14:30 Are you certain? I'm quite sure myself that Outskirts in there is magnum ammo bags. In the alleys before the hotel. Hard to find as they are in some hidden nooks and crannies after the REX Easter egg sword. Will confirm later in an edit.
You right🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️ I was searching “magnum ammo” in the files on all the H2 missions but its actually named “pistol ammo” so I missed that one. I will try to clip that part out later
No biggie bro, I was just about to come back with that edit. 😅 P.s nice video Man, Halo CE is my personal fave and I enjoyed your comparison vid! Can't wait for whatever you do next.
The topic of Elite armor goes further in CE. It's not just their helmets that can be different. Their gauntlets and leg armor are also randomized between different permutations. Edit: Bioluminescence is a thing in nature (look at a bunch of cephalopods, for example) so glowing flood could be "realistic".
The armor itself comes in preset combinations, the random part is just which one the AI spawns with. Elites, jackals, and grunts all have various armor loadouts but only the elites have rank specific ones. All jackals can spawn with either tan skin or black skin and with or without helmets, leading to 4 variations. All grunt ranks can spawn with the normal trianglular methane tank and mask, or they can spawn with the curled backpack and elongated snout mask with the backwards spike on the top. As for elites, the zealots, stealth, and spec ops officers use the "officer" armor set that has a helmet with larger fins, pointy shoulders, different gauntlets, and downward pointed thighs. Minors, majors, and normal spec ops can spawn either with the generic armor everyone knows or with the curled back spade shaped helmet, larger shoulders, and smaller almost half thigh armor
@@texel76 considering I have personally went out of my way to look for each of these armor permutations in game myself, as well as asked around for people who do modding to look into game files for me, there's nothing I said that's incorrect
Yeah i bet a lot of these were a result of that, especially the unique enemy abilities/visuals. some things seem deliberate (health system, smaller combat areas) but there's no good design reason to not have the bespoke helmets and stuff for the higher tier enemy variants.
@iRunfastXC it wasn't just the lack of time Bungie had. Their own ambition ruined their development of halo 2. Their ideas were too ambitious for the engine at the time so Bungie had to cut things left and right.
I remember I did some testing back then, and in halo ce, depending on what you walked/ jumped on, it would make a different sound corresponding with whatever floor you’re interacting with. For example, walking on a forerunner floor vs walking on glass makes a different sound in CE, but in halo 2, it’s just the same universal sound used for all materials. This was a while ago tho, so halo 2 may have multiple sounds, but overall, CE definitely had more sound variety
You're 100% right, Halo 2 has way less. I can't remember off the top of my head but a lot of earthy ground is the same, metal floors are the same, etc.
The AI in Halo 1 could also overheat their weapons, is it seen when wraith drivers flip out of their vehicles and instead of firing in bursts, they fire in full auto.
They can overheat them in halo 2 as well Both games AIs have the ability to reload weapons, just give a marine a partially used sniper rifle, BR, or SMG and they will reload once they get to cover. Why they never made the ai actually need to reload during standard use, i dont know. Its a bit absurd that you can watch a marine use 3 rockets without reloading. For enemies like the flood, i get it, disable that mechanic, but for enemies and allies that should be able to, let them reload. If i had to theorize, it may just be due to time constraints, not having the time to give the ai animations for reloading certain weapons, ex, brutes, drones, jackals, etc. Nor time to balance AI around them needing to reload. Halo 2 ai, LOVE to pin down targets with suppressive fire. Having them need to reload after wasting a clip at a wall or cover will make them a lot easier to pick off, and make your allies feel less useful as they may be reloading when the enemy does decide to leave cover.
For the flashlight i noticed when in coop we see the light coming from chief's lights on the helmet, the light moves when meleeing because chief moves his head in the animation i assume
even then, it moves in the exact pattern that the weapon moves in, always aiming wherever your barrel is aimed. likely just a small thing that slipped through in development, never noticing the dichotomy between first and third person flashlight positions.
This comes down to the insanely short development time of Halo 2. They gave us the E3 presentation and realized none of this works with their current engine on the original Xbox. So they had to scrap basically everything and ask Microsoft for amother year of development. I think it was Marty O'Donnell, could be someone else tho, that confirmed they made 90% of Halo 2 in just nine months. That is why the entire third act got delayed for Halo 3. Which wasn't planned at all.
That’s interesting. Too bad a lot of those small details didn’t get carried over. I know Ruby’s Rebalanced Halo 2 will bring aback a lot of these. Some of these changes like having vehicle health by tied to the player’s, having the Ghosts/Banshees alternate their plasma guns, having the flashlight be tied to Chief’s helmet, and a few other things are good ones in my book.
Halo 2 was the first one I played, then I played Halo CE after years and I was stunned by the details that where in Halo CE but didnt return for Halo 2, I almost didn't believe Halo CE came before Halo 2
Yea, Bungie had to make loads of concessions to make halo 2 run on the original XBox, the reduced quality of the textures on terrain, items, and weapons is extremely noticeable.
I want them back, I thought that they were going to in infinite due to it being a spiritual successor to ce, unfortunately that was not the case, still has the best ai in my opinion
Correction for #19 there is actually lots of magnum ammo within the halo 2 campaign and they are also in blue plastic bags like in CE. From the top of my head I remember there is a dead marine on sacred icon located right before that piston before the super foggy room with all the flood that has lots of magnum ammo.
Also at least one on Outskirts in the little section right after the mission starts and before the hunters show up, it's on the second story next to I think a marine body or two and sniper ammo
Isn't it weird how that's typically the only way to find magnum ammo? Just one huge stash on one part of the level. It's like they realized how little magnums there were and added a stash after the fact on each level
this vid is pretty funny and interesting as a halo 1 lover, yeah its crazy how radically the game design switched from 1 to 2, and 3 and reach stuck closer to 2 than 1. Halo 1 feels so damn unique because of this, and in a good way
Awesome video, a few more things: - H2 uses a spreadsheet of damage types vs material types with projectiles being grouped into certain buckets. CE's weapon had their own damage matchups against enemies. - H2 uses the same melee framedata and animations. CE's weapons had their own framedata, hitboxes, and damage roll depending if you were running, jumping, or just standing. - H2's plasma nade sticks and needler combines lost their EMP blast from CE. - H2's needler is the only version of the needler that doesn't need to ramp up its fire rate - H2 Hunters don't take melee/sword damage - H2 human vehicles are destructible
Like someone else mentioned, there are a decent amount of Elite variations such as Honor Guard, Ranger, and Councilor. There’s also the heretic elites as well
the reflections in halo 1 are really the map re-rendered upside down which is probably why they couldn't do that in halo 2 with the higher quality models and textures
4:00 I hate how the Plasma Grenade im general was changed from CE to 2, since the franchise never made it good and balanced again. In CE the Frag Grenade had more blast radius and detonated quickly, while the Plasma Grenade took much longer to detonate and had a smaller blast radius, but dealt a lot more damage to enemies around it and of course instantly killed enemies that it stuck to (except Hunters). The two grenade types being so different meant that you actually had to think about which one you wanted to throw. In every single Halo game after CE, grenade types are all very similar. All people do now is mindlessly throw grenades at people whenever they see them no matter what type of grenade the one they're throwing is. They also made the Frag bounce like a tennis ball after Halo 3 and I despise it.
