Blackout (Level)
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| Bathed in frozen moonlight, this abandoned drilling platform is now a monument to human frailty. | 
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Blackout[2] is a multiplayer map featured in Halo 3 and is a remake of the classic Halo 2 map, Lockout. It is featured as one of the three maps in the Legendary Map Pack that became available on April 15th, 2008.
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[edit] Description
Rather than a Forerunner facility, like its predecessor, this map takes place in the Arctic [1] on Weather Station Z/41. The layout is almost identical to that of Lockout, but features more grenades and now includes equipment. Most of the jumps, even the insane ones from Halo 2, are still there. However a number of things have been modified or removed such as one area, which was altered to make it more difficult to lock down that part of the map.
Blackout's code name was Moonlight Sonata during its development due to the level's dark night-time sky, and as an allusion to one of Beethoven's works. It replaces Assembly in the Halo 3 Legendary Map Pack. Assembly was included in the Mythic Map Pack. Rather than the blue gravity lift that was featured in Lockout, Blackout has a red airshaft, which appears to fit the atmosphere better.
Bungie almost didn't make the map, because they already had Guardian, the spiritual successor to Lockout, but with a remake still in considerable demand by fans, they decided to remake it completely.
[edit] Geometry and Forge
In the second most recent ViDoc, multiple forge items from Blackout were revealed. They include and detail staircases, man-cannons, standard doorways, portals, and blocking doorways, shield doors, and newly edited shipping crates that stay once they are placed. Another new object is the FX filter. Using these will change the tint, contrast, brightness, and overall color of the map, and it is recommended to experiment. You may combine them, to make cool effects. A full tour of this map can be viewed here. The barracks on Blackout contain a basketball hoop, and the Battle Rifle tower is now featured with windows compared to being fully opened. The cartography and common anatomy of the level resembles Lockout in almost every way, shape, or form with little differences. The only difference being the replacement of the Needler with a Spiker.
[edit] Overview
[edit] Strategies
- As mentioned above you can shoot the Fusion Coils to launch the Sniper Rifle toward you.
- You can camp in the center room (under the Helicopter pad), on the slanted walls, a Shotgun is recommended.
- If you inch up on the wind tunnel, in the lift room at the top, you can fall down without being shot back up.
- Blackout has, just as Lockout, many combinations of death defying jumps, learn the map, and use these to drop down behind your enemy or in your enemy's blind spot. One handy jump is from BR1 to BR2. Along the wall on the hatch that you can drop through from BR2 to BR1, there is a little ledge that you can jump on. If you jump on the ledge, you can jump up to the next floor. This is useful when there is someone above you because it will surprise him or her and it is quicker.
- A great way to kill the opposing team is to control the air duct, Sniper tower, and helipad. Concentrate your fire when you see them.
- When holding the helipad in Swat patrol the ramps. Many people go up the left one. You can get many kills and save your buddies if you can kill the enemy fast.
- While alone on BR3 (third floor of BR Tower) always watch behind you. If you are alone and your team-mates are covering other points of the map, your opponents usually spawn below you at BR2 or BR1, offering a perfect chance for them to come behind you.
- Always remember that when you are on Top Lift, you can always jump to Elbow if there is an enemy there, a team-mate in trouble or you just want to make an escape. This escape is actually better then dropping down the hatches on the side because you can get fragged easily.
- When playing Team SWAT, if you spawn at Lift in the beginning of the game then do not go up the lift. Your enemy will most likely be expecting you and you will be killed as soon as you get up. If you spawn at Rec Room, then look towards lift. If there's nobody there or you killed him or her already, then look towards Elbow. You can usually get some kills early in the game this way.
- Unlike in Lockout the bottom passage is not entirely lined up, or at least less so than Lockout. This was probably meant to reduce long range battles down the passage and make it an easier area to traverse.
- As in Lockout, close-ranged weapons are key.
[edit] Forge
- Doors placed in certain entrances usually make Infection Mode more interesting and challenging.
- Using the doors you can block off whole rooms of the level, this small change alone can change the way the level plays, in respect to movements of the players, effectively changing the entire dynamic of the game.
- If you pick up a turret while somebody's in it, then push him or her as far up as possible, you can send him or her past the barrier and he or she can float objects way above the level. But there's a death barrier if you go too high.
- Through a glitch in Forge, you are able to spawn a teleporter inside of the smokestacks. Once inside, however, the player has very limited mobility, and if moved in a certain spot, will be killed by the Guardians or the death will count as a suicide.
- In Monitor mode you can fly up onto the air lift building as mentioned above
[edit] Trivia
- The helicopter pad seems small enough to only hold a Hornet comfortably.
- Bungie claimed that one of the only differences between Lockout and Blackout is that the Needlers were replaced with Brute Spikers.
- The lights in the sky are the Aurora Borealis (Northern Lights).
