The blade was ok, except how they made you use it. You should have been able to carry a gun and use the blade at the same time. Also the whole pressing the joystick down to lunge with the blade was kind of tiresome IMO. I guess to me that's one thing I felt was lacking in Halo 2, close quarters melee combat. Which I was extremely good at in Halo 1. I just felt like if I hit someone with a weapon it wasn't going to do the kind of damage it should so why bother using it? Also the fact that you remember the computer can always kill you with one swing of the blade on any difficulty level, yet it takes you many attempts to kill someone with it. I hate that crap. Which reminds me that Devs sometimes are lazy and make the difficulty levels harder simply by adding more bad guys or making you do less damage with your weapons when they should actually make the AI more intelligent instead.

and for everyone who is interested: http://www.homebetatrial.com/

theres a website for the beta already

Always thought Hijacking threads was a form of Trolling!! *Eyes windbane and stromprophet

Superior to Live? They still do not have a unified friends list, custom sound tracks or in-game messages. The only time I chat with others on Live is in-game. The only time I compare achievements in on Xbox.com. Home is just a pretty but much slower way to do achievements and match making. This is inferior by far. Also, everyone is acting like this thing just launched. Going by Sony`s past history Home will be late and have half the features promised. Microsoft will have the spring and fall updates to it`s Live service before Home is released.

Superior to Live? They still do not have a unified friends list, I hope your crazy... right? Sony has had plans for that announced long ago. custom sound tracks or in-game messages. once agian. Seriously. Read about the PS3. custom soundtracks. RR7 has already. And ingame messages are coming soon with V2.0 If I'm not mistaken... Along with unifyed friends list The only time I chat with others on Live is in-game. The only time I compare achievements in on Xbox.com. That's becuase the online side of x-box live sucks on that aspect, so it's only useful when your surfing the web. make it more innovative and fun. You'd use it on your x-box I'm sure. Home is just a pretty but much slower way to do achievements and match making. Really? From what I've read about the 360's system it sucks, and is fast... and sucks. I'd rather something be awosome and slow, than fast and suck! This is inferior by far. Yes the X-Box live service is. Also, everyone is acting like this thing just launched. Going by Sony`s past history Home will be late and have half the features promised. Microsoft will have the spring and fall updates to it`s Live service before Home is released. Sony's past history is why I think home will be great... and from microsofts RECENT history. Why I think it will continue to be... what it is. VISTA is so great aint' it?

Announcing a unified friends list and having one are 2 different things. They have custom soundtracks in ONE game and you act like that is good enough. Still no custom sound tracks. So everything I said was true. Right now the PS3 does not have a Unified friends list, custom sound tracks or in-game messages. To check achievements on the PS3 you will need to launch Home and WALK to your trophy room. On 360 I click one button and there they are. Achievements on the 360 are a fantastic and innovative idea that just works great. On the PS3 they are an after thought and a hacked inferior copy of Live. Home is laughable. Not only is Home not cool it is stupid. The reason Home is getting so much attention is because PS3 fans are desperate for anything to justify their $600 purchase. Do people want to pay $600 to play Second Life? Have fun walking around in your Doll House. I will be playing real games like Mass Effect, Halo 3, Too Human and BioShock. Home is a nice bonus but not a killer app. Unless you are 13.

All I heard was, "I know you are but what am I?"

It was announced that you can access everything in Home from the PS3 media bar if you dont want to take in the virtual world.......likely, this means one click to see achievements, then boom youre in that room to look at achievements....its just instead of looking at text you can look at it in 3d.....hardly an encompassing scenario and hardly having to "walk" around everywhere if you dont want to. It is what it is, its fresh, its new and the potential rests in the users and developers, it will be neat but it will be a niche thing until it creates itself....by that i mean, whether it becomes a true game itself whereas people actually use it like a sims, or if it merely becomes an animated userface but i think it will be a cool way to interact with others and few information about upcoming games or movies. It just sounds pretty cool, just take it for what its worth, its not meant to cure cancer....and its free for gods sake, its not like the whole BD dilemma of the user paying out the butt for something they may not want, so i dont see what the big deal is, it has enormous potential.

the child molesters out there are going to be loving this!