I completely agree! I've recently been forcing myself to slow down on levels, that way I can try and pretend I'm experiencing it for the first time. Few games out there can keep me occupied for days on end like Halo.
You know, given how rushed the game was, and how its engine is figuratively held together by super glue and rubber bands, the fact that Halo 2 was even playable when it launched is just a miracle.
@@Mrmaverickism Leagues better. It also helped that the projectiles of the UNSC weapons in Halo 2 also traveled a lot faster than the ones in Halo 3, often going so fast as to be mistaken for hitscan. If the projectiles of Halo 3 had been set to travel as fast as the ones in Halo 2, or even Combat Evolved, then the wonky netcode wouldn't have affected online play as severely as it actually did... or maybe the netcode still would have screwed people regardless.
@@BioGoji-zm5ph no even that the netcode prioritized bullets last, doesn't matter how fast they went they just dissapeared because someone threw a nade LOL
@@BioGoji-zm5ph ye it was a priority issue it was "only" online lol and itbironically would have been fine with hit scan I think it was just an oversight. You could dissapear bullets by blowing up a ghost so big team battle you got tickets or sniped the AR needler were innefective bc half the bullets would be banished to the shadow realm
Bro i was on acid when i watched this shit il never forget this i can't even explain it what i experience with the nostalgia while being under the effect halo 2 still has new ways to still show us more perfection 👌
I was 11 years old when Halo 2 came out, and i still remember that day quite vividly. Halo was the game that got me into gaming, before that i had never even heard of an xbox. I was incredibly hyped for Halo 2, as were millions of other people, and it was the first thing i probably ever got hyped for, and possibly still the most hyped i have ever been for something. My mom took me to Gamestop for the midnight release, but told me i had to wait until school was over later that day to play. i brought the manual to school, and read the entire thing like 5 times over, showing my friends all the cool new guns and features and stuff. Then i played for probably 10 hours straight when i got home. I remember i would pretend to be sick just to stay home and play Halo 2, and most nights i would get caught playing at 1 in the morning. My parents had to start taking the Xbox power cord with them to bed. For my birthday i threw a big LAN party at my house, ordered 100 buffalo wings, brought every TV in the house into the living room, and played 14 player multiplayer with all my friends. I got like 5 controllers as gifts from friends, and an extra copy of Halo 2. Best birthday ever.
That LAN party sounds awesome, my childhood dream back then haha! All my friends had PS2s, but I managed to convince them to come to Xbox when the 360 arrived, and I have Halo 2 to thank for that!
im so late in playing halo (born 2006 and started playing the whole halo franchise at 8 years old). but at least i got to experience this badass game with just only my cousins and family friends.i remember playing on the couch with my family and I was so much better than everyone and one of my cousins was good as me but still have the strats (strategies) everyone would just be teaming up on me 1 v 4. i said, "if you guys dont kill each other before i kill you,i would win, but if you avoid me and kill each other without you, then one of you would win." of course they ignored it, went all try hard on me and i still beat them. even in 2020 i still beat them on my old xbox 360. and one time, me and my cousins were fighting each other until the ghost of halo came in and we noticed it. the ghost was unstoppable so we restarted
To me Halo 2 kinda took online trash talk to a whole new level. This was the game where the t-bagging started. You had beef with your own teammate or an opponent in the match lobby? You settle it by wiping your big hair metal balls on his lifeless body during a match. You see guys t-bagging someone else while getting shot at in the middle of the map because all that mattered was disrespecting your opponent. Not to mention the friendly fires or a guy riding in the back seat of an opponent's warthog. Someone insulted you? You send him an invite one v one on Lockout. Thanks for the memories Halo 2
Halo 2 had the only online ranking I've ever played that mattered. None of this time based crap. If you were an 18 and lost a match to a bunch of 17s and 16s, you got demoted. Your skill mattered. You didn't max out rank cuz you still live at home and have no life. You never had to wonder how you stack up against the Frey. Nor would you constantly have to get pwned by said no lifers with all the good weapons. You played close to your rank. Some above, so below. It perfectly gauged your skill level, even took HOW you killed into account, something not seen since Goldeneye.
Seriously, I remember always watching my brother and old neighbor play halo2 as teams together and I would get mind blown how high of a rank they would get together, in team Slayer they reached up to the 40's it was crazy! And they would match up with halo emblem type ranks which were like 50 and up, now every online game is "oh you lost? Will still give you XP to level up" lol 🙄 it's literally all time based now and how many shit loads of games you play win or lose just to level up your rank 🙄 lol it's not skill based at all
it was so simple, i don't get why they don't put it back in. Halo 3 got weird with it and added experience levels and i remember them talking about how you had to use different guns to rank up faster or something. just make it simple, i win, i rank up, i lose, i rank down.
Yesss i remember how hard it was to get past 30 and anything after like 35 you were getting modders or stand-by laggers lol. I learned to bridge host and got to a 42 and stopped playing slayer lol.
We are getting back the guy who wrote those lines so we can expect that cheesines back in the campaign lol. Only thing I liked from Bungie's stories tbh
@@86Fallowcp I agree with you. But Infinite is being delayed until fall of next year. I don’t wanna put my expectations too high on Infinite and end up getting Cyberpunk’d.
Wait.. why does this only have 1.5k views? I was expecting at least 100 times that! Super well done in terms of video production and research, SameToken.
Check out Part 1 (Combat Evolved): th-cam.com/video/M5TW8tMmSMs/w-d-xo.html And Part 3 (Halo 3): th-cam.com/video/WxOVzehtoKA/w-d-xo.html 25:15 - Huge thank you to everyone for all your support! Had a blast making this one, though it took a little longer than I was expecting. Loads of stuff planned for this year! Also thanks to The Vengeful 'Vadam for providing permission to use his Halo 2 alpha and beta footage, definitely check out his channel: th-cam.com/channels/B1Tv9XrY_vRcIVWkGtmKdw.html. And a shout-out to the final Halo 2 players, you can find all the TH-cam sources in the description! Edit: Small mistake at the start - Halo 2 had the highest grossing *opening weekend* of any entertainment product, rather than in general. Edit 2: One more slight correction, the error message delaying Halo 2 Vista was pre-existing and not a product of the team porting the game
Man, as someone who was like 16 when Halo 2 launched, this video really brought back some amazing memories. I was crushed when Halo 2 multiplayer was turned off.
