✅ Subscribe: ua-cam.com/users/BenPlaysGames 🖱 Support the channel: www.patreon.com/ben_plays_games One of those rare occasions where my views regarding a level changed radically while working on the video for it.
Heroic is my favorite of Johnson's dialogue. "We didn't have any fancy schmancy tanks. We had sticks! Two sticks and a rock for a whole platoon! And we had to SHARE the rock!"
I remember hearing in one of Bungie's Vidocs that they wasted far too much time making the E3 demo a reality & used it as a learning experience of what not to do going forward. Apparently it cost them precious dev time trying their hardest to impress.
That makes sense, the demo was wildly ambitious and so far ahead of even Combat Evolved. At least we got all the gameplay improvements shown off, if not the level itself!
@@BenPlaysGames oh, 1000%. Makes you wonder how the game would have been received if the E3 was what we got back in 2005. Would have made Halo 3 a hell of a lot harder to achieve a par expectation
Honestly the fight (the scarab fight, and also the fight where you save the marines in the building) would still be awesome, but a lot less cool if they removed the music. Music has a massive impact on halo, and every other game that uses it in general.
8:52 - It was very much caused by technical limitations. The build shown in the demo was developed on an engine that made use of advanced graphics affects such as stencil shadows that, according to Halo 2 engineering lead Chris Butcher: "That entire graphics engine had to be thrown away, because you could never ship a game on the Xbox with it". From what Chris described, they went through months just trying to get something together for E3. If they had that much difficulty getting a demo going, I can't imagine how the game would have run on retail hardware without it. The whole demo was also heavily scripted, almost all encounters were completely scripted with a handful of it using true AI. 'Illusions' were used for other areas like dual wielding, which was in fact a single weapon instead of two individual weapons. 343 Industries did demo it on a developer Xbox recently (the main difference being they have 128mb RAM instead of the retail 64mb) and it didn't seem so bad.
the tunnel after the bridge was supposed to be a steal section. it was going to be flooded so chief could hide crouched in the water and ambush grunts like a crocodile.
There’s a workshop mod for halo 2 adds a lot of removed content I played it a little while ago that tunnel you’re in is underwater and has a hole in the roof with water flowing through it you can crouch under it like you said it’s pretty gnarly
I played Halo 2 for the first time last summer but the scarab section still blew me away (pun intended). I think it’s the music that makes it feel more exhilarating than it actually is.
This level is one of my favorites in the entire franchise! I still remember being blown away by the ending, jumping onto that scarab! The scorpion tank bridge run is a great set piece as well!
This was the level my step brother and I spent the most time on. We absolutely loved the vehicle combat and spent even more hours going back to the Easter eggs hidden here.
A Scarab-tacular video indeed! I personally love the initial bridge section and Sargent Johnon's epic lines. It's such a shame we never got anything more like the E3 trailer apart from the few brief moments in this level. It always bothers me that after you kill the enemies on the Scarab, the mission just ends. Even a button to press or something to shoot would've been nice! And then in the in the cutscene the Scarab is on fire - what did the Chief do!? I guess at least we were able to destroy the Scarabs ourself in Halo 3.
Hey Ben, I know it’s been forever since I last commented but I haven’t missed a single video! I’ve actually been showing your videos to my girlfriend, and we now mostly watch on her account on the TV. Your videos have introduced her to the world of Halo in a way that I have never been able too, and now we both look forward to your uploads. Thank you for what you do and as always the content is superb.
This is super kind Devastator mate, thanks to both of you for all the support! Huge props to your girlfriend for watching with you, I can't get my fiancée to check them out for love nor money haha.
This right here is the best mission in Halo. Yes, it's that good. There's a tank section, CQC section, sniper section warthog section and you get a novel firefight on a mobile fortress. It's just fun.
I love this mission.. tip, you can drive the scorpion over the barrier where you took the wart hog. Makes killing all those enemies in that little section a lot easier. Great video Ben.
It’s kinda crazy how I start halo 2 with outskirts. Every time without fail. And also skip the arbiter without fail straight to delta halo. Man I wish the bungie games were longer. …”we had 2 sticks, and a rock, and we had to share the rock!”
It sure was quite an experience man. I was like seven or eight years old and honestly the entirety of the game blew my mind. Now that I'm older and have played through multiple times and watched the cutscenes. I now realize just how special it was to play this series from beginning to end. You honestly just had to be there.
