Four Years and Still Strong

So, today signifies the four year join date for me on Bungie.net. Since that is the case, I would qualify for the Veteran prefix for my title. However, that's not the case as I already have Exalted which is the highest prefix one can gain. Over my stay there I have been in so many awesome private groups, one of which was the very first group I joined I am still in. I remember the first group I started on my own and tried to get off the ground. Needless to say it didn't go to well... Ah yes, the abomination of a group that was Troops of Onyx. Oh, and can't forget about the real only semi-successful Legion of Elites. Yeah, it had a whole 15 members and only a few were ever active. After that I finally realized that I should give up on trying to start a group myself. I think the only group that ever had a chance at getting off the ground was the Halo Gaming Association. Apparently though, two revived versions of the group wasn't enough to get things going smoothly.

Anyways, a couple weeks ago I played some of Reach's multiplayer with Storm. We had plenty of awesome games and here are a few of them. One of the only times where I'll ever have 20+ kills. The Key made me do it! The Key is basically the sword; it's a reference to a phrase the Tucker makes from I think season four of RvB. Okay, so maybe this is another one of those times. Again, the Key made me do it. Blarg! That was an awesome game, it basically came down to who could control the yellow(more like green to me...) Which a lot of people consider bad for Sword Base, but I like it; I think it adds to the chaos that goes with the name of Halo. <3 Oddball. I didn't do much scoring wise, but I kind of helped by keeping the enemy team away from our teammate who had the ball. Yet another close game. Stupid Armor Lock... I believe that is all of the games I have to post.

However, I do have some rendered videos to show off. This first video shows how not to throw a grenade out a doorway. It might look like it worked, but Storm(yes, he's the one who threw the grenade) was actually intending to throw it out the doorway a little bit farther to the right. In turn I end up getting blown up by a grenade. I'll admit, I laughed pretty hard the moment it happened. Embedded version is below, with the direct link to download the clip to Reach. At some point I hope to have it uploaded to my Youtube channel.
Direct download link is here.
Speaking of my Youtube channel, about a month ago I uploaded some other rendered videos I had laying around in Reach to it. I believe that some of them I haven't posted on here before, on the other hand; some of them already have been. Ah well, pick and choose which one(s) you want to watch.

As of lately, I've been going for another personal goal of reaching 15,000 Gamerscore. Most of you might remember a couple posts I made earlier about my quest for 10,000 points and then later 12,000. I am currently sitting at 14,653 and having a hard time getting those last few points. I originally thought it would be easy to get the last 500 points when I reach it, but that was like 3 months ago... That's all I have for now. I know it's a rather short post compared to what I usually do, but it's at least something.

Title-less

No, I haven't lost my title on Bnet yet; it's just I don't know what to call this post...again. I think I'm going to jump right on into this post with a few of my older posts from the forums that have been hiding for a little while. You might have to scroll down the page until you see my name in order to find them. Whereas others are near the top of the page.
No, I don't have a Hail to the King; I have 7 of them now. Yes, at that point I didn't have any, but it was only a couple months later that I got my first one.
Really? I had no idea that getting a random unplanned kill was not expected.
You're kidding, right? The more I look at that thread; I don't know what I was thinking.
Seriously, back in Halo 3 I was always changing my helmet several times throughout the day. Luckily, I like the helmets they have in Reach so I don't change them that often.
Says the person who has played a handful of games and netted themselves a skill of 5 in the playlist.
Again, really I had no idea that it takes good teamwork to defeat a good team...
This is decent one with the way I worded it. It makes it sound like I boot people if they betray me in a game even if it was an accident.
So far, those are all the posts I have found for now. I'll see if I can scrounge up some more for a future post, but they are slowly dwindling now that I realize how not to be an idiot.

Anyways, remember that map that I mentioned in one of my earlier posts that I said I was working that was originating as an idea for a Halo 3 map and it has kind of died of since I started it in Reach? Well, I haven't killed it completely...not yet anyhow. I do have a very good start on it(read: pretty much finished) however, I need to change around some things on the map that I'm not happy with. Oh, and it still needs a name for it. There still are a few things that I need to add to it, such as making it compatible for the other gametypes. I'm thinking of also changing the current spawns for the sniper rifle as I'm not exactly happy with them. Once it is finished and I have given it a playtest with Storm, I will post it on here accompanied with a few screenshots perhaps for you all to download and enjoy. Or hate on, whichever suits your style better.

Now, before I leave you with a short post; I'll add in a few more words and pretty colored text and some moving images share some of my files I have taken in Reach as of lately.
First up is so far the only Firefight gametype I have created. I am actually rather happy with it. When I first started brainstorming the idea I was hoping for a Jackal only match of Firefight; well that happened and it is comprised of mostly Jackals, but it wasn't fun with only them. Needless to say even with the skull selection for each round it didn't offer a challenge. I wasn't planning on creating a gametype that was meant for a challenge, but I didn't want something that was going to easy to complete either. Once I had everything perfected in the end I ended up with a few other groups of enemies added in there also. It's still a fun mode to play, especially if Jackals have been owning you in the campaign and you completely hate them(like I do) you can take out your frustrations on them here. I also think you'll like what's in store for you if download it and play until round two.
Anyways, link to download aforementioned gametype.
Next up are a couple video clips I took from the game. Right now I will embed the video directly into the post, and give you direct download link. However, here soon(as in I'm going to do it no matter what) I'll have them and the older ones I found that I had rendered and that are stashed away uploaded to my Youtube channel. No promises as to when they'll be up, but I'm hoping to remember to do it soon.
First up in the batch of videos, a very lucky Elite with a Ghost and also, a very unaware Grunt that ends up going through a window....ouch.

If only I had Armor Lock... Direct download link.


I hit the Elite with the Ghost thinking that ramming him up against the building and the front end of the vehicle would kill him, but nope it doesn't work that way. He evidently had an invisible parachute that saved him. Direct download link is available here.

Now, the following is so far, I think, my best failure of Reach currently. Like the description of the clip says, I need to learn how to get out of a vehicle safely.

So that was Storm driving the Hog on the left after getting killed then respawning near one, I was the one that drove our old Hog back(located on the right) so we could use it. Well, lets just say that Newtons law where an object in motion tends to stay in motion until an equal or greater force are presented didn't work in my favor. At least...I think that's the way that law goes. Direct download link can be found...here.

