Warning:
This is some seriously epic text here, so let that be known first of all. This is my fully detailed review and loving tribute to the swansong of my favorite game series, expect long text.
Wow? has it really only been nine years since the release of Halo: Combat evolved? Looking back through recent gaming history, the first Halo game just feels like it was brought to our attention a generation ago, in reality it was just under a decade. Yet in that time, the little game called Halo spawned a whole franchise seemingly overnight. Books were written, fans were brought together, sequels were made and in so doing Halo became one of the more recognized grand trilogy?s stretching through gaming history, and it has only barely started to spread its wings by comparison to some of the other massive franchises out there. In so doing also giving the small development team Bungie a great moment in the spotlight and now the ranking of one of the more recognized developer teams out there.
It has affected gaming in a lot of respective areas and as far as successful franchises go, you don?t get much more successful than this. However, Halo also has had to, in recent years; suffer a lot of hate and scorn and negative criticism. Criticism that too often I can?t help but feel it wouldn?t have to answer to if it wasn?t the juggernaut that it is. So in some respects having such a huge success rate has also resulted in a lot of negative backlash and has left the raging debate of:
?Is Halo good??
Running through the internet for the latter half of a decade now. I suspect and indeed have had to come to accept that fact that no matter what I say in this instance the war will not end and we will continue to flame each other over this issue until we are old men. During which time, our lack of ability to probably argue will result in us instead spitting our false teeth at each other.
However even though I have more than a few battle scars from internet wars, I still feel that the franchise as it stands has a certain soul and charm and that alone kept me going forward. I love this game series; it was the thing that made me the gamer I am today. It has always stayed at the core of my game playing life, playing Halo games that were developed by Bungie.
I suppose that is why I am taking it upon myself to review the last Halo game ever to be released by Bungie, the final moments of the grand saga that has been a part of my life for over nine years.
I?m just warning you right now, I suspect there will be gushing? and possible tears, as I write this up.
Anyway, here it is, Halo: Reach. The great saga ends exactly where it truly began.
Every true Halo fan knows the story of Reach. Even minor fans that are barely paying attention have no doubt some understanding of it even if it was just name dropped once or twice.
To the un-initiated, Reach was once a planet newly populated by the human race and was considered the prize of all the outer colonies for the tactical location, size and perfect environment conditions. However eventually the war against the genocidal fanatical alliance of alien races known as ?the Covenant? arrived on Reach?s doorstep.
What followed then was an utter military disaster, in some respects, the worst military failure in human history. The planet was completely overrun and then eventually burned to glass by the relentless destructive force of the Covenant. A complete failure, resulting in the deaths of millions of innocent people and the devastating loss of several huge fleets and thousands of military and navy units and ultimately the almost complete annihilation of the genetically augmented super soldiers known as the Spartan II?s.
A dark chapter of the UNSC history referred to simply as ?The Fall of Reach?.
This is the story that Halo: Reach aims to tell, of the desperate struggle against simply overwhelming odds. The death, the courage and the determination but also of the tragic realization that this time all the determination and implied badassery are not going to be enough.
That this time, there is simply no chance of victory and that while the ?hell yeah let?s kick some alien ass? has worked in the past, this time that is just not going to happen. As it stands this is easily the darkest chapter in the Halo franchise to date, and while the sheet of dark hopelessness is still clear throughout the campaign there are still the occasional moments of catharsis that still make the player feel like they have achieved something far greater.
So now that I have covered the main theme of the story here, let?s actually get into the story and also, the campaign.
As I hinted at above, there was indeed a book called ?the Fall of Reach? that covered a lot of the story and drama and huge scale conflict of the battle of Reach. However the game itself does not follow that same plot which is, in all honestly, probably for the best as deconstructing a deeply layered novel into an action oriented shooter would probably turn into a narrative disaster. So, rather than focus on the grand scale of the battle of Reach from the perspective of the military, the Covenant, the civilians and the Navy and all points in between, the story instead opts to go into the viewpoint of a much smaller but still very significant part of the story.
In this case a branch of Spartan III?s known as ?Noble Team? who is now at the forefront of every major battle in Reach. So, rather than experience the full scale of the conflict we are instead witness to just the chaotic drama that this one team faces.
The campaign starts off with Noble 6, this is you the player, meeting up with the rest of Noble team. It is set before the battle of Reach has actually started, instead the main thing that Noble Team are assigned to do battle with are the Rebels, also known as Insurrectionists. This is a big nod to fans of the established franchise, as the rebels have had a lot of involvement in the story prior to the Covenant even entering the picture. But still the illusion of relative peace is then lost very quickly when on a routine mission, you find yourself battling a Covenant recon force.
That?s right; the game literally starts right from the beginning of the battle of Reach and ends right at the ending of it. And just by looking at the opening scene and as the story progresses, the more obvious it becomes that despite the best efforts of Noble 6, there is nothing that can be done to save Reach and that in the end, this is a battle you are destined to lose.
I don?t wish to give away too many plot spoilers but truth be told, the campaign is in a lot of ways a huge love letter to a lot of fans out there. True it still stops short, clocking in at around eight hours, but within is a lot of lore and history and blatant acts of fan service.
The most notably being a cameo by someone quite well known, well I might as well just say it, Catherine Halsey! The character that has had such a significant impact on the entire franchise but has spent most of it in the back row off stage is now front and centre, showing her face for the first, and in all likelihood, last time in a Halo game.
It is true that due to the careful attention not to greatly mess up the continuity of the plot of The Fall of Reach, there isn?t really a lot the story can do with her, but still it is nice to finally see Halsey isn?t it?
There are a few other cameos thrown in as well towards the end and a brilliant end sequence that perfectly ties the events of this game to the main trilogy as well as a damn near perfectly chilling final moment after the credits finish. Like I said before, it manages to attempt a single shine of uplifting hope even after so much damning darkness and in terms of plot, it succeeds.
So at the end of the day, it is a rather short campaign that I managed to get all the way through in one very dedicated night?s worth of playing, but I had a lot of fun while doing it and there?s plenty of substance to work with here.
So, now that I?ve skimmed through the plot with a minimal amount of spoilers, I can start talking about the campaign in terms of gameplay and in terms of experiences and the general presentation.
All things considered, I have decided to start with a rundown of the positives and negatives of how the game is presented.
First and foremost, Reach looks amazing. It might not be on the level of the Unreal Engine or the Crytech engine or anything like that but as it stands the visuals are strong and helpfully show off a lot of detail in the lovingly rendered world. There are some very odd moments where the engine seems to chug for a few second but for the most part it is a brilliantly constructed engine that allows flowing combat and can put many enemies on screen at one time. More importantly, it makes Reach feel like a real world, complete with actual wildlife running around.
Also worth noting though from a storyline perspective, are the characters. Namely, Noble Team. I admit that each individual character suffers more than a few clichés, Carter is the bold leader, Kat is the clever tech whiz, Jun is the chatty sniper, Jorge is the heavy lunk of meat with a heart of gold and Emile is the cocky and cynical badass. By themselves, they are quite cliché and yet when put together, they suddenly come alive. There is genuine chemistry between the Spartan team here, whether it?s Emile bitterly laughing as Jorge once again ?forgets what he is? by attempting to show some compassion to a terrified civilian or how Carter and Kat get into a slightly fierce debate over what to do next and whether or not they have a right to question their orders. Or just hearing Jun be way too chatty and incidentally annoy his commanding officer, they all work as a unit and I at least did grow to like them a considerable amount.
Another great thing about them is that they now are much more human. They take their helmets off and reveal that they are people with actual human personalities and better still, they play as allies in almost every mission you play. Giving off the idea that you aren?t alone and that this is a team effort.
Another thing that I could damn near kiss Bungie for is that for the first time in all of the Halo games, the Spartans are NOT specifically American anymore. This time the cast is a lot more diverse, Kat and Jun are both heavily accented, sounding possibly Hungarian or maybe Russian. Jorge, the great heavy badass has a very thick English accent that makes him sound like he?d be right at home in North London working in a Fish and Chips shop. Emile is clearly African American as you can tell from his voice, essentially only Carter is the one white male American lead here.
This also connects to the population of the Planet Reach itself, with civilians speaking in Hungarian and various cultural backgrounds, it does a lot to help erase the image that Halo has frequently had to suffer from, namely that it?s all just ?America, HELL YEAH!? Seriously Bungie, this was a very good move on your part.
Also to praise, the presence of Kat. Finally we see a dignified female Spartan entering the field after having spent so much time backstage, much like Halsey, and only covered in the books. Thus her being here also helps remove the unfair stigma Halo has of being a ?machismo masculine obsessed action game.? Even if admittedly she does find herself in that oddly popular role for women in action games, the ?tech girl?.