Great video! Thanks for the content. I agree with some of the other comments that parts of this level wouldn't be half as good without the music inclusions and voice lines.
@@BenPlaysGamesOh you mentioned the sniper jackal, that can smack to get his sniper but did you know there’s a human sniper the right of the jackal? Near a rock… If I recall correctly.
i never had my own xbox but i got to play halo 2 at my friends house, we werent allowed to play the flood levels so we ended up playing this one a lot, i have very fond memories of running the bridge on co-op.
8:29 I'd love it if a modder could open up this closed off street to make a "U" shape that loops around the Tterab Industries building back to the Wraiths. Perhaps along this street we can finally have some of that Gauss Hog vs Shadow encounters shown at E3
This is still my favourite Halo level of all time! The opening cutscene, the tank section, the Scarab, and closing out with my personal favourite cutscene in all of Halo.
I don’t know if it’s just me, but I’m obsessed with scarabs, all of the different ones, I just wish I had a real one I could drive through the streets, oh god that would be sick!
There's a team working with 343 called the "digsite" to bring the E3 demo back to life, among other alpha/beta things, with some old recovered drives full of assets and whatnot from 2001 onwards.
It's worth noting that in the original Xbox release of Halo 2, there were no loading screens so this entire city section was experienced as a long, unbroken sequence.
Cutsences did exist in the original xbox version of Halo 2, it's just that Halo 2 didn't use many mid-level cutsences, so having Earth City (Outskirts + Metropolis) would be VERY long without the small cutsence
@@MisterYankou that is true, back then and especially now (some games now do indeed love to take alot of assets in and replace them when a cutsence plays)
In the section at 6:26, I think perhaps the unfortunate aspect of having that jackal sniper and long range combat is that you're distracted from what I see as the point of that whole section. If you look to the right, you see the scarab walking through the area and if you're fast enough, you can see it clamber up and around the buildings in the area with the wraith. This idea solidifes the final set piece, since it gives you the sense that you're chasing the scarab, and provides the tension necessary for the ending to be as climactic as it is. That being said, you didn't point it out, and understandably so. Perhaps that's just poor level design, making you feel like you just have to clear out an area from enemies which detracts from what's happening ahead of you.
There is a playable version of the Halo 2 Demo kicking around on the internet. Apparently its barely playable, you have to follow a very set path to avoid crashing the game. So it may have been cut to avoid that issue, too many assets to run.
I think Halo 2 at times feels a bit unfinished, and no level feels more unfinished than this one. In particular I actually think the city section (the one that’s kinda like the E3 demo) is the very worst. It feels empty and quiet in a unfinished way, espescially the geometry. Sure, CE is also very simple and quiet at times, but there it *makes sense*. You’re stuck alone in this ring. This city feels… not like a city. Probably won’t be that many people because of the invasion, but there’s not even trace of people or life. It’s just so… devoid. I suppose Halo 2 itself on all parts of Delta Halo (the place, not the level) is also quiet, but there it feels less unfinished since it makes sense that it’s a devoid place. And the Covenant city? That actually does feel quite lived in I think! I agree the Scarab hasn’t aged well. I think it hasn’t aged well for simlar reasons I think a lot of the Half-Life series (as much as I like them) haven’t aged well. Set pieces just feel… cheap to me these days (maybe CoD made me cynical with their imo pretty bad use of it in some of their campaigns).. What I think ages much better is fundamental gameplay and sandbox (which Halo 2 very much does have!). This is also why the Scarab in Halo 3 is so much better, it doesn’t feel like a cheap set piece, it feels like a part of the sandbox (a giant part, granted, but still). Anyway, great video!
Honestly I prefer being on the halo rings over earth. Which is why I found Halo 3 kinda boring in terms of set pieces. The installations are just so unique and fascinating to learn about. And the structures of the forerunners
There's a whole bunch of dev videos for Halo 2 talking about the e3 demo vs. finished product. Bungie just over developed on the demo to the point it would be impossible to finish the game on time on top of other issues they had.
The biggest thing that coulda made halo 2 slower to come out wasn't the demo level ("Digsite", or possibly more accurately, Earth City] being worked so hard on and then being scrapped... It was the entire GRAPHIC engine and the 3rd chapter of Halo 2's oringallg 3 part story being scrapped
I believe that the E3 demo was ai scripted rather than an in game event, since they wouldn't have been able to make the xbox at the time handle a mission like that
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One of those rare occasions where my views regarding a level changed radically while working on the video for it.