I believe that is all I have for now. I'm hoping to get another post out with that map I was talking about sometime in the next few days. However, if past experience is any source; I wouldn't count on it.

Next Tier: Gold

Ah yes, if you look at my Halo: Reach service record that is is what most of my commendations for the campaign look like. What are commendations you ask; well some of you might be at least. Basically they are certain milestones for getting "x" amount of headshots in campaing/multiplayer/Firefight. However, they aren't only for headshots; you can get them for killing so many enemy vehicles(or killing so many enemies inside a vehicle) anyways you get the idea though right? Good, now moving on. Since I have been playing the campaign in Reach so much I have six, almost seven, commendations upgraded to their Silver tier. Each tier has an "x" amount you have to reach in order to gain the next tier. The tiers are set up much like this(in order from lowest to highest): Iron -> Bronze -> Silver -> Gold -> Onyx and then I think you can max out the Onyx tier also, not sure on that. Plus when you reach the next tier of a commendation you get a credit boost(hear by known as cR) on top of whatever you got in the game you just played. It's a cool way to gain some extra cR's if you have the time to sit there and "rank them up" so to speak. So what does any of what I just said have to do with anything really? Well, I'm on a personal goal to max out at least one of the campaign related commendations; however, after looking at a friends' service record which has a couple commendations that are Gold tier and the next one being Onyx, it looks like it's going to take me a really long time in order to accomplish that goal.




Now moving onto something else and I know I've already stated this. A couple weeks ago I took my first foray into the multiplayer since the Beta back in May and it's still really fun. So here, I'll share a couple games from that experience.
My very first game of multiplayer was in an age old classic playlist called Big Team Battle. I was actually really happy that my first game was Territories. It probably my favorite gametype anymore next to Grifball. Yes, I like it even better than CTF now.
I also like Oddball... and Headhunter. However, I still don't like SWAT; which is why I'm glad that it is its own playlist now. Since Storm and I decided to switch to Team Objective so we could play Headhunter, we also got to play a gametype called " Hot Potato" which is pretty fun. I'm still not sure exactly how it works, but I think when one team has gotten so many points holding the ball(which is actually a bomb) it blows up and resets. Still though, it's pretty fun.
I have found out that I still have this strong liking for one sided assault(one bomb.) Despite the score being 2-0 in our favor, the game was still pretty close. There were points when we thought they would score easily, but then our defense would kick in and stop them. I remember one time where they had the bomb armed with a few seconds left(10 I believe) and the actual timer on the bomb was only one to two seconds behind the game time. So in one round we escaped that round without them scoring only because the countdown on the bomb was a couple seconds slower then that game timer. It was awesome to say the least. Not a whole lot went on in this game. However, it was still another good game. The other team scored fairly early in the first round and we had a little trouble scoring our first time, but again our teams defense kicked into action that round(mainly Storm keeping them pinned down with the sword, more on this in a bit) and held them off so we could score in the final round. Now, what I said about Storm keeping the other team pinned with the sword makes no sense right? Well, it was interesting to see to say the least. They took the bomb off to one of the sides of the map and tried to sneak it around that way, well one of their players had already grabbed the sword and rushed into our base where Storm had killed him thus taking the guys sword. Anyways, the bomb carry gets killed right out in the open and the other team tries to rush in there to grab the bomb in hopes to overrun us; but each time Storm stepped out there with the sword they ran away and hide until the rest of their team showed up. It went on like that for pretty much the duration of the third round.
This final game, I have only one thing to say. I still like the Warthog.


So I will give you a quick update on the map I say I am working on, and yet; still have to show it to you. I actually have more than two bases and two rocks placed on it after some time on it today. I managed to place the flag and capture point to make it compatible with CTF and have placed a lot more cover than what was there before. I have also added a few weapons to the map also; and will most likely add more here soon. It was interesting trying to get a kill zone I have placed next where the rockets are set up so that it wouldn't kill you when you went anywhere near them. After that I placed a couple small little sniper towers, but those might not stay as I don't want the sniper to always have everyone else pinned down and all that....even though that is the point of a sniper. It's near being complete, all I have to do is maybe add some more cover, perhaps weapons even and change the respawn times on the power weapons. Oh, plus figure out what some of the stuff I have placed on the map does. And think up a name for it wouldn't hurt also. It should be done within the next couple weeks I'm guessing, but it really depends on how much longer it takes and how often I get the chance to work on it.

I believe that is all I have for now. I can guarantee that I will have a little longer post out sometime soon; just don't count on it is all. I will also give a quick update on my title on Bungie.net; I still have the Mythic title since I gained it back in last month. I also noticed that this Thursday will be one month that I have kept said title. That surely beats the whole four days I had it last time back in August.
Update: So, I'm back down to Legendary yet again. I'm noticing a pattern though, each time I talk about it on here; I loose it. Solution: don't even mention it on here anymore. Am I disappointed? Yes, but the way I look at it is I didn't loose it due to a ban or warning.

The Classified Files of Reach

Okay, so maybe they're not exactly classified; but I thought I would share some of the files I have taken in Reach so far in the past two weeks. Well, it'll actually be a whole two film clips and a screenshot as the other couple of items I have; since you've already seen it. Anyways, moving on. I embed most of the clips in the post since I have them rendered and will follow up with the direct download link for Reach. In a few days I hope to have the multiplayer ones posted up on my YouTube channel and that way it'll be easier for you all to view them. Now, I believe we are moving on.
First I'll start with some clips. This first one is a custom game of Oddball on Pinnacle, which is Reach's re-imagination of Ascension from Halo 2. It's a simple clip actually, I jump down from a ledge and perform on assassination on Storm as he is running around with the skull. I think the best part is how the skull rolls towards the camera.



Almost forgot, direct link to download.

Now this next one was taken from our venture into Reach's matchmaking last weekend. We were wanting to play Team Headhunter in BTB, but no; everyone decides to play SWAT instead...stupid SWAT gametype. So still wanting to play Headhunter, we move into Team Objective and get a game of it. Later on we play several more games and hit another game or two of Headhunter in the process. However, on the third or fourth game; I manage to grab one of these.

Yeah, you could say that it was instant win literally. So yeah, my first and probably only Skullamanjaro(I think that's how it is spelled...) And here is the direct link to download.

Now for that lonely screenshot that I have taken. It's really simple and rather boring, but it was also rather awesome. Evil Storm shows now mercy to a poor Grunt.

