Seven Things You May Not Know About Halo 3: ODST
News, Xbox 360 | Paul D. | August 23, 2009 at 8:55 pm
These days, we face a wall of information…sometimes we miss or forget the little things. So we’ve scoured videos, the Bungie community and more to bring you – in true Bungie fashion – seven little titbits of info on Halo 3: ODST that your average Halo fan may not know. Very minor spoilers included:
Engineers will feature - With ODST’s achievements apparently leaked, two of them are to do with engineers – the long talked about, and rarely seen, covenant race. The Engineers recently made their first official in-game Halo appearance in Halo Wars, but this will mark the first time we get to blow them up in a Halo FPS. They are quite passive and, as the achievements suggest, you can either leave them be or kill them all…
- No matchmaking for Firefight - Unfortunately it seems you will have to rely on your friends, or recent players, list to play ODST with anyone…for Firefight is based upon the co-op model of Halo 3, according to Bungie Producer Curtis Creamer. A couple of users on the Bungie forums have claimed that they have spoken to some Bungie employees recently who said that the game would have taken, at least, an extra SIX months to finish had they included Firefight in matchmaking.
Gold-armoured Hunters to appear? - The Bungie community has long been rife with rumours about tougher versions of existing enemies appearing. The covenant’s ranks are presented to the player in the form of varying colours. A Bungie employee (seen at the bottom of this thread) has all but confirmed that we’ll be seeing gold hunters in the game. Here’s a pic, someone has taken from the recent Vidoc, of what appears to be such a beast. We’d hate to take them on in Legendary…
- The Announcer Guy Returns – While Firefight is a form of co-op, Bungie have still managed to find some space for The Announcer Guy: Halo’s long-standing commentator (i.e. the guy who says ‘Overkill!!’ etc.). In this vid, we see that the players get a few medals without a peep from the announcer…but he can’t seem to contain himself and eventually says ”Reinforcements”. Due to the mass amount of enemies, The Announcer Guy could become quickly annoying…so kudos to Bungie for fixing this while also keeping him around; it just wouldn’t be a Halo FPS without him.
No Elites - Yup, there will be no Elites. Many of us may have forgotten this sad news, but we’re here to remind you of it all over again. Bungie revealed that ODST would be Elite-less back in January of this year, when Urk attempted to break the news gently in their Weekly Update. While it’s all to do with consistency with the story ark, it’s not like Sgt. Johnson should be on Earth as a playable character in Firefight…is it Bungie? Then again, it wouldn’t surprise us if he cloned himself to preserve his awesomeness.
- Only two players per console…even in Firefight – This is an unfortunate one, due to the fact that Firefight is, again, a co-op mode. Since it’s built on the co-op model of Halo 3, the game will have the limits that Halo 3’s co-op has…and Firefight is included. That means in order to play on the same screen as four friends, you’ll have to System Link a couple of Xboxs together with two copies of the game. A little disappointing, but this also applies to the similar Horde mode in Gears of War 2 and Left 4 Dead as well.
No Dual Wielding - According to some things we’ve read on the Bungie forums, dual wielding will not feature. This is due to the limitations of being an ODST rather than a Spartan, according to Bungie’s Design Director Paul Bertone. Yet this is somewhat puzzling…the troopers can lift chainguns off their mounts and carry them about with absolute ease. Sorry to be sexist here, but I fail to see how Dare, the female ODST, could carry that thing about with such consistency…let alone one of the males.
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i cant believe firefight isnt going to have matchmaking
Nicely put, but I have to admit I was NEVER annoyed by the announcer and would be sad if I heard him less.
Neither am I, but you seem to get a lot of medals in Firefight; imagine him saying something every second…
piece of shit. i would rather play MODERN WARFARE 2, MAG, and KILLZONE 2
Bit of a fanboy, are we Darren?
No matchmaking for Firefight saddens me, but I always played Horde with friends anyway. I guess it’ll be fine.
ROFL Sony fanboy go play them then and stop bitching that you don’t have a 360
@ Darren,
Yea that’s how I feel but I choose to have different words for how I feel about Halo.
@ Andrew,
It’s not always that a person is a Sony fanboy if they don’t prefer Halo. I’m not a huge fan of Halo, and feel kind of same way, but would def. not call Halo a piece of shit. But Modern Warfare 2 i’m going to have to say will kick it’s ass.
Agreed Adam, while I respect what Halo has done for console shooters I have to say Halo is an average shooter with a marketable name. It has never revolutionized the genre one bit, not even multiplayer. This game will sell like crazy though, no denying that.
Heh, I honestly can’t predict which game will be more popular; without a doubt Modern Warfare 2 will be the most popular multiplayer game, but single player?
Here’s some more little tidbits, since they did not make us sign any nondisclosure agreements to play firefight on the odst tour.
There are buggers with rechargeable shields as well. I ran across a couple of red ones while playing. The inability to dual wield is also true, although it does boggle the mind as to why. Another thing I noticed while playing firefight (and this could be changed still) is that I was able to hold more than just 2 of each grenade type. While I’m on the subject, in addition to being slower and jumping lower, you have a different arc to your grenade throw, and shields have been replaced by stamina. You can generally take one or two shots before your actual health starts depleting (depending on what you are being shot by). The scope mode on the pistol is also back.