So yes, while I was originally hoping that I could end up praising Kat as my new favorite 'tough girl' and have her stand alongside Ashley Williams of Mass Effect in terms of tough yet awesome female characters in games that I just love, in the end Kat just barely doesn't make the mark. (Blimey I have been mentioning how much I like Ashley a lot lately haven't I?)
Still, her simply being there finally erases the image of Halo as a 'boys only club' so I'm grateful for her addition to the plot.
Also, another major change that has effected greatly the overall feel of the game, is the updated change of the Covenant. In Halo: Reach, the alien races of the Covenant once again feel very alien. While one can argue with annoyance that after spending so long maintaining that the aliens in Halo are not actually evil irredeemable monsters through the story of the Arbiter, it may seem a little irritating to now revert them back to straight up villains.
However I believe that in this context, with the small story of the experiences of Noble Team that having the Covenant feel monstrous and imposing really does help greatly convey the drama of the situation. Plus, if you play this game with the knowledge of the events of the main trilogy and how really the Covenant are actually not unlike humans in many ways, it makes this new darkened view of them all the more impressive.
So with that in mind, the Covenant now do not speak a single word of coherent English nor do they have any vaguely human behavior. They roar in an unknown language and have the singular goal on their mind of killing you and only you in any way they conceivably can.
Best of all, the Elites are back as the main villains? let me just repeat that with a little more emphasis:
?The Elites are back as the main villains.?
Now, this for me is something beyond awesome and in terms of plot and drama, perfect. If you ask me, there is no greater clash of villain and hero in gaming then the balance of the Elite and the Spartan, both fight each other on equal strength to the bloody end. One in pursuit of salvation and a religious hope and the other in desperate desire to survive as a species.
However here, it is presented with an element of mystery, unknown only to the Spartan team. The Covenant come across as something unknowable, yet hostile. A species that seems to want nothing but endless destruction, so suddenly it gives off an idea of what the marines fighting the Covenant and the civilians fleeing from it, must be seeing as they flee. Right now, the Covenant motivation is shrouded in mystery and because you can?t understand a word that they are saying and because they roar at you in disgust and do everything in their power to kill you, it makes the conflict suddenly feel a lot more real.
And all that it really looks like on the surface is a bunch of aliens speaking in an unknown language, but to the esteemed fan, this is a real interesting look at the conflict and it changes the way I at least, now look at the great Halo conflicts.
Finally, as I must stress, the music is amazing. I know that technically by this point great music in a Halo game is more or less a given but let me tell you, Marty O?Donnell took the music in a whole new idea, there are a few foreshadowed older themes from prior games in it, no question, but the majority of the music is some seriously amazing intense orchestra music that just blew me away listening to. The main Halo theme might be missing from this game but the new themes do more then enough to make up for that fact. I know I might sound like I?m gushing here but? well, it?s just that good. This stuff could be played in an orchestral theatre and be met with praise. It is haunting, and mournful while also being epic and exciting.
If every Halo game thus far has been defined in theme by the music playing for it, then Reach hit all the right notes.
Of course, the display isn?t all good. Like I said, it gets a little clunky at times and even though the voice acting is generally quite strong and conveys the drama of the script quite well, at points there are noticeable moments of flatness and similarly points where the script has some rather overused cliché lines. True, in stories like this it is par of the course but still I found myself groaning when I heard someone say the equivalent of:
?Go on without me.?
And:
?No, I can do this, let?s push on.?
Lines like these have already been made into parodies with the toy soldiers in the movie Toy Story, after this point, they do lose any kind of serious subtext hearing them out loud.
Plus while in and of itself the dark aesthetic and war torn skies look absolutely beautiful it also comes at the cost of losing some of the charm and light heartedness of previous Halo games. There are a few bits designed to make you chuckle but for the most part, with so many dark themes present, at times it can seem a wee bit melodramatic and an ever so small part of the charm of the franchise is compromised in favor of the darkness.
Not a lot, but still some.
Overall though the one greatest negative problem is that now anyone who wanted to so boldly proclaim that Halo was nothing but guys in super suits battling aliens with no further depth could point at this particular game and it would be very hard to argue with them at least as far as this game goes. But as it stands the positives and the negatives do still sort of balance out, theme wise anyway, gameplay wise is a whole other story.
The signature parts of the Halo experience are fully kept alive in Halo: Reach. You will find yourself engaged in enclosed and outdoor gun battles and the transitions between the two are smooth and intuitive. You will also find yourself operating a vehicle more than once, usually the now ever loved Warthog, and also take to the skies in an aerial vehicle. The standard experience hasn?t changed much, which is good in some respects. You get to wander around in much larger map space now and of course once again there isn?t really a ?right? way to handle a situation. Just because you start off with a sniper rifle in one mission doesn?t mean that you are guaranteed to need it later on down the line.
There are some new things put into play too, new vehicles to drive and a handful of crazy new weapons to mess around with greatly and with many laughs to be had. The main change however is the new armor abilities that replace the equipment from Halo 3. The major difference between them and equipment being that they can be used multiple times rather than only once. Some of the armor abilities are, admittedly, just copies of the equipment in Halo 3 but there are some great original ones. My personal favorite in terms of great design being the hologram which creates a perfect duplicate of you that then rushes on a predetermined path and distracts the enemy.
Then of course, there are jetpacks. But we all know the awesomeness of jetpacks so I feel no need to continue to talk about them.
One other, I guess I would have to say gimmick, present in the game is one singular level in which you find yourself in space, doing dogfighting against the Covenant. This is just one small part of a level so it isn?t really comparable to full fledged space combat games but as it stands it provides a great little distraction and helps show you, briefly, the perspective of the great battle for Reach from the perspective of the people battling among the stars.
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Also new among the ideas in Reach are the, frankly, brutal assassinations. Now if you go behind an enemy that doesn?t see you and hold down on the hit button (Note: Halo: Reach has a notably different control scheme to prior games) you go into a third person animation as your character delivers a gruesome death to an unfortunate enemy. True, this also falls under the category of ?gimmick? but if you honestly don?t get a little excited watching Noble 6 show the Covenant what his knife can do then simply put, you are clearly some form of mollusk.
Reach has some grand new weapons as well and anyone complaining about how Halo has guns that look like they came from a toy chest can stop their complaining right here and right now. The guns you use here in Reach, look like guns. They are heavily detailed and they make very real gun like sounds while firing. They are a blast to use.
However, as can generally be expected in these circumstances, any weapon made by the putrid hands of a lowly human falls laughably short in the face of the mighty Covenant weapons which now include a needle rifle, a plasma launching assault rifle, a plasma grenade launcher and a particle beam sniper rifle, as well as a lot of the old classics like the ?oh shit that Elites? going to kill me? inducing Energy sword that will brown just as many Spartan trousers as it did in Halo: Combat evolved.
The enemies are also, as has come to be an expectation in Reach, very intelligent. These are literally some of the smartest enemies you will encounter in a shooter, they evade explosions, recharge their shields, fall back, advance, work as a team and have a nasty tendency to know when you are at your most vulnerable to strike. The Elites are, of course, the best examples of this, proving once and for all that the epic encounter of Spartan V Elite still holds its ground. Expect to be brought down a lot, foul human, by the might of Covenant. For they are fearsome and intelligent.
I?m not even kidding around; the enemy AI is very smart, at times to an almost scary degree.
I do have one major issue with the enemy selection in Reach, actually many issues, many big ugly hairy smelly issues. The Brutes still feel like they have to return. Even though the Elites are widely considered the ?big bads? for this game the Brutes still get awkwardly pushed in as well. They look ugly as hell and tragically, their AI doesn?t really play out all that different to the Elites. They do all the same things without any trademark brutish behavior or indeed much of a brain. They have been reverted back to just being damage sponges that don?t do much in the way of interesting gameplay, they are only implemented a few times but still? poor show. Not that I have much respect for the brutes but they can do better than this.
They are also much uglier than before
Also it must be said that although the enemy are damn near genius?s, if only the same could be said for your allies. While the cinematics do a reasonable job making you like and sympathize the members of Noble Team I think you will find yourself cursing them a few times in gameplay. Like when they refuse to get into the Warthog, or consistently die, or just generally come across as glitchy.
This is the weird foible of the series really, the same blessed genius of your enemies is rarely given to your allies.
