Chronique:Halo Bulletin 13/11/2013
13 novembre
Original
This month not only marks one year since Halo 4 shipped, but also one year since I moved out to the West Coast to join the 343 Industries team. The past year has been filled with getting settled into my new home, adventures and challenges of all kinds, and naturally a little bit of missing home. This being true, I invited my parents out to visit this past week and enjoy the beautiful weather that Seattle has to offer in the fall months.
Since I started competing at Halo tournaments several years ago, something that I've always had trouble with is explaining my job to others. The question is often unavoidable when meeting new people. "So what exactly do you do?" they ask, with the assumption and expectation that this is a pretty simple question to answer. Regardless of how well I try to explain my job, most people have always assumed I just played videogames all day. However, I've spent a great deal of time explaining to friends and family members exactly what I do at the studio - working on Matchmaking updates, community and industry events, and future projects that neither you nor they know about. Through this, I think I've somewhat broken the "videogames all day" stereotype.
This past Monday, I told my visiting parents that I needed to do something for work that evening. They must've assumed that it would involve something like a computer, email, or even a sketchpad and pencil. That night, they of course found me in my home, on my couch, yelling into an Xbox Live microphone while playing Halo in this month's Community Playdate. If anyone asks, I just play video games all day. I give up.
Community Playdate: Multi-Team
On Monday evening, I joined several 343'ers in this month's Community Playdate. We had five total players searching in the new Multi-Team Playlist, which meant that we would get split up onto separate teams every game. As a result, my goal and battle cry became "I don't care if we win, just don't let my coworkers win." Overall, this slightly confused my teammates, but worked pretty well. I personally had a blast shooting friends from work all night, so I hit them up yesterday to see if they had as much fun as I did.
Gamertag: SamPand
"I loved playing in the Multi-Team playlist Monday night! Luckily, I was put on the same team as TTL L askan because 40% of the time, we'll win every time! Guaranteed.
My favorite games were King of the Hill on Ragnarok, where I turned the hill into my own personal parking garage. Whether I was on Green, Yellow, Blue, or Red Team, you better believe I was bringing a Mongoose or Warthog to the gun fight and loving every minute of it."
Gamertag: HaloWaypoint
"Billy here. This was my first Community Playdate with the 343 Industries crew and I contributed by making sure no one else took over the spot for "person who got shot in the face the most." I was frequently paired with Bravo, and despite not being able to hear him for some odd reason (I'm sure he blocked me) watching him play was a site to behold. It seemed like Laskan was the true dominant force of the evening, and if I saw him in my sights, I got the heck out of the way. Multi-Team Oddball was the most hilarious, since it's four teams running for the ball, and at choke points it would become a festival of assassinations. Loved it! My personal highlights would have to be getting my first ever Airsassination and getting two assists on killing Bravo. That equals one kill, right?"
Gamertag: JayFresh006
My spirit was willing but my aim was weak for this round. I really enjoyed the frantic pace and controlled chaos of Ricochet, Regicide, and King of the Hill. I spent most of my time going Rambo on objectives and kills; an aggressive strategy that was probably pretty entertaining for the pros and often placed me neatly at the bottom of the leaderboard for my team. It was some of the most fun I've had getting my butt kicked.
The highlight for me was landing a Hail Mary on SamPand's retreating Warthog on Ragnarok for a memorable double-kill. As always the community continues to teach me new things—often the hard way—and were great company. Good games everyone and thanks for playing!
Gamertag: TTL L askan
"If there was a theme of the evening it was "Shut Up and Get Behind In Front of Me... Sir". I spent the whole evening using my coworkers as bait and shooting at the Spartans who were shooting at them. I didn't tell them that was what was going on because if "The Plan" is exposed, "The Plan" will sometimes become less effective. I think they might have started to catch on after I kept yelling things like "Get in the hill!" and "Grab the ball!" as I slowly backed away and set up on those who were then going to bombard my objective-minded teammate with thousands upon thousands upon thousands of grenades. Real quickly, a friendly piece of advice to SamPand: GET OFF THE MONGOOSE, JERK! We had a great night of games, we got plenty of Slayer, some Multi-Team Regicide (NEW HOTNESS), a couple really fun KotH games and even a Multi-Team Ricochet game. Good games to all we played with and against, we'll see you again soon.
266 Kills in 12 games #NotSoHumbleBrag"
Gamertag: B is for Bravo All I have to say is: Multi-Team Ricochet on Monolith is a blast. It was the first game I played in, and myself, HaloWaypoint, and our celebrity community member, LittlBasher were a deadly force. On a slightly less boastful note, the game type is very unique to Halo 4, and creates brand new map flow on Monolith. Rarely are any goals scored from the bottom, and it's generally a battle to get the ball to the closed side lift and score a touchdown by way of the almighty Man Cannon. Beware of players who camp by the lift and wait for you to bring the ball to them - we're pretty sure these are the same players who stole your eggs in Diddy Kong Racing's Fire Mountain.
We hope those of you who played with us weren't too upset with our performance, constant yelling, or SamPand's Mongoose antics. We also hope that you're enjoying the Multi-Team playlist, and encourage you to swing by the Multi-Team Feedback thread and share your experiences with us. Based on community feedback, Monday's Matchmaking update also included the removal of Spartan Ops Skulls from episodes 1-8 (in the Spartan Ops Timeline), as episodes 9 and 10 are currently available in Matchmaking with Skulls enabled. Thanks for the feedback, and if you've been waiting to play without the current Skulls enabled, get to it! Lastly, the latest Halo 4 Title Update was also released on Monday, which addressed some in-game issues. To read the details of this update, head to the change list here.
Halo 4 Ricochet Forge Contest Winners
Now that the Community Forge Ricochet Playlist has come to a close, it is time to announce the winners of the Halo 4 Ricochet Forge Contest! After dozens of submissions only six maps made it into the aforementioned playlist, and we now have three winners selected by Certain Affinity. The below note (from Certain Affinity themselves) announces the three winners and reminds them of the awesome prize packs they've won. We'd like to thank the Community Cartographers and everyone who participated as well as congratulate the winners. Lastly, the below maps will also be added to the Ricochet playlist in the 11/25 Matchmaking Update, and we can't wait to see them in the rotation!
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