a big boy

err... did I accidently stumble into IGN? I don't know why you're all getting so wound up by post, I couldn't care less so long as games of this quality are still being made. I was just saying that I'm interested is all.

Tick, tock. Shame the article doesn't mention how many copies will need to be sold before Microsoft break even on Xbox.

Surely they're taking the piss? Where's the video?

They will both sell anything.

EA are the TK Max of the videogames industry. This is a good thing.

Ho Evolution, anyone?

Yeah, Half Life co-op on PS2 is the best co-op I've ver played a mile. I love that they actually made new levels with two players in mind and managed to make it run parallel to the single player game. Genius. The controls aren't nearly as bad as you might think either.

Everyone should experience the original's Legendary mode on the first five levels. Multiplayer aside, these are the franchises brightest moments, in my opinion.

FFS is there anything Future haven't taken over and ruined now? I always enjoyed PC Zone when I got it but due to a ridiculously out of date PC, a PS2 and Xbox haven't bought it for a few years. Are there any online archives for that column you mentiond?

Emptying a needler into a brute isn't enough to kill it?

The needler was still one of the best weapons in the original once you learnt how to use it properly, the difference here is exactly that the grunts use them properly now where as they'd treat them like a plasma pistol before.

Am I wrong in thinking that camouflaged Elites have a weaker shield thank normal ones? I was playing the other day and was managing to take them down with just my battle rifle. I agree, though, for all the ways they've improved the game, there's just a few areas where the perfect balance of the original seems to have been sidelined for the sake of making a harder game. I’m starting to think of Heroic in the same way as Legendary in the original, as the way the game is meant to be played, and Legendary just as being there for a stupidly hard challenge.

The brute shot's great against Jackals. Just fire one shot into the middle of a group and watch them fly.

I agree, though invisible and high ranking elites aside the AI for Halo has always been such that you need to kill the Covenant, rather than the other way around. If they actually did chase you certain sections on the first game, let alone this one, would be practically impossible. Has anyone found any use for the magnum, by the way? I certainly haven't...

Is this for sure? If so, that's just stupid. Annoying thing is, Legendary's so tough it's hard to find an opportuinty to test this out.

In Delta Halo on Lege, it's actually not that hard if you just use all available cover (this also means running back through the level whenever a drop ship appears), take out grunts first and use plasma pistol + battle rifle on elites. And IIRC plasma grenades have always killed elites in one for me...

There's not much point in debating this but my impression of Halo 2 is that the graphics, particularly as far as special effects like needler and grenade explosions are concerned, have been compromised a bit so that the whole thing could run faster.

FFS I'm going to have to go and buy a GameCube now, aren't I?

Burger King in Guildford does Big Kings for 99p.

Not many people know this but if the "sandwich artist" serving you doesn't offer you double meat, you can claim a free drink. Anyway, the best subway by far is: roast chicken lettuce tomato olives vinegar

So once you properly get into it, it's no harder than the original? I fully expect to have it completed by the end of the week, then. Hey Pete, I bunked college to play an 8 player system-link game today. It was the best thing ever. Especially because I won (most of the time). Can you sort that out for us in Durham?

Actually, I think that's the most annoying thing about the sniping Jackals. With Halo single player I was truly immense. I would literally almost never die and would strut around these areas I previosly thought impossible. There was literally no scenario my mad skillz couldn't save me from. The problem was I never knew whether I was this good because I actually was this good or because I already knew the locations of every individual enemy and the best strategy for taking them down. Halo 2 Legendary, I thought, would provide a fresh slate with which to test just how mad my mad skillz are. Therefore to learn that certain sections of the game actually are impossible without prior knowledge of what enemies are where and what guns you need to kills them is extremely disappointing. Not to say it’s not still the best game ever, of course.

Exactly. It's a fantastic game, no doubt, but if there's one thing that pisses me off about single player it's when the odds are just unrealistically stacked against you. Don't get me wrong, as someone that completed the first game on Legendary more times than is probably healthy, I relish the challenge of the sequel, but when you can look at something like the unshielded and pathetic looking jackals being twice as tough as Master Chief, that's not just hard, that's fucking stupid.

Mum music: Coldplay, Keane, Dido, Norah Jones, Jamie Cullum, Travis, etc.