The last thing worth noting in Noble 6 himself or should I say, possibly, herself. Yes, see the Noble 6 thus far seen in promotional videos is unlikely to be the one you see in campaign. For whatever Spartan you design in the armory (more on this in a moment) is the one that will appear in the campaign as Noble 6, and the Spartan model is no longer strictly speaking, male.
So at the end of the day, if you make a bright pink female Noble 6, that?s who?ll be in the campaign. If you make a purple Spartan with E.O.D armor, then that?ll be the one in campaign. I myself ended up with an aqua colored Spartan with the (*cough*) Recon helmet (*cough*) as Noble 6 (okay, I admit the Recon armor isn?t all that astounding). The fact is, the character is YOU. You are Noble 6 and can empathize with him or her quite greatly as a result, even if Noble 6 still ultimately has his or her own set voice, this still very much feels like your character or even just you.
This gives Halo: Reach?s campaign a level of personal involvement that is simply lost in past games and makes the final moments after the credits all the more chilling and memorable.
Seriously, like, for the love of god, stick through till after the credits.
Wow, seven pages in and I?ve only just finished talking about the campaign. This is going to be a long night. Still to wrap up, a descent but not brilliant story with some great references to the Halo Lore and some great additions for atmosphere and great gameplay that might not be perfect but is still very fun to play through with friends. The campaign is still quite disappointingly short but as it stands, it is a blast to play with friends and even on your own has a certain ambiance that keeps you moving forward.
It?s by no means a perfect campaign but it is solid.
Okay, now that campaign is over, I can move on to the core design on the multiplayer component. Given that the multiplayer is literally a sea of content I thought I would start with the three main things not crucial to the main multiplayer experience, namely The Armory, Forge and Theatre? and also possibly Firefight.
I?ll start with, all things considered? the armory. This is going to be short and to the point mind you, because I have a lot to get through.
In Halo 3, the way you updated the armor for your Spartan or Elite was through achievements or playing in the campaign. This time around it works a little differently, now new pieces for Spartan armor are purchased via a ?credit? system which in turn earned through playing of the game. Also it?s more than just the standard helmet, chest and shoulder pieces being unlocked. Now you get more options with over ten slots, this includes accessories like things on the leg, knee guard, lights on the helmet and wrist pieces.
Also available for customization are things like the preferred voice in Firefight which has damn near every voice you could want from beloved characters from the franchise? but alas, no Keith David? and armor effects that include the coveted ?flaming helmet? and an effect that makes your head explode into confetti if you die. However these are insanely pricey and the flaming helmet is only for Legendary so if you have plans for these you will have to play like crazy.
But still the effort is there to make your Spartan the best you can, after all this is the core identity of the player in both campaign and matchmaking. So make the most of it.
True, this is all so much spare extras when you consider that you spend most of the game in first person view but it does still add an extra incentive to play the game and watching your own personalized little Spartan go about his or her business is quite a delight? especially when you see their weak futile forms decimated by the blatantly superior Sangheili.
Speaking of, one major drawback for me through the whole ?hype? engine was that the Elites get significantly less attention than the Spartans do in this game. Rather than many individual mix and match set ups, the Elite is given a singular pallet swap and seven default options and one extra if you got the Limited or Legendary editions (like me). Worse still being that in matchmaking the Elite can no longer be a default model and will only be seen in the following three set ups:
Invasion
Elite Slayer
Firefight versus- Generator defense
While this limitation does hurt me very, very deeply and makes me a sad Vrex there is still hope for all the might of the Sangheili from Bungie and indeed a love letter to all the Elite players everywhere for all the hell we had to go through in Halo 2 and 3. The Elites are better than the Spartans in terms of design.
Now before all the whining Spartan centric small minded fools who cling on to the idea that the human race has any chance, or indeed any right, to survive against the might of the Sangheili, let me explain:
The Elite moves faster on average then a Spartan does. It can take more damage than a Spartan can and it?s shields and health actually regenerate while all the Spartans have reverted back to the Halo: Combat Evolved tactic of needing health packs. They also have by default an ?evade? ability that allows them to roll out of the path of explosions fairly quickly. Don?t think that this means you are a god child on the battlefield, you?ll still die a fair portion of the time due to being a greater target in size then the Spartan? but all in all the fact that the Elites finally play differently to Spartans makes them feel very well put together.
Plus, even though Matchmaking is out of the question for the most part, there is a Preferred Species setting that allows the player to stick with Elites in custom games. So while I stick it out with the Spartan visage in multiplayer I get to be myself in my own mighty Sangheilian image among my actual peers in games we set up for ourselves. It?s a good thing.
Okay, here?s my brief mention of theatre mode in Halo: Reach.
It is unchanged from Halo 3, it allows you to view past battles, make screenshots (like my new Sangheili avatar) and make film clips. It was awesome then but it?s clear there?s no real way to update the technology so it?s only barely worth noting.
Still, kinda cool if a little samey.
Okay, now on to Firefight mode. It was a ?new? mode showcased in ODST by which I mean it was the same as Horde mode in Gears of War 2 but with added gimmicks like skulls that changed the balance of gameplay.
Nowadays though with Reach, there are some totally new changes made. You can customize your firefight experience to have it how you want it, including all grunt modes, modes where everyone has rockets and jetpacks and limitless ammo, modes where enemies spam grenades, modes where you are invincible although you are something beyond a wimp if you need that.
It also has Firefight Versus which as I had already mentioned allows one side to be the Spartans and the other is the Elites now fighting alongside an army of Covenant troops to attack the enemy.
Firefight is still a load of fun, great to play with friends or even just by you to get the Halo experience without having to start the full campaign.
I really wish I could dwell on the rest of this mode but I think I?ve gone on for way too long on other stuff and there is a LOT to get through here.
So now let?s move on to Forge, or more importantly Forge World.
Much talked about in the hype and anticipation for Halo: Reach was Forge World. This is the only multiplayer map on the disk that takes place on an actual Halo ring and as such is probably the most wonderfully brightly colored out of all them, giving flashbacks to Halo 1. But what makes this map truly great is the sheer hugeness of it.
This could literally be about seven small maps but instead it is all seven maps rolled into one huge singular map. It actually takes considerable time to move from one spot to the other and the open nature of its world is frankly, shocking, considering the scale.
Of course such a world, begging to be created by your own design needs grand tools does it not? This is where Forge World shines.
You are given almost endless freedom to create damn near whatever kind of map you could ever want made. The Forerunner technology returns as the building blocks and well? you?ve probably seen the vidoc already. Unlike the somewhat clunky method of the original Forge in Halo 3 you now have much greater tools to put together your own maps. For instance now you can phase together one object with another and scenery so you can have a base sticking out of a rock look seamless. You can also keep them locked in one place so they?ll float in the air. I could go on talking about this for about an hour but seriously let it be known, the forge options in Forge World are simply staggering. You can create your own world, your own art if you want and your own gametypes and are given near limitless freedom to do so.
That said there are still issues; don?t think my fanboism has blinded me of those.
For instance, putting smaller objects inside recently constructed rooms proves a lot harder this time around, you run the risk of accidentally moving an entire section of building and for some reason the Forge Monitor doesn?t seem eager to go into the rooms if you are carrying a weapon, instead remaining in the doorway leaving you to have to chunkily push it around. Some people have managed to work around this problem and they are now considered saints because only someone with divine knowledge of the other side could comprehend how to do that.
Also, the other main issue I have can be summarized with one sentence:
?What about the other maps??
You are given the option to forge the other multiplayer maps, excluding the firefight ones sadly, but it?s almost pointless. There is a very barren selection of improvements you can give each map and although I was expecting unique objects to each map, in the end what I am left with is the same basic collection of objects in the UNSC themed map ?sword base? as I get in the Japanese themed hotel map ?Reflections?. There?s just kind of a general lack of any incentive to try and make custom maps for these maps. Especially not when Forge World lets me create a replica Pillar of Autumn.
Right, that?s all that covered. Now let?s move onto the meat and core of this delicious fruit? the multiplayer. And just for fun let?s have the starting picture be of an Elites killing a Spartan
The full Halo multiplayer experience has, for the longest time, been something that has eluded me because I used to lack Xbox Live. Hence one reason I loved Halo multiplayer, apart from the fun and the memories of many happy hours playing the game with friends while we drank our coke and ate our pizza and cookies in our designated ?Xbox Nights? so many years ago? sigh? was the fact that Halo did not instantly assume that every player had Xbox Live and as such had local multiplayer support to allow me to just play the game with people I like. Years later I would discover that I was indeed able to get Xbox live and that I could do so with the ease of the Holy Wireless Adapter.
