Halo 2: Killtacular

The documentary on YouTube.

Halo 2: Killtacular was a documentary contained on the disc for the Halo 2 Multiplayer Map Pack. It is an 18-minute video produced by Bungie, with the developers going over the maps available in the Bonus, Killtacular and Maptacular map packs, and their designs. The documentary also covers the making of the Another Day at the Beach cutscene, contained on the disc.

Transcript

Opening

• Curtis Creamer: "At the end of Halo 2, we thought it would be a really cool idea if we got a lot of people involved with making small multiplayer maps."

• Aaron Lieberman: "People spend most time on multiplayer maps, not in the single player ones."

• Adrian Perez: "The importance of all the different things you can do is wildly changing."

• Michael Wu: "It's easy to get the concept; 'I am here to defend the space.'"

• Max Hoberman: "So we split into four groups."

• Curtis Creamer: "Fresh ideas."

• Paul Russel: "Non-stop action."

• Michael Wu: "Bang bang bang."

• Steve Cotton: "Frantic game of whack-a-mole."

• Curtis Creamer: "A lot of new eyes."

• Chris Carney: "Definitely see stuff that you're like, 'how the hell did they do that?'"

• Mike Zak: "Think you're exaggerating."

• Adrian Perez: "Swing!"

• Curtis Creamer: "Just like everybody else, we were getting a little bit tired of playing some of the same maps over and over, so it was a great opportunity to get more maps out there."

Containment

CONTAINMENT
_{STEVE COTTON,
// Designer
MICHAEL WU,
// Environmental Artist
PAUL RUSSEL,
// Environmental Artist}

• Michael Wu: "Containment is a big map."

• Steve Cotton: "It's definitely the biggest map in the downloadable content."

• Michael Wu: "Two-team, Capture the Flag, eight-on-eight."

• Paul Russel: "This map is so big, the Xbox can't even hold it."

• Michael Wu: "We are visiting the quarantine zone. These zones were created by the sentinels in order to prevent the Flood from escaping further and infecting even more of the Halo structure."

• Michael Wu: "It was supposed to be just a straight-up conversion of Timberland from Halo PC."

• Steve Cotton: "The bases are more intricate."

• Michael Wu: "...because they're basically the Sidewinder bases."

• Steve Cotton: "Make it more interesting."

• Michael Wu: "Change it even further."

• Steve Cotton: "More dynamic."

• Michael Wu: "Just change it altogether."

• Steve Cotton: "Two rocket launchers, but there's also two sniper rifles."

• Michael Wu: "Two Warthogs."

• Steve Cotton: "A Banshee, and an outside of your wall is a tank."

• Steve Cotton: "We tried to do some things the other big maps didn't: incorporate the tank, hopefully effectively this time."

• Curtis Creamer: "This sort of flesh out their ideas with Max riding shotgun overall, making sure that they're not getting too crazy."

• Michael Wu: "We were going to have what we call "boo bags". They would just be these clusters of these boogers all over the level that would explode and harm you. Max decided that they bounced too much, so he made them pretty static."

• Max Hoberman: "If they're gonna make a change for artistic reasons, it's really helpful when they also can think how this will affect gameplay."

• Michael Wu: "Whenever you ask Cotton or Paul about it, they get pretty upset, because they liked them the way they worked."

• Steve Cotton: "...you wonder why this map took three months to make."

• Paul Russel: "There wasn't really any precedent for bouncing testicles of death. I hate video games."

• Paul Russel: "What?!"

Backwash

BACKWASH
_{ROB STOKES,
// Designer
EAMON MCKENZIE,
// Engineer
JUSTIN HAYWARD,
// Environmental Artist}

• Justin Hayward: "Backwash is a humid environment. In all our other multiplayer maps, you can see another player from a quarter mile away. Here you can't."

• Rob Stokes: "We knew we had to make this small, like, four-player Slayer style map; the idea came up to use the Halo 1 swamp as this foggy arena."