Before I publish this quick post, I'll update you on a couple things. You remember that map I said I was going to make in Halo 3, then changed my mind and said I was going to make in Reach? Well, I finally got a start on it. It's not much of a start, but I at least have a couple bases(which is more than what I had on the H3 variant) and a neat little place for the rockets or shotgun hanging of the cliff and a fancy little place in the middle for...well something. However, I'm missing a key detail I'll need before I publish it anywhere, a name and description. I have a couple ideas floating around but I'm not sure; maybe I'll come up with something better in the following days.

And lastly, I have been promoted back to an Exalted Mythic Member of Bungie.net and this time I'm betting I keep it for a little while longer than last time. It's funny actually, I logged on around early Thursday night and logged back in later that night and I noticed my title bar color had changed from Legendary gray to Mythic royal blue. Funny, that's what happened last time also. What makes me say I can keep it for a little longer than the previous time is I see a lot more Legendary members out there so the quota for that title might be filled already and I have gotten "bumped" up to Mythic finally. That and I am hoping to keep my activity consistent from here on out and hope to keep active enough to keep it. Of course all of what I just said is completely a hypothesis and all. Now, I think that is all. A better, longer post might come out sometime next week if I can have the time to do so. Until then, keep killing Jackals/Skirmishers.

Hour of Reckoning

No, this won't be some long drawn out post about Reach. However it will be about Reach. I have decided to post my experience of the midnight release that I attended at my local Gamestop. It's only four pics of that, but I am also adding in some pics of what I got and my first screenshot and video from the game. Which were taken from the campaign, but shouldn't have any spoilers in them in case you have yet to finish the game. Anyways, on to midnight release stuff. A forewarning though, some of these people might seem a little strange in the one picture. Okay, so they're in reverse order but oh well.

The time should read 1 hour, 38 minutes and 20 seconds until release.

Poster hanging in the window.

The larger-than-what-I-thought it would be crowd.

Time of departure for the game store.

The next group of pics will be of what I got that night. One item which I new I was getting since I payed for it and the other, which I had no idea of.

Picture of both the Legendary edition box and the limited edition Xbox 360 "Slim" model with a Reach design on it.

And a side view of the actual console itself. I have more pics of the seal on the Legendary edition, but I would like more with the contents and a better view of the box. Anyways, onto a screenshot and quick clip I took the other day. First up; the screenshot.

And lastly, here is the embeded version of the film clip I took from the campaign followed by a direct download link for Reach and WMV.

And here is the direct link to the file for download in Reach or WMV.
Anyways, hope you enjoy it and expect some more pics at a later date and maybe even some more clips also.

If Only it was True

So, some of you may be wondering where I've been the past few days...or weeks. It's simple actually(isn't it always?), a few weeks ago I played the demo for NCAA Football 11 and that made me want Fall to come even quicker and it also made me want a football game for the 360. So a couple weeks ago I went down to my local game store and picked up NCAA Football 10. Yeah I know it's not the new one with all the fancy features and all; but hey, it was 20 bucks cheaper! So far, I have had several intense games and a couple blowouts also. Anyways, what's all in this post? Well, hopefully I'll be able to talk about a bit the football game and how I've done it. Maybe I'll even manage to fit it some talk about Reach. Yeah, pretty sure I'll be able to fit that in there somewhere; I'll make room. Anyways, moving on.


Like I said, a couple weeks ago I picked up the football game(I can find a way to use it this sentence again) and have enjoyed it so far. It is by far one of the best Collegiate football games I have played. Before I continue though, you might be asking(more likely not) "What is the team you chose to use?" Well, that team is my favorite college team; Illinois. There really isn't a whole lot to say about it though. I did start a Dynasty on it, which kind of has you playing as the coach of the team; but you're still actually playing the game. On my first season(Which I started three days after getting the game) I went 8-0 in conference play and 12-0 overall. But wait; that's not it though! I finished that season rated #1 in the Coaches' poll and all that stuff, plus went to the BCS National Title game against #2 Boise State with the same record. Despite it being a video game, I was actually nervous a little when playing the game knowing that something would happen. So, the kickoff happens and Boise State is receiving for the first half. Okay skip all that and go ahead several downs and Boise State is close to scoring a touchdown. Luckily our defense held them off at our own 15 yard line and they only escape with a field goal. Okay, so now I'm wondering what to do now since we're down 3-0 and I'm not having much luck getting my running game going. So I decided to start passing on them with the occasional option run play thrown in there. Well it works I then take the lead 7-3 and build on it from there. In the end the final score is Illinois 63 - Boise State 3. Yeah...umm, owned. After winning that bowl game, I ended finishing the season and 13-0 overall. At the end of my first season I still had another two years for my contract with Illinois, however; I got a couple job offers also. One was with Alabama, which had a really good season that year(in that game that is) and another one was North Carolina I believe though I'm not sure how they did. I also had the choice to renew for another six years with Illinois, well I decided to renew my contract for the other six years. Right now I am currently in my second season of it and am ranked #5 in the Coaches' Poll with an overall record of 7-0. So far in the second season and in conference play I am 3-0 already beating Michigan, Minnesota and just recently, Indiana. So far the only team that has shown any sign of possibly beating me was the game against Minnesota. I still won that game, but the final score was 62-24. I know, I know; that's still double their score so why should have worried about that? Well they scored a TD first, which put us down 7-0; however on the kickoff I return it for a touchdown thus evening up the score. Fast forward into early in the second quarter I score another TD taking the lead 14-7. Soon afterwards they score yet another touchdown and tie the game up. Halftime rolls around finally and I have the lead at 21-14; second half starts and I just take off from there and finish the game with the previously stated final score.


Really the only thing else I have done was started a "Road to Glory" mode thing.... What you basically do is create a player and start with your state's high school championship playoffs and try to get a scholarship to a college. I did that, won the Illinois State playoffs with a local high school and got scholarship offers from a whole bunch of places. I decided to sign with....with.....I can't say it....with Iowa. That left a bad taste.... Yeah, so since I'm an Illinois fan I don't care a whole lot for Iowa. However, I was guaranteed a bunch of stuff by signing with Iowa, one of which was being a starter for them. I would have liked to sign with Illinois(obviously), but they wanted me as a second string and I was hoping for a starter position. What I am thinking of doing is creating another player(probably someone on defense) and seeing what I can get there. I don't know really, it's the least of my concerns since I want to see how I can do in the Dynasty I started; that and Reach is only a couple weeks away, but hey who's counting right?



