, variety of gameplay.

Not even a patch on other xbox games graphics such as assassins creed or resident evil V, never mind Sony First party stuff.

Also feel the same way abot Gears slow bitbump flat graphics, few baddies per screen, just hate UE graphics, but thats another story.

Laughable article really.

If it was a Gears of War vs Gears of War 2 article, Leadbetter would still bring up Kz2 :P

Id rather have a Eurogamer website face off with Edge Face off tbh.

The Halo 3 engine only looks nice to me when it's rendering something sci-fi. With vegetation, especially, it look bloody awful.

As for "detail complete" split-screen - at least on co-op in the main game it dialed back vegetation, lighting and all water animation, so I'd hardly call that "detail complete" :)

This article has gone a long way towards helping me make my mind up. Australians get a crap deal from MS Live (no Wolfenstein etc etc etc) and Killzone looks really good. I think I am about ready to jump ship.

"This article has gone a long way towards helping me make my mind up. Australians get a crap deal from MS Live (no Wolfenstein etc etc etc) and Killzone looks really good. I think I am about ready to jump ship. "

But it plays as a fairly average fps for me. Ity wouldn't be the deciding factor in getting a PS3 for me by a long way.

Both have great games and great games coming and I know i'd regret gettng rid of one for the other.

Why not just own both, multi platform is the best of both worlds? i'd never go back.


What's that about Wolfenstein in Aussie anyway?

why jump ship, sail on both. Multiplt games often better on Xbox, and prefer system link coop.

Could not do without drake or Infamous etc.

Uncharted best console graphics todate in my opinion (graphics means animations on main chaacters and others, movement as well as pretty static stuff).

That doesn't make the rest hypocrites, that makes you an idiot.

Nice name calling, Xerx3s. Let me remind you of your number-one-argument -- the one you never cease to come up with when you smell an opportuntity: "but they had 3 years to develop KZ2, so no big deal that it looks so good. No other developer has that luxury". Now, let's look at how long Bungie has been working on Halo 3 tech. And it still looks... decent.

Hypocrit indeed.

I noticed as soon as they showed the Halo 3 OSDT gameplay that the game was still running sub-720p and without AA. Looks very rough and jaggy in that unique PS3 kind of way (take a look at inFamous for example, terrific game, granted, but it often looks like a PS2 game at times!). It's not something you expect from the Xbox 360 to be honest, which tends to do AA much better than rival consoles.

While Halo 3 ODST isn't exactly ugly, it's nevertheless disappointing that such a big name Xbox 360 exclusive still cannot even manage the 720p and 2X AA minimum spec for an HD game that Microsoft promised way back at E3 2005. Visually the two current generation Halo games are nowhere near as technically or visually impressive as the original Xbox game was back in 2002. My jaw never hit the ground once in the entire time I played Halo 3 unlike Halo. Shame but so long as the new game plays well I don't suppose its core fans will care.

Personally I wished the new game looked as good as the screenshots produced in Halo 3 which were 720p and included AA. This was the kind of visual update we got going from PGR 3 to PGR 4 for example, but it's not to be. Oh well.

360 at peak of power confirmed!

/exits.

Look, if you had a game in a small room as a whole level, they could do 1080 P with incredible detail, a large level you scale it down, sandbox large level even more as guess it would be hard to stream data in sandbox.

Infamous has great large level sandbox graphics, period. dumb comment. If it was a small linear type corridoor shooter, they could obviously do more.

Racing game with one track, they can stream the graphics small corridoor, the benchmark here is 1080 P like 2 Ps3 games.......

Halo ...it depends on the size of the level, if its very large you could consider it to be a bit sandboxish and so you would expect sub 720 if there are lots of things going on as well (number of enemies / animations)

halo > half life

Both Halo 3 and Killzone 2 were fairly mediocre.

Both of the Gears games were better looking than Halo 3 and Gears 2 was better looking than Killzone 2.

This article is absolute flame-baiting tripe as well. EG seems to love putting one of these horribly biased wastes of time up now and then to get the clicks a-flowing. We get it. You love the 360, Sony killed you puppy and you've sent Nintendo to the nursing home to be wheeled out and doted on occasionally.

What's the matter guys? Not enough traffic for your E3 coverage?

I don't really care with one has better graphics to be honest - the graphics on most games these days are majorly impressive.

Are you really going to turn off your console because of a bit of screen-tearing when your having a blast??

The most important thing is whether the game is immersive & fun to play.

YOU'RE the ones giving them the hits you friggin' numpties.
If you don't like the articles or the idea that EG are getting hits for them, don't fucking click on them and leave pages of comments.
If no-one truly cared like you all claim, EG wouldn't get the hits and they wouldn't run the articles, but you just can't help yourselves!

I personally love them. Keep 'em coming EG, and thanks to all you whining idiots for making these articles the most popular on the site.

How about a Stalker/Clear Sky article soon since we've got Call of Pripyat on the way?