Category Archives: Halo Reach

regarding anything about the game of Halo Reach

Tonight is my last night of playing Halo Reach.

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It is with some sadness as well as celebration that I play Halo Reach for the last time tonight.

Since I’m going to be uber busy tomorrow prepping for my trip to New York Comicon, I won’t have time for Reach. After NYCC, I’ll be playing Halo CE: Anniversary and Halo Wars to try and finish those achievements off. Should I finish before Halo 4 comes out, I’ve got a couple of other projects I can attempt to finish.

Tonight is my normal gaming group’s members night. However, if you’d like to join me for this final night of Reach, please send me an e-mail/XBL message letting me know you want to play. Should there be room, I’ll be happy to get you in for some games.

I can say I had a LOT of fun playing Reach. I’ve attained everything I had sought out to do and then some.

I hit Inheritor last year July. I went over 95% commendation. I improved my K/D. Got all of the achievements for Reach, and most importantly, branched out and made a bunch of new friends.

Reach has been good to/for me. While some may complain it wasn’t a great Halo game, for me, it was. While I put this game to rest tonight, I’ll reflect on the good times I had and look forward to what Halo 4 will bring to me.

Thanks Bungie not just for Reach, but for all of the Halo titles you created over the past 10 years. Thanks 343 for picking up the mantle with Reach and moving forward with the franchise with a whole new trilogy in the works.

Okay, now that the mushy stuff is over, anyone want to play Reach? Halo 4 in 4 weeks!!!

-Sal

One of my last two goals in reached in Halo Reach!

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For the past 5 weeks I’ve been diligently working on the Small Arms commendation (Mutliplayer) in Reach. I started off the month of September needing just over 1000 kills with small arms weapons. By Oct 1st I had that down to just a couple hundred.

Today I needed 86. I played a game of Living Dead then jumped in a party with one of my friends and later her brother for some Swat Magnums.

I’m happy to report I hit the goal of ranking that commendation up to GOLD. So now every commendation I have is either Onyx or Gold. I know I won’t be able to rank up any more before Halo 4 comes out, so this is where they will forever remain.

First the percentage DID go up to 97%. Well on Waypoint. Strangely it still shows up as 96% on LIVE.

Now no haters on the 81 BPR. That is artificially low as I played a lot of Griffball games where I was going for kills and lost… (Rolls eyes)

Here next is what I’m proud of in the sense of gaming accomplishment.

Most of those Onyx are MAX as you can tell by the flames on them. So ends my commendation progress in Reach.

Now for my one remaining goal. That is to have 50 million credits in the “bank,” by the time Halo 4 comes out. I’m up to 46.6 million now. (This does not include the close to 10 million already spent on Armory items.)

I should be able to make this goal as well, though New York Comicon will interfere with that for a few days. (I think I can make that sacrifice, LOL.)

You can view my whole service record here.

My two biggest goals in Reach where to make Inheritor, which I did in July of 2011 (yes, last year), as well as get all of the achievements, which I completed as well.

So what goals do you folks have for yourselves in Reach before Halo 4 comes out?

-Sal

Winding down on Reach…

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Today, I’ve closed one of the chapters on Reach. I have been working on commendations in hopes of getting my percentage to 97% before Halo 4 comes out. While all of my campaign commendations are already Onyx, there were two that were close to being maxed out. So, I took it upon myself to push further on them and max them out. Now all but four of my campaign commendations are maxed.

Next up is the “Grounded” commendation in Firefight. I’m less than 120 vehicle kills away from getting that one to Gold. Once I do that, I’ll be done with Firefight and will have closed that chapter. That will mean that all but two of my Firefight commendations will be Onyx and those two last ones will be Gold.

The final chapter will be to get my “Small Arms” commendation to Gold. Then all but four Matchmaking commendations will be Onyx, with those remaining Gold.

Hitting those levels should get me to my desired 97% complete.