Moving onto that map I said I was going to make before Reach came out. Yeah, so that was like two weeks ago and I haven't started it yet. So obviously by now I have decided to scratch the idea of creating it in Halo 3's Forge and just wait until Reach comes out(two weeks!) and start it in Forge World. I don't know where I will build it exactly, but I am thinking about going to The Quarry and building it there. I know it's an open area and all that so how will people know where the boundaries of it are? Well, they're called death barriers for a reason. Since it's in an open area that obviously means that some stuff might change, however this could be a good thing in the long run. Luckily that means it should give me the chance to make it a little larger than what the Sandbox version currently could be. I can see some really cool stuff being worked into the new version of it with all the stuff we'll have at our hands in Forge World. As of right now I don't know if I'll try to make an exact remake of it(with the general geometry and weapon placement) or if I'll make some changes to it. However, it's going to be along the same concept of the one I was planning on making in H3's Forge. I know, it sounds like I just contradicted myself there; but if you read it carefully I'm basically stating that since I'm planning on building it in a different place some of it might change if I can't make it work properly...or something like that at least. Anyways, moving on before I confuse you even more.

So, after reading Bungie's weekly update for August 20th, 2010 I am really excited for Firefight even more. So if you watch the one video showcasing the Firefight gametype called "Skeet Shoot(-ing)" I really liked the way that one looked. After seeing that video though it made me start hoping that they included in the game the option to save custom Firefight settings(which I'm sure they did), but also the ability to upload them to your file share for the game and download other variants and such. A lot like the way we can download custom maps and gametypes in Halo 3 already, but only with Firefight 2.0 for Reach since we are going to be able to edit all sorts of settings for that mode. I have already mentioned a few ideas in earlier posts that I have made about some settings that I might change in order to make a game of Firefight interesting. I have yet to see some gameplay of the one built-in Firefight mode called "Gruntpocalypse." I guess it's nothing but Grunts and whatever load-outs you have to choose from. Sounds like a real good version to play when you want to waste some time or just have fun and don't want to play a regular game of Firefight. I have seen some footage of Firefight Versus and it looks fun. I'm honestly note sure how often I will play it, but I'm sure I will at some point just to check it out even.
Something that I think would be really cool to do, but I think it's not going to happen and is to late implement is if you could make your own Firefight maps using Forge World. Now at first I was against the idea of being able to create your own maps and using them in Firefight; but honestly, I think it could possibly be a really cool feature to have. I can easily see it being used and some great community Firefight maps being made in the end; especially from the more "known" Forgers in the Halo community. The one thing I would have done if you could have been able to do it is make even just a part of an old Firefight map from ODST. I would leave the basic geometry and layout of said section if at all possible and just adding maybe some extra cover if I wanted to and certainly adding some more weapons laying around the main area of the map. Like I said though, I doubt it we're going to be able to do and since the game comes out in 10 days(again, not counting...) it is most likely too late to put it in the game right now.

Anyways, I think that is all for now. I am hoping to have another post out possibly before Reach comes out; but I'm not going to guarantee anything. I can guarantee that I will have a post out sometime shortly after Reach is released as I'll be wanting to talk about all the neat new stuff in it and I can do so here. So until then, keep killing aliens...or whatever it was your were doing before arriving here. Oh yeah, I also got around to changing the picture for the header of my blog. It's a screenshot I took from the Reach Beta. If I remember correctly I am the Elite that is on the right hand with what was left of the laser blast in my face. I swear when that happened I was dead...

What is Mythic?

This is something I have been thinking of the past couple days since I saw a video on Waypoint and since I saw the new bio for someone on my Xbox LIVE friends list. Anyways, I'm sure most of you have at least heard of what Mythic difficulty is and what it is all about. If you haven't or simply just forgot what it was; here's what the "true" definition of it is. Turn the game up to Legendary difficulty and turn all the skulls on and complete it by yourself. Oh but wait! That's not all, you have to also complete it in one sitting without using the save and quit feature. Now personally, that's fine and all; but I mean if you complete a level of Halo 3 or ODST on Mythic difficulty and you turn it into someone to get an "official" award stating that you completed the level and they comeback and say for some reason that it doesn't count. And yes, I've had that happen before. That's not the point though, my point is since you don't sit and play the game in one sitting you shouldn't get an award for going through all that torture of Mythic difficulty? Tell me, is that any fair to you at all? Personally, I don't think it is. In my case I turned in a run to a site that was running a campaign challenge and I thought I would try it out on Mythic difficulty; well when I did that I did the run of the level on co-op with Storm. Once we finally completed the level I thought we both would get a little badge on our profile page saying we "completed this level on Mythic difficulty." Well, we get an award to go on both of our player pages; however, at the same time I received a message from the person running the challenge that it didn't count as on "official" Mythic run since it wasn't done solo. Now that's fine and all now that I understand what the "true" definition of Mythic is. However, if you break the difficulty for Mythic down into its basic parts what are you left with? Legendary campaign difficulty with all the skulls turned on and campaign scoring also. I suppose you could count that doing it solo is a key component, but to me it really isn't something that is a huge factor in it. Because again, Mythic is really just Legendary and all skulls on. Lastly on this subject, I will share the game which I refer to several times in the previous paragraph. Moving on now.

So, I'm sitting here thinking "what else is Mythic?" Well, I believe I can answer that question actually. Sometime the other day I was promoted from Exalted Legendary Member on Bungie.net's forums to Exalted Mythic Member. Now, I'm sure some of you might be thinking "Well what's the difference and why should I care?" Well firstly, you don't have to care if you don't want to. I just thought I would share this here with anyone who wandered here to my blog. Secondly, the difference between a Legendary Member and Mythic Member is somewhat simple. A Legendary Member is an active member for 1-2 years, whereas a Mythic Member is an active member for 2-3 years. Which if you look at account age, I can qualify for both. Another difference is the title bar color for each is light grey for Legendary and royal blue for Mythic. There are also a very few amount of Mythic's at one time.
Anyways, back to the point here. I could have qualified to become a Mythic member earlier in the year(since my 3 year join date was this past March) or even last year since you only have to be an active member for two to three years. When March did roll around I was hoping to gain the Mythic base title, but never did. Around March the only thing related to my title that I gained was the Exalted prefix; which is basically three years without a warning or ban. I didn't mind it at all since I didn't even know that I could qualify for that prefix. So at that time I was an Exalted Legendary Member and from what I've seen; not that many people hold the Exalted prefix either. Throughout most of the summer that is where I stayed and I didn't mind it in the least bit. Now fast-forwarding to yesterday, I log on and go about the normal stuff I do on there which consists of checking my groups I'm in. So I go to one that just recently started where I was asked to be a staff member for them, I go and check the staff group out to see if anything new has come up in the meantime. I see that something has so I go check it out; then I see a post I made right above the new one and that is when I noticed that my title bar color had changed from the Legendary light grey to the Mythic royal blue. At the time though I didn't know if my prefix changed to something else since I was viewing the group and my roll in it is called "Staff" (like had I lost my Exalted I have?) so I went and checked out a post I had made the night before in the public forums and found out that I wasn't actually seeing things and that I was an Exalted Mythic Member. Anyways, that's that; I am now(at least for the time being) a Mythic Member.
*Status Update* As of August 15th, I am back down to Exalted Legendary Member. I didn't think it would last long. Maybe I'll get it back sometime.