CE plasma grenades also has EMP, which takes out any shields no matter how strong they are, this also applies to the super combine of the Needler. It's Baffling to me that only CE had this.
@@BoletusDeluxe I mean, in the games without the super bouncy frag, it bounced far enough to usually land by an enemy's feet if they're around a corner. If not, the blast radius was almost always enough to damage them a bit. Me not liking the whiffle ball frags is just my opinion of course. I just don't think it's as satisfying to hit someone with one anymore since it's a lot more sensitive to coordinate and kind of luck-based, leaving me never feeling accomplished when I get a kill with one.
i have some comments: Nice job pointing out! -im very sure halo 2 flood do glow BUT its only the infection form. in some darker places in sacred icon, there's some infection forms in there which are evidence. if not, then its probably MCC port issue cause im very sure OG ones glow. -I think Halo 2 and future halo games npcs all uses bottomless clips in their settings. Bungie do have reload animation for them. idk why they didnt set infinite ammo settings to "enable" than "bottomless clip" if going with halo firefight settings/coding. it do nice to see NPCs to have limited ammo in their gun and have to reload but well, the classic trick everyone knows when u deplete an empty gun, just go give it to a marine and they will reload for you.
Halo 2 had more Elite armor variations than 1 did. I understand that maybe the helmet didn't change from an Elite Minor to an Elite Major this time around, but that doesn't detract from the Stealth and Ranger Elites, or the fact we have Zealots and then Ultras, Honor Guard armor and both Councillor armor variants with the massive helmet crest. They also had Heretic Elites and the Arbiter's own armor. I know a lot of these don't show up every single mission, but I do remember feeling there was more variety overall in 2 versus 1.
@@sa-amirel-hayeed699 no, just no. ODST pods are not escape pods. They could be used as one but they are not. Simply because ODST pods can only drop down by gravity and do not have any thrusters like the CE escape pods.
@@zalf1641 bro what? We don't have life pods in Halo 2... Because Bungie decided to use the drop pods... To insert troops on the second ring.... Which is exactly what I said. Wtf does it have anything to do with thrusters?
Not just tight deadline. Bungie was a shitshow back in Halo 2's development. They spent 30% of the development time for the E3 trailer. There's also a lack of communication between teams and infighting with how Halo 2 was gonna go. There's a reason why Halo 2 has the most cut content out of every Halo game.
My favorite line from the vid docs was "it's like jumping out of a plane with a silk worm and a needle." They had 3 whole years to make the game and didn't really get shit done until the final 10 months.
Lacking real-time reflections has been a downgrade across the entire industry. Functional mirrors have become increasingly uncommon in the past twenty years. Also important to remember that Halo 2 was still running on the same hardware as the first game. All of the improvements and visual upgrades definitely had a cost. Sometimes a cutscene would start with only half of the scenery loaded...
Real-time reflections were accomplished by rendering the world twice. As games became more detailed, the rendering cost would become exponentially higher, as these reflections would have to redraw every object again for the reflection. Games eventually adopted screen-space reflections, which is a post-processing effect that relies on what's already being rendered on your screen. As such, they are cheaper, but can't be used for perfect mirrors. And now we have ray-tracing, which is still very expensive, as it's simulating light rays reflecting in real-time. So there's an understandable reason why real-time reflections aren't terribly common in games.
@@bshap495 Yeah, I understand, I just don't like it. XD There are many visual 'upgrades' in some modern games that I would gladly sacrifice for functional bathroom mirrors.
Great video. I can’t believe I didn’t know all of these. Here’s a fun fact that many people don’t know in exchange that you may or may not know. The lifeboats (10:20) in halo CE have a name. They are called Bumblebees
1:16 Technically the armor of the minor and major elites is the same but with 4 permutations, with 2 variants in each one and that vary randomly, these are: Helmet: 1 shark type, 2 dumpling type. Shoulder pads: 1 almost stolen type, 2 rounded type. Bracelets: 1 spiked type (old bracelets with shields), 2 rounded type. Leg warmers: 1 type closed, 2 types more open at the groin. The Zealots, special operations and invisibles, use the old armor from the beta, which is more similar to the combination of type 1 variants, but more pointed and with lower graphic quality (textures and brightness I don't know, but it does have fewer polygons than the others).
Plasma rifle stun effect is a big one, it made the plasma rifle a relevant unique weapon instead of just an inferior plasma pistol. Mortar-style fuel rod cannon that grunts used and you could use in mutiplayer or with mods (halo 2 and onward fuel rod became like rockets). Shotgun effectiveness, the actually good magnum and needler were lost.
5:00 Halo 2 technically has health. It's reduced from 75 to 30 HP, regenerates the first 25% after a while, and completely regenerates every checkpoint. You can bring its UI element by checking a couple flags on the Fog Skull in the game's files.
#2: I don't think removing the glow would be considered more realistic, as bioluminescence does exist in nature. And besides, they're aliens in a sci-fi game, so they get to bend the rules of reality anyways. #5: Health wasn't removed, they just made it regenerative like your shields. #8: I don't consider this a bad thing. The alternating cannons are actually more accurate, as they move towards the center of the crosshair. #11: It also doesn't make sense for most UNSC weapons, as they don't have flashlights visibly attached. Only the AR and shotgun have actual flashlights mounted to them. #14: Lifepods probably just didn't have a place in the game. They don't necessarily have to be there. #15: These are called planar reflections. They essentially render another view of the world, which means they have a high rendering cost. So they likely didn't reappear for performance reasons. #23: Note that only Covenant vehicles in the campaign have health, and can only be damaged if they're being piloted. I'd give H2 credit for being consistent with vehicle damage.