So now having gotten my Holy Wireless Adapter hooked up and I am now welcomed into the online gaming world I can now discuss the Halo: Reach experience in all of it?s pistol whipping, gun slinging tea bagging glory.
I kid really.
The custom game options do as it says, allowing you to play games just with friends either of the standard gametypes or ones you make yourself. There are an insane amount of options here so I won?t even get started listing them or I?ll be here until the day the Earth stands still. But just let it be known, they are amazing.
Anyway, now that I have the holy wireless adapter in my hands and am able to bend it to my will, I can now express with a lot of joy that Halo: Reach is a game with a lot of incentive for people wanting to play alongside or against other players.
One major thing that sets Reach apart from other Halo games is the loadouts. In much the same vein as Call of Duty games instead of just spawning with the standard issue assault rifle/pistol combo, you now get to in most matches pick which weapon set and armor ability you want. So now you don?t have to worry about someone on your team trying to kill you to steal your shotgun or whatever. While this change ultimately still feels much more Call of Duty then it does Halo it certainly does help maintain the flow of the game and gives players the opportunity to play all the armor abilities they want.
The old classic modes return like Slayer, Capture the Flag, Assault, Juggernaut and Oddball but there are also some great interesting new modes too.
For example, Stockpile which is essentially capture the flag but with many neutral flags that are scattered across the map to pick up instead of just the one singular objective based flag. Another is Headhunter in which one player on each team is carrying a surplus of ?skulls? on their person and upon dying they all scatter to be picked up by the opposition who then deposits them at a certain point. The idea of course being to collect as many skulls as you can from as many players as you can. Again, it?s fun and interesting.
Also although Elites and Spartans may never face one another in slayer you can still play an Elite only variant of the game type with just members of the Sangheili race. Not a lot changes of course but the fact that you now roll and can take a bit more damage and such is great at reminding you that the Elites play differently to Spartans.
There are a lot of different playslists including Firefight which is now officially available in Matchmaking but out of all of them, the one that I recommend the most is Invasion. I really can?t go on talking about all the many modes out there with the small amount of space I still have left so I?ll just end by covering my favorite.
Invasion is a Spartan VS. Elite gametype. It is also one of the most hectic and intense and fun experiences I?ve ever had in an online Halo match? remembering I have not had much prior experience in an online Halo match.
Essentially there are two teams, one is the attacking one and the other is the defending one, the one I?ve actually played the most is ?Spire? which is the one where the Elites are defending and the Spartans are on the assault.
The Spartans have three minutes to capture a point and bring down a shield generator to allow them to reach the next spot, they do this by standing near it and capturing it, much like a game of territories. The Elites merely have to prevent them from doing so, if they succeed the round is over.
If the filth that is humanity I somehow allowed to succeed, then there is a second ?tier? unlocked that allows new loadouts for both sides and the objective for the Spartans is now to reach the top of the tower and shut down the control section, again this plays like a match of territories. The Elites are once again tasked with bringing the pitiful humans down a few notches.
The last step for the Spartans is to capture some power cells and bring them to a Pelican dropship that lands. At this stage in the game not only do Covenant Banshee?s and UNSC Falcons spawn for either team to engage in the air but all loadouts are readily available as the Spartans make a mad dash to drop off the power cores and the Elites boldly defy their attempts.
The game has multiple rounds and allows both teams to get an equal chance to play both perspectives. What is great is that it fits with the context of the story and setting of Halo while also defining the difference between Spartans and Elites in terms of gameplay. Out of all the many multiplayer games available, this is the one I recommend highest.
Okay, okay there are faults too. Don?t think I?ve forgotten about those.
First of all, there is a rather small collection of multiplayer maps overall, only about nine. They are also each just cut away pieces from campaign levels or remakes of classic maps from prior Halo games. This, combined with the barren selection of forge options available in them is a bit of a let down. It is helped a bit however by the sheer number of modes you can play with; even so this is something that I think needed improvements.
However my biggest complaint is simply put, that the Holy Wireless Adapter is cursed by Halo: Reach at points. In the early days of playing the game, my connection dropped like crazy. On average about once every twenty minutes, this often left a lot of pissed off gamers and friends who I was in the middle of a match with and suddenly couldn?t reconnect to. My friend is convinced this is what happens when you go wireless but I disagree, Halo 3, in the short time I had left to play it online, never had this problem or at least not as noticeably. Hence it has to be the fault of the server.
It was so intense the number of times the match just abruptly ended for me and of course the controversial ?quit ban? eventually came into plays which of course for the unfamiliar is a twenty minute suspension given to people who frequently leave games? AND NOTHING ELSE (*twitch*) and while in and of itself it?s not a bad idea it does mean I?m being punished for what really isn?t my fault.
To their credit, my connection has been getting more steadily better in recent days so maybe Bungie have noticed that and patched it up but still it doesn?t make suddenly dropping out of a match, mere points away from gaining Sergeant grade 3 as a rank and be left with nothing something of a tolerable experience.
However overall, the flaws are not enough to deter me from playing this game. Sure the campaign is on the short side but what I get is good quality stuff and with the ability to play online co-op with up to four people there is some excuse for that. So while there is a short campaign that does occasionally suffer from a little melodrama, it?s still a worthy experience. Similarly although there are few maps available there are a lot of various gametypes up for grabs and while connection issues are a *****, it still ultimately comes together quite nicely. Hell, there aren?t even that many annoying little kids spamming the mike anymore.
I get the feeling that it?s probably too late to hope Halo: Reach doesn?t get flamed endlessly for carrying the stigma of being a game with the word ?Halo? in the title but I really can?t stress enough that Halo: Reach is a good solid game with a lot of content, even if it gets a little patchy from time to time there is plenty to keep you occupied. The fact that this review took so long to write is a testament to that fact because I kept on getting distracted by playing the actual game.
If nothing else, nothing can truly compare to the dark epicness that is the very final moments of the game, and the last interactive moment of Bungie?s grand saga. Of which once again I have to stress, YOU MUST SEE FOR YOURSELF.
Man, looking back I just can?t believe it. This is it, the last Halo game by Bungie and literally everything they?ve ever put into prior games is in here and then some, this is without a doubt the final definitive Halo. It?s poetic in so many ways, in the way that it ends and it brought a slight nostalgic tear to my eye playing it. I mean this has all happened in just under a decade, I now watch as the game franchise I loved and was a core part of me now reaches the spiritual conclusion. Bungie is shutting the doors to the Halo franchise and are now moving to new, unfamiliar shores and will soon be on the forefront of new franchises and new original games and I for one hope for their success.
This is the swan song to Halo, the last one by the original creators and while 343 industries are going to take the helm of the Halo franchise from this time on and we are left pushing forward ceaselessly into unfamiliar waters, we will always have Bungie?s Halo series and the great legacy that comes with it. Bungie and Halo may never meet again on the bumpy road of game design in the foreseeable future but nothing will take away the memories of this series I have. From stepping out onto a Halo for the first time, from assuming the role of the Arbiter or from the thrill of finishing the fight? this is my franchise.
It kills me to see it go but at the end of the day, it doesn?t get much better than this in terms of endings.
So let us say our thanks to Bungie and good wishes for their future endeavors, wherever they may take them and look forward to the next generation of Halo games, waiting to be explored.
For Other self indulgent Vrex related reviews please click on the following links:
Vrex at the movies: Coraline [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.130069]
Vrex at the movies: Dead Space Downfall [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.105604]
Vrex at the movies: Pitch Black [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.120198]
Vrex at the movies: Mary and Max [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.114658]
Vrex at the movies: Friday the Thirteenth [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.107487]
Vrex at the movies: District 9 [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.136231#3067612]
Vrex at the movies: Up [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.141623#3174604]
Vrex at the movies: 500 days of Summer [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.145257#3283119]
Vrex at the movies: Mao's last dancer [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.149544#3490835]
Vrex at the movies: Whip It [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.152214#3625164]
Vrex at the movies: Avatar [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.163318#4221383]
Vrex at the movies: Splice [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.228103-Vrex-at-the-movies-Splice#7861475]
Vrex at the movies: Piranha 3-D [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.228871-Vrex-at-the-movies-Piranha-3-D#7912359]
And as for games:
Vrex behind the controller: Otogi: Myth of Demons [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.113073]
Vrex behind the controller: Dead Space [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.116791]
Vrex behind the controller: Mass Effect [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.116372]
Vrex behind the controller: Halo 3: ODST [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.146265#3332107]
And for specials:
The Vrex film awards 2009 [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.165051-The-Vrex-Film-Awards-2009#4329656]
The Sangheili [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.183671-The-Sangheili-A-very-special-Vrex-review#5501359]
This is some seriously epic text here, so let that be known first of all. This is my fully detailed review and loving tribute to the swansong of my favorite game series, expect long text.