- Bungie claims that the model for Blackout was rebuilt because the original model of Lockout was too messy and chaotic to work with.
- Blackout has more Plasma Grenade spawns than Fragmentation Grenade spawns. It is the only Close-quarters map in Halo 3 for which this is the case.
- There is a basketball hoop (Shown on a Bungie Weekly Update) [3]located in the Barracks building in the right corner.[4]
- The map is slightly larger than Lockout in some aspects and areas, the Battle Rifle tower is actually larger, the Barracks are smaller, and the Platform next to the Sniper tower is larger.
- Upon falling off the platform, a splash can be seen after your character lands in the water. On other occasions, if your character lands in the water flat on his/her back or stomach he/she will land and slowly sink downward into the ocean.
- Getting out of the map is easy, just float down under the platforms and you're there. However, you can't build anything down there because of something called "Map Radiation". If you stay out of the map too long, you will die and the game calls it falling to your death and things placed are automatically deleted.
- Just like the original Lockout there is a Sniper Rifle in front of a Fusion Coil (In Lockout there were 3 Power Cores instead). In fact, if one would be on the BR tower facing opposite of the Sniper tower, and lobs a frag grenade correctly at the fusion coils, the Sniper Rifle will fly towards the Battle Rifle spawn where the player is standing. This is considered the classy way to acquire the Sniper Rifle.
- The backdrop of this map was once being used as the Bungie.net website's background, but has now been changed.
- In Lockout, near the Sniper Rifle lies 3 Power Cores (The Forerunner version of Fusion Coils), but in Blackout this there's only one Fusion Coil. The reason may be because in the original Lockout players on the other tower could use the explosives to easily kill a Sniper if one lurks at the position of the Sniper Rifle spawn point. The change decreases the explosive force impacted on players nearby, although, the Sniper Rifle can be blown around or even off the map if the Fusion Coils are set off.
- The windows throughout the map are identical, including their reflection. The windows were originally made for the Barracks (opposite the lift). The reflection when you look in these windows is a blurry view of the lift area. If you look into the other windows (bottom of sniper tower are easiest to see), you will see the same image.
- Blackout is a favored map for Team SWAT because of its mix of mid and short range combat.
- The room right behind the sniper spawn cannot be entered. Even using glitches to get your way in will result in death by the guardians.
- Interestingly this map has been a hotbed for the Ghosts of Halo, perhaps none-too-surprisingly, as the first Ghost of Halo was reported at Lockout, Blackout's predecessor.
- Blackout along with, Cold Storage and Orbital, are the only maps in Halo 3 that do not spawn a Brute Shot by default.
- The angle of the platform seen in Blackout's backdrop, is wrong. If it were correct, the image should have shown the back of the lift building, instead, we see the back of the BR tower.
- Bungie jokingly tasked the fans with coming up for a back-story for Blackout and z/41.
- If you look in one of the rooms with the items hanging up on the wall, there are core samples on shelves that can only be obtained by drilling, thus explaining the "Drilling Platform" description.
- Exactly every 5 minutes, a red comet will soar over the sky for a split second.
- There's a key element Blackout failed to give; In Lockout, there was minor Fog all over the map. Blackout, however, does not have a single chill of Foggy environment, which some players did not feel the "Lockout" feeling when playing on Halo 3's Blackout.
- It is possible that Blackout was abandoned due to the Covenant activity in the Arctic mentioned in Halo: Ghosts of Onyx.
- Blackout is very similar in appearance to the environments in the video game "F.E.A.R.", due to the dark setting, and similar metallic structures.
- This is probably the easiest map to get the Came...From...Behind Achievement, due to the many camping spots and the level of darkness.
- Bungie stated in the Legendary Vidoc that you can block of all the doors in Blackout if you want to with doors. However, there is not a large enough supply of doors to block ALL the ways inside.
- Unlike Lockout, the map isn't featured in Big Team or Squad Battle playlists.
- This map was originally going to be set on a partially destroyed Strato-Sentinel on The Ark, near the planetoid in its center.
- In Blackout, you can find Covenant weapons, such as the Spiker, Plasma Pistol, Plasma Rifle, Plasma Grenades and the Energy Sword. This may also lead to the belief that the drilling platform was abandoned due to a Covenant attack, though they're probably just there since Blackout is a multiplayer map.
[edit] Gallery
 The shotgun hall. |
 Weather station Z41 (AKA Blackout). |
 The landing pad. |
 The sniper tower. |
 Weapon and equipment respawn locations. |
 Blackout's backdrop. |
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[edit] References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 http://www.bungie.net/projects/halo3/content.aspx?link=H3LegendaryMapPack
- ↑ http://www.bungie.net/News/content.aspx?type=topnews&cid=13413
- ↑ http://blog.tiedtheleader.com/article/828
- ↑ 1UP.com
[edit] Related Pages