I love the quality of your videos! It's a miracle Halo 2 got released in the state it did. To this day, I think it's one of the best Halo games, in some cases being even better than Halo 3, mostly in its story and characters. I can't wait for it to be released on MCC PC, I'll try to play it as soon as it comes out
Halo 2 was the last game my dad and I coop-played together. I sure miss him. The levels were so much fun then, but no other Halo game has been the same without him.
I gotta say, I'm young enough that seeing the world trade center collapse is one of my earliest memories. Halo CE and 2 absolutely dominated my early childhood (and Jurassic park). I knew everything there was to know. I lived every moment in those games and wholeheartedly love them. This really brought me back and I'm so glad to have been a part of it.
Wasn't even able to play Halo 2 on Xbox Live when I was younger, yet still it's such an amazing game that it is still to this day my favorite game of all time.
@@MapleTree0 For most people it was the compatibility issues and the annoying nature of the User Account Control, which was set to either On or Off, with no middle ground. In Windows 7, the UAC was given a middle ground that made it far less intrusive, and most compatibility issues were resolved. Personally, I love the visual aesthetic of Vista's AERO interface, but it was also a huge resource hog in many ways. I never hated Vista the way many other people do, but I can certainly understand why they found it difficult to use.
Even after all these years hearing martys epilogue from halo 2 and having that electric guitar kick in still gives me chills. Long live halo, even if it died post-reach and even if 343's attempts to revive it this christmas fail, halo will always be remembered for what it was, a masterpiece.
This is an amazing mini documentary, love your attention to detail. Keen for the retrospective of Halo 3! You should also get a Patreon going, your channel deserves the support
Dual wielding definitely was fun... if you only dual-wielded Needlers. Every weapon received a noticeable damage reduction when dual-wielding (except the neutered Magnum oddly enough), making the feature useless on higher difficulties unless you were using Needlers or the Noob-Combo. While this balance is fine in multiplayer, it is frustrating in the Campaign, where you face enemies that have far more health and shields than the player, in addition to multiple enemies of various types, often at the same time. Basically, the dual-wielding function suffered from a problem that plagued most of Bungie's Halo titles after CE... which was the refusal or fear of having the campaign sandbox be balanced differently than the multiplayer sandbox, even when it made sense for the campaign to have a different set of balances than multiplayer because of its different gameplay environment.
One of, if not the biggest selling point was a flop. This was a bug reason I was still playing CE when 3 came out lol. Halo 2 looked the part bit never lived up to it's predecessor for me...
Halo 2 was genuinely life changing for me as a teenager. I have dozens of friends from the clans that I still talk to and have never met. No other game has given me those connections
Halo 1-3 (including ODST & Reach) were definitely a “you had to be there” thing. It’s hard to overstate how huge Halo was culturally. I’m sure a lot of todays teenagers don’t really think much of Halo, but it really was something special back in the day.
the crew behind no man's sky had to release their game unfinished, but it's honestly a fairly respectable game now that they have had time to pretty much rebuild it from the foundation up so dont lose hope just yet
Dude I've worked on large projects (non gaming) with loads of crunch, trust me every single working on something like that with so much effort and time put only wants for it be finished properly. But as always, there's people above that mandate that rush, they just want it on time. Believe me it feels so awful when your work goes out rushed and sucks because you didn't have just a bit longer to finish it.
I'd like to highlight how awesome the teaser trailer for Halo 2 is: There is no mention of Thel Vadamee/The Arbiter, or the prophets. It is not made of pre-rendered CG. It has no actual gameplay. What it is, is an in-engine short film/tech demo that features Downes and Taylor reprising their roles from the first game (As Chief and Cortana) that gives us both a recap of CE, and a basic outline of the direction the game would take, ending on an early version of the "What if you miss" setpiece. If that's not a Teaser, I don't know what is.
I really can't wait for the retrospective of the third one. Watching your 1st and 2nd videos (this one) was so enjoyed by me with a little of memories passing through my eyes meanwhile listening. I literary can't wait to fully imerge in good times again.
This game is such a big part of my life. I know how that will Will sound to a bunch of you, but it really is. I first played this game when I was 13 years old, I'm now 28 years old and I still know some of the people that were on my friends list. I feel like this was a special moment in time, that made bonds that were super strong but will never be forgotten. It was its own golden age, its own Renaissance in a way. Nothing will ever come close to how this game made me feel The music to this game still gives me chills., The soulfulness of epilogue will forever feel my heart with sorrow, for a time that will never come back. It's so crazy how powerfully I feel about this game.
I knew a couple who married after meeting in Halo multi player! This game was such a huge part of that generation's lives. I am an old fart but I still love Halo. Currently slogging my way through the MCC, Heroic on PC. So glad to be able to play and re visit these games. I had only really played and finished Halo 3 up until recently. Played Reach, Now on CE, Two Betrayals level. I am chomping at the bit to get to Halo 2! I hate The Flood.
Halo CE and Halo 2 are beautiful masterpieces. I always felt that 3 felt too short, too rushed. I remember being apprehensive about the changes from CE to 2, but Halo 2 won me over quickly. Marty's score was always a highlight. I miss the good old days of Halo, easily some of my favorite memories.
Really? because i always felt like Halo 2 felt rushed and pretty halfbaked. I very clearly remember reading about how rushed and wonky the development was and thinking to myself"Ah. That explains everything". Granted, since i never owned an original XBox i grew up playing Halo 1 and then when i got an 360 i played Halo 3, and only after that did i play Halo 2. But i always felt Halo 2 couldn't measure up to any of the other Halos. It just felt so... clunky. Especially the campiagn with it's mid-level loading times and overabundance of wave-defense sections where you couldn't progress and had to stand there to wait for stuff to happen.
