Something still bugs me. One side of me likes the anniversary graphics. They are in HD and look fantastic. The other side of me thinks it looks too much like Halo Reach. I can’t decide if I like the graphics or not and it annoys me.
So let’s think about this for a minute. The events of Halo CE took place right after Halo Reach. I guess it would make sense to have the marines, the covenant, the weapons, and vehicles look exactly like Halo Reach, which a couple exceptions like the Master Chief and Assault Rifle.
See, it’s weird to me. The original Halo CE looked WAY different with the weapons, vehicles, UNSC, and Covenant because it was the first Halo game.
It’s so weird to me because it makes me think that 343 wanted the game to fit with the timeline, and since Halo CE was right after Reach, 343 decided to make things look the same as Reach. However, this is so jarring because now the new graphics are completely different from the classic graphics. So is anniversary graphics part of the canon or the classic graphics? I think… I’m thinking too deep into this.
Hey, at least Halo 2 Anniversary looks like Halo 2 and not… Halo reach.
It’s a number of things. Canonically, you can make the argument that since the PoA was based at Reach and left Reach, a number of the weapons, vehicles, Marines (Armour included) and more will all be based off of the tech present at Reach. At least for the Marines, their armour in Reach is not too different from the classic armour style anyway. It’s difficult to make it look exactly like CE classic because CE classic is incredibly dated. Halo 2 at least still looks somewhat modern and has enough detail to it as opposed to CE.
Now, the business reasons are different. Reach’s assets at the time were the most detailed of any Halo game, featuring higher polygonal counts for the models and more. Rather than develop new assets from the ground up, it would be much easier to port what can be salvaged from Reach to save on development costs and then modify it accordingly. You can see this in CEA’s early gameplay, where the MA5B is actually the MA37 from Reach. It’s likely they took the model then modified its aesthetic to look like the MA5B though the core asset is Reach’s MA37. It also saves on development time, allowing 343 to put HCEA together quickly in order to meet Microsoft’s long term release plan for its exclusives.
Personally, I find the art style for some of the backgrounds and enemies to be a little off. It seems overly saturated (if that’s the word) compared to CE classic, something I feel also is the case with H2 and some environments look overly done, unlike H2A.
It’s hard to note down exactly what it is, but I do agree, it feels slightly off though my reasons may be different from yourself or others.
Marines on the Pillar of Autumn wear a very noticeable brown armor, while they actually have brown armor during the last mission on Reach, they don’t on CEA, they use UNSC Army stuff.
There are times when I don’t absolutely love having Anniversary graphics on because they seem a bit surreal. The color palette chosen seems a bit too vibrant. Contrast that with Halo 2 Anniversary where the new graphics are the only way to play the game now because they look so freaking pretty!
> 2574155679901782;2:
> It’s a number of things. Canonically, you can make the argument that since the PoA was based at Reach and left Reach, a number of the weapons, vehicles, Marines (Armour included) and more will all be based off of the tech present at Reach. At least for the Marines, their armour in Reach is not too different from the classic armour style anyway. It’s difficult to make it look exactly like CE classic because CE classic is incredibly dated. Halo 2 at least still looks somewhat modern and has enough detail to it as opposed to CE.
>
> Now, the business reasons are different. Reach’s assets at the time were the most detailed of any Halo game, featuring higher polygonal counts for the models and more. Rather than develop new assets from the ground up, it would be much easier to port what can be salvaged from Reach to save on development costs and then modify it accordingly. You can see this in CEA’s early gameplay, where the MA5B is actually the MA37 from Reach. It’s likely they took the model then modified its aesthetic to look like the MA5B though the core asset is Reach’s MA37. It also saves on development time, allowing 343 to put HCEA together quickly in order to meet Microsoft’s long term release plan for its exclusives.
>
> Personally, I find the art style for some of the backgrounds and enemies to be a little off. It seems overly saturated (if that’s the word) compared to CE classic, something I feel also is the case with H2 and some environments look overly done, unlike H2A.
>
> It’s hard to note down exactly what it is, but I do agree, it feels slightly off though my reasons may be different from yourself or others.
Interesting read. If anything, Reach should resemble CE more versus CEA resembling Reach more. I’m not the biggest fan of the art style in Reach, but it still feels like Halo so I’m cool with it. Ultimately, I don’t really care that CEA resembles Reach. Getting to play the campaign with better graphics is good enough for me. I do feel H2A did it better. I can’t think of a damn thing wrong with that game.
I mean, Halo CEA’s multiplayer was just Halo Reach multiplayer on remastered CE maps, so…
Well, CEA looks weird to me too. Reach artstyle might make sense for continuation but it just looks out of place.
I much prefer the old artstyle in most things when it comes to Halo: Combat Evolved like the marines, grunts, shade turret shots and the athmosphere in level “343 quilty spark” with its fog and such to name a few.
The Chiefs armor is not that bad in CEA graphics though but thats not enough to make me want to use those.
I just hope Halo: Reach would have looked more like the older Halo games. the enemies for one just looked so weird compared to the older games.