Wow? has it really only been nine years since the release of Halo: Combat evolved? Looking back through recent gaming history, the first Halo game just feels like it was brought to our attention a generation ago, in reality it was just under a decade. Yet in that time, the little game called Halo spawned a whole franchise seemingly overnight. Books were written, fans were brought together, sequels were made and in so doing Halo became one of the more recognized grand trilogy?s stretching through gaming history, and it has only barely started to spread its wings by comparison to some of the other massive franchises out there. In so doing also giving the small development team Bungie a great moment in the spotlight and now the ranking of one of the more recognized developer teams out there.
It has affected gaming in a lot of respective areas and as far as successful franchises go, you don?t get much more successful than this. However, Halo also has had to, in recent years; suffer a lot of hate and scorn and negative criticism. Criticism that too often I can?t help but feel it wouldn?t have to answer to if it wasn?t the juggernaut that it is. So in some respects having such a huge success rate has also resulted in a lot of negative backlash and has left the raging debate of:
?Is Halo good??
Running through the internet for the latter half of a decade now. I suspect and indeed have had to come to accept that fact that no matter what I say in this instance the war will not end and we will continue to flame each other over this issue until we are old men. During which time, our lack of ability to probably argue will result in us instead spitting our false teeth at each other.
However even though I have more than a few battle scars from internet wars, I still feel that the franchise as it stands has a certain soul and charm and that alone kept me going forward. I love this game series; it was the thing that made me the gamer I am today. It has always stayed at the core of my game playing life, playing Halo games that were developed by Bungie.
I suppose that is why I am taking it upon myself to review the last Halo game ever to be released by Bungie, the final moments of the grand saga that has been a part of my life for over nine years.
I?m just warning you right now, I suspect there will be gushing? and possible tears, as I write this up.
Anyway, here it is, Halo: Reach. The great saga ends exactly where it truly began.
Every true Halo fan knows the story of Reach. Even minor fans that are barely paying attention have no doubt some understanding of it even if it was just name dropped once or twice.
To the un-initiated, Reach was once a planet newly populated by the human race and was considered the prize of all the outer colonies for the tactical location, size and perfect environment conditions. However eventually the war against the genocidal fanatical alliance of alien races known as ?the Covenant? arrived on Reach?s doorstep.
What followed then was an utter military disaster, in some respects, the worst military failure in human history. The planet was completely overrun and then eventually burned to glass by the relentless destructive force of the Covenant. A complete failure, resulting in the deaths of millions of innocent people and the devastating loss of several huge fleets and thousands of military and navy units and ultimately the almost complete annihilation of the genetically augmented super soldiers known as the Spartan II?s.
A dark chapter of the UNSC history referred to simply as ?The Fall of Reach?.
This is the story that Halo: Reach aims to tell, of the desperate struggle against simply overwhelming odds. The death, the courage and the determination but also of the tragic realization that this time all the determination and implied badassery are not going to be enough.
That this time, there is simply no chance of victory and that while the ?hell yeah let?s kick some alien ass? has worked in the past, this time that is just not going to happen. As it stands this is easily the darkest chapter in the Halo franchise to date, and while the sheet of dark hopelessness is still clear throughout the campaign there are still the occasional moments of catharsis that still make the player feel like they have achieved something far greater.
So now that I have covered the main theme of the story here, let?s actually get into the story and also, the campaign.
As I hinted at above, there was indeed a book called ?the Fall of Reach? that covered a lot of the story and drama and huge scale conflict of the battle of Reach. However the game itself does not follow that same plot which is, in all honestly, probably for the best as deconstructing a deeply layered novel into an action oriented shooter would probably turn into a narrative disaster. So, rather than focus on the grand scale of the battle of Reach from the perspective of the military, the Covenant, the civilians and the Navy and all points in between, the story instead opts to go into the viewpoint of a much smaller but still very significant part of the story.
In this case a branch of Spartan III?s known as ?Noble Team? who is now at the forefront of every major battle in Reach. So, rather than experience the full scale of the conflict we are instead witness to just the chaotic drama that this one team faces.
The campaign starts off with Noble 6, this is you the player, meeting up with the rest of Noble team. It is set before the battle of Reach has actually started, instead the main thing that Noble Team are assigned to do battle with are the Rebels, also known as Insurrectionists. This is a big nod to fans of the established franchise, as the rebels have had a lot of involvement in the story prior to the Covenant even entering the picture. But still the illusion of relative peace is then lost very quickly when on a routine mission, you find yourself battling a Covenant recon force.
That?s right; the game literally starts right from the beginning of the battle of Reach and ends right at the ending of it. And just by looking at the opening scene and as the story progresses, the more obvious it becomes that despite the best efforts of Noble 6, there is nothing that can be done to save Reach and that in the end, this is a battle you are destined to lose.
I don?t wish to give away too many plot spoilers but truth be told, the campaign is in a lot of ways a huge love letter to a lot of fans out there. True it still stops short, clocking in at around eight hours, but within is a lot of lore and history and blatant acts of fan service.
The most notably being a cameo by someone quite well known, well I might as well just say it, Catherine Halsey! The character that has had such a significant impact on the entire franchise but has spent most of it in the back row off stage is now front and centre, showing her face for the first, and in all likelihood, last time in a Halo game.
It is true that due to the careful attention not to greatly mess up the continuity of the plot of The Fall of Reach, there isn?t really a lot the story can do with her, but still it is nice to finally see Halsey isn?t it?
There are a few other cameos thrown in as well towards the end and a brilliant end sequence that perfectly ties the events of this game to the main trilogy as well as a damn near perfectly chilling final moment after the credits finish. Like I said before, it manages to attempt a single shine of uplifting hope even after so much damning darkness and in terms of plot, it succeeds.
So at the end of the day, it is a rather short campaign that I managed to get all the way through in one very dedicated night?s worth of playing, but I had a lot of fun while doing it and there?s plenty of substance to work with here.
So, now that I?ve skimmed through the plot with a minimal amount of spoilers, I can start talking about the campaign in terms of gameplay and in terms of experiences and the general presentation.
All things considered, I have decided to start with a rundown of the positives and negatives of how the game is presented.
First and foremost, Reach looks amazing. It might not be on the level of the Unreal Engine or the Crytech engine or anything like that but as it stands the visuals are strong and helpfully show off a lot of detail in the lovingly rendered world. There are some very odd moments where the engine seems to chug for a few second but for the most part it is a brilliantly constructed engine that allows flowing combat and can put many enemies on screen at one time. More importantly, it makes Reach feel like a real world, complete with actual wildlife running around.
Also worth noting though from a storyline perspective, are the characters. Namely, Noble Team. I admit that each individual character suffers more than a few clichés, Carter is the bold leader, Kat is the clever tech whiz, Jun is the chatty sniper, Jorge is the heavy lunk of meat with a heart of gold and Emile is the cocky and cynical badass. By themselves, they are quite cliché and yet when put together, they suddenly come alive. There is genuine chemistry between the Spartan team here, whether it?s Emile bitterly laughing as Jorge once again ?forgets what he is? by attempting to show some compassion to a terrified civilian or how Carter and Kat get into a slightly fierce debate over what to do next and whether or not they have a right to question their orders. Or just hearing Jun be way too chatty and incidentally annoy his commanding officer, they all work as a unit and I at least did grow to like them a considerable amount.
Another great thing about them is that they now are much more human. They take their helmets off and reveal that they are people with actual human personalities and better still, they play as allies in almost every mission you play. Giving off the idea that you aren?t alone and that this is a team effort.
Another thing that I could damn near kiss Bungie for is that for the first time in all of the Halo games, the Spartans are NOT specifically American anymore. This time the cast is a lot more diverse, Kat and Jun are both heavily accented, sounding possibly Hungarian or maybe Russian. Jorge, the great heavy badass has a very thick English accent that makes him sound like he?d be right at home in North London working in a Fish and Chips shop. Emile is clearly African American as you can tell from his voice, essentially only Carter is the one white male American lead here.
This also connects to the population of the Planet Reach itself, with civilians speaking in Hungarian and various cultural backgrounds, it does a lot to help erase the image that Halo has frequently had to suffer from, namely that it?s all just ?America, HELL YEAH!? Seriously Bungie, this was a very good move on your part.
Also to praise, the presence of Kat. Finally we see a dignified female Spartan entering the field after having spent so much time backstage, much like Halsey, and only covered in the books. Thus her being here also helps remove the unfair stigma Halo has of being a ?machismo masculine obsessed action game.? Even if admittedly she does find herself in that oddly popular role for women in action games, the ?tech girl?.
