Halo 2 beats box office records

The Cleric · Post by **The Cleric** » 2004-11-14 03:10pm

What your arguments are starting to come down to is "HL2 has modding!" Guess what? IT'S A FUCKING COMPUET GAME! Do you want Bungie to come out with a modding system for Halo 2, only to have it appeal to a small fraction of the target audience (people with modded XBox's)?

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2004-11-14 03:18pm

Why does every Halo-related thread on the G&C board have to turn into a forum for PC wankers to bash the shit out of the game? How many times have Halo fans swooped into HL2 or Doom 3 threads to engage in this rampant fanboyism?

Vendetta · Post by **Vendetta** » 2004-11-14 03:21pm

It's the PC gamer way. Because the PC's such a marginalised market, at the end of the day, they have to be louder and more obnoxious to make up for it.

PC gamers can't hack the fact that they don't matter any more, and they're lucky to have even one decent company like Valve making exclusive games, let alone Valve and Relic.

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2004-11-14 03:25pm

Joe wrote:Why does every Halo-related thread on the G&C board have to turn into a forum for PC wankers to bash the shit out of the game? How many times have Halo fans swooped into HL2 or Doom 3 threads to engage in this rampant fanboyism?

I have yet to see a single PC player bash Halo 2 in this thread. What happened is someone mentioned HL2 might beat out Halo 2 on unit sales and then suddenly the console players were badmouthing Half-Life and bitched the modding shouldn't count as part of a game.

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2004-11-14 03:28pm

Vendetta wrote:(whine, bitch, moan)

*yawn*

You done acting like an idiot? Yes, us PC players feel so lucky to actualy get games that are revolutionary and trying to further the genre. Halo is a fun game, but its nothing more then a run of the mill shooter.

Yes, us poor PC players have to put up with titles like Half Life, Tribes, Max Payne, Doom 3, Unreal Tournament, Far Cry, Ghost Recon, Rainbow 6, Battlefield, etc...

Yes, us poor PC players are being marginalized.

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2004-11-14 03:34pm

Fun little fact. Consoles own the gaming market for years. It was only in the late 90s that the PC started doing well and its been GAINING on the console market ever since.

Andrew J. · Post by **Andrew J.** » 2004-11-14 05:41pm

Alyeska wrote:Yes, us poor PC players have to put up with titles like Half Life, Tribes, Max Payne, Doom 3, Unreal Tournament, Far Cry, Ghost Recon, Rainbow 6, Battlefield, etc...

Yeah, don't you guys get tired of playing first-person shooters all the time?

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2004-11-14 05:54pm

Andrew J. wrote:
Alyeska wrote:Yes, us poor PC players have to put up with titles like Half Life, Tribes, Max Payne, Doom 3, Unreal Tournament, Far Cry, Ghost Recon, Rainbow 6, Battlefield, etc...
Yeah, don't you guys get tired of playing first-person shooters all the time?

Thats why I also play Real Time Strategy games, something else the PC does much better then console.

The games the console can do better then your average PC are sports games, RPGs, adventure, and simulation (I said average PC meaning no stick or stearing wheel). I don't like RPGs or sports games. Adventure games don't interest me much. I like simulation and I have a joystick.

2000AD · Post by **2000AD** » 2004-11-14 05:57pm

Andrew J. wrote:
Alyeska wrote:Yes, us poor PC players have to put up with titles like Half Life, Tribes, Max Payne, Doom 3, Unreal Tournament, Far Cry, Ghost Recon, Rainbow 6, Battlefield, etc...
Yeah, don't you guys get tired of playing first-person shooters all the time?

Yup, that's why we have brilliant RTS's( like the C&C franchise and Warcraft) RPG's out the wazoo (like Diablo, Fallout, KoToR and all those online ones), civilisation sims (like Civilisation, Alpha Centuri and the Total War series (all though there more strategy)), flying sims, sports managing sims, general sports games, life sims (like The Sims) and just about every genre under the sun, plus most games that come out on consoles come out on the PC as well and are genrally better.

Andrew J. · Post by **Andrew J.** » 2004-11-14 06:20pm

Alyeska wrote:Thats why I also play Real Time Strategy games, something else the PC does much better then console.

The games the console can do better then your average PC are sports games, RPGs, adventure, and simulation (I said average PC meaning no stick or stearing wheel). I don't like RPGs or sports games. Adventure games don't interest me much. I like simulation and I have a joystick.

