Overheard@PAX: The wrath of a Halo fan

by Richard Mitchell { Sep 5th 2009 at 6:00AM }

Meet Connor. Connor is a young Halo fan who attended the Halo 3: ODST panel hosted at PAX (more on that later). The panel contained many Bungie luminaries, including Joe Staten, Brian Jarrard, Curtis Creamer, Marty O'Donnell and several others. During the Q&A session at the end of the panel, fan after fan approached the microphone, asking about everything from O'Donnell's musical inspiration to when we'll get to see some gameplay from Halo: Reach.

Connor, faced with the developers of one of the most popular gaming franchises around, had only one question. "Why would you even take the battle rifle out of the game?" (the battle rifle is MIA in the ODST campaign, lest you haven't heard). Listen to Connor's question (and Bungie's response) below.

Direct Download (MP3)

Tags: bungie, halo, halo-3, halo-3-odst, pax, pax-2009

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)

hallowhero @ Sep 5th 2009 6:10AM

I never really used the battle rife so I won't miss it much. It is pretty strange that they took it out though. It sounds like a good reason though. I'd rather have new weapons and better textures than the battle rifle.

Ryan @ Sep 5th 2009 10:33AM

The br is the main weapon in multiplayer for any decent player.

Jrinswand @ Sep 5th 2009 10:38AM

Really Hallow? You realize that that was a complete bullshit response on the part of Bungie, right? It is entirely possible to have pretty textures, new weapons, and the battle rifle. I'm pretty sure that tossing in one more gun wouldn't break the game.

hallowhero @ Sep 5th 2009 10:40AM

Yeah it may be a BS response but I won't miss it much. I like to be different and play with the other weapons available.

hallowhero @ Sep 5th 2009 10:41AM

Sorry for the double post but like they said it will still be in multiplayer just not single player.

Cool8man @ Sep 5th 2009 11:11AM

I hated the BR. Good riddance. Hopefully this $60 expansion pack actually has some new weapons.

Anthology @ Sep 5th 2009 2:44PM

I'd rather have some variety than to plow through the entire campaign with the same gun.

Mr. Manly ESC Mcbeefington Ferguson The Second @ Sep 5th 2009 4:58PM

Bungie response was absurd.They could have say,we didn't include weapons such as the battle rifle because we want players to use the ODST weapons like the Pistol and the SMG and we feel that the Battle rifle would be out of place.There that is a good answer.

Honestly I didn't understand what was so damn funny about his question not to mention that Bungie response sort of implies "We are fail at programming, lol"

Note:If you look at some of the ODST footage the Covenant Carabine does appear in the game which is the equivalent to the Battle rifle so is kind of weird.

Womble @ Sep 5th 2009 10:58PM

"The br is the main weapon in multiplayer for any decent player."

Correction. It's the go-to weapon in multiplayer for any player that wants to protect their rank.

"Decent players" can use any combination of weapons. It's just that the BR is so powerful.

I play Social to get away from the BR-only mentality. The game is simply more fun when you are trying to splatter someone in a Warthog, rather than trying to 4-shot them with your BR game after game after game.

DWells55 @ Sep 7th 2009 2:02PM

The BR balanced Halo 2 into a playable game. The way they nerfed it in Halo 3 is what ruined that game.

DeepFriedSushi @ Sep 5th 2009 6:20AM

he has bad posture.

Marmot @ Sep 5th 2009 6:30AM

Maybe that's why he has the hump...

RazorD @ Sep 5th 2009 6:37AM

Oh dear, Marmot.. I couldn't help but imagine you putting on sunglasses and the CSI Miami opening theme playing when i read that.

See what you've done to me, Joystiq?! :(

iluvmyzune @ Sep 5th 2009 9:50AM

taking the br out of halo is a serious no no. Thats all i use in multiplayer.

Alex @ Sep 5th 2009 9:55AM

Too much 'gaming position'. Sitting down, bent forward, elbows on knees, controller in hand.

siraru @ Sep 6th 2009 2:16AM

maybe he just has a short leg?

VaultICEE @ Sep 5th 2009 2:43PM

Wow. You guys are getting upvoted somehow for making fun of a kid.

Real cool.

Ballistic H @ Sep 6th 2009 1:50AM

And does he looks old enough to play an M-rated game?

Moofree @ Sep 5th 2009 6:21AM

Lost the battle rifle, but won the war... rifle?

Damian @ Sep 5th 2009 9:44AM

A war rifle would be fucking sick.

LadiesMan217 @ Sep 5th 2009 12:01PM

wait, theres a freaking war rifle now!?

Brackynews is @ Sep 5th 2009 1:34PM

Confirmed!

Spartan [Planeteer l Power of bad weather] @ Sep 5th 2009 7:07PM

that's the funniest thing I've read all week.

(and Ive read some good jokes this week)

Regular Pants @ Sep 7th 2009 4:09AM

Agreed. I just laughed so hard I snorted for the first time in ever Jerry... in ever.

Leroy_Rocktopus [Planeteer: Power of Asian Disability] @ Sep 5th 2009 6:27AM

That's great. He could have asked them about pretty much anything and he chose that.

Akuma FTW @ Sep 5th 2009 1:35PM

I was there and most of the other questions were from people grovelling and sucking up to Bungie. This kid was pure win and had us all laughing

mgsrocks1 @ Sep 5th 2009 6:34AM

Haha Richard laughing out loud. OK what was Bungie's response? Something about memory constraints and wanting 2 new weapons in the game? I couldn't make out what they said.

I can't wait till the ODST truck comes to Virginia so I can try out the game. :)

Jrinswand @ Sep 5th 2009 10:39AM

I couldn't understand most of what they said either. I need some sort of transcript or something.

DeepFriedSushi @ Sep 5th 2009 11:13PM

basically to include the battle rifle they would have to "reserve" more memory in-game whether you use it or not they ultimately took it out so they could replace that game asset with a new weapon (this isnt an issue of disc space so please dont bring up blu-ray). they could have just as easily included more weapons but then that would limit their memory budget.

simplified version: so less memory on weapons, more memory on environment, and from what i've seen the environmental textures do seems much better compared to the original h3 campaign. (also there was a problem with halo3 and odst being developed on older development kits which had around 64mb less memory which is actually pretty significant in consoles)

Bailers77 @ Sep 5th 2009 6:42AM

Shouldn't this kid have been in school?

Xero @ Sep 5th 2009 7:39AM

He took the Bungie guys to school... so i think he gets a pass.

jynxycat @ Sep 5th 2009 10:30AM

On a friday evening ?

Bagels: Almost certainly not as stupid as you think. Also, Memes. @ Sep 5th 2009 11:11AM

Bailers, I downvoted your stupid face, I'll have you know.

Jake'm @ Sep 5th 2009 6:48AM

The battle rifle's the one where you can zoom in and you fire 3 shots at a time, right?

Ooh, my friend's not gonna be pleased with that. He's a self-proclaimed god with that weapon.

Josh @ Sep 5th 2009 8:13AM

It'll still be available in multiplayer so he can still "be a god" with it online against others.

Womble @ Sep 5th 2009 10:55PM

"He's a self-proclaimed god with that weapon."

Don't worry. In my experience, people who use the BR exclusively are ALL "self-proclaimed" gods. Just as long as they have a BR handy. ;)

You can find them all over YouTube, calling people "n00bs" for not out-BR'ing someone in 4 shots, or for failing to no-scope someone from across the map.