Somebody send this guy an invite!

http://www.halowars.com/forums/thread/774096.aspx
Ran into it when I was going to Age of Spaceology.com to get a Sparrowhawk background. This guy is dead on.

And the people are either agreeing with him or noob-blasting him. It's epic.

Edit, for those who are perma-banned...


Well, seeing as how the population is now slipping below 1,000 online players in the low peak hours with less than 5000 during peaks, I'd say the game is more or less flopped.

Not sure why that last thread about the Zero Punctuation Halo Wars Review was deleted(probably because they hit where it hurts and nobody could say otherwise), but I'll leave my own feedback with the points made.

The first turnoff for me about this game is that the game mechanics didn't deliver AS PROMISED. While the RPS triangle was a very pretty diagram and all, I'm sure everybody found out when the game first came out that infantry did NOT counter air. Some caught on faster than others, but the entire population(me being the exception) didn't notice that grunts didn't counter air until now.

There was also a few rather annoying details hidden about the units that reared its ugly head many times in the game, but took considerably longer to figure out. The most obvious example is that scout units counter air. A few more subtle examples would be the increased damage taken in Rage with each further upgrade, the fact that tanks will lose vehicle damage from Canister Shell when upgraded to Grizzlies. These little things were not mentioned in the game, the manual, or the Prima's Game Guide.

As for "not delivering as promised", I'm of course speaking about the fact that Scorpions and Grizzlies very frequently destroy their own hard counters. When someone throws a single unit spam at you and you spam out the appropriate hard counters in considerable numbers with matching upgrades, they shouldn't still be cutting through your army like a hot knife through butter.

I also question the level of play testing this game went through, as the Gauss Hog was the most obvious issue that quickly stuck out like a sore thumb infected with a flesh-eating bacteria with open sores all over.

http://www.halowars.com/stats/StatsGame.aspx?Id=27870528-4239-3349-1590-000000000000

http://www.halowars.com/stats/StatsGame.aspx?Id=35011367-9476-1167-0220-000000000000

http://www.halowars.com/stats/StatsGame.aspx?Id=68611131-0756-9763-4670-000000000000

Games like this where you can win simply by stupidly spamming a single unit over and over again should not happen in a STRATEGY game. Certainly it might require some skill to avoid counters and pull off a successful hit and run, but I personally find the task less demanding than say, ordering exactly 3-4 infantry units to fire upon a single target and repeating it again and again, not to mention much more rewarding.

I've also had a few games where victory came from spamming Scorpions all over the map. Those were usually the games where my opponents favored hard counters over air units.

And that's what the UNSC games devolve into. Either a Gauss Hog or Scorpion spam.

I find little reason to mass infantry, as they'll be useless as soon as the first tank comes out(which is about 3:42 into the game with Forge), not to mention that the ANTI infantry unit is just as cheap with the same 0 tech level. They are slower than tanks, they deal less damage to buildings and most ground units than tanks, and they end up costing more than tanks because they have ZERO cost effectiveness. Tanks just cost slightly more and takes a little longer to make. And because the window of opportunity is so small, I'd say you could get a tank out before your opponent can make 10 marines and get them to your base.



Also, WTF is with the ARBITRARY numbers?! I swear, one of the devs must've been completely ANAL about the numbers. Every single upgrade is listed on a completely different Tech level like freaking 1,2,3 without fail. You'd think that on such a ridiculously weak scout unit like the Ghost you could simply make an exception and give the Strafe upgrade to the Tech 1 level with the Scout Shield at Tech 2. At least SOMEBODY there must've had a short stroke of genius when he or she decided to put ODSTs at Tech 3. If they could have at least skipped a Tech level and shoved the Gauss Cannon upgrade to Tech 4, that alone would've worked just as well as the nerfs they put on the *** unit.



As for the gameplay itself, I'm personally disappointed about the lack of defensive options. The turrets cost too much to be cost effective and will dramatically slow down your economy more than the rusher whom you made the turrets for. I also don't see why only one turret could be building at a time. Regardless of the fact that sniper towers are more or less an advanced warning system rather than anything USEFUL, they won't give me enough "advanced" warning to get those stupid turrets up and/or upgraded in time before the enemy horde shows up at my base. Shield generators are more of a necessity rather than an accessory, as a covenant base is ridiculously weak without it(3 Spartanks could easily blow a Citadel half to death with Canisters alone). I can understand not wanting a match to drag on forever, but crippling a defensive option pretty much cuts off the effectiveness of turtling and turns the game into a stupid rushfest. Having the turtler lose more than the rush economically is stupid, but letting 5 warthogs tear down an entire base becausethosestupidassturretstakeforevertobuildandyoucan'tmakeanyunitstocounterbecausethehogswillteardownanyunitproducingbuildingsbeforetheycancomeup

is just freaking retarded.

Whereas in retrospect, Cobras are excellent in defense, but almost completely useless on the OFFENSE because of how pathetically USELESS they are when trying to chase tanks back down to their bases.

And on the topic of microing...at least make it worth my while. If you're going to insist upon making me select one freaking *** with a rocket launcher to fire upon one flying *** in a jet, and insist that I do it 10-20 more times, at least give me some motivation to do that as opposed to driving an entire army of hogs under the flying pricks and watching the pricks fall, or selecting 6 wolverpricks and leaving them under the flying pricks with NO micro for MUCH better results. If you're going to insist that I spend 10 minutes making a neat little wall of pricks(ODSTs) and sticking the freaking snakes(Cobras) behind them, at least make it more worth my while than stupidly spamming out the freaking snakes all over the ground. If you're going to ask me to tap dance, you'd better give me some money rather than a *** pat on the head.

The last flopping point is the lack of maps. I'd say that 1 vs 1, while the most challenging is more or less carbon copies of each other with differing hooks, chokepoints, and whatnot. 3 vs 3 was the main attraction for me since we could all get together and hold hands with each other while staring at each other's eyes and stroking each other in a location and manner reminiscent of old pastors touching young boys and HOT DIGGITY.

No, but seriously, 3 vs 3 was more or less the most fun for me. With 2 teammates watching your back, you have time and leave to do whatever you like without worry about someone being out to "get you" as soon as the match starts. You can set up the most retarded strategies and team combos. The flopping point was that there was only 3 maps to choose from, and just about everyone despises Exile enough that most of the instant resigns I've ever witnessed was on this cursed map. From the very start, there should have been at least 5 3v3 maps, with an additional 2 in the DLC.

Sadly, the thread is already gone. Looks like ES really hates criticism.

What's hilarious is that Aloy then contends that the only reason forummers are upset is because they don't have sig images anymore, as if we weren't upset before he showed up.

I was under the impression that Aloy was not one of the old mods. Neither Lethe nor SOLUS was so power-crazy.

That's really weird...I mean, Lethe wasn't the best, but he was never this bad.

didn't we officially deem talk of Halo wars and HWF to be taboo?


either way... we have enough bad opinions of aloysius and HWF on this site that it doesn't need to be discussed in yet another thread...

I think the topic is more that there is a soul over at HWF that requires saving right now. However, because the thread is already gone, only Rasq knows the bugger's name.

Aloysius ain't Lethe.

Anyhow, the post is still cached on Google. Somebody better find out how to get the username out of it.