This is my opinion of what I think and feel about Anniversary, what its errors and graces are and what I would have imagined it to be.
A long, long time ago… that was almost a decade… Halo: Combat Evolved was released for xbox. But is only a decade a reasonable length of time to celebrate the life of a franchise? Many games have reached their 25th anniversary lately, and aren’t getting nearly as much hype. So is this truly a celebration of Halo:CE it’s self? The franchise? 343 moving it into the future? Or Bungie letting it go? And if it is a celebration of the Halo franchise as a whole; why ignore many of the new advancements in the games themselves?
I fully understand the nostalgia play that Anniversary represents. The original Halo experience covered in new audio and graphics to make it a modern game, with some new bonus features. But I feel that some of the features from the modern Halo tittles would have been really good to add into the game, such as the ability to modify the AI health and strength and the current weapon and vehicle sandbox.
But those features would most definitely change the CE experience, but not necessarily for the bad.
I believe the current build is beautiful, and is for the nostalgic Halo fans, but takes away from those who enjoy the current Halo experience too.
So I think it should have included another version as well, with modern AI, models and generally make it closer to the newer games.
But yes, it would be a more serious project then could be handled by 343 when they already have the Reclaimer trilogy in full swing, due to budget and man power. It would also be considered a “blashphem” by the fans who love the original.
They can’t make the same classic experience and a completely new one. Coding is a very difficult thing, you can’t change the way the game plays without ruining it.
> They can’t make the same classic experience and a completely new one. Coding is a very difficult thing, you can’t change the way the game plays without ruining it.
What about Custom Edition mods? Those don’t ruin the gameplay. They introduce a CE-H2 hybrid level of gameplay as well as customized gameplay.
343 is afraid of their new fanbase, CEA, the new Halo Reach upate among a few other things here and there is them testing the waters. Also let’s not forget the lessons the game industry learned from The Twin Snakes and many other radical remakes.
> > They can’t make the same classic experience and a completely new one. Coding is a very difficult thing, you can’t change the way the game plays without ruining it.
>
> What about Custom Edition mods? Those don’t ruin the gameplay. They introduce a CE-H2 hybrid level of gameplay as well as customized gameplay.
Thats the thing though custom edition mods DIDNT effect the campaign. They were strictly used to change the layout of the start menu and multiplayer games, we the halo community dont want cea (CAMPAIGN) to change at all, graphically speaking is fine, but they included a non graphically altered version as well,
Now to be fair on the subject including THE ABITY to change factors in the campaign wouldnt hurt so long as DEFAULT was classic CE. So im both sides of the equation, but to be honest im glad ce doesnt include these options(for campaign)
> Many games have reached their 25th anniversary lately, and aren’t getting nearly as much hype.
That’s because those are games like Mario and Legend of Zelda, both of which have been done to death many times over. There’s less hype because the general public is sick to death of hearing about them. Besides those two franchises, what else does Nintendo have to make serious money?