"Concentrate on the Wraiths, they're the biggest threat" -Cortana, ignoring those Jackal Snipers
And I took that personal.
-Jackal Snipers
She's technically not wrong though speaking literally - they are the biggest in terms of size. Not in threat though haha.
Heroic is my favorite of Johnson's dialogue. "We didn't have any fancy schmancy tanks. We had sticks! Two sticks and a rock for a whole platoon! And we had to SHARE the rock!"
I remember playing this as a kid in 2005, jumping onto the scarab absolutely blew my mind.
Me too dude! Always so funny to me how basic it now seems compared to 3, as it was so incredible at the time.
I remember falling off thew bridge by mistake on my first playthrough, and landing on the scarab. I thought I broke the game at first.
I remember hearing in one of Bungie's Vidocs that they wasted far too much time making the E3 demo a reality & used it as a learning experience of what not to do going forward. Apparently it cost them precious dev time trying their hardest to impress.
A lesson they have clearly taken to heart; they didn't try to impress _at all_ with the latest Destiny 2 expansion.
@@TehCakeIzALie1 Not since redwar
That makes sense, the demo was wildly ambitious and so far ahead of even Combat Evolved. At least we got all the gameplay improvements shown off, if not the level itself!
In 2005, I was definitely disappointed it wasn’t closer to the E3 reveal. But in hindsight still, what an amazing game.
I definitely wasn't complaining as much at the time as I do nowadays.
@@BenPlaysGames oh, 1000%. Makes you wonder how the game would have been received if the E3 was what we got back in 2005.
Would have made Halo 3 a hell of a lot harder to achieve a par expectation
Honestly the fight (the scarab fight, and also the fight where you save the marines in the building) would still be awesome, but a lot less cool if they removed the music. Music has a massive impact on halo, and every other game that uses it in general.
Completely agree dude - it's a section that is still fun to play through but is much more about the atmosphere in the present.
8:52 - It was very much caused by technical limitations. The build shown in the demo was developed on an engine that made use of advanced graphics affects such as stencil shadows that, according to Halo 2 engineering lead Chris Butcher: "That entire graphics engine had to be thrown away, because you could never ship a game on the Xbox with it". From what Chris described, they went through months just trying to get something together for E3. If they had that much difficulty getting a demo going, I can't imagine how the game would have run on retail hardware without it.
The whole demo was also heavily scripted, almost all encounters were completely scripted with a handful of it using true AI. 'Illusions' were used for other areas like dual wielding, which was in fact a single weapon instead of two individual weapons.
343 Industries did demo it on a developer Xbox recently (the main difference being they have 128mb RAM instead of the retail 64mb) and it didn't seem so bad.
Thanks for sharing!
Child me seeing a FREAKING SCARAB really was a core memory
Likewise, I brought the see through green Xbox with Halo 2 at launch, was a massive deal!
the tunnel after the bridge was supposed to be a steal section. it was going to be flooded so chief could hide crouched in the water and ambush grunts like a crocodile.
A steal section?
@@jarlwhiterun7478 Stealth
that would of been sick
That actually sounds awesome. Given what we saw in the TV show, we know Chief has the glutes for swimming.
There’s a workshop mod for halo 2 adds a lot of removed content I played it a little while ago that tunnel you’re in is underwater and has a hole in the roof with water flowing through it you can crouch under it like you said it’s pretty gnarly
I played Halo 2 for the first time last summer but the scarab section still blew me away (pun intended). I think it’s the music that makes it feel more exhilarating than it actually is.
Definitely! I wonder how many moments in the series would be affected if Marty and Michael's music wasn't there.
@@BenPlaysGamesYou can try it on the master chief collection, without music it’s a whole different experience
Ben knows what the subscribers like
Best quote ever haha.
This level is one of my favorites in the entire franchise! I still remember being blown away by the ending, jumping onto that scarab! The scorpion tank bridge run is a great set piece as well!
This was the level my step brother and I spent the most time on. We absolutely loved the vehicle combat and spent even more hours going back to the Easter eggs hidden here.
I always play Outskirts and Metropolis back to back. They really complete each other.
i loved this segment as a kid. It felt like a futuristic take on the early war on terror.