Always love watching your videos. I knew Halo 2 went through development hell, but I actually had no idea that Halo 3's plot was the intended 3rd act for Halo 2. I always learn something from watching your videos. Good luck in your final semester at university and I'll look forward to more of your content in the future! Thank you again, Mr. Token.
Friends: See you tomorrow Geo Me: Goodnight guys *starts up Halo 2 and trys to log in xbox live* *gets booted 2-5 times* Me: what? The internet might be acting up again. *trys to log in 2 hours later* Me: Huh, thats weird. *Gets call from my cousin* Cousin: The Xbox LIVE servers have been discontinued. Me: No... it can't be, you are lying! Cousin: I wish I were *checks on the web for info* *sees that my cousin was not lying* I cried myself to sleep those next few months hoping that they would fix the issue but little did I know that it was gone for good. Now knowing that I might never see my friends again.
I get sad watching Halo retrospectives. I get sad because I know I'm never going to experience a game or its sequels the same way again. I was lucky to grow up with Halo and XBL. The times I've had, the friends I've made... Man... Halo was, in my mind, my generations Star Wars (The original trilogy) and it brought us all together. All the laughs, all the broken controllers... If I could go back in my life to any point, it would be to relive my teenage years kickin' it on XBL shooting the shit with my friends. If you bothered to read this I'm sure you might feel similar. And I just want to let you know that there is someone out there that feels the same way. I miss the good ol' days.
Can i just say that xbox was the worst thing about halo for a long time. Thise of us who had a pc and didnt have money for a console just had to watch everyone else have fun when it wouldnt have killed them to port the sequels a little sooner.
Why did I get so emotional with that ending tho..... I didn’t even get to play Halo 2 online.......why did that hit so hard...... Awesome video dude, can’t wait for all future installments of this, retrospective, series :3
I know I’m a late viewer, but in all honesty dude, you kill it with these halo videos! From the research, to the commentary, to the editing, it’s all 110%
This is still the pinnacle of Halo. The campaign may have not been as balanced or fun as CE but everything else eclipsed it and has never fully been overthrown.
I never got to experience Halo 2 the way so many others did (because I never had an Xbox, only got a 360) but this video really makes me appreciate the love, care and hardwork that went into building this franchise. Really great video and all the best for uni submissions!
Halo 2 was impressive, but for me there was a significant downgrade in the campaign level design in terms of lateral scale. It felt like a series of bigger & smaller corridors, but there were none of the wide-open and nonlinear level sections like we saw in Combat Evolved with the Silent Cartographer, Halo, and Assault on the Control Room levels, there was less of an eerie alien sense of mystery to the environments with long quiet periods of stealth & exploration ( which hasn't been quite recaptured since), and in my opinion, dual wielding hurt the weapons sandbox by effectively nerfing many weapons and making them less viable on their own. And I'm not sure if I ever liked the change to the health system, Chief had armour on, and it made no sense that after the energy shields were down he might as well have been wearing a tutu underneath. It also meant there was less sense of risk & weighing up the pros & cons of pushing through a position, and that you could push further, but there would be a cost. I hope these areas are addressed by Halo: Infinite Halo 2's multiplayer was unquestionably a huge improvement though
Hey everyone! Im still playing halo 2 with xlinkai. Theres at least 40 people still playing everyday. Come relive the glory years. I have been having so much fun. I just got home from playing halo ce campain with my little bro (9yo) for the first time. I about cried as he was laughing and having so much fun. Come join me and my friends online. Im sure well have fun. :) peace
So many great times with friends on XBL...people who i'd never met in real life but played and laughed for hours with on H2. The friends list on H2 was fantastic. I will never forget my H2 experiences.
I was in my first year of college when halo2 dropped. I sent my gf to get it cause I couldn't leave her dorm case it was a only female. Two hours later with standing in line I had halo 2 in my hands. I played all night on legendary, to only make it to the 2nd level. When I looked outside and saw daylight creeping up. I turned off my box and got ready for class. When I arrived in class there was a handful of us and the professor walked in saying where is everybody? I answered with probably playing halo2 since it just got released last night. Every looked back at me so I added yeah I haven't slept yet. The professor wrapped it up pretty shortly and I run back to my gf dorm to keep playing. Halo will always hold a special place in my heart; with all the friends I made, playing with family and probably caused a break up lol long live halo
I'll never forget that first demo. I watched it probably thousands of times. Watching Chief hijack that ghost was so badass. I was just a boy but I'm pretty sure that it made me grow a beard. I think that demo kicked in my puberty, lol.
I can't believe that it's been so long since I've picked up Halo 2. Got an Xbox 360 in 2006 when I was 6, & minutes after coming home my uncle stopped by and heard the news. He gave me a paper pocket with a disc inside. It was his copy of Halo 2 that he got during launch night in 04, however upon starting a family he put down the gaming controller and passed on the game to me. Me and my brothers for the next decade would play splitscreen and have LAN parties with the neighborhood kids until the 360 red ring and the disc broke apart... Yes, I played 3 and Reach and 4 as they came out, but none of them held me with the consistency that 2 did.
This gives me goosebumps I can remember playing halo 2 on Xbox live for days, I remember I would wake up every single weekend to go play halo in the living room before my brother would wake up when we share the same Xbox. Better times
I'm glad that this video still exists. Due to some serious messed up drama, I had to delete my original channel. I don't really have any plans to create new content on TH-cam but if you wish to update the link to my current channel here, you may.
THANKYOU. This video was FANTASTIC. One of the best videos I've ever seen done on a Halo game and I've seen them all... Thank you for all the time and effort you put in to making this.
Amazing video, thank you so much for this. I was 10 years old when Halo 2 released. I remember my Dad coming home shortly after its release with a copy of it. I even remember the strange detail of the yellow price sticker on the case. I used to watch my Dad playing and it wasn't long before I got an xbox of my own, and Halo went on to form a huge part of my childhood memories and a huge part of my life.