Ah well, I've never really understood why people like those sorts of games either. The only complicated flight sims I ever enjoyed were the X-Wing/TIE Fighter series, and that's mainly because of the lisence. There's no way I'd have put the effort into memorizing which button controls what in an ordinary flight sim. I liked the Rogue Squadron games on the Nintendo consoles much more, anyway.

Sims in general are like my experience with FPS and Goldeneye: I played SimCity when I was a kid, and it was okay, but that was enough of that genre to last me for the rest of my life.

PC games are just so much work, you know? There's the whole business of making sure you have the right software, compatible equipment and video cards, installation, trying to figure out why it makes the computer crash after it's installed...I'm sure people that don't mind all that have a great time with computer games, but I just like to put it in and play the game right after I buy it. Chalk it up to natural laziness, I guess.

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2004-11-14 06:33pm

I actualy find it fun building computers and solving computer problems. Of course when I end up not solving the problem I do get irritated, but over the years the number of problems I can't solve or don't have resources to solve (like this very forum) have almost completely vanished. So the problems you describe are minor at worst for me and actualy fun to work with at best.

Andrew J. · Post by **Andrew J.** » 2004-11-14 06:36pm

2000AD wrote:Yup, that's why we have brilliant RTS's( like the C&C franchise and Warcraft)

Boring.

RPG's out the wazoo (like Diablo, Fallout, KoToR and all those online ones),

Old and overrated, old,released earlier on the X-Box, and unappealing to someone that didn't even like multiplayer in the 16-bit era (like me), respectively.

civilisation sims (like Civilisation, Alpha Centuri and the Total War series (all though there more strategy)), flying sims, sports managing sims, general sports games, life sims (like The Sims)

Even more boring than RTS, if you can believe it.

and just about every genre under the sun, plus most games that come out on consoles come out on the PC as well and are genrally better.

Fighting, racers, side-scrollers, platformers, the majority of RGPs, and the most iconic and fondly remembered characters are either underrepresented or wholly absent from PC gaming. Also, console hardware is optimized for games, whereas PC hardware is not, so consoles are generally able to outperform PCs in temrs of raw performance.

Shyaa, I really should have put a smiley after my initial comment. Now look what's happened to me because of it; I got drawn into this big, drawn-out discussion. Well, at least this was more enjoyable than doing my math homework, but I'll have to get around to it sooner or later. Good night!

2000AD · Post by **2000AD** » 2004-11-14 07:24pm

Andrew J. wrote:
and just about every genre under the sun, plus most games that come out on consoles come out on the PC as well and are genrally better.
Fighting, racers, side-scrollers, platformers, the majority of RGPs, and the most iconic and fondly remembered characters are either underrepresented or wholly absent from PC gaming. Also, console hardware is optimized for games, whereas PC hardware is not, so consoles are generally able to outperform PCs in temrs of raw performance.

There's still side scrollers being made nowadays? And platformers are different from side scrollers?

Fighters are under represented i'll agree with you there (although the PC had the brilliant One Must Fall: 2097), but there are plenty of racers and i can find Sonic and Master Chief on the PC (only Nintendo characters missing) not to mention that the PC has a load of icons as well.
As for the majority of RPGs not being on PC, don't make me fucking laugh!

And a game optimized PC is not that hard, in fact there's an entire brand dedicated to it (Alienware), and i've yet to see a console game approach games such as Doom 3 and Farcry in terms of graphics standard, what other standards of raw power do you want to compare.

The Cleric · Post by **The Cleric** » 2004-11-14 07:56pm

2000AD wrote:And a game optimized PC is not that hard, in fact there's an entire brand dedicated to it (Alienware), and i've yet to see a console game approach games such as Doom 3 and Farcry in terms of graphics standard, what other standards of raw power do you want to compare.

News flash: a console IS optomized for games. And Alienware costs over 10 times as much as a console. Don't even start if you want to go by price comparison. You'll spend as much on your single graphics card as I will on my whole system, which won't ever lag on me.

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2004-11-14 09:51pm

As for the majority of RPGs not being on PC, don't make me fucking laugh!

Well, you have none of the Japanese-made console RPGs showing up on the PC these days.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2004-11-14 10:29pm

You all have no idea how tempting it is to HoS this thread. I can't even tell where the Halo 2 discussion ends and the H2/HL2 fight begins so that I might split the thread.