So yes, while I was originally hoping that I could end up praising Kat as my new favorite 'tough girl' and have her stand alongside Ashley Williams of Mass Effect in terms of tough yet awesome female characters in games that I just love, in the end Kat just barely doesn't make the mark. (Blimey I have been mentioning how much I like Ashley a lot lately haven't I?)
Still, her simply being there finally erases the image of Halo as a 'boys only club' so I'm grateful for her addition to the plot.
Also, another major change that has effected greatly the overall feel of the game, is the updated change of the Covenant. In Halo: Reach, the alien races of the Covenant once again feel very alien. While one can argue with annoyance that after spending so long maintaining that the aliens in Halo are not actually evil irredeemable monsters through the story of the Arbiter, it may seem a little irritating to now revert them back to straight up villains.
However I believe that in this context, with the small story of the experiences of Noble Team that having the Covenant feel monstrous and imposing really does help greatly convey the drama of the situation. Plus, if you play this game with the knowledge of the events of the main trilogy and how really the Covenant are actually not unlike humans in many ways, it makes this new darkened view of them all the more impressive.
So with that in mind, the Covenant now do not speak a single word of coherent English nor do they have any vaguely human behavior. They roar in an unknown language and have the singular goal on their mind of killing you and only you in any way they conceivably can.
Best of all, the Elites are back as the main villains? let me just repeat that with a little more emphasis:
?The Elites are back as the main villains.?
Now, this for me is something beyond awesome and in terms of plot and drama, perfect. If you ask me, there is no greater clash of villain and hero in gaming then the balance of the Elite and the Spartan, both fight each other on equal strength to the bloody end. One in pursuit of salvation and a religious hope and the other in desperate desire to survive as a species.
However here, it is presented with an element of mystery, unknown only to the Spartan team. The Covenant come across as something unknowable, yet hostile. A species that seems to want nothing but endless destruction, so suddenly it gives off an idea of what the marines fighting the Covenant and the civilians fleeing from it, must be seeing as they flee. Right now, the Covenant motivation is shrouded in mystery and because you can?t understand a word that they are saying and because they roar at you in disgust and do everything in their power to kill you, it makes the conflict suddenly feel a lot more real.
And all that it really looks like on the surface is a bunch of aliens speaking in an unknown language, but to the esteemed fan, this is a real interesting look at the conflict and it changes the way I at least, now look at the great Halo conflicts.
Finally, as I must stress, the music is amazing. I know that technically by this point great music in a Halo game is more or less a given but let me tell you, Marty O?Donnell took the music in a whole new idea, there are a few foreshadowed older themes from prior games in it, no question, but the majority of the music is some seriously amazing intense orchestra music that just blew me away listening to. The main Halo theme might be missing from this game but the new themes do more then enough to make up for that fact. I know I might sound like I?m gushing here but? well, it?s just that good. This stuff could be played in an orchestral theatre and be met with praise. It is haunting, and mournful while also being epic and exciting.
If every Halo game thus far has been defined in theme by the music playing for it, then Reach hit all the right notes.
Of course, the display isn?t all good. Like I said, it gets a little clunky at times and even though the voice acting is generally quite strong and conveys the drama of the script quite well, at points there are noticeable moments of flatness and similarly points where the script has some rather overused cliché lines. True, in stories like this it is par of the course but still I found myself groaning when I heard someone say the equivalent of:
?Go on without me.?
And:
?No, I can do this, let?s push on.?
Lines like these have already been made into parodies with the toy soldiers in the movie Toy Story, after this point, they do lose any kind of serious subtext hearing them out loud.
Plus while in and of itself the dark aesthetic and war torn skies look absolutely beautiful it also comes at the cost of losing some of the charm and light heartedness of previous Halo games. There are a few bits designed to make you chuckle but for the most part, with so many dark themes present, at times it can seem a wee bit melodramatic and an ever so small part of the charm of the franchise is compromised in favor of the darkness.
Not a lot, but still some.
Overall though the one greatest negative problem is that now anyone who wanted to so boldly proclaim that Halo was nothing but guys in super suits battling aliens with no further depth could point at this particular game and it would be very hard to argue with them at least as far as this game goes. But as it stands the positives and the negatives do still sort of balance out, theme wise anyway, gameplay wise is a whole other story.
The signature parts of the Halo experience are fully kept alive in Halo: Reach. You will find yourself engaged in enclosed and outdoor gun battles and the transitions between the two are smooth and intuitive. You will also find yourself operating a vehicle more than once, usually the now ever loved Warthog, and also take to the skies in an aerial vehicle. The standard experience hasn?t changed much, which is good in some respects. You get to wander around in much larger map space now and of course once again there isn?t really a ?right? way to handle a situation. Just because you start off with a sniper rifle in one mission doesn?t mean that you are guaranteed to need it later on down the line.
There are some new things put into play too, new vehicles to drive and a handful of crazy new weapons to mess around with greatly and with many laughs to be had. The main change however is the new armor abilities that replace the equipment from Halo 3. The major difference between them and equipment being that they can be used multiple times rather than only once. Some of the armor abilities are, admittedly, just copies of the equipment in Halo 3 but there are some great original ones. My personal favorite in terms of great design being the hologram which creates a perfect duplicate of you that then rushes on a predetermined path and distracts the enemy.
Then of course, there are jetpacks. But we all know the awesomeness of jetpacks so I feel no need to continue to talk about them.
One other, I guess I would have to say gimmick, present in the game is one singular level in which you find yourself in space, doing dogfighting against the Covenant. This is just one small part of a level so it isn?t really comparable to full fledged space combat games but as it stands it provides a great little distraction and helps show you, briefly, the perspective of the great battle for Reach from the perspective of the people battling among the stars.
Also new among the ideas in Reach are the, frankly, brutal assassinations. Now if you go behind an enemy that doesn?t see you and hold down on the hit button (Note: Halo: Reach has a notably different control scheme to prior games) you go into a third person animation as your character delivers a gruesome death to an unfortunate enemy. True, this also falls under the category of ?gimmick? but if you honestly don?t get a little excited watching Noble 6 show the Covenant what his knife can do then simply put, you are clearly some form of mollusk.
Reach has some grand new weapons as well and anyone complaining about how Halo has guns that look like they came from a toy chest can stop their complaining right here and right now. The guns you use here in Reach, look like guns. They are heavily detailed and they make very real gun like sounds while firing. They are a blast to use.
However, as can generally be expected in these circumstances, any weapon made by the putrid hands of a lowly human falls laughably short in the face of the mighty Covenant weapons which now include a needle rifle, a plasma launching assault rifle, a plasma grenade launcher and a particle beam sniper rifle, as well as a lot of the old classics like the ?oh shit that Elites? going to kill me? inducing Energy sword that will brown just as many Spartan trousers as it did in Halo: Combat evolved.
The enemies are also, as has come to be an expectation in Reach, very intelligent. These are literally some of the smartest enemies you will encounter in a shooter, they evade explosions, recharge their shields, fall back, advance, work as a team and have a nasty tendency to know when you are at your most vulnerable to strike. The Elites are, of course, the best examples of this, proving once and for all that the epic encounter of Spartan V Elite still holds its ground. Expect to be brought down a lot, foul human, by the might of Covenant. For they are fearsome and intelligent.
I?m not even kidding around; the enemy AI is very smart, at times to an almost scary degree.
I do have one major issue with the enemy selection in Reach, actually many issues, many big ugly hairy smelly issues. The Brutes still feel like they have to return. Even though the Elites are widely considered the ?big bads? for this game the Brutes still get awkwardly pushed in as well. They look ugly as hell and tragically, their AI doesn?t really play out all that different to the Elites. They do all the same things without any trademark brutish behavior or indeed much of a brain. They have been reverted back to just being damage sponges that don?t do much in the way of interesting gameplay, they are only implemented a few times but still? poor show. Not that I have much respect for the brutes but they can do better than this.
They are also much uglier than before
Also it must be said that although the enemy are damn near genius?s, if only the same could be said for your allies. While the cinematics do a reasonable job making you like and sympathize the members of Noble Team I think you will find yourself cursing them a few times in gameplay. Like when they refuse to get into the Warthog, or consistently die, or just generally come across as glitchy.
This is the weird foible of the series really, the same blessed genius of your enemies is rarely given to your allies.
