Narcogen and Trindacut examine the second level of Halo 3, A Crow's Nest, for Anger, Sadness & Envy, the official podcast of Bungie fansite Rampancy.net. Features include an interview with the Prophet of Truth, changes to voice actors, and Halo 3's equivalent of the Jackal sniper: the invincible Brute chieftain.
This is the plain MP3 version, for use in a flash-based web player or for those who prefer the MP3 format.
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Anonymous (not verified)
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest
Please. Please. On the next podcast please don't do the Narcogen on the left and Trindacut on the right speaker. It gets very distracting when you get audio artifacts on the opposite speaker. I was listening at work and only placed one earbud in my ear. It took me about 30 seconds to realize that I was only listening to Trindacut's side of the podcast.
Anonymous (not verified)
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest (MP3)
I've got to say, your interpretation of what the story would have been is interesting, but I think you vested a little too much in it to be satisfied by what the truth is.
Of course, when you get your hands on Contact Harvest you'll learn a little bit more about Truth, and you'll understand he does know a lot more then everyone else. He knows the Humans are the Forerunner's "children" in that they inherited the Forerunner's goods. He also has shown active rebellion against an "Oracle" the Covenant have found before, showing that in some small parts he might not all be about going on the Great Journey. Certainly, he believes in it...almost all Covenant members do, if they did not they would not fight so fiercely. However, he is a manipulator through and through, and perhaps when he had been "transcended" he would have gone on a mission to remove all others in his way. He is deluded, but not foolish I suppose.
narcogen
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest
In reply to: Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's NestYeah we won't be doing that again.
Rampant for over se7en years.
narcogen
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest (MP3)
In reply to: Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest (MP3)That's good to hear :)
Rampant for over se7en years.
Anonymous (not verified)
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest
Is this only encoded for play on iTunes? I have tried to play it on multiple machines in Windows Media Player and the Zune Player and cannot get either Episode 1 or 2 to play. I really want to hear you commentary :)
Anonymous (not verified)
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest (MP3)
I think you're very mistaken as far as your interpretation of Marty and Joe's discussion in the commentary.
From what I picked up, [i]Michael Wincott's[/i] voice sounded like someone "you could possibly be friends with" as in when you play as the Arbiter in Halo 2 he doesn't sound completely overbearing, but rather like a respected General or something that cares about his subordinates "The hopes of all the Covenant rest on your shoulders, Chieftan..." The way Wincott's voice sounds and the way it is delivered, regardless of how "raspy" it is, sounds encouraging, and nothing like the delivery of ANY of Truth's lines in Halo 3. In Halo 3 on the other hand, now that Truth's betrayal of the Arbiter had come and gone, there was no reason to insert Wincott's touch of ambiguity into Truth's voice- in Halo 3, as voiced by Terrence Stamp, Truth is pure malevolence and evil.
narcogen
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest
In reply to: Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's NestCheck the link above for the plain MP3 version. It should play on anything.
Episode 1 we only produced in a plain MP3, so I can't think of any reason why that wouldn't play. However, I don't have a Zune to test on, so I haven't tried it myself.
Rampant for over se7en years.
Anonymous (not verified)
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest (MP3)
In reply to: Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest (MP3)Also, I thought that your discussion on the Crow's Nest "big brute encounter" was kinda blown out of proportion. Even on legendary, it can be surgically dealt with, with little frustration.
1. In the encounter previous, rip off a turret with full 200 ammo.
2. Open the door, drop the turret in the cup of the slotted military cover thing, and from that slot, shoot each one of the twelve bursts of your battle rifle at the Chieftan's head. Before he is able to turn on his invincibility, the last burst will enter his unhelmeted cranium.
3. Pick up the turret again, and move forward one row of cover, still on the bottom. As brutes come down to investigate one by one (every time), fill them full of lead and retreat to recharge your shields before the next one comes around the corner. If you take each one out with the turret, your shields will never go all the way down, but if by some fluke chance two of them can get shots/grenades off at you around a corner at once, use the architectural features of the raised portholes to evade them.
4. All but one or two brutes will be dead, the ones that didn't come to investigate will be easy pickings with your turret even when you leave cover if you barrage them well because even taking 2 one at a time on legendary with no cover with a turret, you will not die.
5. Take the invincibility and the hammer, and get ready to own the brutes/fuel rod chieftan in the ops center with no fear of death.
Your interpretation that Bungie rewarded the player for using the grav lifts by putting a close quarters weapon like the shotgun up there is unfounded, because there are two weapon racks on each side of the corridor on the BOTTOM, each with shotguns in them.
By the way, I've loved your site for years and it's great to hear this kind of discussion about Halo on your podcast. :D
I think your listener base will grow, but I honestly don't know why more people don't visit R.net anyways. Your site and the Halo Story Page are my two favorite Halo sites ever when they're updated regularly (which you have been doing to a great extent prior to and in the wake of Halo 3's release).
Anonymous (not verified)
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest
In reply to: Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's NestWell, the Zune was just another test. I tried playing it in WMP on 2 machines so far with no luck. Seems strange...what codec was used to encode it for MP3?
Anton P Nym
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest
In reply to: Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's NestI too cannot play the file at the 'plain mp3' link on either of two machines in WMP, despite updating codecs on both. The only way I got to listen to the first podcast was to dust off iTunes, download that, convert it to mp3, and then shunt it to my laptop by network.
Dunno what's causing the hiccup, but WMP10 conks out every time.
