Few quotes from Tech Analysis: Halo: Reach
The long wait is finally over. It's been three years since the mighty Master Chief bowed out in 2007's epic Halo 3, and while last year's ODST exhibited plenty of minor tweaks and improvements to the base tech, there was little doubt that the vast majority of the Bungie engine had remained untouched. While the gameplay delivered, core gamers spoiled by the cutting-edge graphical techniques seen in titles like Killzone 2 really wanted to see what a next-generation Bungie game could deliver.
Halo: Reach is that game, an enormous technical leap over its predecessors and competitors on 360 and an exciting example of a first-party exclusive that genuinely pushes the console into new technological territory - something we don't see so often on the Microsoft platform.
Reach manages to up the resolution to nigh-on full 720p, while retaining HDR and employing an inordinate amount of dynamic lights - every needle from the needler is a bespoke light source, for example. It strongly suggests that another major innovation is the implementation of some form of deferred rendering - something we can confirm for certain if our planned tech interview with the Reach team comes to fruition.
The improvements to the Halo 3 engine are substantial, to the point where Bungie says that the vast majority of the rendering systems have been rewritten from scratch. The result is a game that still looks like a Halo title, but when put to the test in terms of basic graphical comparisons, wipes the floor with its predecessors.
From a technical perspective, Halo: Reach is undoubtedly a colossal improvement over the previous games in the series: higher resolution without sacrificing HDR, tangibly improved poly counts, insane use of particles and alpha, far higher levels of dynamic lighting, four times the draw distance, four times the amount of enemy units... the list is seemingly never-ending. But for all its technical achievements, it's clearly still a Halo game. It looks like one, it plays like one - and that's all by design.
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-halo-reach-tech-analysis-article
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