• Justin Hayward: "Old and crusty Forerunner."

• Eamon McKenzie: "We're saying this is on the Delta Halo, and it's actually an area very similar to the place on the Alpha Halo, where the Chief met Guilty Spark. In fact, we actually have the monitor of the Delta Halo. He's flying around the environment."

• Rob Stokes: "We definitely were looking to encourage the short game, so you'd be more inclined to use weapons like shotguns and the sword."

• Rob Stokes: "It's very easy to spawn and instantly see where everybody is fighting, because you see plasma bolts in the fog and you know exactly where everybody is, so you just go charging over there."

• Rob Stokes: "...and Nathan's favorite tactics to get up here on this little metal protrusion that he's just lobbing grenades down at people.

• Nathan Walpole: "I'm kind of the resident griefer. I kill everybody on my team, laughing the top of my lung."

• Eamon McKenzie: "Nathan's griefing is is a well balanced by his lack of skill."

• Justin Hayward: "Yeah, no one likes Nathan."

• Eamon McKenzie: "You know this map will be a success if people love this place. Slayer is Halo at its simplest form. It should be one of the places where it's just fun to find the high spots and gain elevation through jumping and when you do that, you pull it off, um... I don't know, I feel like a Halo god."

• Justin Hayward: "And we got glow bugs. It doesn't get any better than that."

Terminal

TERMINAL
_{CHRIS CARNEY,
// Designer
MIKE ZAK,
// Environmental Artist}

• Chris Carney: "Terminal. It is a train terminal. Exists in New Mombasa."

• Mike Zak: "It's supposed to be Zanzibar-plus."

• Chris Carney: "What if we took Zanzibar to the next level? What would that map be?"

• Chris Carney: "It's completely asymmetrical. There are two bases, but it's not a mirrored environment, or an environment that is rotated so it's identical on both sides. The nature of it is it's imbalanced, so the attackers have a starting location and the defenders have a base, but they're not equal like which one is easier to defend or easier to attack."

• Mike Zak: "The only real dynamic element is the train."

• Chris Carney: "If you play too close to the tracks, you'll die."

• Chris Carney: "Most of our Halo 2 maps, playing single flag CTF, the vehicles are fun, but they're not a key component of how you win or lose. We wanted to make a vehicle encounter significant; you cannot ignore the Wraith. The Wraith is a big deal. You need to take out the Wraith if you're an attacker. If you're a defender, you want to preserve the Wraith."

• Max Hoberman: "Everything that we're thinking about is balance. We put a lot of thought into making sure that a guy on the foot can destroy that vehicle."

• Mike Zak: "No rocket launcher."

• Chris Carney: "No rocket launcher."

• Mike Zak: "No rocket launcher."

• Chris Carney: "It's a big design issue."

• Max Hoberman: "I think they've actually softened on that position a little bit. There's now a rocket on Terminal."

• Chris Carney: "Okay, people who are good with the Wraith: we've added the rocket launcher back in the Terminal, which we didn't want to do in the first place. We tried to specifically designed this map, so we didn't have to use the rocket launcher, but now, because people have gotten so good with the Wraith, the rocket launcher's back in there."

• Mike Zak: "It's pretty rare that you'll get people just sitting in a spot and being cowardly. I hate cowards."

Elongation

ELONGATION
_{TYSON GREEN,
// Designer
DAVE DUNN,
// Environmental Artist
ADRIAN PEREZ,
// Engineer
AARON LIEBERMAN,
// Engineer}

• Tyson Green: "This is a remake of Longest, one of the maps in Halo 1. It's supposed to be this dirty cargo freighter. Two parallel hallways with bases at either corner."

• Dave Dunn: "You can see Earth. You can see the moon. I thought about it; I really hated about Longest that I wanted to fix. The ladders really destroy the realism."

• Adrian Perez: "I've never seen a ladder I liked."