The last thing worth noting in Noble 6 himself or should I say, possibly, herself. Yes, see the Noble 6 thus far seen in promotional videos is unlikely to be the one you see in campaign. For whatever Spartan you design in the armory (more on this in a moment) is the one that will appear in the campaign as Noble 6, and the Spartan model is no longer strictly speaking, male.
So at the end of the day, if you make a bright pink female Noble 6, that?s who?ll be in the campaign. If you make a purple Spartan with E.O.D armor, then that?ll be the one in campaign. I myself ended up with an aqua colored Spartan with the (*cough*) Recon helmet (*cough*) as Noble 6 (okay, I admit the Recon armor isn?t all that astounding). The fact is, the character is YOU. You are Noble 6 and can empathize with him or her quite greatly as a result, even if Noble 6 still ultimately has his or her own set voice, this still very much feels like your character or even just you.
This gives Halo: Reach?s campaign a level of personal involvement that is simply lost in past games and makes the final moments after the credits all the more chilling and memorable.
Seriously, like, for the love of god, stick through till after the credits.
Wow, seven pages in and I?ve only just finished talking about the campaign. This is going to be a long night. Still to wrap up, a descent but not brilliant story with some great references to the Halo Lore and some great additions for atmosphere and great gameplay that might not be perfect but is still very fun to play through with friends. The campaign is still quite disappointingly short but as it stands, it is a blast to play with friends and even on your own has a certain ambiance that keeps you moving forward.
It?s by no means a perfect campaign but it is solid.
Okay, now that campaign is over, I can move on to the core design on the multiplayer component. Given that the multiplayer is literally a sea of content I thought I would start with the three main things not crucial to the main multiplayer experience, namely The Armory, Forge and Theatre? and also possibly Firefight.
I?ll start with, all things considered? the armory. This is going to be short and to the point mind you, because I have a lot to get through.
In Halo 3, the way you updated the armor for your Spartan or Elite was through achievements or playing in the campaign. This time around it works a little differently, now new pieces for Spartan armor are purchased via a ?credit? system which in turn earned through playing of the game. Also it?s more than just the standard helmet, chest and shoulder pieces being unlocked. Now you get more options with over ten slots, this includes accessories like things on the leg, knee guard, lights on the helmet and wrist pieces.
Also available for customization are things like the preferred voice in Firefight which has damn near every voice you could want from beloved characters from the franchise? but alas, no Keith David? and armor effects that include the coveted ?flaming helmet? and an effect that makes your head explode into confetti if you die. However these are insanely pricey and the flaming helmet is only for Legendary so if you have plans for these you will have to play like crazy.
But still the effort is there to make your Spartan the best you can, after all this is the core identity of the player in both campaign and matchmaking. So make the most of it.
True, this is all so much spare extras when you consider that you spend most of the game in first person view but it does still add an extra incentive to play the game and watching your own personalized little Spartan go about his or her business is quite a delight? especially when you see their weak futile forms decimated by the blatantly superior Sangheili.
Speaking of, one major drawback for me through the whole ?hype? engine was that the Elites get significantly less attention than the Spartans do in this game. Rather than many individual mix and match set ups, the Elite is given a singular pallet swap and seven default options and one extra if you got the Limited or Legendary editions (like me). Worse still being that in matchmaking the Elite can no longer be a default model and will only be seen in the following three set ups:
Invasion
Elite Slayer
Firefight versus- Generator defense
While this limitation does hurt me very, very deeply and makes me a sad Vrex there is still hope for all the might of the Sangheili from Bungie and indeed a love letter to all the Elite players everywhere for all the hell we had to go through in Halo 2 and 3. The Elites are better than the Spartans in terms of design.
Now before all the whining Spartan centric small minded fools who cling on to the idea that the human race has any chance, or indeed any right, to survive against the might of the Sangheili, let me explain:
The Elite moves faster on average then a Spartan does. It can take more damage than a Spartan can and it?s shields and health actually regenerate while all the Spartans have reverted back to the Halo: Combat Evolved tactic of needing health packs. They also have by default an ?evade? ability that allows them to roll out of the path of explosions fairly quickly. Don?t think that this means you are a god child on the battlefield, you?ll still die a fair portion of the time due to being a greater target in size then the Spartan? but all in all the fact that the Elites finally play differently to Spartans makes them feel very well put together.
Plus, even though Matchmaking is out of the question for the most part, there is a Preferred Species setting that allows the player to stick with Elites in custom games. So while I stick it out with the Spartan visage in multiplayer I get to be myself in my own mighty Sangheilian image among my actual peers in games we set up for ourselves. It?s a good thing.
Okay, here?s my brief mention of theatre mode in Halo: Reach.
It is unchanged from Halo 3, it allows you to view past battles, make screenshots (like my new Sangheili avatar) and make film clips. It was awesome then but it?s clear there?s no real way to update the technology so it?s only barely worth noting.
Still, kinda cool if a little samey.
Okay, now on to Firefight mode. It was a ?new? mode showcased in ODST by which I mean it was the same as Horde mode in Gears of War 2 but with added gimmicks like skulls that changed the balance of gameplay.
Nowadays though with Reach, there are some totally new changes made. You can customize your firefight experience to have it how you want it, including all grunt modes, modes where everyone has rockets and jetpacks and limitless ammo, modes where enemies spam grenades, modes where you are invincible although you are something beyond a wimp if you need that.
It also has Firefight Versus which as I had already mentioned allows one side to be the Spartans and the other is the Elites now fighting alongside an army of Covenant troops to attack the enemy.
Firefight is still a load of fun, great to play with friends or even just by you to get the Halo experience without having to start the full campaign.
I really wish I could dwell on the rest of this mode but I think I?ve gone on for way too long on other stuff and there is a LOT to get through here.
So now let?s move on to Forge, or more importantly Forge World.
Much talked about in the hype and anticipation for Halo: Reach was Forge World. This is the only multiplayer map on the disk that takes place on an actual Halo ring and as such is probably the most wonderfully brightly colored out of all them, giving flashbacks to Halo 1. But what makes this map truly great is the sheer hugeness of it.
This could literally be about seven small maps but instead it is all seven maps rolled into one huge singular map. It actually takes considerable time to move from one spot to the other and the open nature of its world is frankly, shocking, considering the scale.
Of course such a world, begging to be created by your own design needs grand tools does it not? This is where Forge World shines.
You are given almost endless freedom to create damn near whatever kind of map you could ever want made. The Forerunner technology returns as the building blocks and well? you?ve probably seen the vidoc already. Unlike the somewhat clunky method of the original Forge in Halo 3 you now have much greater tools to put together your own maps. For instance now you can phase together one object with another and scenery so you can have a base sticking out of a rock look seamless. You can also keep them locked in one place so they?ll float in the air. I could go on talking about this for about an hour but seriously let it be known, the forge options in Forge World are simply staggering. You can create your own world, your own art if you want and your own gametypes and are given near limitless freedom to do so.
That said there are still issues; don?t think my fanboism has blinded me of those.
For instance, putting smaller objects inside recently constructed rooms proves a lot harder this time around, you run the risk of accidentally moving an entire section of building and for some reason the Forge Monitor doesn?t seem eager to go into the rooms if you are carrying a weapon, instead remaining in the doorway leaving you to have to chunkily push it around. Some people have managed to work around this problem and they are now considered saints because only someone with divine knowledge of the other side could comprehend how to do that.
Also, the other main issue I have can be summarized with one sentence:
?What about the other maps??
You are given the option to forge the other multiplayer maps, excluding the firefight ones sadly, but it?s almost pointless. There is a very barren selection of improvements you can give each map and although I was expecting unique objects to each map, in the end what I am left with is the same basic collection of objects in the UNSC themed map ?sword base? as I get in the Japanese themed hotel map ?Reflections?. There?s just kind of a general lack of any incentive to try and make custom maps for these maps. Especially not when Forge World lets me create a replica Pillar of Autumn.
Right, that?s all that covered. Now let?s move onto the meat and core of this delicious fruit? the multiplayer. And just for fun let?s have the starting picture be of an Elites killing a Spartan
The full Halo multiplayer experience has, for the longest time, been something that has eluded me because I used to lack Xbox Live. Hence one reason I loved Halo multiplayer, apart from the fun and the memories of many happy hours playing the game with friends while we drank our coke and ate our pizza and cookies in our designated ?Xbox Nights? so many years ago? sigh? was the fact that Halo did not instantly assume that every player had Xbox Live and as such had local multiplayer support to allow me to just play the game with people I like. Years later I would discover that I was indeed able to get Xbox live and that I could do so with the ease of the Holy Wireless Adapter.