The loss of the eye scanner can be because they fled from Reach in Halo 1, which was a military research powerhouse. The eye scanner was probably some kind of bleeding tech they just so happened to have that didn't get reproduced on Earth in time for the events of Halo 2.
Halo CE was such a gem of a game. I generally enjoy Halo 2 more, but Halo CE is one of those rare games that I would describe as perfect, and the fact that it's still talked about 22 years after release is a testament to that.
The needler ammo returns in one of the DLC maps for Halo 2 multiplayer nearby one of the needler spawns on Uplift. Also, there's a lack of proper snow levels in Halo 2. The level believed to be a snow level, is actually the leftovers from a cut campaign level that survived via Burial Mounds in multiplayer and continued via Containment from the DLCs, with their dirt textures recolored to be white instead of orange-brown and some snowfall in order to sell the recolored dirt as snow at the last minute. So the lack of ice to drive over is because the levels were never designed to have frozen bodies of water to begin with, originally being a desert instead of frozen land. After learning about this, I am unable to see the "snow" on those levels as anything other than recolored dirt, and the sound effects for it also imply the textures are dirt instead of snow. Halo CE had more convincing snow, simply from being designed to actually have snow in the level from the start. They didn't have time to make the snow properly in Halo 2, but i don't think anyone noticed or cared, all things considered.
Great video! Also, the #2 one specially, I though I was going a bit crazy but yeah, CE Flood DID had a glow while they lost it in 2, same for some scenery stuff that seem to share that Flood like glow. Been working on a lil Halo 2/3 video for forever, and might bring this up so, oughta credit you for that one.
I would not have been mad for a second if Bungie had simply made a sequel to Halo 1 that was the same game but with online multiplayer, some new weapons/enemies/vehicles and slightly improved graphics.
I was today years old when I realized Halo 2 doesn't have the AR. I never noticed because I always main precision weapons so it's not something I ever pick up by choice.
I liked that Halo 2 onwards for the most part, kept the player immune to fire damage. The Spartans can withstand falling & burning through a planet's atmosphere and crashlanding into its surface but a tiny bit of minor flame eats through their armor. xD
I think the most surprising thing was the missing realtime reflections. I had forgot halo1 even had that, but it looks really nice. I wonder if the switch to a stencil shadow renderer (and then back again) contributed to it being missing from halo 2.
Not a campaign thing, but more of a general gameplay thing: Halo 2 removed damage markers (I don't know what it's really called). When you took damage in CE, you'd see a red arrow on the edges of the screen telling you the direction you took a hit. But in Halo 2, the screen just flashes blue when shields are damaged and red when you take health damage
Things that can be easily added via modding: #1, #2, #3 (variety), #5, #7, #8, #9, #12, #14, #16, #17, #18, #19*, #20, #21, #24 Things that can NOT be easily added via modding: #4, #11, #13, #22 Things I have no clue on: #3 (ice), #6, #10, #15, #23 #4 is actually the cut burning animation reused #19 is wrong, magnum ammo is in between sniper alley and hotel zanzibar in H2's Outskirts
Yea I will try to clip out the pistol one when I get back on my computer. By the way, this is a very niche question but do you know why AI wont enter Banshees when they are unoccupied?
@Hunterunt for h2 specifically, I'm not sure. Heretic Leader does so when scripted. Could be an awkward seat entry point position or weird decision-making hierarchy
I've never noticed the subtle differences between the games like that, and always been curious as to what they are. This helps me understand a bit more why people love CE that much. I'd be very interested if you made comparisons like that for halo 2 and 3 or even beyond!
About the flashlight in CE, it gets even weirder. I comes from the helmet just like in Halo 2, you can see this in 3rd person but in 1st it comes from the weapon. You can see this when playing coop
I really like some of the details you show us like the plasma weapons struggle to keep firing but others are things that are common sense things to dissapear . Like why you need life pods? Or art change of the marines.
Another big one is elites speaking an alien language. I know it came back in Reach, and that's one of the things that made that game feel CE-like to me. It makes sense for them to speak English in cutscenes, because it would be tedious having to read subtitles constantly, but maybe in gameplay, if you played as MC, the elites could still have spoken an alien dialect or something
A lot of these are present in Halo 2. Noteably: 1. Ice. 2. Bullet ricochets off shields (they happen fast, so they're hard to notice. But they *do* happen) 3. Reflections (Most noteable in the gas mines on The Oracle) 4. Magnum ammo (little blue packs, where Battle Rifle and SMGs use red, and large blue ammo packs respectively) 5. Flood glowing (it's a fainter yellow glow that lacks the flicker of Halo CE's flood. Noteable in the unfogged portions of Quarantine Zone, since the blue/white background makes it stand out.) 6. Jackals' side rolls (They'll still roll to the side to avoid vehicles) 7. Grunts have Needler reloads, as do Drones, but they're hard to pick out.
I wouldn’t say armor variation in the covenant is really an issue. For the elites, they had 3 different armor types and 2 of them are the same other than the helmet. Meanwhile halo 2 had the normal combat harness, the ranger, arbiter, counselor, heretic, and honor guard. All of which having their own unique looks. On top of having a lot more ranks so a lot more color differences. The grunts had their normal look, and then they also had the heretic look. The jackals have the normal look and then the sniper (which is the normal look without the shield so I’ll give you that one), and then the hunters have the same look throughout. But another thing Halo 2 does to improve from CE is the addition of 2 new species in the drones and brutes, where the brutes also have 4 different looks in the minor, captain, honor guard and Tartarus looks.
One of the reason for halo 2s more localized combat with fewer ai could be because halo ce was originally planned to be top-down. When looking at the combat footage side to side, halo ce almost feels like halo wars
This is a good retrospective.. you see as an 8 or 9 year old I was obsessed with CE and I realize as an adult that the game shaped much of what my tastes are today.. So while Halo2 is generally perceived with rose colored glasses, the truth is that back in the day when it came out, I was immediately disappointed by quite a few things in comparison to CE.... But that's really not surprising.. CE is legendary mostly because of it's campaign, and Halo 2 is legendary mostly because of its multiplayer
i guess sometimes AIs from halo ce, either have infinite ammo or just limited ammo cus we dont know if they have limited ammo cus we kept killing them and nicking their weapons all the time, we all never tested that (cus gamer instances) theres a different between infinite ammo and bottomless clip ik when it comes to AI having max ammo on halo 2 cus bungie just automatically gave all AI bottomless clip cheat, so they can fire without penalty, its basically a blessing/curse when playing on legendary or LASO and as we know from halo 2, it was on a time-crunch cus bungie was not expecting a sequel, its no wonder we got halo 2 we know and love/hate, best game/story but worse gameplay/difficulty
imagine the halo 3 we would have gotten if they did what they were intending to do for the halo 2 ending? i remember watching an interview about halo 2s ending and how they were running out of time or something and had to scrap the original ending they were going for.
