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Bungie releases Halo: Reach screens, concept art and bios

by David Hinkle on Jan 26th 2010 1:00PM

Click image to Spartan-size

We hope you wanted to see a bunch of screens from Halo: Reach today. Bungie has uploaded a ton of new images, showing off environments and gameplay, as well as an extensive collection of concept art (all compiled in the gallery below). You'll also find some character bios on Bungie's site, if you plan on getting to know your squad of Spartans a little better.

The images are generally full of the things you'd expect at this point: Spartans; Covenant; and general Halo-y goodness, but one image in particular is very curious to us. Not only is the reticle not in the center of the screen, but there's also a HUD item scrubbed out. Whatever could it be?

We know the internet has had way more experience than us in putting Halo stuff under the microscope, so we leave the guesstimating up to you. Best one wins our undying love and admiration forever!

Halo: Reach

[Thanks, Omer]

Source

Tags: 343-industries, bungie, covenant, fps, halo, halo-reach, Microsoft, reach, screens, spartan, Xbox-360

Reader Comments (78)

Sexy I say.

I been away from Halo since 2. I played some of 3 but never caught the vibe. This looks like it will bring me back into the fold of the series.

Dang, I might actually be interested in playing a Halo game again. Looks pretty awesome. I hope it plays much different then the past ones.

ODST changed things up for the better, and I'd imagine Bungie will be looking to continue that.

I meant that I still felt really slow as past Halo games have been. This is why I moved to CoD4 for the sprint function. Ever since they said they'd have one for Halo 2, I'd been looking forward to moving a little faster, and the anti gravity jumps have gotten a little old after a while.

I hear there's an option to sprint in this game so things are looking pretty good.

sprinting really does add alot of depth to movement, its definitely the feature im most exited about

I think that reticule that's off center isn't for the Assault Rifle the spartan is holding. The gun seems to be aimed at the center nonetheless so I would guess that its some sort of lock-on system for either another spartan (you would be able to see exactly where your team mates are shooting) or for that human looking vehicle in the air there. I've always hoped for a little command option to give to the marines to attack a certain enemy. Or maybe its just a command for the spartans? Who knows?

Or, as someone above put it, it could be body motion. like maybe you get to move your reticule within a certain zone before your body turns. That's like Goldeneye, which i don't know is good or bad.

Some sort of lock on mechanic was also my first instinct. If the player had just been locked onto that enemy on the left an instant before the screenshot was taken, it would be conceivable that not only would the reticule be in the process of returning to the center of the screen, but any information about that enemy that was displayed when locked on would still be on screen for a few moments and this is what is blurred out. What this sort of mechanic would mean for gameplay is harder to speculate on based only upon a screenshot...

Ooooooooohhh, ahhhhhhhhhhh, purrrrrty!

Looking very good. Obviously it has like 4xAA in these screens which wont be in the final game. Is it confirmed to run at 720p?

Obviously?

Yes obviously, there's not a jaggie in sight!

As of now the graphics are worse / just on par with Halo 3, and thats not a good thing. But I think its a pre-alpha build? So graphics wont be insulted just yet.

How can you be "Pre-Alpha"? That doesn't even make sense.

It would also imply they haven't even started on the game yet.

Pre Alpha refers to the fact that the game is not feature complete, which means they are still developing features for the game, Making changes to the core concepts of the game and nothing is stable.

Alpha means all features are in the game, but not complete, Major work is still being done to the core parts of the game (major A.I coding/development, Engine improvements, etc.) Most of the levels are done from a design standpoint, but tons of work is still needed to finish them off and get everything in place.

Beta indicates feature complete. All features are in the game and finished, most of the levels are fully playable and textured and all design work is done. Core components are done and just require bug testing. Most of the final steps are tweaking game play to make it the best it can be and bug hunting, along with polishing up the graphics, sound and remain A.I tweaks.

RC (release candidate) Game is done. All polish is done, coding is complete and all gameplay tweaks are made. This is the stage that you look for any show stopping bugs and make sure everything is ready for final release. If no show stopping bugs are found then:

Gold: game is done and sent to be pressed to disc. At this point developers take a break and prepare for launch, But Bungie then swings into online mode, prepping for matchmaking list, server stuff for stats and website stuff.

Maybe the reticle not being in the center of the screen indicates Natal use.

TO CLEAR UP THE RETICLE SPECULATION:

The screenshots were taken from a build where theater mode had a reticle glitch.

supposedly...

Is there any word on when the BETA starts? want to make sure I have ODST by then.....

Looks like spring, if this is any indication: http://www.haloreachbeta.com/content/halo-reach-beta-date-narrowed-down-spring-2010

I don't get all the hate on the graphics. I guess I'm one of those sad people still stuck thinking Halo 3 looks fine (as does the sub-HD MW2). I think we've reached the point for me where graphics are as good as they need to be, since I can clearly see everything I need to. The biggest problem I had with H3 was the faces, but apparently they've moved to mo-cap for them in this game so that should just about fix things up.

Also, anyone else freaked out by the concept picture of the Spartan with the skinny robot arm?

Doesn't look nearly as good as ME2.

"We're intentionally bringing the game back to Halo: CE's degree of choice over the direction you can take." - Niles Sankey, Mission lead on Halo: Reach.

Yes, please!