• Dave Dunn: "You have this vertical motion, but you don't see your hands doing that. We got rid of all the ladders. Everybody hated ladders."

• Adrian Perez: "It's a really nice thing about this map is that there's total mobility.

• Tyson Green: "It's a fairly simple map, so that it's easy to navigate, easy to understand."

• Adrian Perez: "One of the ways that you can get to the second floor from the ground floor is to take advantage of these boxes that are moving around."

• Max Hoberman: "Gameplay-wise, the crates are a huge change, because they create this jumping path that you can get between the two levels on the map from any point."

• Adrian Perez: "One of the interesting things that just kind of fell out of this design and this is not intentional... if you are on the conveyor belt, even though you're moving faster than the motion sensor, if you're standing still, you don't show up. It has like this one thing that we've never had before, which is you can hide and actually end up with a different spot than you were... and the whole time you won't be on the motion sensor."

• Tyson Green: "I wanted to put the ladders back in, but make them slanted, so that you didn't have the same horrible problems that you did."

• Dave Dunn: "You never expressed that though."

• Tyson Green: "I never expressed that."

• Dave Dunn: "It would have been shot down."

• Adrian Perez: "It would have been a problem."

Relic

RELIC
_{ROB STOKES,
// Designer
EAMON McKENZIE,
// Engineer
CHRIS BARRETT,
// Environmental Artist}

• Rob Stokes: "Relic. Big Island."

• Chris Barrett: "The original idea came from the very first Halo multiplayer map back on the PC. four-on-four; that's kind of the sweet spot for that map. The more people, it's gets a little more chaotic."

• Rob Stokes: "We were looking for a asymmetric one-flag CTF map that played differently than any of the others."

• Chris Barrett: "It's designed specifically to have a unique experience for Capture the Flag."

• Rob Stokes: "It's set up to have a side that is protecting the flag.

• Chris Barrett: "So there's always an attacker and defender keeping the entire map in play at all times."

• Rob Stokes: "It totally changes the way the two side behave; one of the smart routes to go is down here by the beach, because that's where the rocket launcher is."

• Chris Barrett: "Both sides try to fight to get that as quickly as possible."

• Max Hoberman: "Do you take the quick route and run out into the open to get to the base, or do you take the longer but safer route? I mean there's a trade-off; we intentionally make it so that the fastest route is the straight line that's running the gauntlet, so it's risk versus reward."

• Chris Barrett: "Scoping out over the entire island is really cool, because you can see people coming up through the rocks."

• Eamon McKenzie: "There's a contest to go and get the rocket launcher, much like there's a contest to get the sniper rifle. You have to make real conscious decisions about what's important to you to win this map."

Gemini

GEMINI
_{TYSON GREEN,
// Designer
TOM DOYLE,
// Environmental Artist}

• Tom Doyle: "It's Gemini. Its origin is in Marathon."

• Tyson Green: "In Marathon Infinity there is a map called Duality; that's the fundamental structure that we took."

• Tyson Green: "It's not really a symmetrical or asymmetrical map. It's an arena free-for-all map."

• Tom Doyle: "We wanted it to feel holy, otherworldly. This isn't something for the rest of the Covenant; this is the Prophets' antechamber. The two rooms, two ramps in the lower lobby..."

• Tyson Green: "The teleporters that let you rapidly move to another part of the map. The door seem really mundane, but a door actually lets you play with the person."

• Tom Doyle: "That's what this is: corridors. Cool moody lighting. Lots of artfully well-placed weapons and good combat, so that's the essence of a good ground pounder."

• Tyson Green: "Even walking slowly, I can cover the entire map in about 15 seconds; that makes it very difficult to actually mount a defense."

• Max Hoberman: "Our engine is designed for a mix of different weapons that work at different ranges; you can only carry two."

• Tyson Green: "The reason you pick up two plasma rifles is not so you can squeeze both triggers at the same time. It's so that you can pulse them, like you can fire one until it burns and then fire the other while the other one cooling off... 'cause if you need to reload when you're dual wielding that you're basically screwed."

