Halo Reach Beta

I am Currently playing the Beta Version of Bungie's Halo Reach

It is the same old halo formula with a couple of noticeable game play tweaks.
1. Armor abilities
2. Damage tweaks
3. Loadouts
4. Ranking

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1. Armor Abilities

These Abilities have been added, to enhance game play and add extra levels of strategies to battles, there have been 4 abilities made available for the beta.
these include

1. Jetpack - the jet pack is pretty much self explanatory

2. Sprint - same thing

3. Armor Lock - the armor lock allows the user to become Temperately invincible for the cost of movement, you can;t move in anyway. when armor lock is held for a longer period of time it charges an EMP blast which lowers the shields of everyone around you when released

4. Active Camo - Active camo or invisibility is now activated with the Left Bumper, and is made less effective by moving.

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2. Damage tweaks

Heath Packs ARE BACK!!, you now have both a rebounding sheild and regular HP.

In halo 3, when you received damage it would deplete the shields and any left over damage would reduce HP, however this has been altered in Reach.

Now when you receive damage, it only depletes shield, any left over damage isnt carried into HP, so when low shields are in effect, punchs are not instant kill.

Also Holding Down the punch button when standing behind an enemy will begin an assassination animation, these animations are brutal , but take time to perform, in this time an enemy can kill you, saving his teammate, or your teammate can steal the kill.

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3. Load outs

Think COD classes, but without the customization, these Loadouts are chosen at the start of each re spawn, and contain, 1 armor ability , 1 primary weapon and secondary weapon, and 2 grenades ( frag, or plasma ).

These classes are determined by the gametype you are playing. preventing players from creating overpowered classes.


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4. Ranking

The Traditional ranking system has been replaced, so no more hording EXP or increasing your trueskill score. its all about credits, these credits are put towards buying armor variants. however when buying any armor your Total collected Credits dosent decrease, only current reserves.

And now determed by your playing ability ( i.e K/D, Betrayals, and average life times ) you are given a rating, these ratings help place you in the communtiy , these rating will place you in one of 4 divisons (steel, siliver, gold or ONYX)
over a season ( around 2 weeks ) these rating will be reset at the start of each season, so you will have 2 work hard to maintain your spot.

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So far i have found all these changes to be welcome additions, no matter how many times i lose a kill to armor lock.
and recommend all of you with 360's to check it out after its release.

Its HALO (5) ... just going back to their best title (1st HALO) since the other ones were so crap, people just nano'd the OP segments.

I won't be wasting mah cash on this, I think it's a good game. The mechanics were decent and the way the maps got layed out was good.

Not saying dont get it, I say get it, but just saying its not my type of game.

Watched a review by the old gamespot-tv crew (now X-Play) ahhh... Gamespot TV... saturday mornings lol

Sounds like the way Halo-online should have been from the word GO ;D Interesting game-play features (Combat Evolved anyone?) and a competitive ranking system.

I think my biggest problem with the Halo-3 style of online, was simply the fact that so many people who played it, considered themselves to be the bees-knees when they had the sword or the sniper rifle.
So what I want to know is-
Is the sword still the same weapon from Halo 2, all based on some retarded timing system.
Is the sniper rifle still too easy to use?

Well the sword is still very powerful, HOWEVER with a well timed punch, you can deflect the swing, very good if you time it.

and the sniper is still pretty much the same. hehe