http://www.bungie.net/age_gate.aspx?fw=/wEFe2h0dHA6Ly9kb3dubG9hZC5taWNyb3NvZnQuY29tL2Rvd25sb2FkL2EvN i8xL2E2MWYzMWE5LWU0ZWUtNDRkMi1hYzk1LTg2Mjc5ODE3ZmMzMy9IYWxvM 19FM19UUkFJTEVSXzIwMDdfMzYwcDMwX1NUXzJNYnBzLndtdg==&gs=/wEFBkhhbG8gMw==

Looks pretty now I should finish halo 1 and 2

http://i16.tinypic.com/4lr3vr5.jpg

http://i10.tinypic.com/6cr46kn.jpg

http://i9.tinypic.com/62z85c6.jpg

http://i17.tinypic.com/4plyx60.jpg

http://i16.tinypic.com/4pnkidk.jpg

http://i13.tinypic.com/4rahwkh.jpg

http://i8.tinypic.com/4udnck0.jpg

http://i15.tinypic.com/637vwd1.jpg

http://i10.tinypic.com/4mwetch.jpg

http://i7.tinypic.com/63v66xh.jpg

I'm totally going to get eaten alive for this: I think it looks good, but not amazing. It looks really clean, really polished...but doesn't amaze me like Gears did the first time I saw it. Sorry.

I'm totally going to get eaten alive for this: I think it looks good, but not amazing. It looks really clean, really polished...but doesn't amaze me like Gears did the first time I saw it. Sorry.

Sure. I mean, I wasn't as amazed by, say, Halo 2 as I was by Halo, even though it looked inarguably much better.

It looks close to that screenshot posted 1 or 2 days ago.

Sorry but are those screen shots supposed to make the game look good or bad?

I'm totally going to get eaten alive for this: I think it looks good, but not amazing. It looks really clean, really polished...but doesn't amaze me like Gears did the first time I saw it. Sorry.


I'm with you thrillhouse. That said it'll still move a lot of 360's and the upbeat fps action should be there. It's just so tough for me to go to that kind of game after play GOW with the way it looks and plays.

It looks fine. If I decide to play this game, it won't be for eye candy.

The water looks cool.

I'm totally going to get eaten alive for this: I think it looks good, but not amazing. It looks really clean, really polished...but doesn't amaze me like Gears did the first time I saw it. Sorry.

GoW has a unique art style and look not to mention uses an entirely different perspective to play in. The scale is different. Mostly the unique art style though adds the wow effect.

For this type game with the Halo style art design this is looking quite good. In fact pretty amazingly realistic looking for a fantasy world.

looks great, i cant wait

GOW is the most linear game i've ever played, and uses the smallest color pallet i've seen since the SNES, of course they can focus more on the graphics when there isnt anything on screen.

i prefer gameplay and larger environments, GOW SP was way too short, and the MP segment blows. i put more time into the H3 beta from a crackdown rental than i did with GOW SP+MP. GOW isnt bad, and looks well polished, but it's not that great.

looks great, i cant wait

GOW is the most linear game i've ever played, and uses the smallest color pallet i've seen since the SNES, of course they can focus more on the graphics when there isnt anything on screen.

i prefer gameplay and larger environments, GOW SP was way too short, and the MP segment blows. i put more time into the H3 beta from a crackdown rental than i did with GOW SP+MP. GOW isnt bad, and looks well polished, but it's not that great.

I agree, I didnt get that much enjoyment out of GoW. It didn't help that the story sucked. It does look incredible though.

As far as Halo, I think there are some gaming enthusiasts, me included, that hoped because it is such a high profile game that it might stand out as that shining example of what the 360 is capable of in a big world environment. Unfortunatley, although it doesnt look bad, it certainly isn't that title. I'm thinking Alan Wake may be that title.

The fact that those shots are just upsampled from that 640x380 video makes it looke really soft, but it looks great other than that.

Im completely amazed that we are back to graphic whoring AGAIN. Seriously, I do not understand how somebody could think that doesn't look terrific. Thrillhouse are you watching on a 120x60 TV or something?

