AbsolutSurgen

It wasn't until midway through the PS3/X360 era that PC and console gaming truly started to converge. Yes, consoles did receive ports of big PC games before then -- but most of them were, IMHO, hot trash. [PCs were also not the place to play console-style games in that era.] Halo was a very good game. Visually? I would have to go back and look. At the time, there were other games that I thought were better (i.e. some of Kojima's work was astounding on PS2).

I don't know the numbers, but my friends in res played a lot of 90s computer shooters over their University's LANs. Those guys were mostly CompSci students, so I don't know truly widespread it was -- but there were a lot of them the times I visited. Why weren't you playing Socom online? I don't think I ever went into the single player of that game.

I can't remember exactly. I do recall playing racing games (Wipeout?) that allowed 4 players to play -- 2 on each console. But its been almost 30 years, and I only used it a handful of times.

TBH, that cable was the only thing I have ever used to connect consoles together locally. [Yes, did tons of LAN parties on PC.]

I listened to GB because of the specific personalities -- Ryan, Jeff, Brad and Vinny. While there were some other personalities that grabbed me over the years, they have mostly all left as well. I may check out the Nextlander podcasts if they are doing a GB style GotY podcast.

It was probably just the beginning of a trend. The cause was probably PC developers switching their focus to console development due to the larger install base.

Playstation had a link cable that was supported by a bunch of games -- not technically the same thing, but functionally the same.

Reminds me that one of my January traditions used to be listening to the OG Giant Bomb crew doing their GotY podcasts -- sad that those guys aren't doing that anymore.

Week 14 Feature Game New England Patriots (+5.5) $2,000 QUESTIONS 1) Pittsburgh FG 2) Pittsburgh 3) Under 4) Three 5) Denver, Minnesota, Atlanta

That was so excited when the new Doom reboot came out -- it gave me hope (apparently false hope) that FPS games would return to their roots and give us the kind of experiences we enjoyed in the late 90s. A world where controls were crisp, the action was fast, we could carry as many weapons as we wanted and we didn't stop and hide so health would "regen".

Split screen local multiplayer had been around for years when Halo came out. It used to be a staple of multiplayer games, and was implemented in FPS games in the previous gen.

They were commenting on Rockstars release strategy to continuously release new versions of the same game on next gen platforms to get people to rebuy their games. For example, it was released on PS3 first, then PS4, then PC, then PS5.

It's rendered at 1440p or lower -- not 4k. They think it uses Ray Tracing Global Illumination (sure makes the car paint look great) It probably uses Ray Traced Reflections (but not always) Shadows and hair are really impressive. Probably won't be 60fps They think the final version will probably be for the Playstation 7 Pro They think there are more RTX-3080s than XSeXs, so they think RS is being cynical for not releasing on PC D1

Controllers and KB/M both have their places. FPS shooters are one of the places that controllers don't shine -- they require lots of auto aim, and are imprecise and slow. I opt for a controller on a lot of games -- for instance I would never play a DMC game with a KB/M. The two games I am playing right now -- Forza Motorsport and Dave the Diver, I am choosing to play with a controller. I would rather gouge my eyes out than play a Far Cry game with a controller (and I love me some Far Cry). I'm never been a "PC-Centric" gamer. I played a lot of console games -- in 2000 in particular I didn't play a whole lot, because I kinda got sucked into online shooters -- but in most years I was playing at least as much on consoles as PC. IMHO, Halo was designed around the limitations of console controllers. I don't know what a "major pillar of the gaming industry" is. It was a very good game, in a year with a lot of very good games. I personally liked MGS2 and DMC a lot more (which are all best played with a controller). [On a tangent, I am now a PC-centric gamer, because for the first time in history, you can largely play all of the games on one platform.]

If you say so. Many games still don't let controller and KB/M players play together Games are games. As someone who played both, I typically gravitated to different styles of games on my PCs vs. consoles. If you're making the point that console shooters of the era were typically significantly worse than playing on PC, I wouldn't debate you. You probably only needed a 28.8k modem to play Quake 3. I honestly don't remember if I had high speed in my apartment in 2000, or whether I got it in my first house in 2004.

Halo:CE multiplayer was still not online, when online was the norm for multiplayer shooters. The controls were only good if you ignore KB/M -- but, they were probably the first decent shooter controls on a controller (Bungie's way of tweaking the auto aim and acceleration on the sticks has always been top notch). I'll be honest, when I played it at a buddy's house at the time, I was underwhelmed. (Most of my gaming in 2000/2001 at that time was online Unreal Tournament and Quake 3.) I found the pace of the combat really slow/floaty compared to what I was used to. That's not to say it was a bad game, I thought it was a really good one. But at the time, given the choice to play Q3 online or Halo:CE splitscreen, it really wasn't a competition for me.

You can get rid of the almost.

I was in my late 20s when Halo came out, so my friends and I weren't really getting together to play shooters - and the ones we did play were online, not split screen. I thought Deus Ex was a great game -- though I have never really thought of it as an FPS. Quake 3 (was my game of choice), but some of my friends swore by Unreal Tournament.

I did not -- in the late 90s, early 00s, I was primarily a PC gamer for FPS games.

Bungie left Microsoft because they wanted to make a game like Destiny, which turned out to be a great game. However, because of technical limitations (or at least that is what I have heard), it became VERY hard to get the kind of content pipeline that would keep a GaaS going. And, consequently a lot of the people who were WAY into Destiny early on gravitated to other games (I am one of them). You need the revenue to keep the lights on, and pay all of the great perks that people want. The problem is largely one of their own making. Halo was a very good game, however I don't really understand putting it on a pedestal. There were other great shooters before it (i.e. Half Life, Quake 3, etc.) that, on the whole, were better games. They DID figure out how to finally get decent FPS controls on a controller -- but those controls are still far inferior to KB/Mouse.

It's clearly not a game for everyone. There are a lot of people who don't like Ubisoft open world games and/or stealth focused games -- so my take is that it's less likely a play for traffic, and more likely that these are games that are "just not for them".

Having read 4-5 reviews. My TLDR. If you like Far Cry gameplay (the stealthy ones) and you like Avatar -- you'll probably love this. If you think Ubisoft open world games are trash, and you think Avatar is terrible -- you'll probably hate it.

The average score seems to be really dragged down by a bunch of scores from places I have never heard of: 4/10 from IndianTVCZ, 5/10 from Stevivor, 5/10 from Techraptor, 5.5/10 from Sector.sk, 4.5/10 from Checkpoint gaming.

Reading the reviews this game is either: A boring repetitive game with a predictable story. OR A beautiful well-crafted open world with well crafted main-story missions, compelling combat and the best Pandora story ever. Lots of 8s and 9s in those reviews.