Halo 4 was quite a technical achievement on the Xbox 360, but the excessive shiny-ness of everything was just too much for me. Spartans look like they’re made of plastic.
Anyone else hoping for a more traditional art style? The progression from Halo CE to 2 was logical, as was the progression from 2 to 3 and 3 to Reach. Reach to Halo 4, however, was a drastic change in art direction.
Maybe I’m overthinking it, but I greatly preferred the look of Reach to Halo 4. Character designs looked more practical and less like action figures. I also didn’t like the random changes in character designs and vehicle designs.
I am. The color palettes were too hot on the characters, and the surfaces were a bit too shiny for my tastes. Not only that, I feel the effect of stepping from dark to shadow was a bit overdone. I don’t know what that is called, but it’s the brief moment where the background appears brighter than it normally is.
I’m sure 343 was experimenting with a lot of stuff, so there was a good reason behind some of this. But yeah, in terms of art direction, I’d take a cue from any prior game, but especially Reach, in terms of how realistic colors and surfaces looked on my TV screen.
> I’d like a middle ground between reach and h4, except for the armor
> reach’s armor all the way
I just hope that the armor selection becomes more organized, akin to reaches armor system (Categories and then sub categories) Example. If there MUST be an inclusion of skins for each piece of armor. Each piece should have its base variant. then much akin to halo reaches helmet system, each piece of armor has a sub menu to select the skin you want. this would allow for spending a lot less time scrolling.
… And yes id like an armor STYLE that is a middle man between reach and 4. Some of the armor just looked… weird… AND BRING BACK ARMOR ATTACHMENTS! I feel like they are a must ever since Reach did it with their helmets.
You know, I do actually like the look a lot of the levels in 4, but I agree the multiplayer models looked a bit plastic and a lot of metallic objects were a bit too shiny.
Though as it stands I don’t completely mind the way it looks, but I think the Halo: Reach grittiness was a good direction to go down. The player models from Reach were the best looking yet in any Halo.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with Halo 4’s shiny surfaces or the amount of lighting. I find the color palette too “juicy”. The armor and a lot of metallic surfaces look too much like plastic in Halo 4.
> Halo 4 was quite a technical achievement on the Xbox 360, but the <mark>excessive shiny-ness of everything</mark> was just too much for me. <mark>Spartans look like they’re made of plastic.</mark>
>
> …<mark>3 to Reach</mark>. Reach to Halo 4, was a drastic change in art direction.
>
> Maybe I’m overthinking it…
Just thought id highlight some of your points here. First i must say overly shiny and plastic spartans = H3 moreso than any halo. If what you mean was “make some places have shadows/ be dark” id agree because night levels shouldnt be just a day level tinted blue.
As for art direction H1-3 all embraced the sci-fi aspect while Reach and H4 went a more funtional realistic route.
I just want to see more traditional Armor variants. Half of the helmets in H4 looked like something out of transformers. The other half looked impossible to even see out of. It was as if most of these helmets were designed to be used by Sloth from The Goonies or Rocky from Mask.
The “plastic” look of the armor isn’t really a lighting thing. More detailed texturing, combined with more worn and less vibrant reds and blues, could easily fix the issues in appearance. With next-gen capabilities, I expect to see texturing taken to a whole new level. Even H4 had a crazy amount of pixelation blatantly apparent in almost every texture.
It’s interesting you say that OP. I was under the impression that most fans liked H4 lighting better than Reach.
I certainly prefer Halo 4’s lighting to Reach’s, which was very accurate but not very realistic. Everything looked like a dark comic book, drained of color and gray. Compare that to H3 (my favorite in terms of lighting) where metallic objects properly reflect light. Think how brightly a golden brute’s armor shone if he caught the sunlight, or how you were blinded as you emerged from the belly of a Scarab. That’s proper lighting.
I think H4 reached towards this and didn’t quite make it, though I might blame that on the character models looking like power rangers. One thing is for sure (for me anyway), when I look at a Spartan or even a Warthog in H4, it never crosses my mind that it’s metal.