Atriox: We HAVE seen him before AND we have FOUGHT HIM!

This article is conjecture, however with some research behind it to bolster my claim. If you’ve heard otherwise, please just hear me out…

Chances are, you’ve not only seen Atriox before, but have PLAYED against him if you played the original Halo Wars.

Atriox IS the unnamed Brute Commander in the ORIGIAL Halo Wars game!

So how did I come to this conclusion and what facts do I have to prove this or at least make a good argument for it? Let’s explore, shall we?

First, let’s take a look at the Brute Commander from Halo Wars.

unnamed-brute-halo-wars-comp_sm Continue reading

Halo Update: Monitor’s Bounty PREVIEW

Whew, it’s been a couple of months since I’ve posted an update. To be fair, the last couple of months haven’t seen any real significant updates. That changes with December’s update!

The following is a reblog from Waypoint, with my remarks in BLUE.

Well folks, the hour has finally come. It’s no surprise that this time of year exudes a spirit of gift-giving, and we couldn’t be more excited to help you unwrap a very special present from us to you: Monitor’s Bounty. Halo 5’s latest content release is an epic salvo of experience-enhancing additions, from new weapons, armor, and skins, to brand new ways to build and play, all alongside the biggest Forge update ever seen in a Halo game. In fact, we’ve got so much in store that we’ve split up the reveal across two days.

Today, we’re excited to begin our bountiful breakdown of everything that’s in store for your hungry hard drives on Thursday, Dec. 8. That’s right, baby – the day after tomorrow. Be sure to return to Waypoint tomorrow for deep dives into Forge, Canon Fodder, Warzone, and Playlists.

To kick off this party, let’s take a look at all the free REQ items heading your way in Monitor’s Bounty.

monitorsbounty_infographic-ba193589b2ee4513b8133c8c2b319afc

HFFL: I will have a short breakdown of this some time tomorrow. For now though…HOLY CRAP, CQB and EOD! Loving the Reach Pilot helmet too. Hmm, I wonder if that means we’ll get a ‘Haunted” version too???? Continue reading

HFFL Spartan Company Commendations to work on.

Below are the remaining level 3 commendations the HFFL Spartan Company needs to work on to get the Achilles armor.

HFFL Commendations Aug 16 to get

We are getting very close on the top 4 of those. It’s the bottom 3 we need to pay attention to.

I will accept new members until August 16. At that time, new membership will be suspended until such time as we get the Achilles armor. Then I will once again open it up for new members. This is to ensure that people aren’t just joining to get the armor, then leave.

If you want to join, you have 11 days in which to do so. Send a request to join here:

https://www.halowaypoint.com/en-us/spartan-companies/halofanforlife

There should be a link there for you to sign up. In doing so, you MUST be VERY active. Since we are very close to getting the armor, I will not allow for inactive people to sign up and get the armor for no work towards it. I will be monitoring member activity DAILY. From Aug 16 until we get the armor. New members that join between now and the 16 MUST play at least 20 games within three days (straight). If you cannot maintain this amount of gameplay, you will be removed from the company. Members who are currently in will be monitored for activity but on a different scale as most of those have been members for awhile.

Also, to all of my Lieutenants of the Company, from Aug 16 until we get the Armor, you will be temporarily demoted to member. This is to ensure that we do not get a flux of new members without my knowledge, and more importantly, ones who are not active.

So recruit now!

Halo Wars 2 Story Vidoc

There is SO much goodness in this video. Take a look then we’ll talk after…

Okay, so what did you think? First off, Blur’s visuals have gotten even BETTER.

Atriox is truly a Brute Commander to be reckoned with! Fighting off 3 Spartans and not even breaking a sweat or breathing heavy? Yeah, uh, we’re in for a fight here!

The updated look for Anders is decent. I like the new AI, though I can’t wait to see what happened to Serena.

Can you imagine being in Cryo for 28 years, then coming out of it to this? Just think about in our own lifetimes how much has happened in 28 years. For instance, if you went into Cryo in 1998, then woke up now? The world has changed DRAMATICALLY in those years. Such it is as well for the crew of the Spirit of Fire.

The story of Halo Wars 2 is really shaping up to be something special in the Halo timeline. I have a bad feeling that ending of Halo Wars to may not bode well for the crew of the Spirit of Fire… Worse still, the UNSC at large.

Community Update: RTX 2016 Recap

BY B IS FOR BRAVO

Welcome back, friends. Since we last spoke, the Warzone Firefight release has reached your consoles, we’ve traveled to the heart of Texas, and we’re now back in the studio preparing for what’s next. Perhaps the “what’s next” list may be of great interest to you.