Really glad you enjoyed, and thanks for sharing! It's amazing the memories we pick up that once seemed insignificant, yet we become nostalgic about years later. Halo 2 definitely does this for me too, I remember my Dad downloading the thumbnail-sized E3 gameplay in 2003. I was in awe as it lagged and stuttered on our old iMac.
Wow, I've watched alot of halo 2 documentarys and man, you smashed out of the park! I mean you've actually taught me more then I knew before. That's pretty awesome!
This was a really well made video. I'm surprised it doesn't have more views right now. The commentary felt a little choppy at times, but your points came across really well regardless. Halo 2 is my favorite Halo game, and seeing how it all came to fruition was a really cool experience. Thank you for making this!
This is still the pinnacle of Halo. The campaign may have not been as balanced or fun as CE but everything else eclipsed it and has never fully been overthrown.
It’s amazing how Halo 2 was originally going to be the last Halo game. Unfortunately that didn’t happen. I loved Halo every game Bungie made but with 343 at the helm it feels different now
thelasthallow It can go both ways. If it were to have ended on the (originally planned ending, it would’ve been amazing to the series. All good things must come to an end, and don’t need an explanation) But on the other hand yeah, I couldn’t imagine a world without the later entries. Reach, ODST, 3.
Halo 1-3 were absolutely groundbreaking. I wish I could forget about those games, so I can re-experience them all over again.
I completely agree! I've recently been forcing myself to slow down on levels, that way I can try and pretend I'm experiencing it for the first time. Few games out there can keep me occupied for days on end like Halo.
Experiencing the exact same. It's genuinely sad sometimes because the nostalgia just makes me think of better times
I'm a newcomer to Xbox and Halo, and I'm playing through those campaigns for the first time right now. I totally understand you.
That's how I feel about the Mass Effect franchise
Just Some Guy without a Mustache halo all of the FPS bungie halo games and destiny 1 sooo nostalgic
I'm not crying. You are crying.
😢
Hey Chris how are you
@@9-11wasthecoolestthingever9 Hey how are you?
Phew. Glad I’m not the only one. A salute for our brother who held on till the boot.
i am most definitely crying
They should hire you to do a full documentary of this 20 years of halo and its legacy in games, Book, comics and movies
good idea fellow profile pic person
Found 2 of the other 100 hots players in the world lol
@@KBird204 naah there's still a lot of players, last time i played matchmaking wasn't long
please make this for all halo games.
Can't wait for him to talk about Halo 5 then. Such an amazing game
@@Earlys-ec4iz I agree. It was completely non divisive and the whole community loved it. Best story in the franchise too.
EL OH EL you guys just hate it because it wasn’t as good
@@gavinklein4998 I hate it because of the shit story. That's pretty much it lol
EL OH EL jew
You know, given how rushed the game was, and how its engine is figuratively held together by super glue and rubber bands, the fact that Halo 2 was even playable when it launched is just a miracle.
The netcode was better than halo 3 too lol
@@Mrmaverickism Leagues better. It also helped that the projectiles of the UNSC weapons in Halo 2 also traveled a lot faster than the ones in Halo 3, often going so fast as to be mistaken for hitscan. If the projectiles of Halo 3 had been set to travel as fast as the ones in Halo 2, or even Combat Evolved, then the wonky netcode wouldn't have affected online play as severely as it actually did... or maybe the netcode still would have screwed people regardless.
@@BioGoji-zm5ph no even that the netcode prioritized bullets last, doesn't matter how fast they went they just dissapeared because someone threw a nade LOL
@@Mrmaverickism So people would still get screwed regardless? Damn.
@@BioGoji-zm5ph ye it was a priority issue it was "only" online lol and itbironically would have been fine with hit scan I think it was just an oversight. You could dissapear bullets by blowing up a ghost so big team battle you got tickets or sniped the AR needler were innefective bc half the bullets would be banished to the shadow realm
Damn, this video gave me a massive nostalgia trip
For real
Bro i was on acid when i watched this shit il never forget this i can't even explain it what i experience with the nostalgia while being under the effect halo 2 still has new ways to still show us more perfection 👌
15 years and Halo 1, 2 and 3 are the only games I frequently play from that long ago. Frequently.
Emotional moment.. seeing the last players hold out, until the last one got booted :(
RiP OG Halo 2 online.
I was 11 years old when Halo 2 came out, and i still remember that day quite vividly. Halo was the game that got me into gaming, before that i had never even heard of an xbox. I was incredibly hyped for Halo 2, as were millions of other people, and it was the first thing i probably ever got hyped for, and possibly still the most hyped i have ever been for something. My mom took me to Gamestop for the midnight release, but told me i had to wait until school was over later that day to play. i brought the manual to school, and read the entire thing like 5 times over, showing my friends all the cool new guns and features and stuff. Then i played for probably 10 hours straight when i got home. I remember i would pretend to be sick just to stay home and play Halo 2, and most nights i would get caught playing at 1 in the morning. My parents had to start taking the Xbox power cord with them to bed. For my birthday i threw a big LAN party at my house, ordered 100 buffalo wings, brought every TV in the house into the living room, and played 14 player multiplayer with all my friends. I got like 5 controllers as gifts from friends, and an extra copy of Halo 2. Best birthday ever.
