What is your favorite Halo aesthetically speaking?

Reach, in retrospect, was a very good looking game. Especially compared to 343 titles. That being said when it first came out I ragged on it for looking overly generic and militarized, psuedo call of dutyish. And I stand by that. It's a great looking game, but halo ce and 3 are both better.

 

Yeah I'm going with H3 on this one. Especially the Forerunner details and architecture never looked better imo. I mean the Forerunner aesthetics from Guardian are much better than Coliseum for example. Loved the oldschool Bungiestyle. The floors of Epitaph and stuff like that were great too. Also one of the first things crossed my mind were some walls in CE, the ones with all the small pieces of crystal in it. Man that looked great in 2001 lol

 

Halo 3: ODST Mombasa Streets > Halo 3 > Halo Reach > Halo CE >> Halo 2 > Halo 3: ODST >>>>> Halo 5 > Halo 4

 

I liked the aesthetics in Reach when you armor lock

 

1st: Halo 3. Without question. The Ark especially was soooo beautiful.
2nd: ODST. The atmosphere was incredible.
3rd: Halo 2: I personally loved the feeling given by the Delta Halo missions and the High Charity missions. Quarantine Zone still makes me puke to this day though.

Does this include remakes??

 

Halo 4 is still the most beautiful video game I have ever played.

 

I concur

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Halo 4 looked too noisy at every corner and grungy at best. I cringe when i think about the textures on that game.

--- Double Post Merged, May 21, 2016 ---

I concur

--- Double Post Merged, May 21, 2016 ---

I concur and I concur

 

I concur... about the jimmies rustling...

 

http://imgur.com/gallery/nXD38

 

H3 and Reach were sharp and clear, even if they were in dark environments. H4 maps in comparison seemed cloudy, foggy, or misty no matter how bright the lighting might be, and that was a real turn off for me. I just don't enjoy that type of ambiance.

In fact I would add that H4 took a HUGE turn for the worse in this regard and I made this observation many times since its release. One canvas that was not like this was Impact. It was sharp and beautiful, perhaps the most beautiful of all the H4 maps. Forge Island lacked sharpness; Erosion was noisy and gloomy; Exile looked like a freaking cartoon; Ragnarok was ok, but it lacked sharpness I think; Complex was too noisy visually; Abandon, Meltdown, Shatter, Solace, Vortex, wreckage, and Perdition all were misty/cloudy/foggy. Haven was not "misty", but in so many ways it may as well have been. Every map suffered from what seemed like a lack of visual focus, and Haven was one of the worse.

And I haven't even begun on which maps are "over rusted"...

 

I say that Halo 3 was the most aesthetically pleasing to me, and i like to think that I am not saying that solely because of nostalgia factor. In my opinion, Halo struck an almost perfect balance between gritty and colorful. Everything had nice variety in color and felt alive, yet didn't feel like it was over vibrant or distracting. Furthermore, i think the level of detail was excellent. High enough that you could see damaged areas and a variety of settings and tidbits, yet wasn't excessive or completely unnecessary.

I do think that Reach nailed the Spartans though. And I think it edges out out Halo 3 MP Spartans solely because the Spartans have minimal wear on their armor in H3 (whereas Chief's armor is absolutely gorgeous in campaign in H3.) I liked Reach's darker Spartan colors and tones and their symmetrical, balanced use of the secondary color without overshadowing the PRIMARY color.

Plus, Reach had a true dark Sage color worthy of the MC himself. H5 Moss is a weak contender in comparison.

 

I tend to favour the more gritty, realistic aesthetics, so Halo: Reach and the Halo 2: Anniversary campaign (in-game, not the prerendered cutscenes) take the top spots for me, although there are exceptions to this. For example, I really hate the Halo: Reach Assault Rifle, and think it's the worst of the 4 different AR designs.

However, if I were asked which aesthetics are used to create the best atmosphere, definitely Halo 3: ODST.

That said, each of the Halo games have good points and bad points in aesthetics, in my opinion, and I even like bits of Halo 4 and 5's aesthetics, which are the worst in my opinion.

 

Reach gets my vote and Halo 2 Anniversary is up there with it. If only the lighting had been designed with gameplay in mind for H2A I think I'd have appreciated it a lot more, but when you're just watching it's a very good looking game.

EDIT: I had the MP in mind, but the H2A Campaign is imo the best example of Halo aesthetics overall. Saber didn't quite get it perfect with CEA, but I really think they nailed it with H2A.

 

I wholly agree with you, Preacher. Halo's current artistic style needs to return to more a simple, humble approach... preferably to the year 1999:

 

What does kissing dads have to do with anything. It makes me more sane because I did not waste that much time of my life. Please these insults could be much better.

 

Reach.

Really clean sound design, unobtrusive weapon viewmodels, no HUD clutter, and really simple plain graphics. No extreme post processing or anything like that.

 

I think more people would like Reach if there was as much forerunner stuff in it as halo 3 had.

 

I think there's a meaningful distinction to be made, because in one sense Reach had more grey forerunner bullshit scenery than any game before or after.

 

Not once have I played Reach, looked at a wall, and been like, "Wow, what horrible details"

Halo 5 on the other hand...