Giant Bomb Video Game News

I so hope it's Marathon HD :)

First! It's a new Halo game expansion.

lol, first. Teaser sucked though, sucked ass, sucky suck suck arse.

Stumped

That really is the worst teaser trailer I've ever seen. They might as well have just shown a minute long video of a grunt dancing "crank that". Pile of poo.

Halo expansion pack...  how disapointing. Was hoping for a new game of some sort.

I cant wait. The teaser looks f*cken awesome

The Halo 3 portion of the clip implies that this is some sort of Halo 3 add-on or related content. Everything appears to take place from the point of view of a security AI watching as what appears to be drop pods crash down in a huge group. The overall graphical quality seems to imply the use of a previous engine- Halo 3 or prior. All of it seems a bit comical- so people probably shouldn't expect anything too serious out of this.

In the opening scene there is a very large "Traxus" logo in the bottom right  corner of the camera's view. "Traxus" is a reference to an AI in the Marathon series- a forerunner (Not Forerunner) AI to Durandel and Tycho (who are the main AI characters in the series). Traxus went rampant- destroying much of the Martian Net infrastructure- and forcing that network's shutdown in order to stop the AI. (http://traxus.jjaro.net/traxus/Traxus)

If we charge after that thread- you could possibly get the idea that maybe Bungie is making a nod to Portal. A Portal-esque plot oriented- and possibly comedic- expansion to the series- based on the Halo 3 engine. Traxus or an AI of that type could be introduced as a Glados like character- manipulating and influencing what could end up being the expected Halo universe squad based tactics game.

In the process of the drop pods- or whatever they're- hitting the ground- they also destroy much of the city- forcing the citizens or the AI to react with emergency oriented precautions- implying that this drop might have not been expected- or wanted. The AI's reaction appears to be almost WALL-E ish. The graphics of emotion go from emotionless to confused to freaked out and then to sad.

If they AI that seems to be our viewpoint in the trailer has nothing to do with the eventual game- the large number of pods could imply the squad tactics format by themselves. Based on the footage- the squad game we have been expecting might just be a repurposing of Halo 3's advancements in 4-player co-op, Bungie creates a modfiied version of the existing campaign- or a new campaign altogether- but just as an add-on to Halo 3's overall gameplay.

In reference to the award videos that were released earlier this year- what that might have shown us was a PVE level editor- a new take on the concept of Forge- which would expand any Bungie generated campaign material.


Or- in the most straightforward- boring- and literalistic interpretation- this is a teaser for Bungies new "Ultra-Mega-Doom" Banhammer technology- which will force the citizens of Halo to "Keep it Clean"- and thus- making Xbox Live family friendly; allowing for free Xbox Live and huge amounts of ad revenue.

The teaser is exactly that, so I wasn't expecting much anyway. However, when a game has been out as long as Halo 3 has you would think they would drop all this build up stuff and cut to the chase. Apparently it's a campaign expansion and a Joystiq post (I forget the original source) says it could be coming early '09.

Whatever happens, this trailer is rubbish. It does enough to open up a bit of speculation between fans, but does absolutely NOTHING to show what could actually be in this content. After the countdown I was expecting some decent news, this did not deliver.

I agree that this gives no clear details about gameplay mechanics- unless the new stuff ends up being a tactical drop pod simulator. I do also think that it would have been kind of Bungie to get more to the point. But for a "Just for fun." teaser trailer- it could end up being mildly useful. But let's hope that Bungie gives us something more this Friday in the Update.That might actually happen since they've officially acknowledged this project- which has been popping up in random computer communciation text on the tale end of variious Bungie.net articles for the last few months.

Well- they could be going down the path of Final Fantasy 13's man iterations. Or it could just be an expansion pack for Halo 3. Which I'm not sure makes the most amount of sense unless its just to kill time until their next major project appears. The tone of the trailer feels like they might be taking the chance to make something for the fun of it. We'll have to see what they tell us.

I really haven't been excited about Halo since the 1st one.  The two sequels - while technically superior - never really reached that crescendo of suspense that was present in the original.  It really was just more of the same, and in some cases too much of the same.  Halo 3 broke ground with the Forge and video tools, but the fact you still couldn't play as the other races was just inexcusable.  A Class-based multiplayer game where the race of Covenant made up the different classes would have been so much more than the tired rainbow of Master Chiefs we've had since Halo on PC.  Adding the Elites and different suit parts was a start, but they didn't take it all the way, and games like Team Fortress 2 and Call of Duty 4 trumped them.

That being said, a GRAW-style Halo game would be nice, either with four dudes in the Mjolnir armor (possibly experimental models) or go the other way and make it four Marines that don't need that fancy shit to get the job done.  It worked for Republic Commando, and I can see it working for Halo.  Master Chief needs to stay in bed and let some new faces breathe some life into the franchise.

As for Portal-esque storylines.  Didn't Portal ape the original Halo's Librarian?  And frankly, rogue AI antagonists are nothing new, Portal just did it well.

And for what it's worth, I'd love to see a new Marathon, either in remake or sequel form.  Even a new Pathways game would be a nice change to all this sci-fi.

Portal type funny sci-fi vs. Star Wars type semi-serious sci-fi (the tendency of the Halo games).