If you want to claim that Gears looks better as far as its extreme closeup polishing, I might buy it, but Halo3 obviously has 50 times the amount of action going on at any one time, the levels are huge, the colors are amazing...and best of all it seems to all flow buttery smooth together. Gears looked great, but it really was tiny in sheer volume of what was going on.

I guess all I can say is I hope your extreme pickyness when it comes to graphics doesn't ruin the experience for you. The game looks fabulous and Im sure will be a total blast to play.

I must say that the game looks, it looks like it plays good and I like its chances. ;) Seriously, the game looks like it has a lot going on and the graphics look good.

Sorry but are those screen shots supposed to make the game look good or bad?

They're supposed to show people who haven't watched the video what the game looks like.

The fact that those shots are just upsampled from that 640x380 video makes it looke really soft,

They're from the 720p video from Bungie's site.

I think it looks every bit as good as GoW so far and it's not even done yet. I'm definitely even more pumped up about it.

I think it looks really good. The art style of this game is so different than most games it is hard to compare. I don't think it is the best looking game we have seen but still a really good looking game.

In my mind what makes Halo stand out is the different art style. I'm so tired of bland war-torn cities with no color.

The trailer is up on marketplace in HD. I stand by what I said. The textures, the sandbags, the warthog...they look like Halo 2 high rez + a little more horsepower. They don't wow me like gears. Marcus looked more detailed than Master Chief does.

I'm thinking Alan Wake may be that title.

Call of Duty 4 is that title.

Marcus looked more detailed than Master Chief does.

Marcus had more **** on his armor. MC looks like what a guy in his armor would look like. What do you want, elaborate scrollwork all over the Spartan armor?

Look, I'm just calling it like I see it. And I'm comparing Halo to everything else that is out there, which is fair. We've come a long way since Halo.

The Arbiters back huh? That's a shame.......

Look, I'm just calling it like I see it. And I'm comparing Halo to everything else that is out there, which is fair. We've come a long way since Halo.

What games out there, graphically, do you think look better than this? Is Gears the only game? The list is certainly not going to be that long, and assuming the gameplay is terrific and there is a lot of replay value (which I think is pretty much a given), then Bungie has hit a home run again.

I dont understand what some people expect with this. We're you expecting live footage of real aliens and spaceships flying around and a real life master chief?

Come September 25th, we will see exactly what people think of Halo 3.

Come September 25th, we will see exactly what people think of Halo 3.
It will kick ass and look amazing. If they don't like it I wish they would shut up and don't try and ruin it for those that are excited about it. They are the type of people that don't like others to succeed.

It will kick ass and look amazing. If they don't like it I wish they would shut up and don't try and ruin it for those that are excited about it. They are the type of people that don't like others to succeed.

My opinion is just as valid as yours. I suppose that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I was never irrational, and have just as much right to state my opinion as you do. This thread wasn't about gameplay, it was about visuals. I don't think that Halo's graphics are quite as good as other games.

They're from the 720p video from Bungie's site.
I've got the 720 video and though it still looks a rather soft do to the compression, it looks noteably sharper than the shots you posted.

Hopefully they make the campaign fun again. I've played through Halo 1 countless number of times simply because it's so enjoyable to do so. I've yet to play through Halo 2 even once just because it got so boring towards the end.

The thing I hated most about GoW was that I had such a hard time distinguishing the bad guys from the good guys. Halo 3 seems to have such a clear disctinctness that I can see. I'll be happy if it's Halo 1 in HD.

I dont understand what some people expect with this.

The game looks good. As I said in previous threads on this topic, this game is the flagship game of the 360. It has been in development for such a long time and as such people expect great things visually and gameplay wise from this game, as they should. Visually, the game needs to look as good or better than GoW b/c that is the standard bearer like it or not. We'll see how H3 compares visually to Mass Effect, BioShock and Call of Duty 4 b/c the comments about COD 4 seems to place this game at the top of the heap visually. If COD 4 lives up to hype graphically, people are going to wonder what Bungie spent all of these years doing as far as H3 goes.

My opinion is just as valid as yours. I suppose that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I was never irrational, and have just as much right to state my opinion as you do. This thread wasn't about gameplay, it was about visuals. I don't think that Halo's graphics are quite as good as other games.
I wasn't singling you out. You are entitled to your opinion. I just hear a lot of people saying it's not looking that good, but it seems to look just as good last night as GoW PC did on the same screen. What are people expecting?