Equinox2003 · Post by **Equinox2003** » 2004-11-15 04:03am

With all this talk about how much $$ Halo 2 is making, it leaves me
wondering, just how much of it is actually profit?
R&D, pruduction of the units, anybody know how much of the $54 you
lay out for the game is profit?

Xon · Post by **Xon** » 2004-11-15 05:27am

Equinox2003 wrote:With all this talk about how much $$ Halo 2 is making, it leaves me
wondering, just how much of it is actually profit?
R&D, pruduction of the units, anybody know how much of the $54 you
lay out for the game is profit?

Profit margins on software which sell in bulk are simply ludicious. Its how Microsoft reached the +$60 billion cash in reserves on basicly 2 product lines. MS office, and Windows.

Making Halo 2 couldnt have cost more than 10-20 million. So making $225 million in the USA alone on the opening night gives a heck of a lot of profit.

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2004-11-15 07:45am

ggs wrote: Profit margins on software which sell in bulk are simply ludicious. Its how Microsoft reached the +$60 billion cash in reserves on basicly 2 product lines. MS office, and Windows.

Making Halo 2 couldnt have cost more than 10-20 million. So making $225 million in the USA alone on the opening night gives a heck of a lot of profit.

Its a heck of a profit, but Halo 2 didn't cost only 10-20 million.
3 years of work on a what, 40 man team, it alot of man-hours, that need to be paid.
Their making a massive profit, but remember the publisher gets most of it.

Post by **Gandalf** » 2004-11-15 07:47am

Ace Pace wrote:
ggs wrote: Profit margins on software which sell in bulk are simply ludicious. Its how Microsoft reached the +$60 billion cash in reserves on basicly 2 product lines. MS office, and Windows.

Making Halo 2 couldnt have cost more than 10-20 million. So making $225 million in the USA alone on the opening night gives a heck of a lot of profit.
Its a heck of a profit, but Halo 2 didn't cost only 10-20 million.
3 years of work on a what, 40 man team, it alot of man-hours, that need to be paid.
Their making a massive profit, but remember the publisher gets most of it.

Don't forget marketing. It was nuts here.

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2004-11-15 07:54am

Gandalf wrote:Don't forget marketing. It was nuts here.

No doubt, even here there were 3 ads.
When you have lines outside Toys R' Us, in Israel, you know they spent millions.

Xon · Post by **Xon** » 2004-11-15 08:14am

Ace Pace wrote:Its a heck of a profit, but Halo 2 didn't cost only 10-20 million.
3 years of work on a what, 40 man team, it alot of man-hours, that need to be paid.
Their making a massive profit, but remember the publisher gets most of it.

The publisher and producter are the same company

Bungie is wholly owned by Microsoft.

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2004-11-15 08:16am

ggs wrote: The publisher and producter are the same company Bungie is wholly owned by Microsoft.

I know their the same, but still need to operate at a profit.
But they did pull a nice profit on the first day, though I don't know wether to think their going to pass the $b mark.

2000AD · Post by **2000AD** » 2004-11-15 08:18am

StormtrooperOfDeath wrote:
2000AD wrote:And a game optimized PC is not that hard, in fact there's an entire brand dedicated to it (Alienware), and i've yet to see a console game approach games such as Doom 3 and Farcry in terms of graphics standard, what other standards of raw power do you want to compare.
News flash: a console IS optomized for games. And Alienware costs over 10 times as much as a console. Don't even start if you want to go by price comparison. You'll spend as much on your single graphics card as I will on my whole system, which won't ever lag on me.

News flash: i didn't say consoles weren't optimised for games.

What i said was i have yet to see a console approach a PC for quality of top of the line graphics.

And a PC has a vastly greater range of games, can perform more than 3 functions (games, DVD's, music) and can play said games with better quality, so IMO the increased price is worth it.

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2004-11-15 08:21am

2000AD wrote:
What i said was i have yet to see a console approach a PC for quality of top of the line graphics.

And a PC has a vastly greater range of games, can perform more than 3 functions (games, DVD's, music) and can play said games with better quality, so IMO the increased price is worth it.

And most cases where a console approachs a PC for graphical quality, its thanks to the low resoution, stick Final Fantasy number whatever, or Halo 2 on a 19 inch monitor that your close to, or scale it up to 1024 resolution, and you start seeing cracks.

EDIT: And don't forget, a console has to live with its hardware its entire life, while a PC can be upgraded. How many consoles can do Far Cry?