That’s all the things I can think of right now that I haven’t seen anywhere else I’ve looked yet.
lmao cod4 couldn’t even stay on #2 let alone beat halo in the long haul. it only stayed #1 for what–less than a yr. lmao now that’s a piece of shit game if it can’t even be #1 until now–unlike halo. i’d much rather play halo and shadow complex over an over than play cod6 after i finished campaign mode. besides, not many ppl are better than me on cod4 anyway. check the leaderboards. that’s only playing for 2hrs 2x/wk for 3mos. those losers who never stopped playing cod4 since release couldn’t even crack top 400,000th on the list let alone top 500. losers. odst & opf2 are better than cod6 and the sony shit ppl mentioned.
I feel it is also worth pointing out that in all the videos, the HUD shows 4 of one type of grenade being carried at one time, compared to a maximum of 2 of any type in halo 3, eg. 4 frags or 4 plasmas
Joebob – Thanks for those extra titbits. =)
Anon – Yeah, Joe did say that. Gotta be true…
To the extra grenades mentioned by anonymous and joebob4884: In gameplay footage and reviews, Bungie has said that grenades will be much more important than in Halo 3.
@ Aaron R.
uuhm… are we forgetting EVERY shooter before Halo: Combat Evolved, and just about every shooter soon after? you can’t say it didn’t revolutionise any part of shooters… because it’s the game that brought shields to the FPS genre. there may have been a few before Halo that had them, but Halo made it mainstream.
*ahem* NOT saying that was a good thing… but Halo’s impact can’t be overlooked. I still think the first was the best… they still have the limited health under your shields, but why can’t we see it anymore? :/
but I digress; now, to my point.
SOMEONE LIED. I’m paraphrasing, but I’m FAIRLY certain someone announced at E3 or sometime before that “now you will be able to play Halo campaign with three of your best friends all on the same screen in Halo 3: ODST.”, and yet, now we’re being told you’ll have to system link?! this is bullsh*t! that was the only reason I was excited for this game; now I’m just mad it even exists!
This coming from a total Halo fanboy, too… f*** you, Bungie. f*** you. I feel betrayed.
@ mr.dick
your house is are definitely second on my list of “buildings to burn down”. right after Bungie HQ.
I’m 100% with Aaron R. on this.
In my case, I have to have a friend come over; someone who owns a 360, a system link cable and another fucking TV (I’m not playing 4-way split screen on my 32″ TV) to play 4-player co-op! The article mentions something about “recent players” who can possibly play with you but this is unconfirmed so far. Bungie and everyone else has been going crazy over this new mode for months and now I find out I have to jump through hoops to play it?
I’m now considering just canceling my pre-order now. Normally I don’t let things like this get to me but I’m a little pissed about this. I know my wife will be happy to play (and that’s not a bad thing) but I was really looking forward to a 4-player experience. Mostly because I’m a bit of an achievement whore and I’d like to obtain the Recon armor, but my wife isn’t going to be down with all the vid-master achievements needed to get it.
What bothers me even more is Bungie’s comments on this. They said “it would have taken another 5-6 months to release the game if they put it in Matchmaking.” So what? What’s another 6 months to give their customers the experience they deserve? Maybe that would be cause enough to justify the full price for the game?
Sounds to me like this game was rushed out the door. I don’t know what to do now.
This game may not be “revolutionary” but it is DEFINATLY FUN!! Sick game, great modes, more maps. screw PS3 (obese or anorexic) XBOX 360 fo LIFE!!!
Halo is lame. It’s for kids. No blood. You jump like you’re on the moon. And it takes a full clip to kill your enemy. It’s slow and annoying. Any other on-line multi-player out there is better right now. Battle Field 1943. COD5. Gears. These game all have better graphics and realism that Halo will never have. If you want to shoot Aliens and jump around like and idiot with a laser gun Halo is the game for you.
I loved the first halo for pc. Since I refused to upgrade to Vista, couldn’t play #2. Now I am playing a game called F.E.A.R.2, AWESOME to say the least.
U guys really need to find a new game to play. Halo sux ass……i have a Xbox 360 and i would never buy this shit
No matchmaking no thanks. You changed Bungie. You used to be about making good games.
No, halo is cool but its hust sad that they don’t make the best of it ex: 4 player everywhere co-op, matchmaking,firefight and to be honest i think the maps they are going to bring out are lame its just too small you will not be able to drive a tank! they should have a small map, a medium, and a big like avalanche or something apart from that its going to be great!
these are all my questions for odst: first off, anyone know what the campaign length is, because that will probably be the deciding factor for wether or not im going to get it, that and if u can play firefight alone, i dont have live gold. second can u hijack vehicles, third will u face scarabs in the campaign or in firefight and last if i have a cool forge map for halo 3, will i have it for odst too.
Now mw2 questions: can u play spec ops mode alone, how long is campaign, is it worth getting only for campaign and spec ops ( if its true u can play it alone) because i dont have a call of duty and i wanted to get a call of duty game with great singleplayer value( thats why i dont want to get cod 4.
thanks if u answer
Yea you can play Spec Ops alone, but it’s boring.
wtf would there not b eletes isent this a prequil to halo 2??
Yea it is really disappointing that firefight will not be in matchmaking. I’m sure I will use message boards like gamefaqs.com to get friends to play with.
There is also one other let down in ODST that so far no one else has mentioned yet. The Battle Rifle is not in Campaign or Firefight. While kind of a let down it still isn’t so bad. The Covy Carbine is still their and with the new pistol I personally feel that it won’t make much of a distance.
I wish they would just remake Halo 1 + Xbox live + a Halo 2/3 style interface (so you could change controls mid-game). Maybe add a multiplayer level or two.