Like it or not, people are going to discuss graphics critically on a gaming forum. Right now, none of us can play this game, we can only look at the video and discuss graphics. I dont think it looks bad, but there certainly isn't anything ground breaking about the graphics in this game. Comparitively, videos of Bioshock, Mass Effect, Call of Duty 4, Uncharted, and KZ2, and Heavenly Sword all look way better to me. JMO.

The fact that Master Chief is in armor, which doesn't necessarilly require quite as many textures as a human, doesn't defend the game, but rather is a knock on it. If they don't have to spend as many resources on the armor, why can't they put some of those resources into the environment.

I'd love to discuss the gameplay elements more, but unfortunately the trailer moves from one scene to the next very quickly and its tough to get a feel for anything, so we are stuck we graphics "whoring".

There is a shot in that video, near the end, of marines in the warthog. It was quick, but what I could see, the detail was incredible. Very impressed with this.

I don't see Halo 3 as a graphics spectacle like a lot of people here hold GoW to be. I see Halo 3 (and the first 2) more as an experience....and addiction! C'mon guys, this is the crack of video games. No other game has had the reply value that the Halo series has had. I played GoW for 2 weeks, beat it on all 3 difficulties and that was it. Halo 1 and 2 I played so much, I'm embarassed to say, lol. GoW's MP lobby compared to Halos lobby......need I say more?! Halo 3 w/o a doubt in my mind, is going to break sales records for a video game, again!!

What planet does it take place on where it's low gravity and everything takes place in slow motion? Hopefully not earth...

I don't see Halo 3 as a graphics spectacle like a lot of people here hold GoW to be. I see Halo 3 (and the first 2) more as an experience....and addiction! C'mon guys, this is the crack of video games. No other game has had the reply value that the Halo series has had. I played GoW for 2 weeks, beat it on all 3 difficulties and that was it. Halo 1 and 2 I played so much, I'm embarassed to say, lol. GoW's MP lobby compared to Halos lobby......need I say more?! Halo 3 w/o a doubt in my mind, is going to break sales records for a video game, again!!

I agree, the people that are really really into Halo won't care about graphics all that much.

My opinion: I'm happy with what I see. The graphics look great. More importantly - this looks like it will be a fun game to play.

Overall, I think textures look better in GoW. However, H3 seems to have some visual affects that look really cool (the water, certain materials, etc..). As has been said before Gears was not very colorful and to me the lack of color kind of made everything seem a little flat. With H3 the game is very colorful and objects really seem to pop out better. H3 graphics is like candy - I want to reach out and eat it up.

The wide open scene with the broken highway and the warthog comes flying through and a brute chopper in the foreground looks like an incredibly fun moment in the game. I am hoping that in co-op one person will drive the warthog and the other will drive the chopper. I can just imagine racing and chasing my friends around while getting shot at and blasting grunts. Bring it on!

Also COD4 looked amazing as well. I think Peter was right when he said this is the best game line up ever. Are we in the golden era of video game history?

I agree, the people that are really really into Halo won't care about graphics all that much.

If I just cared about graphics, then sure... I love GoW... but graphics alone don't make a good game.

Teamxbox has a larger picture and it looks even better. Someone please critique this photo and tell me where they fell short.

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c7/JonathanHartner/Halo3hires.jpg

I think everyone will agree visually the game is a little bit of a let down...that video looks good but not great, there are some high res shots floating around though that look pretty damn amazing......
Gears spoiled everything for us and Bungie took the easy way out on this one(still game of the year though)

What planet does it take place on where it's low gravity and everything takes place in slow motion? Hopefully not earth...

The main charachter is wearing active armor that adds greatly to his strength. According to Halo lore the suit weighs a half ton or something.

What planet does it take place on where it's low gravity and everything takes place in slow motion? Hopefully not earth...

Is there supposed to be an actula level in the game in which everything is in slow-mo?

I've got the 720 video and though it still looks a rather soft do to the compression, it looks noteably sharper than the shots you posted.

