Awesome sauce! I had no confirmation that Jen would do Cortana's voice again, now I'm happy! And we could see her losing it! By the way, was that James Caan in the live-action cinematic?
In addition to the "Spartan Ops" video embedded just above, an introductory video for the entire "Infinity" multiplayer experience and a gameplay video for the "War Games" multiplayer mode can be seen here.
This preview of the Spartan Ops mode gives a little bit of detail on why there are Covenant enemies in Halo 4: Frank O'Connor is comparing the Spartan Ops DLC missions to television shows, suggesting that if the mode is well-received additional "seasons" could be released after the missions currently planned. OXM UK has a list of five ways in which Halo 4 multiplayer is different from past Halo multiplayer.
I decided that I was done with Halo after Halo Anniversary last Nov. My first was Halo Reach and the unniverse didn't appeal to me much. It was a competent shooter, but the graphics and physics were cartoonish. I could scratch my shooter itch by playing other titles that were better at both. But of this Spartan Ops works as advertised and someone's figured out how to do episodic gaming, I'm onboard for another go with Halo.
Halo 2 Anniversary yet another HD-revamp of a past Halo title. http://www.computerandvideogames.com/356982/halo-2-anniversary-now-in-development-report/ via
I would love to see Halo 2 get remade since I have never played it. Also it would give Halo fans something to play since I bet Halo 5 won't come out until the next X Box does so 2014 or 2015.
As a follow-up to the past few posts, 343 Industries denied that they are working on a Halo 2 HD remake. In more recent news, Halo 4 will be accompanied by a hideous custom console. As previously mentioned, a live-action web series entitled Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn is being produced to coincide with the release of the new game. [yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ca3Y8Ws3plI[/yt]
Re: Halo 4 web-series There is a live-action web series done by Microsoft and 343 Industries on the Youtube machinima channel starting October 5 leading up to Halo 4 release. See this thread in the science fiction forum: 'Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn' live-action web series It is directed by Stewart Hendler who has only done another scifi web series H+ The Digital Series and some shorts. Since no one has mentioned it I thought I would here. Here is also a 5 minute behind-the-scenes video for the web series.
Eh. *shrug* I'm not going to cancel my order, but a lot of the wind's been taken out of my sails by the developers' comments on how the Covenant won't have any English dialogue this time out. The Grunts were some of my favorite characters in the game!
Children playing Halo. Even the "general" looks like he's about twelve. Might as well go on Xbox Live.
What did you expect? The show is about a group of cadets, so of course they're going to be young. And Mike Dopud who plays General Black hardly looks 12. I enjoyed it. They've clearly put a lot of effort into the production to create the feeling and tone of the games as well as the previous live action shorts. Though in that regard they have a lot to live up to, because even for commercials, those live action shorts were extremely well done. It was nice to see they got a actors who can actually act and have a screen presence beyond whatever dialog they're spouting. I recognized several locations from other shows, namely BSG and Stargate and I wouldn't be surprised if those same woods served as the backdrop for numerous alien planets throughout stargate. I'll definitely be tuning in for the next episode.
One nitpick: The gatling-equipped warthog. Why the fuck does that thing have a gatling mounted if this is supposed to be inside an academy? Did they think we wouldn't recognize it if it wasn't equipped with one? (If it's a "sim" variant with less-than-lethal rounds, why the fuck is the general using it as a personal transport? You can still kill people with blanks and rubber bullets if they're too close, and they indicate that the sim rounds are probably just as lethal in CQC, so again, why wasn't that a troop transport variant like in Halo 3?) To put this in perspective, I'm only bugged with this because it sticks out in an otherwise well-done episode.
Cryo: They're doing it wrong. (Though I'll admit that having everybody nude is a lot easier to do in text than in live-action video... )
I admit I'm not that well verse in Halo technology, but why do they use Cryo on ships that can go FTL?