14:45 - there is magnum ammo in h2, it's found in the courtyard building in the beginning of Outskirts, and again on Delta Halo > Regret, the magnum ammo containers use a teal-green color, but otherwise look the same as the h1 versions
I imagine a lot of the little details lost like the ammo counters for NPC's weapons and glass reflections were among the things that had to be cut out in order for Halo 2 to meet the release deadline. The warthog fun at the end is a confirmed level that was cut for the same reason (along with a few other levels), though I personally am satisfied with the Halo 2 ending, and how it allowed Halo 3 to bring back the warthog run in epic fashion.
The video was pretty good, the only two things that need to be worked on is the mic (sounds distorted) and add some music from halo, other than that a really good video
I'm glad there's no warthog run in H2. The ending boss fight was a nice way to mix it up. And IIRC, a lot of people disliked that timed run in H1. It's cinematic, but it could also be annoying for new players.
Things cut from Halo 2: The Grunts with croissants on their backs, the croissant-headed Elites, the croissant shaped dropship, the circular, croissant shaped Jackal helmets and like, uh... fuck I really want a croissant. /jk
Not true! You can find magnum ammo in packs on Outskirts! Right after mission start, you go into the open courtyard. Go up the stairs after killing the elites on the left, take the left door and hook left. By the crates there is BR ammo, sniper ammo and magnum ammo. Then, after sniper alley before you get to Hotel Zanzibar, keep left, there are bodies with guns and ammo and there as well you will find the magnum ammo packs
so i guess councilor, honor guard, no helmet, ranger, all these elites and i might be missing one or two of them, do not exist right ? For this point i do not agree like at all, halo2 has the better designs in terms of elite armor and ranks.
Almost all the elites were just pallet swaps. Those honor guard elites only had different armor. Halo ce elite armor had more variety even amongst that the lower units.
I have this personal opionion with a redesign, I think the H1 pistol is a space dessert eagle while in H2 is a regular handgun being that that the reason there is a decrease of power and increase in firerate. As if one was a gun designed for bears and were updated to fight armored lizzard men and another gun was designed for humans and updated to fight medium sized and not so armored goblin things
halo 1 spec ops elites, black armour halo 2 flood are bigger and come in smaller numbers 4:49 tbf he did it right their halo 1 plasma grenades had an emp effect which was removed in 2. grenades in general got nerfed.
It was due to the time constraints, trust me we would've had more for sure. But I will say I do enjoy the otehr things that Halo 2 does have that CE does not, such as duel wielding, you being able to hold and use the energy sword, feul rod and others that were put in halo 2 in addition oh and I can't forget being excited to use the wraith, and Gauss hog for the first time, playing as the best two man army in existence both Chief and Arbiter, being able to play as both sides, being able to go up against more types of enemies, more music to enjoy, and lots more.
![[DOKKAN BATTLE] Worldwide Campaign Announcement Video Part 2!](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/JpT5Voak6WA/mqdefault.jpg)
14:30
Are you certain? I'm quite sure myself that Outskirts in there is magnum ammo bags. In the alleys before the hotel. Hard to find as they are in some hidden nooks and crannies after the REX Easter egg sword.
Will confirm later in an edit.
You right🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️ I was searching “magnum ammo” in the files on all the H2 missions but its actually named “pistol ammo” so I missed that one. I will try to clip that part out later
No biggie bro, I was just about to come back with that edit. 😅
P.s nice video Man, Halo CE is my personal fave and I enjoyed your comparison vid! Can't wait for whatever you do next.
For a moment I thought I had a Mandela Effect, thankfully that was not the case.
@@FoxySpartan117there's also magnum ammo right at the start of the level where Johnson goes on the rooftop in the first courtyard
This has the feel of early low quality 2010s youtube videos just made by ordinary dudes. Brings me back man good video!
Thats dope. Fortunately or unfortunately, Im learning you can adjust mic settings so the mic quality should get much better.
@@Hunterunt noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Halo 1 is also the only Halo to show you your passengers' healthbars!
In Halo 2 and onwards all allies regenerate health
@@evgxmagma3520
True, but in multiplayer especially it'd be super useful to at least be able to see your passengers' shield state.
The topic of Elite armor goes further in CE. It's not just their helmets that can be different. Their gauntlets and leg armor are also randomized between different permutations.
Edit: Bioluminescence is a thing in nature (look at a bunch of cephalopods, for example) so glowing flood could be "realistic".
“24 Features Removed From Halo 1 To Halo 2” addendums
Their shoulders are randomized too.
The armor itself comes in preset combinations, the random part is just which one the AI spawns with. Elites, jackals, and grunts all have various armor loadouts but only the elites have rank specific ones. All jackals can spawn with either tan skin or black skin and with or without helmets, leading to 4 variations. All grunt ranks can spawn with the normal trianglular methane tank and mask, or they can spawn with the curled backpack and elongated snout mask with the backwards spike on the top. As for elites, the zealots, stealth, and spec ops officers use the "officer" armor set that has a helmet with larger fins, pointy shoulders, different gauntlets, and downward pointed thighs. Minors, majors, and normal spec ops can spawn either with the generic armor everyone knows or with the curled back spade shaped helmet, larger shoulders, and smaller almost half thigh armor
@@tubbyduck5317 You got many things wrong body, you were almost there.
@@texel76 considering I have personally went out of my way to look for each of these armor permutations in game myself, as well as asked around for people who do modding to look into game files for me, there's nothing I said that's incorrect
It's probably Halo 2's time crunch.
I was finna say that frfr
@@Hazzymane56 bussin
Yeah i bet a lot of these were a result of that, especially the unique enemy abilities/visuals. some things seem deliberate (health system, smaller combat areas) but there's no good design reason to not have the bespoke helmets and stuff for the higher tier enemy variants.
Such a lame excuse to fail on things they had figured out in the first iteration (which was also under a time crunch, but came out a lot cleaner).