-- Steve
narcogen
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest
In reply to: Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's NestWeird. We'll try to figure that one out before the next episode-- would you mind testing a file before we post that to make sure we've got it right?
Rampant for over se7en years.
Anton P Nym
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest
In reply to: Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's NestOrdinarily I'd say "yes", but I'm having trouble with my Internet connection at home right now... so I couldn't guarantee a timely reply. (Dammit.)
-- Steve
narcogen
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest (MP3)
In reply to: Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest (MP3)I went back and checked and have to say I support my original interpretation.
Play the clip over again; the commentary track only references Wincott, not Stamp, but it's clear they think they made Halo 2's Truth sound too evil. In fact, if you have the DVD that came with the special editions, play the commentary track with the 2nd subtitle track on-- it provides a transcript:
Staten: "I think one of the tactical errors we might have made, Marty, is in the world where we wanted to convince people that Truth wasn't the worst guy in the world..."
Marty: (laughs) How in the world was that ever something we thought would actually happen?"
Staten: "Don't get me wrong. Michael Wincott, genius performance. "
Marty: "Yes, but he's never going to make you feel like he was going to be, possibly be your friend."
Staten: (laughs)
I think that's pretty unambiguous.
For all of Stamp's bluster, look at the final confrontation with the Arbiter-- no threats, no harassment. He does accuse the Elites in general of betrayal, but for all we know, he might actually believe it. He sounds like he does. I'd never have thought that of Wincott's Truth.
Despite having betrayed him, Truth believes he is serving the Great Journey and that the Arbiter should appreciate that. I don't think he's "evil" at all and in the end I think that's where the conflict with him gets its moral aspect. He has to be stopped, but must be destroyed in order to achieve that because he can't be bargained with, because his beliefs do not allow him any room to compromise his goals.
Thanks for listening to the podcast and for your feedback!
Rampant for over se7en years.
Anonymous (not verified)
Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest (MP3)
In reply to: Re: Anger, Sadness And Envy Episode 2: Crow's Nest (MP3)[quote]The way Wincott's voice sounds and the way it is delivered, regardless of how "raspy" it is, sounds encouraging, and nothing like the delivery of ANY of Truth's lines in Halo 3. In Halo 3 on the other hand, now that Truth's betrayal of the Arbiter had come and gone, there was no reason to insert Wincott's touch of ambiguity into Truth's voice- in Halo 3, as voiced by Terrence Stamp, Truth is pure malevolence and evil.[/quote]
I wholeheartedly [b]disagree[/b]!
Wincott's performance was genius, it was wrong of Bungie to change the voice actor. Even the accent was different. It ruined the game for me and is the sole reason I refuse to purchase it.
Rockslider
Motor pool and more
Hi guys. I've finally been getting a listen to a few of your podcasts - specifically the first two, so far. Here's a bit of belated feedback, mainly on the second one.
I got something quite useful out of the Crow's Nest talk. You mentioned the grav lifts in the motor pool Brute encounter and I didn't know about using those at all. After that, I fired up the level and had some fun using them to get upstairs like you said. And I realized that I also hadn't noticed the little weaponry side-rooms up there before! Well, they are kind of dark. So thanks for the tip.
You were talking about how nasty things are if you try to fight from downstairs near your entry point, and I wished I could've butted into the discussion there. With a battle rifle or carbine you can do LOTS of damage quite safely from the bottom of the ramp, maybe even taking down the guy with the funny hat - which will certainly be one less thing to worry about! You can even backtrack for more ammo while the door remains open (it seems to remain open as long as you don't advance too far).
But sheesh, doesn't it annoy you when doors close behind you? Halo 3 is really bad for closing stuff off, and don't even get me started about the rediculous mystery-rockslide business. To me it's a bit symptomatic of what's going on with H3. The power of the 360 let Bungie take two steps forward in what they can do, but some of their design decisions took them one step back. Arrgh! Or did I mean three steps back? Depends on how mean I'm feeling today.
I explored fighting upstairs but found that things can get pretty hairy using those side-areas for cover, when Brutes come up. I especially had to watch out for blasts from a Brute shot, fired from over on the other side. Admittedly Brutes do also close in on you when you're down below, but below I think you've got better cover and evasion possibilities; and if you have the patience to stay back on the ramp and pick off enemies one at a time, there's very little danger at all. Still, it's nice to have that grav lift option and I expect I'll continue to use it for variety.
On another matter, wow, you guys talked a LOT about the voice changes! I clocked that as a good 18 minutes, with another 10 minutes of related follow-up. I have to admit, I was tearing my hair out for you to get on to some actual gameplay talk, but it wasn't until about 38:34 that you said "Moving on to the level itself...". Phew! I guess you made a conscious plan to just pick out a few aspects to discuss in depth, but for what it's worth, more gameplay talk please!
As for the voice-change thing, I hadn't really been aware that Miranda Keyes and Truth had changed, but then again H2 is somewhat of a distant memory for me. In any case I'm not deeply into the storyline business, so Truth has only ever been a peripheral character to me; just another miscellaneous baddie that I briefly met in my limited time playing H2. But although the voice changes haven't affected me, I certainly agree that it's not good for voicing to change.
But my own trouble is that whenever I hear Truth, I see Terence Stamp's face. That's the trouble with using well-known people, though I guess he's not as well known outside the UK. Plus there's nothing even remotely alien about his voice. That really detracts from things. It's not an alien we're up against, it's just... Terence Stamp. And apparently he's got religion REAL bad.
Anyway, keep it up cyborg dudes, and ta very much. I'll be catching up with the Tsavo podcast soon I hope.