A Scarab-tacular video indeed! I personally love the initial bridge section and Sargent Johnon's epic lines. It's such a shame we never got anything more like the E3 trailer apart from the few brief moments in this level. It always bothers me that after you kill the enemies on the Scarab, the mission just ends. Even a button to press or something to shoot would've been nice! And then in the in the cutscene the Scarab is on fire - what did the Chief do!? I guess at least we were able to destroy the Scarabs ourself in Halo 3.
Hey Ben, I know it’s been forever since I last commented but I haven’t missed a single video! I’ve actually been showing your videos to my girlfriend, and we now mostly watch on her account on the TV. Your videos have introduced her to the world of Halo in a way that I have never been able too, and now we both look forward to your uploads. Thank you for what you do and as always the content is superb.
This is super kind Devastator mate, thanks to both of you for all the support! Huge props to your girlfriend for watching with you, I can't get my fiancée to check them out for love nor money haha.
This right here is the best mission in Halo. Yes, it's that good. There's a tank section, CQC section, sniper section warthog section and you get a novel firefight on a mobile fortress. It's just fun.
I love this mission.. tip, you can drive the scorpion over the barrier where you took the wart hog. Makes killing all those enemies in that little section a lot easier. Great video Ben.
God I would LOVE to have a playable version of that Halo 2 E3 trailer!!!!
Jumping on the scarab with the shotgun while the electric guitar theme kicks in is epic every time
It’s kinda crazy how I start halo 2 with outskirts. Every time without fail. And also skip the arbiter without fail straight to delta halo. Man I wish the bungie games were longer. …”we had 2 sticks, and a rock, and we had to share the rock!”
Man how I wish I could’ve played this back in the day
It sure was quite an experience man. I was like seven or eight years old and honestly the entirety of the game blew my mind. Now that I'm older and have played through multiple times and watched the cutscenes. I now realize just how special it was to play this series from beginning to end. You honestly just had to be there.
Great video! Thanks for the content. I agree with some of the other comments that parts of this level wouldn't be half as good without the music inclusions and voice lines.
Always a pleasure mate, hope all's well! And agree too, Outskirts is definitely the more engaging affair outside of the cinematic side of things.
"If god is love then you can call me cupid!"
Man I love seargent johnson. Its like having a pastor on the battlefield. 🤦♂️😂
His scene with the elite at the end of CE on legendary is still one of the greatest scenes in the entire series I reckon.
@@BenPlaysGamesOh you mentioned the sniper jackal, that can smack to get his sniper but did you know there’s a human sniper the right of the jackal? Near a rock… If I recall correctly.
i never had my own xbox but i got to play halo 2 at my friends house, we werent allowed to play the flood levels so we ended up playing this one a lot, i have very fond memories of running the bridge on co-op.
"Fans are upset we didn't spend enough time on Earth."
"Let me introduce you to our new idea: ODST,"
8:29 I'd love it if a modder could open up this closed off street to make a "U" shape that loops around the Tterab Industries building back to the Wraiths. Perhaps along this street we can finally have some of that Gauss Hog vs Shadow encounters shown at E3
I actually had a similar thought to this when playing it - area seems ripe for some action similar to the gameplay demo.
This is still my favourite Halo level of all time! The opening cutscene, the tank section, the Scarab, and closing out with my personal favourite cutscene in all of Halo.
I don’t know if it’s just me, but I’m obsessed with scarabs, all of the different ones, I just wish I had a real one I could drive through the streets, oh god that would be sick!
Fun little fact you can actually save the marine in the tank at 9:15
How
Are you hit marine? This level is amazing 🤩
There's a team working with 343 called the "digsite" to bring the E3 demo back to life, among other alpha/beta things, with some old recovered drives full of assets and whatnot from 2001 onwards.
Newcomer's perspective:
Taking down a Scarab for the first time is a magical experience, even in .
It's worth noting that in the original Xbox release of Halo 2, there were no loading screens so this entire city section was experienced as a long, unbroken sequence.
Cutsences did exist in the original xbox version of Halo 2, it's just that Halo 2 didn't use many mid-level cutsences, so having Earth City (Outskirts + Metropolis) would be VERY long without the small cutsence
@@Kevaca right, and they used those cutscenes to disguise loading. I'm just saying there were no actual loading screens like we have now.