@iRunfastXC it wasn't just the lack of time Bungie had. Their own ambition ruined their development of halo 2. Their ideas were too ambitious for the engine at the time so Bungie had to cut things left and right.
The one feature I liked from Halo CE that didn’t carry over into the other games was the ability to pick up weapons that had depleted magazines
Agreed!
Same
I remember I did some testing back then, and in halo ce, depending on what you walked/ jumped on, it would make a different sound corresponding with whatever floor you’re interacting with. For example, walking on a forerunner floor vs walking on glass makes a different sound in CE, but in halo 2, it’s just the same universal sound used for all materials. This was a while ago tho, so halo 2 may have multiple sounds, but overall, CE definitely had more sound variety
You're 100% right, Halo 2 has way less. I can't remember off the top of my head but a lot of earthy ground is the same, metal floors are the same, etc.
One thing i'd add to this list is Marine berzerking in CE.
The AI in Halo 1 could also overheat their weapons, is it seen when wraith drivers flip out of their vehicles and instead of firing in bursts, they fire in full auto.
They can overheat them in halo 2 as well
Both games AIs have the ability to reload weapons, just give a marine a partially used sniper rifle, BR, or SMG and they will reload once they get to cover. Why they never made the ai actually need to reload during standard use, i dont know. Its a bit absurd that you can watch a marine use 3 rockets without reloading. For enemies like the flood, i get it, disable that mechanic, but for enemies and allies that should be able to, let them reload.
If i had to theorize, it may just be due to time constraints, not having the time to give the ai animations for reloading certain weapons, ex, brutes, drones, jackals, etc. Nor time to balance AI around them needing to reload. Halo 2 ai, LOVE to pin down targets with suppressive fire. Having them need to reload after wasting a clip at a wall or cover will make them a lot easier to pick off, and make your allies feel less useful as they may be reloading when the enemy does decide to leave cover.
You could never swap weapons with Marines in HCE
@@halinaqi2194 Still works in Halo 2? Nice
You should do a video talking about the changes between 2 and 3.
I was going to do one on all features that Halo 2 added from Halo 1 but that would be like 20x longer than this vid 🥵
That’s funny. This version of the video is probably better.
What do you think you’ll make next?
Hey I didn’t want to say it too early but im almost finished on the similarities between H1 and H2 campaign levels.
That’s good news. Definitely looking forward to that.
For the flashlight i noticed when in coop we see the light coming from chief's lights on the helmet, the light moves when meleeing because chief moves his head in the animation i assume
even then, it moves in the exact pattern that the weapon moves in, always aiming wherever your barrel is aimed. likely just a small thing that slipped through in development, never noticing the dichotomy between first and third person flashlight positions.
@@nybergsgarage Yea i agree
This comes down to the insanely short development time of Halo 2. They gave us the E3 presentation and realized none of this works with their current engine on the original Xbox. So they had to scrap basically everything and ask Microsoft for amother year of development.
I think it was Marty O'Donnell, could be someone else tho, that confirmed they made 90% of Halo 2 in just nine months. That is why the entire third act got delayed for Halo 3. Which wasn't planned at all.
That’s interesting. Too bad a lot of those small details didn’t get carried over. I know Ruby’s Rebalanced Halo 2 will bring aback a lot of these.
Some of these changes like having vehicle health by tied to the player’s, having the Ghosts/Banshees alternate their plasma guns, having the flashlight be tied to Chief’s helmet, and a few other things are good ones in my book.
Halo 2 was the first one I played, then I played Halo CE after years and I was stunned by the details that where in Halo CE but didnt return for Halo 2, I almost didn't believe Halo CE came before Halo 2
I’ve always felt that Bungie really made CE feel timeless with the graphics.
Some items look dated, like geography
But weapons look sooo real
Yea, Bungie had to make loads of concessions to make halo 2 run on the original XBox, the reduced quality of the textures on terrain, items, and weapons is extremely noticeable.
all my homies love croissant grunt 🤟😎
If 343 doesn't add Croissant Grunt back we riot
Ahh the curlback grunts have always been celebrated for their excellence
@@QuarrelsomeLocalOaf😂😂😂😂😂
I want them back, I thought that they were going to in infinite due to it being a spiritual successor to ce, unfortunately that was not the case, still has the best ai in my opinion
@@roguespectredelta1951 We sorta got them in Halo Reach! Besides CE, those will always be the coolest grunt models to me
Correction for #19 there is actually lots of magnum ammo within the halo 2 campaign and they are also in blue plastic bags like in CE. From the top of my head I remember there is a dead marine on sacred icon located right before that piston before the super foggy room with all the flood that has lots of magnum ammo.
Also at least one on Outskirts in the little section right after the mission starts and before the hunters show up, it's on the second story next to I think a marine body or two and sniper ammo
Isn't it weird how that's typically the only way to find magnum ammo? Just one huge stash on one part of the level. It's like they realized how little magnums there were and added a stash after the fact on each level
this vid is pretty funny and interesting as a halo 1 lover, yeah its crazy how radically the game design switched from 1 to 2, and 3 and reach stuck closer to 2 than 1. Halo 1 feels so damn unique because of this, and in a good way
Awesome video, a few more things:
- H2 uses a spreadsheet of damage types vs material types with projectiles being grouped into certain buckets. CE's weapon had their own damage matchups against enemies.
- H2 uses the same melee framedata and animations. CE's weapons had their own framedata, hitboxes, and damage roll depending if you were running, jumping, or just standing.
- H2's plasma nade sticks and needler combines lost their EMP blast from CE.
- H2's needler is the only version of the needler that doesn't need to ramp up its fire rate
- H2 Hunters don't take melee/sword damage
- H2 human vehicles are destructible
needler and plasma grenade never had EMP effects in CE.
@@zalf1641 they do check Ruby's Rebalanced
Like someone else mentioned, there are a decent amount of Elite variations such as Honor Guard, Ranger, and Councilor. There’s also the heretic elites as well
the reflections in halo 1 are really the map re-rendered upside down which is probably why they couldn't do that in halo 2 with the higher quality models and textures
4:00
I hate how the Plasma Grenade im general was changed from CE to 2, since the franchise never made it good and balanced again.
In CE the Frag Grenade had more blast radius and detonated quickly, while the Plasma Grenade took much longer to detonate and had a smaller blast radius, but dealt a lot more damage to enemies around it and of course instantly killed enemies that it stuck to (except Hunters).
