While Call of Duty 4 and Team Fortress 2 are two major online first person shooters for Xbox 360 to be released within a two month span, it’s no secret that the majority of Live users are still tossing spike grenades and bludgeoning enemy combatants with a Gravity Hammer in Halo 3.
While the newly independent developer is still satisfied with the success of its biggest game yet, they’re not completely done with it, since new implementations have and will be made.
If you are a hardcore player, you have probably spent a lot of time examining your previously played games on their respective playgrounds of destruction by taking a look at where all the action took place on an overhead view of the map itself on your Bungie.net profile. The evolution of that feature comes in the form of Heatmap, which allows players to see where things got a bit heated on the battlefield.
“Heatmaps are the Doppler Radar System of Death in Halo 3,” said Bungie community man Luke Smith. “We’re tracking encounters, weapons used and their results in a given game, collecting that data and sharing it with players visually. The key here is ‘the darker the red, the more frequent the deaths’ (or kills, depending on the parameters).”
While the addition is still considered to be in beta form, it’s a fairly neat way to allow players to see crucial data on every map.
Speaking of maps, Mr. Smith did tease us a bit in regards to what will be featured the upcoming downloadable content for the game in relation to its multiplayer map editor, Forge. Players will be able to place their own Mancannons as well as shield doors of various sizes wherever they see fit on the new maps, both of which cannot be done in the current line-up of multiplayer maps.
Not only is Bungie busy working on the new content of the game, but making alterations to the vehicles as well.
“There are a couple of still-secret, still-in testing adjustments and changes that come to classic Halo vehicles. To say that these changes are the intersection between hysterical and tactical would be a pretty drastic understatement. Other less risque changes coming to vehicles include environment-specific decals being applied to vehicles and certain vehicles have had their weapon systems modified so that they behave differently in multiplayer combat.”
Aside from all of the new interesting additions to the game, Bungie recently made a few changes to the matchmaking playlists, all of which can be viewed on the Bungie.net’s Weekly Update.
Who’s up for some Rocket Race Hopper?