@@MisterYankou that is true, back then and especially now (some games now do indeed love to take alot of assets in and replace them when a cutsence plays)
11:03 I played it for the first time last year and idc it was still awesome
In the section at 6:26, I think perhaps the unfortunate aspect of having that jackal sniper and long range combat is that you're distracted from what I see as the point of that whole section. If you look to the right, you see the scarab walking through the area and if you're fast enough, you can see it clamber up and around the buildings in the area with the wraith. This idea solidifes the final set piece, since it gives you the sense that you're chasing the scarab, and provides the tension necessary for the ending to be as climactic as it is. That being said, you didn't point it out, and understandably so. Perhaps that's just poor level design, making you feel like you just have to clear out an area from enemies which detracts from what's happening ahead of you.
A top 5 UA-cam channel imo.
Ha I wish! Thank you for the awesome words dude, they're greatly appreciated.
I remember being so disappointed in the scarab fight the first time playing this level. Luckily, Halo 3 got it right.
There is a playable version of the Halo 2 Demo kicking around on the internet. Apparently its barely playable, you have to follow a very set path to avoid crashing the game. So it may have been cut to avoid that issue, too many assets to run.
Why did they alter Miranda Key's look so much for the remastered edition? She was a completely different person.
I'm not a fan of her look in anniversary. They do a great job of most characters but she doesn't at all resemble her look in the original.
@Ben Plays Games I switch back to the OG cut scene when she's in it, lol. But seriously, everyone else is the same...except Miranda. Does not compute.
Really gonna make a video about Metropolis without even mentioning the scarab gun or the giant soccer ball? Those are what make the level great!
I think Halo 2 at times feels a bit unfinished, and no level feels more unfinished than this one. In particular I actually think the city section (the one that’s kinda like the E3 demo) is the very worst. It feels empty and quiet in a unfinished way, espescially the geometry.
Sure, CE is also very simple and quiet at times, but there it *makes sense*. You’re stuck alone in this ring. This city feels… not like a city. Probably won’t be that many people because of the invasion, but there’s not even trace of people or life. It’s just so… devoid. I suppose Halo 2 itself on all parts of Delta Halo (the place, not the level) is also quiet, but there it feels less unfinished since it makes sense that it’s a devoid place. And the Covenant city? That actually does feel quite lived in I think!
I agree the Scarab hasn’t aged well. I think it hasn’t aged well for simlar reasons I think a lot of the Half-Life series (as much as I like them) haven’t aged well. Set pieces just feel… cheap to me these days (maybe CoD made me cynical with their imo pretty bad use of it in some of their campaigns)..
What I think ages much better is fundamental gameplay and sandbox (which Halo 2 very much does have!). This is also why the Scarab in Halo 3 is so much better, it doesn’t feel like a cheap set piece, it feels like a part of the sandbox (a giant part, granted, but still).
Anyway, great video!
2:10 Heroic is the best version.
Personally wish we got a little more of earth and maybe Miranda welding a nuke to the chief
Love the vids dawg but like this the same video from last week 🥺
Superb
Thanks Gabe!
Please do any research on the halo 2 development process. TLDR bungie wanted to do a LOT more.
nice vid, which are you going to do next?
For Halo? I have something special planned to celebrate three years on UA-cam, watch this space.
@@BenPlaysGames oh ok
the only thing i didn't like is i felt the earth section of Halo 2 was too short, and wanted to really get to the Halo ring itself.
Honestly I prefer being on the halo rings over earth. Which is why I found Halo 3 kinda boring in terms of set pieces. The installations are just so unique and fascinating to learn about. And the structures of the forerunners
There's a whole bunch of dev videos for Halo 2 talking about the e3 demo vs. finished product. Bungie just over developed on the demo to the point it would be impossible to finish the game on time on top of other issues they had.
The biggest thing that coulda made halo 2 slower to come out wasn't the demo level ("Digsite", or possibly more accurately, Earth City] being worked so hard on and then being scrapped...
It was the entire GRAPHIC engine and the 3rd chapter of Halo 2's oringallg 3 part story being scrapped
I believe that the E3 demo was ai scripted rather than an in game event, since they wouldn't have been able to make the xbox at the time handle a mission like that
If god is love,then you can call me Cupid
my sacrificial comment to the almighty algorithm is presented
And again!
Oh I know what the ladies like
Another day! Another banger from Ben. Keep up the good work chap.
Nice one E1ectricfee1, will do dude!
Oh I know what the ladies like