They still aren't interesting though. (Destiny)

by Jabberwok, Tuesday, October 07, 2014, 11:07 (3937 days ago) @ Numinar

I think it's a mixed bag, sometimes they are great, sometimes they suck.

Certainly no worse than the Brutes from Halo 3 though, and often way better.

Played the daily Story last night solo. Those missions are making a much better impression on me now than when I first went through. Had to use every skill, weapon and all my mobility to get through.

The stealthed melee guys were one hitting me. It was so intense. The final encounter is amazing, with about 6 or 7 waves without a checkpoint to fall back to.

Reminded me of the better encounters from Halo CE Legendary. I eventually learned not to stay scoped in for more than a few seconds, kept spinning to see where the stealth bastards were and be ready on the quick-swap to Invective. When the boss did show up I had my emergency panic rockets to unload, it was glorious.

I dunno, as far as communicating actions to the player, I thought the H3 brutes did it pretty well. Mainly because they spoke English, which makes it a lot easier. Often times, when I was hiding around the corner with a shotgun, I'd hear them talk about flushing me out, or using grenades. Other than that, though, they maybe weren't as iconic as some of the other enemies. The H1 elites were some of the best, because they had really obvious tells that you could predict. I remember Bungie people making fun of the way brutes behaved in Halo 2, but I thought the buddy system they set up was interesting, actually. If I killed one brute, I could be pretty certain there was another one freaking out and charging me right then, even if I couldn't see him. That made things tense, as I tried to figure out where he might come from.

Another thing that was interestng, in that same talk on AI that I mentioned before, was that players in studies would often misinterpret enemy intelligence just based on how successful they were. So give enemies more health and make them do more damage, and suddenly they seem smarter. If that cloaked vandal rushing you doesn't stand a chance, he seems like an idiot, but if he manages to kill you, suddenly he seems smart, even though there's no difference in the actual behaviors.