I don't know what to tell you. Try taking a framegrab from the video and see how it looks (that's what I did).

I think it looks good. TeamXbox and 1up have impressions of the hands-on gameplay they were shown after the presentation, and said it looks great and much better than the multiplayer (and more impressive than the trailer shown at the conference). My biggest complaint is that the trees look like **** (I wish they'd licensed Speedtree) and the non-armored characters look very bad (like the girl in the one scene in the trailer).

Of course there are better looking games. CoD4, Bioshock, and Killzone, certainly, though on the other hand I see things in Halo that are done better than in those games. The fact that it also has a bright, colorful style also makes it look worse than those games.

I don't know what to tell you. Try taking a framegrab from the video and see how it looks (that's what I did).

I think it looks good. TeamXbox and 1up have impressions of the hands-on gameplay they were shown after the presentation, and said it looks great and much better than the multiplayer (and more impressive than the trailer shown at the conference). My biggest complaint is that the trees look like **** (I wish they'd licensed Speedtree)
as a game artist i can tell you trees are a bitch! they look and seem simple but its truly tough to get a good looking tree and meet the alloted poly budget. in our game we're also licensing a tech similar to speed tree just to bypass that annoyance.
as far as halo 3 goes, its graphics are improved over halo 2, and from what the latest screenshots show the improvements are more than just up-resed halo 2 assets (textures that is). you can see from the foliage they're playign aroudn a bit more with their increased ability for fillrate and poly pushing. though i still think the character models look a but under done, but strangely ina way they could improve it. obviously they're using a pretty high res texture for mc, why then don't they add in more mid frequency detail? it looks almost like a first pass at the characters texturing. my only real complaint other than that is that they're too heavy on the atmospheric effects.
but it looks good enough for me.

it looks almost like a first pass at the characters texturing. my only real complain is that they're too heavy on the atmospheric effects.
but it looks good enough for me.

How long does it generally take to do a second pass on character texturing? What are atmospheric effects?

Thx

I guess I don't see why people are comparing to Gears. Gears had 8 characters on screen at once or less most of the time (more when you have those low detail screamers) with high level textures. Very limited color palette, etc.

Halo 3 should have much more going with much bigger environments (if Halo:CE and Halo 2 are any indication), much more colors and variety.

Call of Duty 4 is multiplatform, twice the framerate, has open environments, tons of variety, weather effects, lots of characters onscreen, vastly superior animation, and is nearly photo-realistic at times. I think that's why people are disappointed in Halo. Bungie was always right at the forefront of visuals with their games and now they've come up pretty well short of other games coming out at the same time.

How long does it generally take to do a second pass on character texturing? What are atmospheric effects?

Thx
thats almost like asking what the length of a piece of string is ;)
it really depends, some objects take 3 min to texture, others can take hours upon hours. and for characters it can take a while to texture, first steps being model the high poly mesh, do you low poly mesh, uv unwrap, bake normals, this route can take quite a while mainly because of the high poly modeling (what gears of war did). or they can do their diffuse texture and generate a normal map from that (from the looks of it what halo 3 is doing). only problem is the first way of generating your normal maps looks better because you're building the low poly around the high and you're also capturing more information into the normal map. but anyways thats getting offtopic, basically the first method takes longer and the second takes shorter time, but the first produces best results. then after this you will start to paint your diffuse, startign with base colors and possibly a bit of color variation (first pass of the diffuse map), the second pass is where you add more mid-level/frequnecy detail, third pass is working on high and very high frequnecy detail, though you should only go so far with high frequnecy detail as it may end up looking grainy if its too high. after this you then add in your baked in basic shading and baked in ambient occlusion (or keep it as a seperate map depending on the engine and resources). but as i said, aside from certain areas, most of mc's diffuse looks almost liek a first pass and combined with an image generated normal map.
and by atmospheric effects i meant things like fog, motion blur and other stuff.

as an example Gears of War (http://www.gon.se/media/gears_of_war/gears_of_war_i-org_3.jpg)

I wasn't all that impressed while watching this on G4 last night, but after downloading the HD clip today, I'm very much excited again. Master Chief smacks a Brute upside the head and the Brute's helmet comes off to reveal the ugly face. Good stuff there.

http://www.tamogila.com/images/brutehelmet.jpg

http://www.tamogila.com/images/bruteface.jpg

Will someone please tell me where the shortcomings are in the screen I posted.

