Halo Reach Public Beta

[Surfing_Pikachu]

Still holding on to that copy of ODST? Well now it's finally time to put that disk to some real good use. With only a click on the main menu, you're on your way to playing the Multiplayer Beta of a game coming to retail this fall, Halo Reach! With no added charge either, all you need as a disk of ODST in your hard drive.

This cluster of never-before-seen awesomeness includes 4 new maps, new gametypes, new Armor Abilities, and the ablity to chose your starting loadout from provided combos consisting of an armor abilities and two guns.


...And did I mention it has jetpacks?


You've finished the fight, now it's time to see it when it all began. See you on the battlefield soldiers!

 

[Empoleon Bonaparte]

Publicity much?

Anyways, I've never liked Halo. Shoot me.

 

[Cobalt_Latios]

Publicity much?

Anyways, I've never liked Halo. Shoot me.

Neither have I, but at least Reach intrigues me. Hell, I'm even considering getting ODST. Maybe it's because I dislike Master Chief? Could be.

I have at least played the first Halo, which at least gives me an idea of things.

Otherwise, I'm somewhat indifferent.

C_L

 

[Surfing_Pikachu]

Publicity much?

This Beta is absolutely not a publicity stunt, If that is what you were referring to.

Neither have I, but at least Reach intrigues me. Hell, I'm even considering getting ODST. Maybe it's because I dislike Master Chief? Could be.

I have at least played the first Halo, which at least gives me an idea of things.

Otherwise, I'm somewhat indifferent.

C_L

First off, let me clarify that this game is a huge step away from what the previous games have been. Why they would do this for their last game I will never know, but they added a whole bunch of things that really change the usual flow. Hell, with all the armor abilities it feels like a complete party game. No teamwork, just people flying all over the place on jet packs spamming reticule-blooming weapons. If you dig this kind of laid-back atmosphere, then you might want to give it a try. You might like these changes especially if you don't like the traditional game play.

 

[fhqwhgads]

It's only got two maps so far, unless the other two are in stuff besides Action Sack.


I mean Grab Bag.


But yeah, so awesome. The new features are really nice, and Stockpile is way better than KotH.

 

[Charizard Champion#06]

This Beta is absolutely not a publicity stunt, If that is what you were referring to.

I think he's getting at how your opening post almost sounded like an advertisement. (I actually liked it)

'Cause y'know, apparently Bungie goes around paying people on Serebii to advertise their games. <_<'

I was playing the Beta for the most part of my afternoon. I ranked up three times, bought some shoulder pads, chest armor and a visor for my Mk V helmet. Aside from the servers going down due to the sheer amount of people playing I had a blast.

I set my controls to Recon (to closest to Halo 3's control scheme) so everything felt natural. Armor abilities add a whole new layer to combat, I'm getting quite good with Armor Lock and was surprised to see myself using Sprint more than Jetpacks. I hardly ever used Invisibility since it's not that useful in Team Matches (I played on Grab Bag the entire time) since it's easy to find yourself outnumbered if you're not careful.

Also I will never get tired of the Elites grunting when they use the roll.

Bungie released some helpful info to anyone having trouble getting matches:

So, yup some stuff is on fire here at the office and if the forums are any indication, we were totally unprepared, don't care about our real fans, and should totally give everyone their zero dollars back with a side of free Xbox LIVE. While none of that's the case, our test team just broke away from an epic struggle with some molten server metal and 600,000 players to deliver us some quick tips to help you get games going a little bit faster.

1. Don't restart your search, even if load times are long. The initial load for map and game type will take a really long time, which is super lame, but once you've made the connection, the files will be cached to your hard drive and the next time you load to same map/game type, it should be nice and fast.
2. Don't reboot or reload the beta. It won't help and it will actually clear your cache, making your wait times much longer.
3. Don't leave your party. Since everybody in the party has to load the same files, your wait is tied to other player's download process as well. Stick with the same crew and things should iron out.


Rest assured that we're working on the issues and as soon as things start to smooth out, we'll let you know. Thanks for your patience.

I just can't wait for the haters to come in trying to look cool for disliking something that's popular. Oh joy.

 

[Cobalt_Latios]

First off, let me clarify that this game is a huge step away from what the previous games have been. Why they would do this for their last game I will never know, but they added a whole bunch of things that really change the usual flow. Hell, with all the armor abilities it feels like a complete party game. No teamwork, just people flying all over the place on jet packs spamming reticule-blooming weapons. If you dig this kind of laid-back atmosphere, then you might want to give it a try. You might like these changes especially if you don't like the traditional game play.

Cool, I'll give it a shot once I'm all set up (lack of ODST and Gold Live isn't helping).

C_L

 

[Charizard Champion#06]

Bungie says the Beta's running a lot smoother now:

The Beta is not quite fully operational, but it should be moving at a pretty good clip now that our online team has applied some technological fixups. You should still expect suboptimal performance, but you should also now be getting games with relative ease. Once again, thanks for being patient. Unless of course you weren't patient at all and you made like a million posts to the feedback forum to complain about the outage even though there were already like a million posts already made complaining about the outage. If you were that guy, thanks for nothing!

Again, we're not out of the woods just yet. If you experience any problems connecting or getting into games, please let us know about it. Politely, of course. Otherwise, have fun in the Beta!

 

[Cobalt_Latios]

I have this beta. MW2 can go die now.

Holy crap, is it that good?!

If so, I'll be getting me a copy of ODST the second I get the chance.

It'll probably be cheaper too.

~cl~

 

[ArmorAndonomon]

Beat me to the thread-making punch. |: Darn SPPf and its issues.