And moving on...yet again. The last thing I wanted to cover here quickly. Remember when I posted this map here? If you do and you have downloaded it, I am hoping to maybe go and completely redesign it in the next few weeks or so. What I have in mind for changing it so far is adding something more to make it look more visually appealing. The basic geometry of the map isn't going to change a whole lot, however I may add some more structures in the center and possibly in the bases somewhere. I also know that I am going to add some more weapons around the map as well; though I have no idea which ones I will place and where either. If everything goes according to plan also, I am going to make it work for more than just the Slayer gametype. That was probably one of the larger mistakes I made about the previous version "Prototype" and I plan on fixing it. With some help from Storm I might get it to work with Oddball and possibly even King of the Hill. I have also decided that if the release of Reach is getting too close before I have finished the map I will scratch it and start from new in Forge World when Reach is released. I have thrown around the idea of making it for Halo 3 and possibly making another version of it in Reach. No idea where I could go with that as of right now since I don't know a whole lot about what we can do in it. Well we do actually, but I have to try it for myself in order to brainstorm ideas for it.

Lastly for this post, I recently discovered that there are some rendered videos I have stashed away that I haven't uploaded to my Youtube channel yet. So, when I get some free time I will try my best to go through the ones I have uploaded and make sure these aren't already on there and if they aren't; I will upload the others.
That is all I have for now. My hands are getting tired from typing this thing for the past three hours (give or take a couple) and I have nothing else to discuss right now.

Set Start, Tough Luck On

If you have every played even a little bit of Firefight from ODST, you know exactly what I mean. If not, I'll quickly explain it here. Each time a new set starts in Firefight, the Tough Luck skull is turned on in the first round and stays on in the following rounds. Now with that out of the way, you're wondering why the title is that way(most likely not though); well I have been playing a huge amount of Firefight lately and now I realize how awesome it is. So in this post I was going to dig through my games of Firefight and post the ones I thought were good. Maybe even through in a screenshot from it or two. And, if I can think of what to talk about it, maybe even discuss some more Firefight 2.0. I'll kick things off with the very first game of Firefight I played, which also happend to be the first time I played ODST the night it came out. http://www.bungie.net/Stats/ODSTg.aspx?gameid=777802&player=StoredGrunt360

Didn't do too bad for the first game, however; it's nothing compared to what I could do now. When I played later that day, I did have one decent game. 87,428. Next day when Storm and were trying to make the campaign last on Normal, we decide to hit Firefight co-op for the first time on the map Windward and here are the results. We also grabbed our first Firefight related achievement by getting par score(which is set at 200,000) for that map. Still though, we can do better than that. So we continue to get the par score for each of the maps fairly easily, until we have one map to do; and that map is Last Exit. First try we get 58,902, second game only a small 11,756, third game we think we finally might get it with 64,700 only to fail there and in the next game getting 12,994. Well we finally get it after like 6 tries. Traveling back to Windward we get our first high score above 200,000 points. Set 5, Round 2, Wave 4; 740,804. Moving forward a couple months, here is our first game where we reached one million points. Yes it was on easy, but so what; we were aiming for massive amounts of kills not points that game. Although the points were a bonus. I would like to note that that game was the only time I thought we would reach a million points. However, this game begs to differ and so would this one. Okay, so I was wrong and we have been able to get to a 1.5 million points at least twice and one million points once. This next game was our first(and only) attempt at the Vidmaster: Endure achievement. Which is to pass the fourth set on Heroic four player co-op over Xbox LIVE. Sound simple right? Well I thought so at first since at the start of the third set we had a decent amount of lives stockpiled until we used them all up. I was left as the last man standing on the fifth wave of round three and got owned horribly by the never ending amount of Brutes. So yeah, we were close since all we had to do was get out of set three and get past set four. This last game was played just yesterday and we almost made it to a million points four a fourth time. We could have kept going except I was the last man standing and was trapped in a corner by a Brute, but when I was finally able to get away from him to reload I jumped right into a suicide Grunt. I hope to get a screenshot of that soon.

Moving onto Reach's Firefight 2.0. If you played the Beta back in May, mainly in late May that is, you probably played the playlist that was dubbed Network Test 1? Well that was meant to test the network coding I guess for the game, however it turns out that the basic gametype for that playlist is going to be a Firefight gametype. From the games I played of it in the Beta it was awesome and I can't wait to see how it is going to work with an endless amount of aliens coming after you not only trying to kill you, but also take out the generators as well. The other gametype I'm interested to try out is "Rocket Fight" I think it may have been called, but anyways; it's nothing but rockets with infinite ammo for them. One thing that I am sure will happen with that version of Firefight is chaos will ensue. I've already talked a bit about the customzation in the new Firefight, but let me elaborate a little as to why I like it so much. Probably the main reason is you'll be able to do pretty much whatever you want to in it. If you want to fight nothing but Grunts then go ahead and do so. If you are tired of being screwed by the Elites in the campaign and just want to slaughter a couple hundred(or thousand if you're like me) then you'll be able to do that also. I'm pretty sure you get the point by now. I know a lot of people that are actually against us being able to do all that; however, their only argument is this: "People will be able to get high scores easily and no skill is involved." Well you know what, fun > skill. Yes it helps to know how to play the game at points, but really if you are just wanting to have fun are you really going to care how far you get? And yes, I also know that to some people, doing to good is having fun and that's fine, but to me it really isn't worth getting mad at a game because you aren't doing good. I know, "But I'm still not having fun." well maybe you should reconsider your current definition of fun.