> 2533274974350131;1:
> Something still bugs me. One side of me likes the anniversary graphics. They are in HD and look fantastic. The other side of me thinks it looks too much like Halo Reach. I can’t decide if I like the graphics or not and it annoys me.
>
> So let’s think about this for a minute. The events of Halo CE took place right after Halo Reach. I guess it would make sense to have the marines, the covenant, the weapons, and vehicles look exactly like Halo Reach, which a couple exceptions like the Master Chief and Assault Rifle.
>
> See, it’s weird to me. The original Halo CE looked WAY different with the weapons, vehicles, UNSC, and Covenant because it was the first Halo game.
>
> It’s so weird to me because it makes me think that 343 wanted the game to fit with the timeline, and since Halo CE was right after Reach, 343 decided to make things look the same as Reach. However, this is so jarring because now the new graphics are completely different from the classic graphics. So is anniversary graphics part of the canon or the classic graphics? I think… I’m thinking too deep into this.
>
> Hey, at least Halo 2 Anniversary looks like Halo 2 and not… Halo reach.
Indeed you are looking too deep into it.
Playing Halo: Reach and then switching over to Halo: Combat Evolved was always very jarring prior to the release of Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary as the games were so far removed from each other visually. Enemies, weapons, vehicles, etc. could look radically different between the two and it made it difficult to see the events of the two games taking place so closely to one another as a result. The change in the art style for Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary from the original game was gone strictly to fix that issue.
I appreciate the changes that Saber Interactive made even if I do think they ruined the atmosphere of certain missions.
> 2574155679901782;2:
> It’s a number of things. Canonically, you can make the argument that since the PoA was based at Reach and left Reach, a number of the weapons, vehicles, Marines (Armour included) and more will all be based off of the tech present at Reach. At least for the Marines, their armour in Reach is not too different from the classic armour style anyway. It’s difficult to make it look exactly like CE classic because CE classic is incredibly dated. Halo 2 at least still looks somewhat modern and has enough detail to it as opposed to CE.
>
> Now, the business reasons are different. Reach’s assets at the time were the most detailed of any Halo game, featuring higher polygonal counts for the models and more. Rather than develop new assets from the ground up, it would be much easier to port what can be salvaged from Reach to save on development costs and then modify it accordingly. You can see this in CEA’s early gameplay, where the MA5B is actually the MA37 from Reach. It’s likely they took the model then modified its aesthetic to look like the MA5B though the core asset is Reach’s MA37. It also saves on development time, allowing 343 to put HCEA together quickly in order to meet Microsoft’s long term release plan for its exclusives.
>
> Personally, I find the art style for some of the backgrounds and enemies to be a little off. It seems overly saturated (if that’s the word) compared to CE classic, something I feel also is the case with H2 and some environments look overly done, unlike H2A.
>
> It’s hard to note down exactly what it is, but I do agree, it feels slightly off though my reasons may be different from yourself or others.
I agree completely with the over-saturation thing. Comparing the warm colors of The Silent Cartographer in the original game to the much colder ones in Anniversary probably shows the most extreme example of it.
Anyway, I’ve compared the assault rifle in Anniversary to that of Halo 3 a few times and I’ve concluded that it is the same model. The AR from Reach was originally used, but the entire model was replaced for unknown reasons as opposed to being modified to more closely resemble the Halo 3 one.
It was easy for 343 to reuse assets instead of making new ones, and it looked decent. Don’t worry too much about the cannon of the way things look. The jump between halo 3 and halo 4 is jarring as heck and has literally no cannon reason. It’s just for looks and game play of the specific game. The chunk of the forward unto dawn wasn’t rebuilt while the chief was knocked out, the art style was just changed. Again just don’t think too much about the cannon of the way things look.
> 2533274849645270;10:
> It was easy for 343 to reuse assets instead of making new ones, and it looked decent. Don’t worry too much about the cannon of the way things look. The jump between halo 3 and halo 4 is jarring as heck and has literally no cannon reason. It’s just for looks and game play of the specific game. The chunk of the forward unto dawn wasn’t rebuilt while the chief was knocked out, the art style was just changed. Again just don’t think too much about the cannon of the way things look.
I have to disagree with the Forward Unto Dawn thing as the ship radically changed in both size and design - inside and out - in between games.
> 2535421324694638;11:
> > 2533274849645270;10:
> > It was easy for 343 to reuse assets instead of making new ones, and it looked decent. Don’t worry too much about the cannon of the way things look. The jump between halo 3 and halo 4 is jarring as heck and has literally no cannon reason. It’s just for looks and game play of the specific game. The chunk of the forward unto dawn wasn’t rebuilt while the chief was knocked out, the art style was just changed. Again just don’t think too much about the cannon of the way things look.
>
> I have to disagree with the Forward Unto Dawn thing as the ship radically changed in both size and design - inside and out - in between games.
And that was done just for looks and game play. There was no cannon reason behind it at all.
It’s not CEA, it’s Reach. If it was not because of it, CEA would look like 3. How can someone look this way (Wars), then look different (Reach), and then like in the beginning again? REach should have been more careful with it’s design…