The two grenade types being so different meant that you actually had to think about which one you wanted to throw. In every single Halo game after CE, grenade types are all very similar.
All people do now is mindlessly throw grenades at people whenever they see them no matter what type of grenade the one they're throwing is. They also made the Frag bounce like a tennis ball after Halo 3 and I despise it.
CE plasma grenades also has EMP, which takes out any shields no matter how strong they are, this also applies to the super combine of the Needler. It's Baffling to me that only CE had this.
The bouncy frag is pretty nice because you can blow up enemies around corners and stuff
@@BoletusDeluxe
I mean, in the games without the super bouncy frag, it bounced far enough to usually land by an enemy's feet if they're around a corner. If not, the blast radius was almost always enough to damage them a bit.
Me not liking the whiffle ball frags is just my opinion of course. I just don't think it's as satisfying to hit someone with one anymore since it's a lot more sensitive to coordinate and kind of luck-based, leaving me never feeling accomplished when I get a kill with one.
@@emperorfridgethedude fair enough
i have some comments:
Nice job pointing out!
-im very sure halo 2 flood do glow BUT its only the infection form. in some darker places in sacred icon, there's some infection forms in there which are evidence. if not, then its probably MCC port issue cause im very sure OG ones glow.
-I think Halo 2 and future halo games npcs all uses bottomless clips in their settings. Bungie do have reload animation for them. idk why they didnt set infinite ammo settings to "enable" than "bottomless clip" if going with halo firefight settings/coding. it do nice to see NPCs to have limited ammo in their gun and have to reload but well, the classic trick everyone knows when u deplete an empty gun, just go give it to a marine and they will reload for you.
Halo 2 had more Elite armor variations than 1 did. I understand that maybe the helmet didn't change from an Elite Minor to an Elite Major this time around, but that doesn't detract from the Stealth and Ranger Elites, or the fact we have Zealots and then Ultras, Honor Guard armor and both Councillor armor variants with the massive helmet crest. They also had Heretic Elites and the Arbiter's own armor. I know a lot of these don't show up every single mission, but I do remember feeling there was more variety overall in 2 versus 1.
Took 9 years to fight enemies with varied armor again
Edit:Actually was 3 years, H3 brutes have mulriple armor variations :/
Not sure life pods were left out. They just didnt really fit. Though i agree, they could've been made to fit.
Halo 2's life pods were replaced by the ODST pods as the insertion method onto the second ring
@@sa-amirel-hayeed699 no, just no. ODST pods are not escape pods. They could be used as one but they are not. Simply because ODST pods can only drop down by gravity and do not have any thrusters like the CE escape pods.
@@zalf1641 bro what? We don't have life pods in Halo 2... Because Bungie decided to use the drop pods... To insert troops on the second ring.... Which is exactly what I said. Wtf does it have anything to do with thrusters?
What "tight deadline" does to a mf
Not just tight deadline. Bungie was a shitshow back in Halo 2's development. They spent 30% of the development time for the E3 trailer. There's also a lack of communication between teams and infighting with how Halo 2 was gonna go. There's a reason why Halo 2 has the most cut content out of every Halo game.
My favorite line from the vid docs was "it's like jumping out of a plane with a silk worm and a needle."
They had 3 whole years to make the game and didn't really get shit done until the final 10 months.
Lacking real-time reflections has been a downgrade across the entire industry. Functional mirrors have become increasingly uncommon in the past twenty years.
Also important to remember that Halo 2 was still running on the same hardware as the first game. All of the improvements and visual upgrades definitely had a cost. Sometimes a cutscene would start with only half of the scenery loaded...
Real-time reflections were accomplished by rendering the world twice. As games became more detailed, the rendering cost would become exponentially higher, as these reflections would have to redraw every object again for the reflection.
Games eventually adopted screen-space reflections, which is a post-processing effect that relies on what's already being rendered on your screen. As such, they are cheaper, but can't be used for perfect mirrors.
And now we have ray-tracing, which is still very expensive, as it's simulating light rays reflecting in real-time. So there's an understandable reason why real-time reflections aren't terribly common in games.
@@bshap495 Yeah, I understand, I just don't like it. XD There are many visual 'upgrades' in some modern games that I would gladly sacrifice for functional bathroom mirrors.
Great video. I can’t believe I didn’t know all of these. Here’s a fun fact that many people don’t know in exchange that you may or may not know. The lifeboats (10:20) in halo CE have a name. They are called Bumblebees
1:16 Technically the armor of the minor and major elites is the same but with 4 permutations, with 2 variants in each one and that vary randomly, these are:
Helmet: 1 shark type, 2 dumpling type.
Shoulder pads: 1 almost stolen type, 2 rounded type.
Bracelets: 1 spiked type (old bracelets with shields), 2 rounded type.
Leg warmers: 1 type closed, 2 types more open at the groin.
The Zealots, special operations and invisibles, use the old armor from the beta, which is more similar to the combination of type 1 variants, but more pointed and with lower graphic quality (textures and brightness I don't know, but it does have fewer polygons than the others).
There actually was magnum ammo packs in halo 2. They are blue instead of red and are on most missions featuring the pistols.
Oh yea another thing for #18 in CE the bullets also deflect off of elite energy shields too and also hunter armor if I am not mistaken
I never noticed that the Marines' AR would display a different ammo count even when they were handling them. Good catch!
Im surprised you didnt mention the EMP effect that the plasma grenade had.
It was a great way to make it usefull even without a stick.
0:55 Marine was edging himself close to death had he moved a little
Plasma rifle stun effect is a big one, it made the plasma rifle a relevant unique weapon instead of just an inferior plasma pistol. Mortar-style fuel rod cannon that grunts used and you could use in mutiplayer or with mods (halo 2 and onward fuel rod became like rockets). Shotgun effectiveness, the actually good magnum and needler were lost.
5:00
Halo 2 technically has health. It's reduced from 75 to 30 HP, regenerates the first 25% after a while, and completely regenerates every checkpoint. You can bring its UI element by checking a couple flags on the Fog Skull in the game's files.
13:26
So… then it’s not harmless…
The tripping grunt off of the drop ship, very rare!
the elites in halo 2 do have different armors though. like the honor guards, space elites, and heretic elites.
#2: I don't think removing the glow would be considered more realistic, as bioluminescence does exist in nature. And besides, they're aliens in a sci-fi game, so they get to bend the rules of reality anyways.
#5: Health wasn't removed, they just made it regenerative like your shields.