That LAN party sounds awesome, my childhood dream back then haha! All my friends had PS2s, but I managed to convince them to come to Xbox when the 360 arrived, and I have Halo 2 to thank for that!
im so late in playing halo (born 2006 and started playing the whole halo franchise at 8 years old). but at least i got to experience this badass game with just only my cousins and family friends.i remember playing on the couch with my family and I was so much better than everyone and one of my cousins was good as me but still have the strats (strategies) everyone would just be teaming up on me 1 v 4. i said, "if you guys dont kill each other before i kill you,i would win, but if you avoid me and kill each other without you, then one of you would win." of course they ignored it, went all try hard on me and i still beat them. even in 2020 i still beat them on my old xbox 360. and one time, me and my cousins were fighting each other until the ghost of halo came in and we noticed it. the ghost was unstoppable so we restarted
I was 6 months old
Reminds me when my mom let me stay home to beat halo 3 and she left to work and I beat it like 30 mins ever that day was sweet
WHAT INTERNET DO YOU HAVE PLZ TELL ME BECAUSE I CANT EVEN HAVE 5 PPL OVER AND ALL PLAY XBOX
Why do I feel like crying whenever I remember the “Noble 14” and how you couldn’t connect to Xbox Live.
You're not alone. *sobs*
Its a similar thing to seeing something like "last online: 8 years ago"
A group called insignia is bringing back the Original Xbox live servers along with halo 2
Noble 14....Saint 14? Was this Bungie's way to honor them by giving it to a Titan from Destiny 2? O3o well not sure at this point. XD
@@GhostChild808 no the noble 14 are the last 14 halo 2 players online , when reach dropped they has 14 dead Spartans on lone wolf to memorize them
What someone actually cites their sources!?
Shut up and take my like and sub.
To me Halo 2 kinda took online trash talk to a whole new level. This was the game where the t-bagging started. You had beef with your own teammate or an opponent in the match lobby? You settle it by wiping your big hair metal balls on his lifeless body during a match.
You see guys t-bagging someone else while getting shot at in the middle of the map because all that mattered was disrespecting your opponent. Not to mention the friendly fires or a guy riding in the back seat of an opponent's warthog.
Someone insulted you? You send him an invite one v one on Lockout. Thanks for the memories Halo 2
MikeBNumba6 and team killing for the sniper.
Lmao getting called the n word by kids halfway across the world 😂
@@jsiabot3467 Simpler times, better times.
After watching this video all the way thorough I have decided that I would subscribe because this is one of the best content I ever see
Halo 2 had the only online ranking I've ever played that mattered. None of this time based crap. If you were an 18 and lost a match to a bunch of 17s and 16s, you got demoted. Your skill mattered. You didn't max out rank cuz you still live at home and have no life. You never had to wonder how you stack up against the Frey. Nor would you constantly have to get pwned by said no lifers with all the good weapons. You played close to your rank. Some above, so below. It perfectly gauged your skill level, even took HOW you killed into account, something not seen since Goldeneye.
Seriously, I remember always watching my brother and old neighbor play halo2 as teams together and I would get mind blown how high of a rank they would get together, in team Slayer they reached up to the 40's it was crazy! And they would match up with halo emblem type ranks which were like 50 and up, now every online game is "oh you lost? Will still give you XP to level up" lol 🙄 it's literally all time based now and how many shit loads of games you play win or lose just to level up your rank 🙄 lol it's not skill based at all
Why Halo 2 multiplayer is still unmatched til this day perfect matchmaking. Rank system and weapon balance. Best maps too.
it was so simple, i don't get why they don't put it back in. Halo 3 got weird with it and added experience levels and i remember them talking about how you had to use different guns to rank up faster or something. just make it simple, i win, i rank up, i lose, i rank down.
Jonathan Zimmerman?
Yesss i remember how hard it was to get past 30 and anything after like 35 you were getting modders or stand-by laggers lol. I learned to bridge host and got to a 42 and stopped playing slayer lol.
…Spontaneous natural character dialogue.
Sgt. Johnson: DON'T MAKE ME TAKE OFF MY BELT!
Said everyone dad ever
We are getting back the guy who wrote those lines so we can expect that cheesines back in the campaign lol. Only thing I liked from Bungie's stories tbh
@@86Fallowcp I know, bro! I got so excited when I heard the news!
I hope this dude can bring back the glory of Halo CE & 2.
@@DCXRevolution Nah, I just want the glory of Infinite.
@@86Fallowcp I agree with you. But Infinite is being delayed until fall of next year.
I don’t wanna put my expectations too high on Infinite and end up getting Cyberpunk’d.
Such nostalgia, great video mate!
Greetings from Greece!
Thank you so much!
Wait.. why does this only have 1.5k views? I was expecting at least 100 times that! Super well done in terms of video production and research, SameToken.
Thank you so much! This one really was a labour of love, so I'm really glad you enjoyed!
@@SameToken Of course haha. This "Retrospective" series is awesome, keep it up!
125k now
Check out Part 1 (Combat Evolved): th-cam.com/video/M5TW8tMmSMs/w-d-xo.html
And Part 3 (Halo 3): th-cam.com/video/WxOVzehtoKA/w-d-xo.html
25:15 - Huge thank you to everyone for all your support! Had a blast making this one, though it took a little longer than I was expecting. Loads of stuff planned for this year! Also thanks to The Vengeful 'Vadam for providing permission to use his Halo 2 alpha and beta footage, definitely check out his channel: th-cam.com/channels/B1Tv9XrY_vRcIVWkGtmKdw.html. And a shout-out to the final Halo 2 players, you can find all the TH-cam sources in the description!
Edit:
Small mistake at the start - Halo 2 had the highest grossing *opening weekend* of any entertainment product, rather than in general.
Edit 2:
One more slight correction, the error message delaying Halo 2 Vista was pre-existing and not a product of the team porting the game
Loving these retrospective vids m8.
can i please know the piano song that starts at 22:42?
Now you have to do a Halo 3 Retrospective. I join your channel just for these! Awesome videos, I’m such a fan of your channel now.
Are you making a retrospective for Halo 3? I love these retrospectives
Man, as someone who was like 16 when Halo 2 launched, this video really brought back some amazing memories. I was crushed when Halo 2 multiplayer was turned off.
I love the quality of your videos! It's a miracle Halo 2 got released in the state it did. To this day, I think it's one of the best Halo games, in some cases being even better than Halo 3, mostly in its story and characters. I can't wait for it to be released on MCC PC, I'll try to play it as soon as it comes out
Halo 2 was the last game my dad and I coop-played together. I sure miss him. The levels were so much fun then, but no other Halo game has been the same without him.