I’ve loved playing the campaign. I have no need to go back an play it anymore. If I ever feel the need to visit it, I can always pick one of my film clips I’ve saved to view it.

Whew, it’s been a long road and I’m almost at the end of it for Reach. Halo 4 just can’t get here soon enough!

-HFFL

Another Halo Reach Commendation ranked up!

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I finally moved my Multiplayer Wheelmen into the Gold Rank. I did it in style too last night. I got 30 wheelmen in one game and my gunner got 31 kills and a Perfection!

Woot, now THAT’S a way to rank up a commendation.

Here’s the game: https://halo.xbox.com/en-US/Career/HaloReach/GameHistory#!/?game=1070760665&section=Unknown

Here’s what my current commendations look like:

The only other one that I know I can rank up before Halo 4 is “Grounded.” That’s the commendation for vehicles destroyed in Firefight. Once I get that one ranked up, the only silver commendation left is “Sidearm” in multiplayer. Hmm, don’t know if I can rank that one up. I might make that one a challenge for myself. I do want all my commendations to be gold or better…

I foresee a lot of Living Dead and Swat Magnums in my future.

I’m currently at 96% complete. With Grounded I may get to 97%. If I go for the pistol kills, that should put me solidly at 97% commendations complete.

-HFFL

Halo LAN Party: Houston June, 2012; Part One preparation and liftoff.

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I had the absolute privilege to attend my gaming group’s first annual LAN. It was held in Houston, Texas on the weekend of June 15-17.

The gaming group I belong to is Rated Mature or “RM” for short. We can be found at: www.ratedmature.NET. The group has been together for a little more than 3 years now. The group is an 18 years of age and over group, though we’ve made 2 exceptions. (And they were exceptions, definitely not the norm) The group is a competitive group, though not to the point of MLG. We like to win, but can have fun just pwning in multiteam. We prefer to play with a mature tone, though of course like many we have our silly (jokes), gross (burping), and vulgar (swearing) moments. This is one reason why we prefer “adult” gamers, so we don’t offend younger gamers or their parents.

Okay so enough about the group you say, let’s get to the LAN part. Last year, one of our members, “RM Samurai” stepped forward to say he would hold a LAN at his place in Houston, TX. We started a thread on our forums for the LAN and planning begun. As the months dwindled down to weeks various members made their travel plans and things were set. Weeks turned to days, then hours, then finally, I was on my way to Houston. Some of these fellows I’ve known for almost 4 years, since before the group was even formed, while others I’ve known for almost a year. Still, we’re all like extended family to one another, likely knowing more about each other’s family than some of our other friends. So the day before I am to leave comes and I’m excited and nervous. I had myself psyched out on flying. (I wasn’t thrilled with having to fly for various reasons which I won’t go into.) I didn’t sleep at all the night before leaving. Instead staying up to 3:30am then just resting in bed until 7:30 when I got up and blogged a little before final preparations to leave.

Midday approaches and my wife drives me to the airport to catch my flight. She wishes me a safe trip and to have fun and off I go.

Here’s the standard pic from the plane showing non-descript clouds.

That greyish streaking thing near the middle is just dust on the camera, no alien ship. Darn.

Stay tuned for the next part where I discuss the events of the different days and show some pics of the LAN in action.

-HFFL

My Halo Reach “playdate” with 343’s BS Angel.

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I had the honor of being selected to game with Jessica Shea, none other than 343’s Blog manager “BS Angel” last night during 343’s gaming night. I got to play three games with her and had a blast.

First up was a game of Snipers on Ridgeline (for which BS Angel promises to ban all of those who voted for Snipers). I’m not a great sniper, though I managed to go 13/5. She was on my team (and we still managed to win, LOL) Luv ya Jessica…

Next up was a game of Heavies on the repurposed Ridgeline variant “Superstition.” Okay, I’m NOT a fan of heavies in Reach, and though we lost, I still have a fun time.