Anyways back on topic here. Besides what I mentioned in my last post about what I plan on doing in Reach's Firefight. Another thing I think I might end doing sometime in it, is having at least one wave or round dedicated to Hunters. I really think they could be a challenge in Reach and from the screens I have seen of them; they also look larger than they were in ODST. Also, I would easily settle for a round or two of Jackals and their counterpart, Skirmishers.

On a closing note; I'll leave you with some screenshots I have taken over the past few days from Firefight.

Reach Beta Clips or Firefight?

Remember how a while ago I posted saying that I had taken several clips from the Reach Beta and I was going to render them, upload them to youtube and post them here? If you do, good; if not, then look here. I know, at that time I didn't have many uploaded yet and I kept promising how I was going to get the last group of them up and posted and yet, I never did. Until now that is. The other night I took the time to upload the last three film clips that I took from the Halo: Reach multiplayer Beta. So where are they you ask? I suppose you could click this link and get all the Reach videos I have. Now you might have to find a way to play the video outside of my channel page thing, as it tends to lag and looks horrible. I need to find a way to organize them better maybe.

So E3 is already long gone and done with, however we did get some interesting campaign footage of Reach and with that we also got the confirmation of Firefight returning. I do wonder though if there was any doubt if it would return or not since I'm assuming it was very popular in ODST, even to this day. The one thing I am very excited about its return is the amount of customization you are going to be able to do in it. From what I've gathered you will be able to decide which enemy and how many of them you want in each wave. Same with rounds and sets I think also. You'll also be able to decide how much damage you and the enemy deals out to each other and if you can be killed or not. Much like you can with certain things in Halo 3's custom games. I was already brainstorming and idea for it the other day with Storm after being owned horribly by a couple hammer Chieftains with their invincibility turned on. If you've ever played ODST's Firefight, you know exactly what I'm talking about on how it seems to last forever when you are so close to making par score and they end up killing you in the end anyways. Well, in Firefight 2.0 I plan on changing that. Right now I know you're probably thinking something like this: "You're crazy Grunt, there's no way you can mimic a Chieftain as a Spartan-III!!!!" Well with the amount of customization, I can! Give myself a hammer and turn on invincibility and set the enemy in the wave to a Brute Chieftain and there you go, one instant rebuttal for all those times you got ripped off by that hammer or fuel rod Chieftain in ODST. Plus if you always got behind the ones with the hammer as they were invincible and assassinated them, just imagine that with the new form of assassinations that are in Reach. Hold B to own Brutes!
Another thing that I've also thought about doing if they return is setting up an entire wave or round of suicide Grunts and see how long we can hold out against them. They get very annoying in ODST currently, but I really want to see how long we could last against just them.

Anyways, I think that is finally it. However, don't be surprised if I comeback with another post mainly discussing Firefight from ODST and possibly Firefight 2.0. Lastly, the complete breakdown post on HGA is still in the works. I haven't had the motivation to work on it as of lately and I still plan on delivering it sometime in the future. With any luck, before Reach falls.

No, the Zombies Haven't Taken Over Yet

Like the title says, zombies haven't invaded the earth yet. Or come into existence for that fact. So why no new blog post as of lately? Well, I've been doing my part at keeping the zombie/alien invasion at bay....kind of. Simply put, I've been busy and haven't had a whole large chance to get a new post out at all. And remember that detailed breakdown I'm working on for HGA? Well, it's still being worked on; however, I feel it will be worth the wait. I've also been playing some Half-Life 2 again as I really enjoyed playing that game. Same way with Left 4 Dead 1 and 2 and with ODST. Wait, do I ever really stop playing that last game? And lastly, I'm still planning on uploading and posting the last few Reach Beta clips I have, all in a matter of time though.

Finally, Reach Videos

Yes, I know I said I was going to post them all at once; however, I haven't had the chance to upload the rest of them yet. So I'm going to change how I was planning on doing things and instead of posting them all at once, I'm going to post the ones I do have uploaded to my youtube channel. Oh and I'm not going to share them individually and embed them into this post. For one reason, it's easier to share the playlist they are in instead of the other way around. Anyways, here's the link: here maybe?
When I upload more I'll be sure to post here and let you all know. I have about three or four more clips that I need to upload from the Beta.

Anyways(again...) here is some stuff that I have in store here soon; or sometime at least. Currently I am working on the complex breakdown of "Project HGA" that me and Sgt Riffle started back in 2008. It went through two different versions, one in '08 and the other one in '09. So, I will be working on that and once it's published; you'll know why I hold HGA close to my Bungie.net life.
One thing I did do recently though is completely do a re-structure of ERS Spartans' group ranks. Well almost complete at least, the most major change was the title names changed. I'm happy with them, except for mine though. It's simply "Administrator" which is fine and all since that is what I am in the group, but I want something different. I wonder if I could work the word "elder" in there somehow as that is the only one title I was going to use, but didn't.

Anywho, enjoy this little rambling type post. Also, E3 is next week; what are you wanting out of it? Personally, some info about Reach's campaign and the confirmation of Firefight to return and maybe some sweet details on Natal also.

Nameless Post 2

Ah yes, I ran into that dilemma where I can't think of a name for this post. Well, what else is new. Anyways, not a whole lot is going to be discussed here. I'm just going to share a few more Reach Beta screenshots I took and maybe give a little detail as for a future post. Anyways, here are some screenshots.

I know, they're not clips and that' what you want to see; well be patient. I don't have all of the clips I took from the Beta uploaded to my youtube account yet and I want to be able to share them all at once. So why not do it now instead of sit here explaining it to you? Well, you want to come here and read something right?

In other news, tomorrow I am going to be getting Just Cause 2, why? Well I played the demo and it was actually fun. Plus I've been looking at Rooster Teeh's Achievement Hunter youtube playlist and some pretty sweet easter eggs exist in that game. It also reminds me a lot like Mercenaries and I enjoyed playing that game also.

In other other news, sometime in the near future I am planning on taking a post on here and giving a complete detailed breakdown on the rise and fall of the group called "HGA." I'm sure you remember reading a post I made sometime last year saying what it is and what it was about, but this time around, it gets complicated. That is all.