So now having gotten my Holy Wireless Adapter hooked up and I am now welcomed into the online gaming world I can now discuss the Halo: Reach experience in all of it?s pistol whipping, gun slinging tea bagging glory.
I kid really.
The custom game options do as it says, allowing you to play games just with friends either of the standard gametypes or ones you make yourself. There are an insane amount of options here so I won?t even get started listing them or I?ll be here until the day the Earth stands still. But just let it be known, they are amazing.
Anyway, now that I have the holy wireless adapter in my hands and am able to bend it to my will, I can now express with a lot of joy that Halo: Reach is a game with a lot of incentive for people wanting to play alongside or against other players.
One major thing that sets Reach apart from other Halo games is the loadouts. In much the same vein as Call of Duty games instead of just spawning with the standard issue assault rifle/pistol combo, you now get to in most matches pick which weapon set and armor ability you want. So now you don?t have to worry about someone on your team trying to kill you to steal your shotgun or whatever. While this change ultimately still feels much more Call of Duty then it does Halo it certainly does help maintain the flow of the game and gives players the opportunity to play all the armor abilities they want.
The old classic modes return like Slayer, Capture the Flag, Assault, Juggernaut and Oddball but there are also some great interesting new modes too.
For example, Stockpile which is essentially capture the flag but with many neutral flags that are scattered across the map to pick up instead of just the one singular objective based flag. Another is Headhunter in which one player on each team is carrying a surplus of ?skulls? on their person and upon dying they all scatter to be picked up by the opposition who then deposits them at a certain point. The idea of course being to collect as many skulls as you can from as many players as you can. Again, it?s fun and interesting.
Also although Elites and Spartans may never face one another in slayer you can still play an Elite only variant of the game type with just members of the Sangheili race. Not a lot changes of course but the fact that you now roll and can take a bit more damage and such is great at reminding you that the Elites play differently to Spartans.
There are a lot of different playslists including Firefight which is now officially available in Matchmaking but out of all of them, the one that I recommend the most is Invasion. I really can?t go on talking about all the many modes out there with the small amount of space I still have left so I?ll just end by covering my favorite.
Invasion is a Spartan VS. Elite gametype. It is also one of the most hectic and intense and fun experiences I?ve ever had in an online Halo match? remembering I have not had much prior experience in an online Halo match.
Essentially there are two teams, one is the attacking one and the other is the defending one, the one I?ve actually played the most is ?Spire? which is the one where the Elites are defending and the Spartans are on the assault.
The Spartans have three minutes to capture a point and bring down a shield generator to allow them to reach the next spot, they do this by standing near it and capturing it, much like a game of territories. The Elites merely have to prevent them from doing so, if they succeed the round is over.
If the filth that is humanity I somehow allowed to succeed, then there is a second ?tier? unlocked that allows new loadouts for both sides and the objective for the Spartans is now to reach the top of the tower and shut down the control section, again this plays like a match of territories. The Elites are once again tasked with bringing the pitiful humans down a few notches.
The last step for the Spartans is to capture some power cells and bring them to a Pelican dropship that lands. At this stage in the game not only do Covenant Banshee?s and UNSC Falcons spawn for either team to engage in the air but all loadouts are readily available as the Spartans make a mad dash to drop off the power cores and the Elites boldly defy their attempts.
The game has multiple rounds and allows both teams to get an equal chance to play both perspectives. What is great is that it fits with the context of the story and setting of Halo while also defining the difference between Spartans and Elites in terms of gameplay. Out of all the many multiplayer games available, this is the one I recommend highest.
Okay, okay there are faults too. Don?t think I?ve forgotten about those.
First of all, there is a rather small collection of multiplayer maps overall, only about nine. They are also each just cut away pieces from campaign levels or remakes of classic maps from prior Halo games. This, combined with the barren selection of forge options available in them is a bit of a let down. It is helped a bit however by the sheer number of modes you can play with; even so this is something that I think needed improvements.
However my biggest complaint is simply put, that the Holy Wireless Adapter is cursed by Halo: Reach at points. In the early days of playing the game, my connection dropped like crazy. On average about once every twenty minutes, this often left a lot of pissed off gamers and friends who I was in the middle of a match with and suddenly couldn?t reconnect to. My friend is convinced this is what happens when you go wireless but I disagree, Halo 3, in the short time I had left to play it online, never had this problem or at least not as noticeably. Hence it has to be the fault of the server.
It was so intense the number of times the match just abruptly ended for me and of course the controversial ?quit ban? eventually came into plays which of course for the unfamiliar is a twenty minute suspension given to people who frequently leave games? AND NOTHING ELSE (*twitch*) and while in and of itself it?s not a bad idea it does mean I?m being punished for what really isn?t my fault.
To their credit, my connection has been getting more steadily better in recent days so maybe Bungie have noticed that and patched it up but still it doesn?t make suddenly dropping out of a match, mere points away from gaining Sergeant grade 3 as a rank and be left with nothing something of a tolerable experience.
However overall, the flaws are not enough to deter me from playing this game. Sure the campaign is on the short side but what I get is good quality stuff and with the ability to play online co-op with up to four people there is some excuse for that. So while there is a short campaign that does occasionally suffer from a little melodrama, it?s still a worthy experience. Similarly although there are few maps available there are a lot of various gametypes up for grabs and while connection issues are a *****, it still ultimately comes together quite nicely. Hell, there aren?t even that many annoying little kids spamming the mike anymore.
I get the feeling that it?s probably too late to hope Halo: Reach doesn?t get flamed endlessly for carrying the stigma of being a game with the word ?Halo? in the title but I really can?t stress enough that Halo: Reach is a good solid game with a lot of content, even if it gets a little patchy from time to time there is plenty to keep you occupied. The fact that this review took so long to write is a testament to that fact because I kept on getting distracted by playing the actual game.
If nothing else, nothing can truly compare to the dark epicness that is the very final moments of the game, and the last interactive moment of Bungie?s grand saga. Of which once again I have to stress, YOU MUST SEE FOR YOURSELF.
Man, looking back I just can?t believe it. This is it, the last Halo game by Bungie and literally everything they?ve ever put into prior games is in here and then some, this is without a doubt the final definitive Halo. It?s poetic in so many ways, in the way that it ends and it brought a slight nostalgic tear to my eye playing it. I mean this has all happened in just under a decade, I now watch as the game franchise I loved and was a core part of me now reaches the spiritual conclusion. Bungie is shutting the doors to the Halo franchise and are now moving to new, unfamiliar shores and will soon be on the forefront of new franchises and new original games and I for one hope for their success.
This is the swan song to Halo, the last one by the original creators and while 343 industries are going to take the helm of the Halo franchise from this time on and we are left pushing forward ceaselessly into unfamiliar waters, we will always have Bungie?s Halo series and the great legacy that comes with it. Bungie and Halo may never meet again on the bumpy road of game design in the foreseeable future but nothing will take away the memories of this series I have. From stepping out onto a Halo for the first time, from assuming the role of the Arbiter or from the thrill of finishing the fight? this is my franchise.
It kills me to see it go but at the end of the day, it doesn?t get much better than this in terms of endings.
So let us say our thanks to Bungie and good wishes for their future endeavors, wherever they may take them and look forward to the next generation of Halo games, waiting to be explored.
For Other self indulgent Vrex related reviews please click on the following links:
Vrex at the movies: Coraline [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.130069]
Vrex at the movies: Dead Space Downfall [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.105604]
Vrex at the movies: Pitch Black [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.120198]
Vrex at the movies: Mary and Max [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.114658]
Vrex at the movies: Friday the Thirteenth [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.107487]
Vrex at the movies: District 9 [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.136231#3067612]
Vrex at the movies: Up [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.141623#3174604]
Vrex at the movies: 500 days of Summer [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.145257#3283119]
Vrex at the movies: Mao's last dancer [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.149544#3490835]
Vrex at the movies: Whip It [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.152214#3625164]
Vrex at the movies: Avatar [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.163318#4221383]
Vrex at the movies: Splice [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.228103-Vrex-at-the-movies-Splice#7861475]
Vrex at the movies: Piranha 3-D [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.228871-Vrex-at-the-movies-Piranha-3-D#7912359]
And as for games:
Vrex behind the controller: Otogi: Myth of Demons [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.113073]
Vrex behind the controller: Dead Space [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.116791]
Vrex behind the controller: Mass Effect [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.116372]
Vrex behind the controller: Halo 3: ODST [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.146265#3332107]
And for specials:
The Vrex film awards 2009 [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.165051-The-Vrex-Film-Awards-2009#4329656]
The Sangheili [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.183671-The-Sangheili-A-very-special-Vrex-review#5501359]