Will someone please tell me where the shortcomings are in the screen I posted.
read my paragraph, mainly complaining a bit about the atmospheric effects being too heavy, the normal mapps looking like they're image generated giving them an unrealistic feel and not working with the low poly geometry as well as they could, textures don't seem sharp in areas that are most noticable, and mc's diffuse looking like an unfinished diffuse texture that has a lot more potential.

Assassyn, that screen is from an original that is like 3200x1800 resolution. The textures in the actual game are not nearly that high a resolution and the lines aren't as clean.

I think the game looks good (though it pretty much pales in comparison to the five minutes of gameplay of Killzone they just showed on G4), but those "official" screens are not representative of it.

Thank you both for the intelligent replies. That's what we need are facts not biased arguments.

Is there new footage other than the trailer I saw this morning of KZ?

Thank you both for the intelligent replies. That's what we need are facts not biased arguments.

Is there new footage other than the trailer I saw this morning of KZ?

Still waiting for some on the web, but I'm sure they'll pop up later today or tomorrow.. People are saying the PSN has a bunch on them now but I can't check that until I get home.

Thank you both for the intelligent replies. That's what we need are facts not biased arguments.

Is there new footage other than the trailer I saw this morning of KZ?

OK, just got home and finally got to see the Halo video on my big screen. Much much more impressed than the low res G4 I saw last night and the high res videos on saw on the internet today. Still dont think it can compare graphically with the top 5 or so AAA games coming out in the next 8 months, but it does look appealing. In particular, I love the colors in Halo. I still wish they did more with the trees and grass. Sometimes you can catch some nice foliage in a pic, but in live action doesnt look so good.

Nevertheless, I would not say Halo 3 is just an up ressed Halo 2, but I also wouldnt say it is a game you'd by for the graphics. Definitely a cool looking game with some interesting art though.

In response to th KZ2, I just watched that too and I won't say too much in this forum (look in the other forum for my comments), but it is very impressive.

I don't see Halo 3 as a graphics spectacle like a lot of people here hold GoW to be. I see Halo 3 (and the first 2) more as an experience....and addiction! C'mon guys, this is the crack of video games. No other game has had the reply value that the Halo series has had. I played GoW for 2 weeks, beat it on all 3 difficulties and that was it. Halo 1 and 2 I played so much, I'm embarassed to say, lol. GoW's MP lobby compared to Halos lobby......need I say more?! Halo 3 w/o a doubt in my mind, is going to break sales records for a video game, again!!


Nail, meet the hammers head! Very good post I agree 100%!!!


Did anybody else notice Cortana's new large sized Breastessess???!!!!

In particular, I love the colors in Halo. I still wish they did more with the trees and grass.



I was playing the trailer for my wife last night and the first thing she commented on was how nice the color looked.

I was playing the trailer for my wife last night and the first thing she commented on was how nice the color looked.

My gf also liked the colors in the beta as opposed to GoW's darker less colorful look.


Heres an interesting article on MS that I read this morning in the NY Post on my way to work about its upcoming/ongoing Halo 3 ad campaign....

http://www.nypost.com/seven/07122007/business/halo_on_the_hunt_business_holly_m__sanders.htm

Well, I'll pass judgement when I see the game running on my Xbox. Honestly, something was wrong with that 720p video. My TV is not as large as some people's here, but it is a 60" 1080p. From what I can see, the video is filled with blocking and other compression artifacts, so I don't think it is entirely representative. Those high-res Bungie screen shots are not indicative of actual gameplay. They did the same thing when Halo 2 came out, making it look substantially better than it actually was.

honestly graphics have never been a worry in halo for me. I was always too distracted by a grunt running around scared screaming like a baby or brute coming right at me. I don't know when I play halo I just seem to have enough time to go (that elite exploding could have looked better).

I agree, the released video seems to be low quality. It looks fuzzy.

I'm shocked bungie would release a low quality video though.

Looks like the Peter Jackson thing will be episodic content released over XBL for the next 12 weeks.