Reaching for Beta: Shared Files

Ah yes, the Halo: Reach Beta is coming to an end, however in the meantime of it; I have managed to get a few screenshots and clips from some of the games I have played. This post here will get you access to the screenshots I have taken so far. I know, I know, you want to see the awesome clips that I may have gathered. Unfortunately as of right now, I don't have them uploaded to youtube currently and can't share them yet. Yet, for whatever reason, you know that I've rendered them already and the above statement is a complete lie covering up the fact that I don't really want to post them; you're wrong. They'll be coming in a later post as there are couple others I can grab hopefully before the Beta goes down.

Anyways, here's a few of them. Again, I'll break these up and put some of them in another post.

Reaching for Beta Part 2

Yep, that's a part 2 that you see in the title and no, it's not a mistake....or something like that. As most of you are sure the Halo: Reach multiplayer Beta was released on the 3rd and I'm also sure that you've done your fair share of providing feedback to Bungie to fix the broken things right? If not, oh well, no big deal. Anyways, I'm going to give my true feedback about the Beta here.

Be warned though, if you are a super-competitive person and think that Reach sucks and that I have a 1.03(which is still positive, but barely) K/D ratio and my opinion doesn't matter; you may want to stop reading after the next paragraph as what I'll say will most likely not agree with you think. That said, let's move on shall we?

Firstly, I'd like to redirect to this post here. In which case I stated that I was going to change my gamertag from StoredGrunt360 to TUE StoredGrunt. Well I did that, obviously, but now I have decided that after May 19th(the day that the Reach Beta ends) I am going to change it back to StoredGrunt360. No, I'm not leaving TUE and no I'm not losing interest in the group; I just want my old name back. So after the Beta is over with, I am going to become StoredGrunt360 again. Heh, right now I'm listening to the ODST soundtrack and the tempo increased right as I started typing that last sentence. Oh the irony of that.



Anyways, here's the start of what I currently think of the Halo: Reach multiplayer Beta. I'll start of by being general, I love it. It really brings back the fun that is Halo multiplayer. When I first started playing it, it brought back some memories from playing the first Halo on splitscreen with some friends. I cannot remember the last time I had this much fun playing the matchmaking side of Halo. However, there are a few things that could be changed I think. Some of them have already been addressed and are going to be fixed for the final game in the fall. I personally think the grenades are a bit overpowered, but it's not bother me if it doesn't change for the fall. Even though they already addressed the issue and are going to fix, they just don't know how though. I'm also not a huge fan of the spawn on Sword Base for 1 Flag CTF. The starting spawns for the attacking team are a little close to the flag. I mean, I don't mind the initial rush at the start of the game to see which team can get the flag first, but if the defending team doesn't choose the Scout loadout(which has the sprint armor ability), then the other team is almost guaranteed to get the flag first and be off before you can do anything about it. Like I said, it's fun and it scream Halo fun, but it gets annoying after a while when the other team is there and gone with your flag every single game. I also think that the spawns for the gold team I believe it is, in Invasion need to be changed or at least some more cover added to it. I don't like Elites in the least bit, but when your playing as them and you get stuck on this side, it's kind of hard to get away from you spawn before you get killed. Over and over again.... Other then those few things, I'm really enjoying the Beta so far.



Onto things that I like in it, besides the fact that it brings back the fun in Halo multiplayer. The new assault rifle in Reach is awesome. Other then the fact that it sounds real for once(which is a big complaint of mine in any shooter game where the weapons don't even sound real) it is actually effective and kills people. Well I was going to say that in the 3 years I have played Halo 3 I had less kills with the AR than I do in the few days of the Reach Beta, but I can't do that as I actually have more kills with in H3 than Reach. However, it's still much better in Reach. I also started to like the new Needler for Reach. It'll actually kill people now and not just annoy them...or me for not killing them. The new shotgun is different from the one in the past Halo games. That one is an M90 Close Assault Weapon System(or for whatever reason you want to call it by it's acronym; CAWS) while the new one in Reach is an M45 Tactical Shotgun(TS). Yes, that was the Halo canon(story) nerd in me there. I'm not sure what I think of the grenade launcher yet. I can say this though, I don't know how to use it correctly and I haven't blown myself up with it yet; which is actually good considering my luck in Halo games and blowing myself up with explosives. The Focus Rifle is really sweet also, I always enjoy using it and always hate getting hit by it. It really drains your health and shields quickly if you're caught out in the open with no cover in sight. I really can't describe what it's like to have, it's just super-awesome!



Now that I am done with the weapons, let's discuss the gametypes in the Beta. So the big hype of the Beta that I'm sure half of the community was really wanting to play was Invasion. Personally, regular Invasion is awesome and with a few tweaks to how the Elites spawn(for example, gold team has the worst spawn since it's right in the open pretty much) it can be perfect. I'm not a huge fan of Invasion Slayer though. I mean, I understand how it works and all that, but it's still confusing. I at least understand what the territories are for now, you capture them and hold them for an extra 15 seconds I believe it is and you are rewarded with a weapon or vehicle drop. Stockpile is something that will be awesome to play if you have a good team. The only thing I can see that would get annoying with it, but it's a totally legit tactic to do; is the teams that don't really want to play it just go in and take your teams flags out of the collection area for the entire game. As I said before, it's not cheating or anything, just rather cheap and annoying after a while. The return of 3 plots from Halo 2 is awesome, I've always enjoyed playing that gametype with friends, never got to actually play it online against other people though. Anyways, it's awesome and I like it, glad to see it return. It really is full of chaos and fun, which is Halo to me. 1 Flag CTF is still awesome, however; I don't like it on Sword Base. I already stated why I don't like it, but maybe it'll change. It's really fun on Powerhouse so far. SWAT is also in the Grab Bag playlist, but my opinion of SWAT does not change from Halo 3. I hate it. I mean, it's okay, but unless you see person A first, you'll most likely die from someone hiding away in a corner. So, in short, I still don't like SWAT. Team Oddball is still awesome and personally, I think it requires more teamwork now as the ball carrier doesn't have a radar now. Did you ever have one in Halo 3? Was there even a Team Oddball gametype in Halo 3? Covy Slayer is a new gametype to Reach also and I actually like it more then I thought I would. It's basically like regular slayer only with Elites versus Elites with Covenant weapons on the map and for the loadouts. It's simple, but I actually like it more then normal slayer. A new gametype that was added yesterday called Spartan vs. Elite Slayer(or as it actually appears, SvE Slayer) is pretty cool. However, I've only played it twice so I'm not exactly sure what I think of it exactly.