#8: I don't consider this a bad thing. The alternating cannons are actually more accurate, as they move towards the center of the crosshair.
#11: It also doesn't make sense for most UNSC weapons, as they don't have flashlights visibly attached. Only the AR and shotgun have actual flashlights mounted to them.
#14: Lifepods probably just didn't have a place in the game. They don't necessarily have to be there.
#15: These are called planar reflections. They essentially render another view of the world, which means they have a high rendering cost. So they likely didn't reappear for performance reasons.
#23: Note that only Covenant vehicles in the campaign have health, and can only be damaged if they're being piloted. I'd give H2 credit for being consistent with vehicle damage.
There actually are ammo packs for the Magnum in Halo 2. They are blue, and appear in Outskirts.
The loss of the eye scanner can be because they fled from Reach in Halo 1, which was a military research powerhouse. The eye scanner was probably some kind of bleeding tech they just so happened to have that didn't get reproduced on Earth in time for the events of Halo 2.
It was a direct reference to aliens. Halo 2 feels less campy to me than CE, so maybe that's why they removed it
Noooo
You can’t fix it with lore
Halo CE was such a gem of a game. I generally enjoy Halo 2 more, but Halo CE is one of those rare games that I would describe as perfect, and the fact that it's still talked about 22 years after release is a testament to that.
Videos like this gives me ideas to add to my fan game
Halo 1.5
The needler ammo returns in one of the DLC maps for Halo 2 multiplayer nearby one of the needler spawns on Uplift.
Also, there's a lack of proper snow levels in Halo 2. The level believed to be a snow level, is actually the leftovers from a cut campaign level that survived via Burial Mounds in multiplayer and continued via Containment from the DLCs, with their dirt textures recolored to be white instead of orange-brown and some snowfall in order to sell the recolored dirt as snow at the last minute. So the lack of ice to drive over is because the levels were never designed to have frozen bodies of water to begin with, originally being a desert instead of frozen land.
After learning about this, I am unable to see the "snow" on those levels as anything other than recolored dirt, and the sound effects for it also imply the textures are dirt instead of snow. Halo CE had more convincing snow, simply from being designed to actually have snow in the level from the start. They didn't have time to make the snow properly in Halo 2, but i don't think anyone noticed or cared, all things considered.
Great video!
Also, the #2 one specially, I though I was going a bit crazy but yeah, CE Flood DID had a glow while they lost it in 2, same for some scenery stuff that seem to share that Flood like glow.
Been working on a lil Halo 2/3 video for forever, and might bring this up so, oughta credit you for that one.
I would not have been mad for a second if Bungie had simply made a sequel to Halo 1 that was the same game but with online multiplayer, some new weapons/enemies/vehicles and slightly improved graphics.
I was today years old when I realized Halo 2 doesn't have the AR. I never noticed because I always main precision weapons so it's not something I ever pick up by choice.
Please do this for all halos
I liked that Halo 2 onwards for the most part, kept the player immune to fire damage. The Spartans can withstand falling & burning through a planet's atmosphere and crashlanding into its surface but a tiny bit of minor flame eats through their armor. xD
Im so watching this after work. Cant wait
halo 2. what is a halo 2? is this a halo too?
Underrated comment
I think the most surprising thing was the missing realtime reflections. I had forgot halo1 even had that, but it looks really nice. I wonder if the switch to a stencil shadow renderer (and then back again) contributed to it being missing from halo 2.
I love the attention to detail in CE, particularly with the armor variations.
Not a campaign thing, but more of a general gameplay thing: Halo 2 removed damage markers (I don't know what it's really called). When you took damage in CE, you'd see a red arrow on the edges of the screen telling you the direction you took a hit. But in Halo 2, the screen just flashes blue when shields are damaged and red when you take health damage
Things that can be easily added via modding: #1, #2, #3 (variety), #5, #7, #8, #9, #12, #14, #16, #17, #18, #19*, #20, #21, #24
Things that can NOT be easily added via modding: #4, #11, #13, #22
Things I have no clue on: #3 (ice), #6, #10, #15, #23
#4 is actually the cut burning animation reused
#19 is wrong, magnum ammo is in between sniper alley and hotel zanzibar in H2's Outskirts
Yea I will try to clip out the pistol one when I get back on my computer. By the way, this is a very niche question but do you know why AI wont enter Banshees when they are unoccupied?
@Hunterunt for h2 specifically, I'm not sure. Heretic Leader does so when scripted. Could be an awkward seat entry point position or weird decision-making hierarchy
I've never noticed the subtle differences between the games like that, and always been curious as to what they are. This helps me understand a bit more why people love CE that much. I'd be very interested if you made comparisons like that for halo 2 and 3 or even beyond!
About the flashlight in CE, it gets even weirder.
I comes from the helmet just like in Halo 2, you can see this in 3rd person but in 1st it comes from the weapon.
You can see this when playing coop
I really like some of the details you show us like the plasma weapons struggle to keep firing but others are things that are common sense things to dissapear . Like why you need life pods? Or art change of the marines.
Great video. I been playing Halo nonstop since CE and didn’t notice these changes until now.
Another big one is elites speaking an alien language. I know it came back in Reach, and that's one of the things that made that game feel CE-like to me. It makes sense for them to speak English in cutscenes, because it would be tedious having to read subtitles constantly, but maybe in gameplay, if you played as MC, the elites could still have spoken an alien dialect or something
it would make the iwhbyd skull a lot more boring though.
@@Substitube true
A lot of these are present in Halo 2. Noteably:
1. Ice.
2. Bullet ricochets off shields (they happen fast, so they're hard to notice. But they *do* happen)
3. Reflections (Most noteable in the gas mines on The Oracle)
4. Magnum ammo (little blue packs, where Battle Rifle and SMGs use red, and large blue ammo packs respectively)
5. Flood glowing (it's a fainter yellow glow that lacks the flicker of Halo CE's flood. Noteable in the unfogged portions of Quarantine Zone, since the blue/white background makes it stand out.)