I gotta say, I'm young enough that seeing the world trade center collapse is one of my earliest memories. Halo CE and 2 absolutely dominated my early childhood (and Jurassic park). I knew everything there was to know. I lived every moment in those games and wholeheartedly love them. This really brought me back and I'm so glad to have been a part of it.
Wasn't even able to play Halo 2 on Xbox Live when I was younger, yet still it's such an amazing game that it is still to this day my favorite game of all time.
21:35 windows vista... * gagging noises *
I can’t think of a more reviled operating system in the history of computers.
@@MapleTree0 For most people it was the compatibility issues and the annoying nature of the User Account Control, which was set to either On or Off, with no middle ground. In Windows 7, the UAC was given a middle ground that made it far less intrusive, and most compatibility issues were resolved.
Personally, I love the visual aesthetic of Vista's AERO interface, but it was also a huge resource hog in many ways. I never hated Vista the way many other people do, but I can certainly understand why they found it difficult to use.
Windows ME was worse.
@@shred1894 Oh, definitely. At least Vista actually worked.
shred1894 I think they may have taken the software engineer responsible for that out back and shot him.
Windows ME
“Don’t make me take off my belt”
Pretty much the six week crunch to release halo 2, is the story of all of my school projects, except 2 hours instead of six weeks
And today, we returned to Halo 2.
Back and better than ever.
Can't wait for halo 3. Definitely the biggest game in my life when I was a teen.
Even after all these years hearing martys epilogue from halo 2 and having that electric guitar kick in still gives me chills. Long live halo, even if it died post-reach and even if 343's attempts to revive it this christmas fail, halo will always be remembered for what it was, a masterpiece.
I remember playing online on Halo 2 the very last day.
"You're so ugly, the tears run down the back of your head" - Sgt. Johnson
Good times.
This is an amazing mini documentary, love your attention to detail. Keen for the retrospective of Halo 3!
You should also get a Patreon going, your channel deserves the support
Halo 2 changed the gaming landscape. If Combat Evolved with the first, then the entire landscape shifted with the second
Should've talked more about legendary difficulty.
"So, in comparison to Combat Evolved's challenging but fair Legendary difficulty, Halo 2's Legendary diffi-" immediately gets sniped by a Jackal.
Gohan we all know how that would go, pew gaahhhh pew nughhhhhh pew every death noise, pew is jackel sniper
Imo people greatly overexaggerate halo 2's difficulty.
@@BioGoji-zm5ph Oh its much more than that. You're the second weakest entity in the game, second to only flood infection form.
@@infinitechoices1641 No. No, we do not.
Dual wielding definitely was fun... if you only dual-wielded Needlers. Every weapon received a noticeable damage reduction when dual-wielding (except the neutered Magnum oddly enough), making the feature useless on higher difficulties unless you were using Needlers or the Noob-Combo. While this balance is fine in multiplayer, it is frustrating in the Campaign, where you face enemies that have far more health and shields than the player, in addition to multiple enemies of various types, often at the same time.
Basically, the dual-wielding function suffered from a problem that plagued most of Bungie's Halo titles after CE... which was the refusal or fear of having the campaign sandbox be balanced differently than the multiplayer sandbox, even when it made sense for the campaign to have a different set of balances than multiplayer because of its different gameplay environment.
One of, if not the biggest selling point was a flop. This was a bug reason I was still playing CE when 3 came out lol. Halo 2 looked the part bit never lived up to it's predecessor for me...
Halo 2 was genuinely life changing for me as a teenager. I have dozens of friends from the clans that I still talk to and have never met. No other game has given me those connections
damn imagine being the last person on halo 2 it would be like a last stand on reach, an unwinable fight
Wonder how's the world where Halo 2 was totally completed.
Halo 1-3 (including ODST & Reach) were definitely a “you had to be there” thing. It’s hard to overstate how huge Halo was culturally. I’m sure a lot of todays teenagers don’t really think much of Halo, but it really was something special back in the day.
When are game devs gonna learn that we'd rather have the finished product than have the thing rushed to us half baked?
Its not about devs its about the people above them who make them get them out
@@NoSleepDaChimney Not in this case.
I think it depends on the publisher, dunno why they rush it this much though
the crew behind no man's sky had to release their game unfinished, but it's honestly a fairly respectable game now that they have had time to pretty much rebuild it from the foundation up
so dont lose hope just yet
Dude I've worked on large projects (non gaming) with loads of crunch, trust me every single working on something like that with so much effort and time put only wants for it be finished properly. But as always, there's people above that mandate that rush, they just want it on time.
Believe me it feels so awful when your work goes out rushed and sucks because you didn't have just a bit longer to finish it.
this vid was really cool! Chill vibes too! :)
I admit it, i shed multiple tears watching this
i love how he mentions the noble 14 at the end
I'd like to highlight how awesome the teaser trailer for Halo 2 is:
There is no mention of Thel Vadamee/The Arbiter, or the prophets.
It is not made of pre-rendered CG.
It has no actual gameplay.
What it is, is an in-engine short film/tech demo that features Downes and Taylor reprising their roles from the first game (As Chief and Cortana) that gives us both a recap of CE, and a basic outline of the direction the game would take, ending on an early version of the "What if you miss" setpiece.
If that's not a Teaser, I don't know what is.
These videos are amazing! Keep them coming please!
Thank you, really glad you're enjoying them!
I really can't wait for the retrospective of the third one. Watching your 1st and 2nd videos (this one) was so enjoyed by me with a little of memories passing through my eyes meanwhile listening. I literary can't wait to fully imerge in good times again.
This game is such a big part of my life. I know how that will Will sound to a bunch of you, but it really is. I first played this game when I was 13 years old, I'm now 28 years old and I still know some of the people that were on my friends list. I feel like this was a special moment in time, that made bonds that were super strong but will never be forgotten. It was its own golden age, its own Renaissance in a way. Nothing will ever come close to how this game made me feel The music to this game still gives me chills., The soulfulness of epilogue will forever feel my heart with sorrow, for a time that will never come back. It's so crazy how powerfully I feel about this game.
