The new Halo 3 Map pack....

My disc of Halo 3 is cracked (mailed it for replacement the other day). However, considering what Halo has meant to me for the past year or so I downloaded them anyway and went and rented a copy to try them out. They are nice maps. Foundry should be fun to goof off in, Rat's Nest should be a nice racing map. But Stand-Off? Gorgeous is the only word that fits. It really is a great looking map, possibly too good.

I've posted previously what gave Halo 2 long legs for me. When playing multi-player got boring I could go in and literally for hours goof off glitching and bouncing and just generally having a good time with friends. Say what you want about glitching and bouncing in match-made games. Most of the time I never really saw it give anybody too great a benefit. Having said that, I realize that to do it in match-made play was unethical for those that did it in an attempt to gain an edge. Opinions vary but Bungie declared it a violation of the rules and players should have respected that decision. Because some didn't, other players bitched for Bungie to "fix" the problem.

Fix them they did. Enter new terms into the Halo-pedia: Death-Barrier, Invisi-Wall, Suck-o-rama... whatever you called it, the meaning was the same. It was the end of fun. No more getting out of the maps, no more bouncing. For most of the maps that was okay and in Halo 2 there were still ways to do it no matter what they tried to do because it was part of the gaming engine that allowed it to occur. The hard thing to digest were the maps that looked like you SHOULD be able to access those areas, areas that wouldn't have hurt gameplay at all and would have probably enhanced it. As far as I'm concerned the best thing they could have done was open the maps up so that EVERYBODY could access the areas. anybody could figure out a bounce, they just had to practice.

As I said, for the most part, the playable maps in Halo 2 and especially Halo 3 don't really lend themselves to there being any great advantage to reaching some of the areas, it usually makes you a sitting duck. But, a couple of the maps scream for you to able to run around and explore. The new Zanzibar (it's been so long since I played H3 I forgot the new name). That map should be wide open, so much to do and see I could occupied forever just running around. Setting up a BTB would be cool as hell and capture the flag on a huge map would be interesting. If you want non-stop fast action go take your ritalin and chill out, sometimes you want the time to be methodical and come up with a plan. Or, maybe you just want to go into customs (as I often did) and just stroll around and look for cookies and easter-eggs.

The previous maps were painful enough. Don't put up an amusement park and keep it gated off. But the new map Stand-Off is like spitting in my face. There are even little ledges and cliffs around the game area that make no sense what-so-ever to have restricted. They might as well have sent a letter to my house and said, "Hey C Moth, see all that pretty landscape, all those buildings in the background, those friggin HUGE facilities with massive satelite dishes off in the distance? Well, you'll NEVER be able to go there. Fuck you!"

No Bungie, Fuck you.

After goofing off on the new maps, even as pretty as they are, I just don't have the incentive to go into matchmaking, it's just more of the same just in a different place. I don't know why that makes it diferent from any other game but it does. The rented copy of the game has been sitting untouched now for two days while I've been busily playing Call of Duty 4. I am addicted to that game in a way I haven't felt since Halo 2. Even though I can't "get out of map" I don't really care, most of the maps aren't condusive to it anyway. There's no need to glitch, aim, shoot them in the face, bingo!! instant death. no magic weapon combos, no shields to take down, just death in a neat and dramatic way. I'm content  to just play the game and do prestige maybe again, I haven't decided yet.

Either way, when my replacement disc for halo 3 arrives i might even play it, there are a few achievements I haven't earned yet. But, maybe not.