For the third/final game of the night with BS Angel, we played TU BTB Slayer on Hemmorrhage. I posted a respectable 10/4 K/D w/10 assists.

I wasn’t really trying to play at the top of my game. I was just having fun gaming with BS Angel and chatting her up about Halo 4 stuff. She didn’t reveal anything new (couldn’t). But did say when asked about Forge that we would be VERY happy.

I asked her what aspect of Halo 4 was she looking forward to the most and she quickly said campaign. When probed about info on Spartan Ops and it’s possible reveal of info at E3 this year, she said “mayyybeee.”

During the games I blurted out a “That’s what she said,” and realized I might have made a major faux pa. Instead she laughed. I apologized but she said she’d be more mad if I didn’t say it more. So I did. LOL. She was a great sport and a real nice person to game with. Very cheerful. She genuinely liked gaming with we fans.

Jessica, if you’re reading this, thanks again. And follow me on Twitter, puh-leeeeesss.

-HFFL

Out of Space (Long Night of Solace)

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So you’ve wanted to get out onto the Covenant ship? You’ve wanted to fly around more freely in the Sabre? Here’s a neat trick to do so. It will require you and another person (or second controller).

I off to go play some LNOS!

Halo Reach Weekly Challenge 3/26/12.

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Okay, this week’s weekly challenge is EASY. It just takes time is all and not as much as you might think.

Here are the specs for it:
Not Lough, High – 30000 cR
Earn a score of 250,000 (points) in any mission in the Reach Campaign.
I did this on the mission New Alexandria. Legendary setting, solo, with the following skulls on:
Tough Luck
Catch
Famine 
Thunderstorm
Tilt
Mythic
and for fun IWHBYD
The skulls I picked essentially have NO effect on gameplay when shooting with the Falcon against the Banshees and Phantoms. So in essence they are “free” multipliers. The reason these skulls have no effect is that they pertain to AI enemies NOT vehicles. The first two deal with grenades. If you’re flying then those won’t harm you. Famine give you less ammo for your gun. Since you’re in a Falcon however which has limitless ammo… The next two deal with damage tables. But since they are for ground forces and NOT vehicles, it doesn’t matter. So turn them on. I usually turn on 1-3 of the silver skulls for the heck of it, though they won’t increase your skull multiplier, so you don’t need them on.
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Banshees were worth 1275 points while Phantoms on their own (without the grunts in the guns) are worth 8500 points. With the grunts it’s over 9K points.
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I did take a short 5 minute break (for nature, LOL). Just landed on  a building and the ships left me alone. Yes, I could have paused the game, ah well.
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So really this game took me 38 minutes to actually play. That’s not too bad at all considering that’s about 3 games worth of a matchmaking game. It was easy and it will help your commendations for killing vehicles as well as killing with a vehicle.
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Before going into matchmaking with your friends, stick this one out and get rewarded with that nice credit bonus of 30,000cR.
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NOTE: If you do this with your friends EACH of you will need to score the 250,000 points independently. No combining scores to make it go faster. So play with a friend if you want, just keep this in mind.
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Good luck!
-HFFL

Inheritor twice over…

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My gawd, I hit over 31 million credits banked over the weekend in Halo Reach. That means along with the credits I’ve already spent to get to 100% armory completion, I would have hit Inheritor twice over now. Yep, it’s official, I have no life…

New Halo Reach Multiplayer map?

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Okay the title IS misleading. I created a small map for Double Team. I call it “Archive.” It’s supposed to represent an area where there is an archive of information stored in a shield world. Similar to the “index,” but not used for purposes of firing a Halo ring.

It uses a portion of Tempest not often used. However, my map looks nothing like Tempest in that most of it is covered up with the exception of the Power Core near the back of the map.

With some lighting effects and the use of the Juicy filter, I feel I’ve come up with a map that doesn’t look like the normal multiplayer maps seen.

I’m going to put it in my fileshare later today, but for now here are some screenshots I took. Let me know what you think of it.