I knew a couple who married after meeting in Halo multi player! This game was such a huge part of that generation's lives. I am an old fart but I still love Halo. Currently slogging my way through the MCC, Heroic on PC. So glad to be able to play and re visit these games. I had only really played and finished Halo 3 up until recently. Played Reach, Now on CE, Two Betrayals level. I am chomping at the bit to get to Halo 2! I hate The Flood.
Halo CE and Halo 2 are beautiful masterpieces. I always felt that 3 felt too short, too rushed. I remember being apprehensive about the changes from CE to 2, but Halo 2 won me over quickly. Marty's score was always a highlight. I miss the good old days of Halo, easily some of my favorite memories.
Really? because i always felt like Halo 2 felt rushed and pretty halfbaked. I very clearly remember reading about how rushed and wonky the development was and thinking to myself"Ah. That explains everything".
Granted, since i never owned an original XBox i grew up playing Halo 1 and then when i got an 360 i played Halo 3, and only after that did i play Halo 2. But i always felt Halo 2 couldn't measure up to any of the other Halos. It just felt so... clunky. Especially the campiagn with it's mid-level loading times and overabundance of wave-defense sections where you couldn't progress and had to stand there to wait for stuff to happen.
Halo 2 was the start of the "Last online _ years ago" friends you refuse to remove from your friends list. Far too many on my old Xbox 360 account...
Always love watching your videos. I knew Halo 2 went through development hell, but I actually had no idea that Halo 3's plot was the intended 3rd act for Halo 2. I always learn something from watching your videos. Good luck in your final semester at university and I'll look forward to more of your content in the future! Thank you again, Mr. Token.
Thank you very much!!
Friends: See you tomorrow Geo
Me: Goodnight guys
*starts up Halo 2 and trys to log in xbox live*
*gets booted 2-5 times*
Me: what? The internet might be acting up again.
*trys to log in 2 hours later*
Me: Huh, thats weird.
*Gets call from my cousin*
Cousin: The Xbox LIVE servers have been discontinued.
Me: No... it can't be, you are lying!
Cousin: I wish I were
*checks on the web for info*
*sees that my cousin was not lying*
I cried myself to sleep those next few months hoping that they would fix the issue but little did I know that it was gone for good. Now knowing that I might never see my friends again.
I get sad watching Halo retrospectives. I get sad because I know I'm never going to experience a game or its sequels the same way again. I was lucky to grow up with Halo and XBL. The times I've had, the friends I've made... Man... Halo was, in my mind, my generations Star Wars (The original trilogy) and it brought us all together. All the laughs, all the broken controllers... If I could go back in my life to any point, it would be to relive my teenage years kickin' it on XBL shooting the shit with my friends.
If you bothered to read this I'm sure you might feel similar. And I just want to let you know that there is someone out there that feels the same way. I miss the good ol' days.
Can i just say that xbox was the worst thing about halo for a long time. Thise of us who had a pc and didnt have money for a console just had to watch everyone else have fun when it wouldnt have killed them to port the sequels a little sooner.
Why did I get so emotional with that ending tho.....
I didn’t even get to play Halo 2 online.......why did that hit so hard......
Awesome video dude, can’t wait for all future installments of this, retrospective, series :3
the cliffhanger ending of halo 2 is probably why halo 3 was so anticipated and so successful
I know I’m a late viewer, but in all honesty dude, you kill it with these halo videos! From the research, to the commentary, to the editing, it’s all 110%
Absolutely amazing, Token. This video has the production and script values of a TV company.
It is faultless. Thank you. 👍😁
Really happy you enjoyed, thanks so much!
Stellar content as always. Thank you! And best of luck in your Spring semester.
Thank you!!
Ha.. stellar.
5:53 "Jason Jones' theory for E3 was to have more balls"
WellThen.jpg
This is still the pinnacle of Halo. The campaign may have not been as balanced or fun as CE but everything else eclipsed it and has never fully been overthrown.
Dang, that part where the original multiplayer was shutdown really hit hard. You deserve way more subscribers and views.
I never got to experience Halo 2 the way so many others did (because I never had an Xbox, only got a 360) but this video really makes me appreciate the love, care and hardwork that went into building this franchise. Really great video and all the best for uni submissions!
Seeing that Friends List... My heart..
I knew how much I loved it H2, but I never knew how much I would miss it.
Why is it raining inside my house?
I can't be the only one that cried...
that was an amazing retrospective.
Since you dont seem to stop making quality halo videos i have no choice but to subscribe!
Halo 2 was impressive, but for me there was a significant downgrade in the campaign level design in terms of lateral scale.
It felt like a series of bigger & smaller corridors, but there were none of the wide-open and nonlinear level sections like we saw in Combat Evolved with the Silent Cartographer, Halo, and Assault on the Control Room levels, there was less of an eerie alien sense of mystery to the environments with long quiet periods of stealth & exploration ( which hasn't been quite recaptured since), and in my opinion, dual wielding hurt the weapons sandbox by effectively nerfing many weapons and making them less viable on their own.
And I'm not sure if I ever liked the change to the health system, Chief had armour on, and it made no sense that after the energy shields were down he might as well have been wearing a tutu underneath. It also meant there was less sense of risk & weighing up the pros & cons of pushing through a position, and that you could push further, but there would be a cost.
I hope these areas are addressed by Halo: Infinite
Halo 2's multiplayer was unquestionably a huge improvement though
Hey everyone! Im still playing halo 2 with xlinkai. Theres at least 40 people still playing everyday. Come relive the glory years. I have been having so much fun. I just got home from playing halo ce campain with my little bro (9yo) for the first time. I about cried as he was laughing and having so much fun. Come join me and my friends online. Im sure well have fun. :) peace
So many great times with friends on XBL...people who i'd never met in real life but played and laughed for hours with on H2. The friends list on H2 was fantastic.