Warlock

WARLOCK
_{MAX HOBERMAN,
// Designer
VICTOR DELEON,
// Environmental Artist
JAY WEINLAND,
// Audio Lead
C PAUL JOHNSON,
// Sound Designer}

• Max Hoberman: "I really wanted to have a lot of small maps. Warlock had a characteristic thing for being four-way symmetrical.

• Victor DeLeon: "Radially symmetrical. It's designed to be completely equal."

• Jay Weinland: "Warlock is based on the original Halo 1 map Wizard and for those that played Halo 1 multiplayer, this is gonna be like an old friend. They're gonna immediately walk into this map and be like, 'Oh, I know what's happening.'"

• Max Hoberman: "I thought it'd be fairly easy to get Warlock up to speed considering that the geometry already existed."

• Victor DeLeon: "We had to mark off each base with a different color, so that you wouldn't get lost. It's pretty easy to get lost in a place where every four of the corners look identical."

• Jay Weinland: "The game is really giving you something that you can look at, so you know you're here."

• Jay Weinland: "We have almost 36,000 pieces of audio that went into Halo 2. 64 surround sound voices... and if you're playing multiplayer and you have a big battle going on around you, you are probably more than likely hitting that 62 to 64 voice limit pretty easily. If you look at it and you think it should make sound, we try to make it make sound."

• C Paul Johnson: "I put some things, like there's bats."

• Victor DeLeon: "No bats."

• C Paul Johnson: "So I think there have been there somewhere."

• Victor DeLeon: "I'm sure, yeah. I mean, I know that we don't have any, so..."

• C Paul Johnson: "Bats."

• Victor DeLeon: "No. No bats."

Sanctuary

SANCTUARY
_{STEVE COTTON,
// Designer
MICHAEL WU,
// Environmental Artist
ED SMITH,
// Concept Artist}

• Michael Wu: "Sanctuary is about a battle that takes place on the Delta Halo."

• Steve Cotton: "You can envision Delta Temple being in the distance behind the cliff and behind the waterfall."

• Ed Smith: "it should look like a single player map, but play like a multiplayer map."

• Steve Cotton: "Its old Forerunner architecture supported by some newer Forerunner metal structures."

• Max Hoberman: "It's really important to us that people believe that they are real places in our universe. First is just a high-level strategy. Just a plan. From there we go to paper design, which is the designer and the artist working together."

• Steve Cotton: "it actually is a symmetrical map. Symmetrical is mirrored in some fashion and it's an attempt to try to make things balanced."

• Michael Wu: "A map can feel balanced, but there's a subtle like sniper advantage to one side than the other."

• Steve Cotton: "What it was designed for is CTF. There's medium range weapons like the battle rifle and the carbine The SMG, you got a needler; those are all symmetrically placed to give each team even playing field. Every time they take on one of those weapons, they are taking on a role. That's kind of the mentality I take, you know, designing spaces. Are there good places for a player to assume those roles and be effective, and are there places for players to fight against that role as well?"

Turf

TURF
_{TYSON GREEN,
// Designer
DAVE DUNN,
// Environmental Artist
ADRIAN PEREZ,
// Engineer
AARON LIEBERMAN,
// Engineer}

• Tyson Green: "Turf. Turf is a medium-to-small map, set in Old Mombasa, sort of early in the invasion before this stuff really starts hitting the fan."

• Aaron Lieberman: "Mombasa was one of my favorite part in the single-player in Halo 2. Seeing certain landmarks from a single player game in the distance, like the bridge, just gives it such a great feel."

• Tyson Green: "It's got lots of cover, lots of very small scale interconnections. More close quarters combat. It's meant for a match between two small teams."

• Curtis Creamer: "We really wanted to work on a map that really featured a new game type that we had in Halo 2 called Territories."