Headhunter in FFA is fun, however, not as fun as I thought it would be. Not a whole lot I can say about it really, so moving on. Juggernaut, an instant favorite of mine. I have no idea how long it's been around in the Halo series, but I got hooked on it back in the early days of Halo 3 when Storm would load up Mad Dash on The Pit or something. It's really cool how the Juggernaut sticks out this time around. They still have the basic waypoint above their head that tells you where they're at, but you also are on fire to. However, I'm sure the being on fire part is just for cosmetic purposes only, but it still looks sweet. I do think though that the Juggernaut needs a little reduction in damage resistance. I understand the definition of a juggernaut, but at points you just can't kill the person who was made the Juggernaut at the start of the game. And that's no fun after a while. Especially if you go in with a full party of 8 and get the game multiple times and the same person is the Juggernaut for most of those games. Oddball is still Oddball as I stated before. It's still fun, but still the same way it was in Halo 3...and 2...and CE, a camp with the ball in the corner of the map that no one can get to festival. I still enjoy it though.
I think that's all for the gametypes.

I really hope Firefight returns in Reach. I guess there have been videos posted up on youtube of people that have hacked the Beta and have found that Firefight does exist in the code, we just can't play it. That's fine and all(even though I'm against people hacking and modding their consoles) I just want official word from Bungie about it returning is all. It can really expand from ODST's version of it with the new sandbox. If it does return, which I'm sure it will with how popular it is in ODST currently, all I really want is more than ten maps. More vehicle based maps like Lost Platoon was in ODST. I think it would be also cool to have perhaps two versions of it, one where you play as Spartans and maybe the other could be where you play as Elites. I know it sounds cruel wanting to play as an Elite and kill endless waves of humans and all, but it would offer a different style of gameplay and you could play as them more then just in the multiplayer when you absolutely have to.

I think that is finally all I have to say about Reach so far. In a few days I'll be post some screenshots and film clips I took from the Beta so far once I have them situated and all that. I'd talk about the campaign a little bit, but we don't know anything about it...therefore I can't theorize about it yet. Oh and one last thing, I will be overhauling my blog a bit. It won't be anything major, but some of the tags are going to change(read: may or may not disappear) and maybe even the picture at the top might change again. We'll have to see. Hope you enjoyed this little read if you are currently reading this.

Reaching for Beta

Okay, quick update everyone. I've been enjoying the Reach Beta since it came out. That means I haven't put a post out yet, well in a few days I will make a post about what I think about the Beta. Currently though, it really brings the fun back into Halo multiplayer.

Finally...Sort Of

Well it has been a bit since I made a post. Go figure, anyways I do have a bit to mention this time around; ODST, Reach and the first challenge.

I'll start off with some of the stuff that you probably heard/saw from E3. I'm sure a lot of you have already seen everything you can or want to on Halo 3: ODST and I must say, I'm excited for it. I've been back and forth between which looks the most cool in the game, the Firefight mode(like Gears 2 of War 2's Horde mode, only Halo-ized. Halo-ized is now a word.) and the campaign. I see things I like of the Firefight mode and I think I'll play that more, but then I see things about the campaign that I like. I'll go into a bit of what I've seen in the next paragraph. If you haven't seen any or hardly any trailers and don't want anything to be spoiled, skip over the following red text.

Okay, so I am assuming you already saw this video here. If not and you're reading this, then do so now before you read any further. Watched it? Good, now let us continue. If you take note, the player moves towards a data panel or something. It says he can activate it so he does and it brings the Superintendent online. Now the Super leads him through the city and away from certain things. Now I think that is really cool.

Okay, you can start reading again. If you read one of Bungie's weekly updates a couple weeks ago they mention that with ODST's firefight mode they are going to integrate some new features into their site, I really can't wait to see what kind of stuff the implement. Also some of Halo 3's multiplayer medals will be brought into Firefight which is pretty cool. I think right now though I can't wait for them to put all these new toys on their site up, then I'll know ODST's release date is even closer.

Now for some Halo: Reach. If you haven't seen Halo: Reach's trailer yet, you may watch it here. There really isn't much that has been said on it yet, except it comes out in Fall 2010 and it is going to be a first person shooter. As of right I don't take a whole lot of interest in Reach since it is still pretty much speculation. I think it'll be pretty cool getting to play on Reach or one of the Spartans/Marines on Reach, that is if you do play as a Marine or Spartan. Plus if you buy ODST, you get an invitation to a Halo: Reach multiplayer beta.

Now, you have asked for it and here it finally is. StoredGrunt's Campaign Challenge.

Okay so the first level will be Sierra 117.

Okay now here are the skulls you need on: Black Eye, Tilt or Mythic.(Any combonation of those three skulls*Two of them must be turned on*)

Difficulty can be either Heroic or Legendary.

You have 2 weeks from the time of this posting to get this run in. When you have your run complete just leave a comment here with the link to the game stats. Make sure you turn on campaing scoring also!

Now moving onto some of my campaing goals. Well I finally did one of HaloCharts' campaign challenge level, and it wasn't easy. I also plan on doing some of the other levels just for the fun of it.

I also tried doing the level Floodgate on Mythic difficulty(Legendary with all 13 skulls on). I got near the end of the level and got caught on something and a ranged form(one that shoots spikes) killed me. And he was right in front of me also!!! I was so ticked that I got so close to finishing my first Mythic level only to have to restart. Ah well, maybe next time.

Also I am working on my way towards 4th in the state of Illinois for most enemies killed in campaign. Last I checked I was only 4,377 away from securing this spot. I also am currently helping my driver work on his way towards 6th or 5th in the state as well. He is so close to gaining 6th, only missing it by a few hundred kills.

On a closing note, do you like things like this?

Well if you do, just drop a comment here with a link to the screenshot you want edited and some specs as to what you want on it and I will let my buddy Sgt Riffle know what you would like edited and all that. He gave me some other stuff to post like an email address, but I don't really want to post that just yet(or you can make a comment with your own address Riffle!) and some other things, but he randomly signed out of chat and I lost the stuff. So for now, post a link to the screenshot and what you would like to see on it and I will message him with the stuff and he'll get on it. He says it doesn't take him a while to do, but I guess it depends on how busy you are.

So there you have it, a bunch of stuff in a short time...sort of.