I will never forget my H2 experiences.
I was in my first year of college when halo2 dropped. I sent my gf to get it cause I couldn't leave her dorm case it was a only female. Two hours later with standing in line I had halo 2 in my hands. I played all night on legendary, to only make it to the 2nd level. When I looked outside and saw daylight creeping up. I turned off my box and got ready for class. When I arrived in class there was a handful of us and the professor walked in saying where is everybody? I answered with probably playing halo2 since it just got released last night. Every looked back at me so I added yeah I haven't slept yet. The professor wrapped it up pretty shortly and I run back to my gf dorm to keep playing. Halo will always hold a special place in my heart; with all the friends I made, playing with family and probably caused a break up lol long live halo
I'll never forget that first demo. I watched it probably thousands of times. Watching Chief hijack that ghost was so badass. I was just a boy but I'm pretty sure that it made me grow a beard. I think that demo kicked in my puberty, lol.
Thank god they didn't call it quits. Halo is the only FPS I've ever enjoyed or even cared about.
I can't believe that it's been so long since I've picked up Halo 2. Got an Xbox 360 in 2006 when I was 6, & minutes after coming home my uncle stopped by and heard the news. He gave me a paper pocket with a disc inside. It was his copy of Halo 2 that he got during launch night in 04, however upon starting a family he put down the gaming controller and passed on the game to me.
Me and my brothers for the next decade would play splitscreen and have LAN parties with the neighborhood kids until the 360 red ring and the disc broke apart...
Yes, I played 3 and Reach and 4 as they came out, but none of them held me with the consistency that 2 did.
halo 2 was the pinnacle, its not just your kid nostalgia either, i was 18 in 06' and loved it just as much.
R Bowden I get that same feeling from 1-3 tbh
Halo CE was the epitome of everything that makes Halo such a classic imo
This gives me goosebumps I can remember playing halo 2 on Xbox live for days, I remember I would wake up every single weekend to go play halo in the living room before my brother would wake up when we share the same Xbox. Better times
I love this so much, can't wait for a halo 3 video and more, keep up the good work
I'm glad that this video still exists. Due to some serious messed up drama, I had to delete my original channel. I don't really have any plans to create new content on TH-cam but if you wish to update the link to my current channel here, you may.
I never got into Halo 2, it's the only true Halo I never played (Halo 4 and so on aren't Halo games)... I just had too much fun playing CE
When you mentioned that noble 14, i immediately cried despite already knowing. It;s just a tragic end to a beloved era/experience
Fire content dude. Definitely surprised how great and well organized your content is yet not having a ton of subs. Good shit dude keep it up.
Halo infinite seems like they got the story back on track and it looks like it’s gonna be a great edition to the franchise, guess we will wait and see
Lol
Fun Fact: Halo 2 Vista still gets updates and has been changed to project cartographer instead.
Although the raycevick video was better, I thoroughly enjoyed this, please make more
I can see now why the game coming of Halo 2 is a papercastle.
Also removing Assault rifle, the most iconic Halo weapon was a huge mistake.
The noble 14 tho. What heroes. Not disconnecting for a month shows dedication. Apache n4sir is a hero. Change my mind
THANKYOU. This video was FANTASTIC. One of the best videos I've ever seen done on a Halo game and I've seen them all... Thank you for all the time and effort you put in to making this.
Amazing video, thank you so much for this. I was 10 years old when Halo 2 released. I remember my Dad coming home shortly after its release with a copy of it. I even remember the strange detail of the yellow price sticker on the case. I used to watch my Dad playing and it wasn't long before I got an xbox of my own, and Halo went on to form a huge part of my childhood memories and a huge part of my life.
Really glad you enjoyed, and thanks for sharing! It's amazing the memories we pick up that once seemed insignificant, yet we become nostalgic about years later. Halo 2 definitely does this for me too, I remember my Dad downloading the thumbnail-sized E3 gameplay in 2003. I was in awe as it lagged and stuttered on our old iMac.
Wow, I've watched alot of halo 2 documentarys and man, you smashed out of the park! I mean you've actually taught me more then I knew before. That's pretty awesome!
This was a really well made video. I'm surprised it doesn't have more views right now. The commentary felt a little choppy at times, but your points came across really well regardless. Halo 2 is my favorite Halo game, and seeing how it all came to fruition was a really cool experience. Thank you for making this!
This video was beautifully put together. These halo videos are some of the best halo content you can find
Halo 2 tried and did improve many things from the original Halo and added new elements, *however* from 1 to 3 its the worst and 3 is the best.
This is still the pinnacle of Halo. The campaign may have not been as balanced or fun as CE but everything else eclipsed it and has never fully been overthrown.
Halo 3 is the pinnacle of Halo
When the online got disconnected... it hurt
halo 2 was my favorite game, But must say all of the halo games have a special place in my heart!
It’s amazing how Halo 2 was originally going to be the last Halo game. Unfortunately that didn’t happen. I loved Halo every game Bungie made but with 343 at the helm it feels different now
you mean "fortunately" halo 2 was not the last halo, because we would not have gotten halo 3, ODST or reach.
thelasthallow It can go both ways. If it were to have ended on the (originally planned ending, it would’ve been amazing to the series. All good things must come to an end, and don’t need an explanation)
But on the other hand yeah, I couldn’t imagine a world without the later entries. Reach, ODST, 3.
@5:53 , here is how we ended up with all the mess in video game industry ... FUDGE
Please do a retrospective on Both Halo 3 ODST and Halo 3 on one video
Damn, i just dropped a tear, so much good memories :')
Halo 2's greatest achievement was making the the hottest version of Cortana
why dont u have more subs???
Thank you for helping me relive some of my most cherished gaming memories. Halo is where everything online started for me.
Great job sir!
Halo 2 and the OG Xbox were amazing, there is a charm to them that will never be lost
Mechanically halo 2 is held together by duct tape. It's a miracle it's as good as it is