This week, the Warzone team pushed out an update to fix the “back button” scoreboard and PGCR (post game carnage report) sorting, and they’re also hard at work on further updates to Warzone Firefight. As we speak, teams are looking at all of the data and feedback you’ve generated so far, and evaluating as they work towards future updates for the mode. While we don’t have a final ETA just yet, you can rest assured that work is well underway, and that you’ll be hearing about more details soon. Oh, and fixes for Tidal lighting are being worked on, too.

HFFL: Oh good, regarding Tidal. It takes an inordinate amount of time to bake lighting. If you are going to forge on Tidal, I HIGHLY suggest SAVING your game before baking lighting. The game can lag out before doing so. It’s happened to me and a few others I know of. 

We’ve been thrilled about the incredible amount of new players who jumped into Halo 5 during the free play period, and hope many of you stick around (one of us! one of us!). As we mentioned last night, we’ve also been ecstatic to see the number of monthly Halo 5 players increasing month over month over the past few months. This is pretty special to see, and I’m looking forward to plenty more gaming with you this summer. Speaking of, we’ve seen many inquiries about what’s to come for Halo 5. We’re glad you’re asking. While you won’t be seeing updates every month moving forward, nor updates the size of the Warzone Firefight release, we’re happy to let you know that there’s still more on the way. Things we have yet to talk about or discuss. Things that I have seen, and I think you will like. These and more are in the works, so in short, there is indeed more to come. Rest easy.

HFFL: Cool. Glad to know there is more on the way. We’ve gotten plenty already. More than enough, IMO. SO anything from this point forward is a huge heap of icing on the cake, so-to-speak.

Next up, let’s catch up on a few different topics, starting with RTX and the cool things we brought there. Grim’s got the details.

RTX 2016

rtx-2016-halo-banner2-4dde8771ef4f4e689c119146338ff8d5 Continue reading

Canon Fodder: Crown Jul

This is a reblog from Halo Waypoint:

BY GRIMBROTHER ONE
ISSUE 81

Howdy, Halo lovers. Thanks for joining us for another week of your favorite service for story-centric snippets. Last issue was a lovely load of lore lovin’, continuing the Firefight-focused fiction feast. This time around we’re playing a bit of catch-up after an incredibly busy few weeks, but we’ve still got some pretty cool things to talk about that we think you’ll enjoy. Also, props to Halo Waypoint community member Nihilus Shadow for the epic highlight shot of the Didact’s Hand (though maybe not quite as good as this one) used as this week’s feature image. And with that, let’s dive in!

JEWEL MADONNA

canonfodder-7-8-16-adee61e09aa243f3add8b121c4f5a56cOne of the sweet little surprises that awaited players diving into Halo 5: Guardians for the most recent release was the (re)appearance of a well-known Sangheili warlord. There were no doubt plenty of surprised  lore aficionados when Jul ‘Mdama’s name was called out for the first time in Warzone within the Attack on Sanctum scenario, as the challenging Boss he is. While this is the first time players have had the opportunity to tackle the resurgent Covenant leader in-game, it’s certainly not the first time he’s left his mark on Halo hearts. Jul first appeared in Karen Traviss’ Halo: Glasslands and would go on to feature prominently in her Kilo-5 trilogy, revealing the ugly underbelly of interspecies post-war politics. Continue reading

Halo 5 Assault Preview Playlist

This is a reblog from Halo Waypoint: 

ball-banner-8b4d78033b704ff09922006bd669d9f3

Today, we’re launching a new Assault Preview playlist that will allow players to get a look at some of the updates that the multiplayer team has been working on. To get you the details, we hand things over to the multiplayer team:

When we launched Assault with the Hammer Storm release back in February, it was received well by players as it was chaotic and a change of pace from Capture the Flag and Strongholds. Over time, we saw some feedback around the feeling of fairness and scoring, and have been working to make updates to improve the mode.  Continue reading

HFFL Exclusive Interview with Halo Wars 2 wins champion, YoungBerk!

Before we get started, I want to make expressly clear that I do not give permission to anyone other than 343 or Creative Assembly to repost this article. You may however, link to this article without posting any portion of the article, with exception to the title of the article itself as it is used exactly here. Please respect that. 

HFFL: Hello, YoungBerk, thanks for agreeing to do this interview.
YB: Hello

HFFL: Tell us a little about yourself.
YB: First, I’m 21 years old and from Berkeley CA. I’m currently a student at UC Berkeley in my sophomore year studying media studies.

HFFL: Great school! Continue reading

My first day thoughts of Halo 5’s Firefight official post beta release.

WZ FF banner MSG

So Warzone Firefight finally dropped yesterday. It’s a whopping 7GB download. For me it downloaded pretty quick.

I had a minor glitch in that I couldn’t choose the WASP. I had to restart my XBOX One to get it to work. (SO do that if it doesn’t work for you)

Anyway, as soon as this dropped, I immediately got into Firefight. Now at first the REQs weren’t available. It took about an hour or two. Once they were there to get though, I bought them all. I had saved up more than 500K REQ Points. So I was set. Continue reading