6. Jackals' side rolls (They'll still roll to the side to avoid vehicles)
7. Grunts have Needler reloads, as do Drones, but they're hard to pick out.
There were actually a lot of big encounters in halo 2, flood missions and high charity missions are notable
For a small channel your essay was actually very good keepbit up looking forward to what you bring next
I wouldn’t say armor variation in the covenant is really an issue. For the elites, they had 3 different armor types and 2 of them are the same other than the helmet. Meanwhile halo 2 had the normal combat harness, the ranger, arbiter, counselor, heretic, and honor guard. All of which having their own unique looks. On top of having a lot more ranks so a lot more color differences. The grunts had their normal look, and then they also had the heretic look. The jackals have the normal look and then the sniper (which is the normal look without the shield so I’ll give you that one), and then the hunters have the same look throughout. But another thing Halo 2 does to improve from CE is the addition of 2 new species in the drones and brutes, where the brutes also have 4 different looks in the minor, captain, honor guard and Tartarus looks.
the needler and ar ammo tracking in CE is amazing to see
nice video, great work. CE is still my favorite.
I'm here to appreciate how much you presented this as an early youtube comp video down to the exit clip. 10/10 pure nostalgia (I'm old lmao)
One of the reason for halo 2s more localized combat with fewer ai could be because halo ce was originally planned to be top-down. When looking at the combat footage side to side, halo ce almost feels like halo wars
This is a good retrospective.. you see as an 8 or 9 year old I was obsessed with CE and I realize as an adult that the game shaped much of what my tastes are today..
So while Halo2 is generally perceived with rose colored glasses, the truth is that back in the day when it came out, I was immediately disappointed by quite a few things in comparison to CE....
But that's really not surprising.. CE is legendary mostly because of it's campaign, and Halo 2 is legendary mostly because of its multiplayer
So observant I like it
I never really noticed the helmet-less Jackal so I always assumed Jackals had a bigger, more reptilian head in Halo CE
I'm certain there is pistol ammo in the second mission in that building right across the alley in the building ahead.
IIRC in Halo 1 you can ride on the side of a tank but was removed in Halo 2.
The attention to detail in Halo 1 was insane. Luckily they rectify some of the lack of details from Halo 2 to Halo 3...I think.
i guess sometimes AIs from halo ce, either have infinite ammo or just limited ammo cus we dont know if they have limited ammo cus we kept killing them and nicking their weapons all the time, we all never tested that (cus gamer instances)
theres a different between infinite ammo and bottomless clip
ik when it comes to AI having max ammo on halo 2 cus bungie just automatically gave all AI bottomless clip cheat, so they can fire without penalty, its basically a blessing/curse when playing on legendary or LASO and as we know from halo 2, it was on a time-crunch cus bungie was not expecting a sequel, its no wonder we got halo 2 we know and love/hate, best game/story but worse gameplay/difficulty
The other games are still great but Halo CE's campaign is the best iteration by miles
imagine the halo 3 we would have gotten if they did what they were intending to do for the halo 2 ending? i remember watching an interview about halo 2s ending and how they were running out of time or something and had to scrap the original ending they were going for.
14:45 - there is magnum ammo in h2, it's found in the courtyard building in the beginning of Outskirts, and again on Delta Halo > Regret, the magnum ammo containers use a teal-green color, but otherwise look the same as the h1 versions
8:20 the light is integrated into the helmet itself, which can be seen in cutscenes in both halo 2 and 3
I imagine a lot of the little details lost like the ammo counters for NPC's weapons and glass reflections were among the things that had to be cut out in order for Halo 2 to meet the release deadline. The warthog fun at the end is a confirmed level that was cut for the same reason (along with a few other levels), though I personally am satisfied with the Halo 2 ending, and how it allowed Halo 3 to bring back the warthog run in epic fashion.
The video was pretty good, the only two things that need to be worked on is the mic (sounds distorted) and add some music from halo, other than that a really good video
I'm glad there's no warthog run in H2. The ending boss fight was a nice way to mix it up. And IIRC, a lot of people disliked that timed run in H1. It's cinematic, but it could also be annoying for new players.
Things cut from Halo 2: The Grunts with croissants on their backs, the croissant-headed Elites, the croissant shaped dropship, the circular, croissant shaped Jackal helmets and like, uh... fuck I really want a croissant.
/jk
This feels well made and informative thank you
Great vid! Hope you have more in the pipeline
Once you realize how little time they developed the game. This makes sense
Not true! You can find magnum ammo in packs on Outskirts! Right after mission start, you go into the open courtyard. Go up the stairs after killing the elites on the left, take the left door and hook left. By the crates there is BR ammo, sniper ammo and magnum ammo. Then, after sniper alley before you get to Hotel Zanzibar, keep left, there are bodies with guns and ammo and there as well you will find the magnum ammo packs
quick correction: there's quite a few pouches of magnum ammo in halo 2 on outskirts, unless I'm mistaken.
so i guess councilor, honor guard, no helmet, ranger, all these elites and i might be missing one or two of them, do not exist right ?
For this point i do not agree like at all, halo2 has the better designs in terms of elite armor and ranks.
Those are different ranks. Halo 1 had regular armor variation within the same rank.
@@Hunterunt but there was more variety overall in h2 imo
I disagree
Almost all the elites were just pallet swaps. Those honor guard elites only had different armor. Halo ce elite armor had more variety even amongst that the lower units.
yeah but those are very rare units. Minors, Majors, Spec Ops, Stealth, Ultras, and Zealots all had same armor different palettes
Envy skull in H2 allows you to proc active camo
I have this personal opionion with a redesign, I think the H1 pistol is a space dessert eagle while in H2 is a regular handgun being that that the reason there is a decrease of power and increase in firerate.
As if one was a gun designed for bears and were updated to fight armored lizzard men
and another gun was designed for humans and updated to fight medium sized and not so armored goblin things
You missed one thing. In halo 1 bullets also ricochet from marine armor. Halo 1 is the only game with this detail.
There is magnum ammo on halo 2. The arbiter flood missions if im not mistaken
halo 2
halo 1 spec ops elites, black armour
halo 2 flood are bigger and come in smaller numbers
4:49 tbf he did it right their
halo 1 plasma grenades had an emp effect which was removed in 2. grenades in general got nerfed.
It was due to the time constraints, trust me we would've had more for sure. But I will say I do enjoy the otehr things that Halo 2 does have that CE does not, such as duel wielding, you being able to hold and use the energy sword, feul rod and others that were put in halo 2 in addition oh and I can't forget being excited to use the wraith, and Gauss hog for the first time, playing as the best two man army in existence both Chief and Arbiter, being able to play as both sides, being able to go up against more types of enemies, more music to enjoy, and lots more.
no one said anytthing on the photobomb guy at 0:53 lol
Cool video. Never even occurred to me there were no powerups it's so obvious. Wow