• Max Hoberman: "Territories requires a map that is designed for the game."

• Tyson Green: "Territories is the game where the objective is to capture and control the territories."

• Dave Dunn: "As you control them, you gain time and you win the game by having the most time."

• Adrian Perez: "The more control you have, the more tenuous that control is. As you're controlling a larger area than that, you have to divide your attention over a much greater space, so then it's easier for the underdog to come in."

• Tyson Green: "We have a street territory, which is being themed as a marine headquarters. The opposite corner, we have a warehouse territory and then at the third quarter we have a Scarab."

• Dave Dunn: "Although in Halo lingo, aren't they called plots?

• Tyson Green: "Uh... no, they're just territories.

• Dave Dunn: "In the UI, doesn't it say plots?"

• Tyson Green: "Well, it's called three-plots for the three territories."

• Dave Dunn: "Therefore... yes... in Halo lingo..."

• Tyson Green: "Am I being too verbose?"

• Dave Dunn: "This is going to be the easiest map to navigate and learn."

• Tyson Green: "So everyone always wants to do a little bit more than they probably can. We always overshoot and then come back."

• Dave Dunn: "Put it in, rip it out. This map has probably had the most work done on of all the maps. It's insane, the detail that's on here."

• Adrian Perez: "This is probably my favorite Halo map thus far. It's awesome. I love his mouth."

• Dave Dunn: "I like it. It's a fun map and I did no work."

Another Day at the Beach

• Michael Wu: "As a game developer, you really get to enjoy two games. One is the game of creating the systems in the art itself and then the other one is to actually playtest it."

• CJ Cowan: "The rest of the staff is working on all these maps. What is the animation team gonna be doing?"

• Curtis Creamer: "Part of this process was getting everybody to take on a new challenge and even expand those skills in new ways that they hadn't thought of before. So that was a great opportunity to get a cinematic together."

• Nathan Walpole: "We looked at the way we combined animation and sound and everything else into the cinematics in Halo 2 and how we can make that process better."

• CJ Cowan: "We didn't feel like our pipeline was really well thought out and we wanted to go through it again and come up with new tools. They're all like, 'Well let's do a short film.' I wanted to do something that kind of paralleled what happened in the game. The marines at the beginning of Earth City is one of those kind of tangents that you see the beginning of and you see the end of, but you never really hear what happened. The third Pelican kind of flies by, and halfway through that level, you see that same Pelican crashed on the beach and you meet up with the marines that were in it... but you never really found out what happened to them. It felt like a good place where you can tie in both the beginning and the end to actual gameplay."

• Jeremy Fones: "Just placing the Master Chief in the scene. This shot that I'm working on right now is the very first shot."

• Nathan Walpole: "This shot right here is where the Pelican has just crashed. You see Fones checking the corpse of O'Brien."

• Jay Weinland: "We're actually gonna be able to fly the Pelican around in a space and capture 5.1 audio of it, being able to embed that the cinematic in a way that we weren't able to in the game engine."

• John Butkus: "That's actually me. I'm the one with the plasma... and that's Jeremy over here... and Bill's dead, of course."

• Bill O'Brien: "The Jackal... is a good character!"

• Nathan Walpole: "We killed Bill off pretty quickly."

• Bill O'Brien: "What do you think? Hollywood?"

• CJ Cowan: "It is going to be pre-rendered, so it's a little bit different than the cinematics that occur in game. We're still using the game engine to render it, but since it's not rendering in real time, we're able to do a lot, you know, more effects and more lighting stuff."

• Curtis Creamer: "Oh, everybody is really getting to do the things that they love to do, to work on the things that they love working on, because it was something that we are doing for fun, it was a learning exercise. It was all just a lot of really good experience for everybody on the team."

• Max Hoberman: "We have a long road ahead of us, I won't lie, but yeah, it's pretty cool. It's actually really fun time to be working here."

• Curtis Creamer: "I would definitely say this is wet the whistle for for what comes next."