Anyways, I'm in love with this beta.
I'm sick of people choosing 1 Flag over Team SWAT every time, but I've been getting the most flags every time.

I also like the Scout pack the most. Idk, I just find running to be a lot more useful to my strategies. :/
I also don't like the Jetpack. I tried it and didn't like it, simple as that. Also, I'm one game away from being Corporal 1. D:
Lol.

But yes, for the first couple of hours, it was literally impossible to play. Around 8PM EST, though, they worked out almost all of the connection kinks, so getting into a game was simple.

However, I already ran into a couple of modded morons, who after five whacks in a row from the Hammer didn't die, then one-shotted me with the assault rifle. Lame.

Anywho, I'm completely addicted to it.

 

[Charizard Champion#06]

If so, I'll be getting me a copy of ODST the second I get the chance.

My one friend doesn't have ODST so he's renting it to play the Beta. Bungie said the Beta would be about two weeks long so he gets to see half of it if he has a week-rental.


I've ran into some complete morons in Flag games. Once in Stockpile, where I scored some flags and a teammate picked it up and started running it over to the enemies score area, literally giving them points. And another time where it was One Flag and I successfully stole the Flag, started bringing it to our goal, got shot, died, and respawned to find my teammate picking it up and bringing it back to where it came from.

Being confused on Stockpile is kind of understandable if you're Red Team since the enemy's score area is always a red coloured marker so you might think that's where you need to take the flag. But you should be tipped off once you see that the score area HAS A BIG BLUE BOUNDARY. However taking the flag BACK on One Flag is just stupid...

 

[ArmorAndonomon]

Omg I SERIOUSLY hate people like that.
"AHAHA I`m funny because I take the flag from our spot and put it in the middle of the field HAHA."
I ended up Assassinating him once and he freaked out at me.

Its like.
REALLY?

Another thing that really annoyed me is the number of people playing with Guests.
In one game that I was in last night with my buddies, the ENTIRE opposing team was one guy and three guests, which I didn't even know was possible.
It was pretty ridiculous.
They were all screaming into the one mic and it was just pure insanity.

 

[Night Shadow]

The Beta is so fucking awesome. This is the reason why people bought ODST.

 

[Charizard Champion#06]

The Beta is so fucking awesome. This is the reason why people bought ODST.

I liked ODST. The campaign was well done (save for one final repetitive level) and Firefight with friends was a blast. For me the Beta's a sweet bonus to a game I was gonna buy anyways.

One thing that Bungie should fix is Stockpile so that when you score a flag your teammates can't throw it out of the score area and then score it for themselves.

Other than that the Beta is super awesome.

 

[ArmorAndonomon]

I liked ODST. The campaign was well done (save for one final repetitive level) and Firefight with friends was a blast. For me the Beta's a sweet bonus to a game I was gonna buy anyways.

I really liked the campaign too.

Spoiler: For those losers who haven't beaten the Campaign

I tried to kill the Engi a couple times but they got whiny about it, so I didn't. :V

One thing that Bungie should fix is Stockpile so that when you score a flag your teammates can't throw it out of the score area and then score it for themselves.

..*TOTALLY not guilty of that once*
:V

 

[Cobalt_Latios]

My one friend doesn't have ODST so he's renting it to play the Beta. Bungie said the Beta would be about two weeks long so he gets to see half of it if he has a week-rental.

....

You know, you could have let me know this a bit sooner. Not everyone is totally engrossed in this knowledge. I would have liked to know when I could play this (lack of Gold account + not getting paid until next week kinda screws me over).

But hey, good fun for everyone else...

Spoiler: please ignore

RAAAAAAGGGGGGGEEEEEE.

Yeah, my timing tends to work out for things. Getting other things to work around my timings tends to want to work around me. Not a good combo.

.

*sigh*

Well, at least I know it'll be a worthwhile purchase...

C_L

 

[Tyrannotaur]

I tried it out yesterday, Really fun. Though I'm kinda upset that you are forced to be a spartan and can only be an elite in certain modes. I like the elites way more than the spartans. Lame. I love the cool dodge the elites can do now though.

-;248;

 

[Slick]

Bleh, is it really worth buying ODST for? I'm probably gonna end up getting Reach anyway.
When does the beta end?

 

[BUG]

Bleh, is it really worth buying ODST for? I'm probably gonna end up getting Reach anyway.
When does the beta end?

I wouldn't buy it for the beta. It's nice if you already have it, but not worth buying ODST for.

 

[Charizard Champion#06]

Is anyone else here the only person that actually gives a damn about the flags in stockpile? It isn't that hard to get them. And I lol at people who take them out and oput them back in so it looks like they got the point.

I recently found out that the Commendation Points (cp) you get at the end of a game to buy armor with aren't actually based off how many points you get from flags. Or kills. Or deaths. Or oddball time. Or K/D spread. Or whether or not you are inclined to help your team whatsoever. It's all based on 6 sets of criteria for how many Assists you get, Headshots, Multikills, Sticks, Sprees and the last one is "Technician" which is "to preform an incredible feat". Anyways once you get a certain amount of, say, Assists, and reach the next commendation tier, then you have a little blue and gray pop-up at the bottom of the screen with the medal on it. That multiplies your score at the end of the match.

I tried it out yesterday, Really fun. Though I'm kinda upset that you are forced to be a spartan and can only be an elite in certain modes. I like the elites way more than the spartans. Lame. I love the cool dodge the elites can do now though.

-;248;

Elites are in different games than Spartans for a reason. They're faster, have more health, and much larger. We'll get to face off Elite vs. Spartan on Friday when the Invasion playlist goes up.