16.10.2009

There have been many great parings throughout history; Rogers and Astaire; Shearer and Sheringham; Fred and Wilma; Schwarzenegger and DeVito. Adding to this list, then, is the video gaming world's Microsoft and Bungie. Arguable neither are the best in the field, but combined they produce something beautiful.And that's the way it has been since we first set foot into the world of Halo: Combat Evolved, way back in 2001. In 2004 we saw the release of the much anticipated sequel, Halo 2. And again in 2007 we had the third and final part of the trilogy, Halo 3. So given the fact that the trilogy already had its three parts, and given the austere presence of its forebears,is there any room in the franchise for a game that steps off the well-trodden Master Chief tracks?Given that Bungie were keen to announce that ODST is more than an expansion, it would seem that they think so. Buying ODST you are given the "two-sided coin" that every FPS/TPS gamer has become accustomed to over the years; campaign and multiplayer. For this episode (if one can call it that) we do not see Master Chief, and we do not see a sequel (it is Halo 3: ODST after all). Instead we see a side story following the events of a Rookie as he fights his way around New Mombasa. And for multiplayer one gets access to all the same stuff as Halo 3, but with one small and hardly noticeable difference, and that is something called Firefight. Actually it's neither of the aforementioned adjectives at all, and I will cover that a bit later.As I have already mentioned, in this game you do not get to play Master Chief Petty Officer John 117, the enhanced "SPARTAN" super-soldier we have all grown to love over the years. In this incarnation you play primarily as a lone UNSC soldier, known as the Rookie. Whilst Master Chief is off fighting the Covenant on the ring-world of Halo (in Halo 2), ODST follows the events on Earth, in New Mombasa, where the Covenant still have a stronghold. Whilst on your way to the drop zone, where you and a bunch of other marines are going to fight 'the baddies', your pod crashes and you are knocked out for six hours. You wake up alone, and the main point of the story kicks in here. You have to find your way through New Mombasa and locate your squad mates, but without the benefits one would expect playing as Master Chief. You do not have any of his cybernetic enhancements; you are not as powerful; you do not have a shield; you are not as fast; you cannot jump as high. You cannot simply blast your way through this sandbox city, because if you do then you die (at least, you are more likely to die quicker). Without a regenerating shield you have to rely of medipacks and first aid stations, and so you will find you need to adapt to the environment more. Attacks on enemies should be planned and more cautious, picking which one to target first and how to escape if necessary. Long gone are the jumping in and shooting everything that comes at you. No, this is a very different experience.As you travel through this respectably large sandbox environment you pick up clues left by your squad members. There are also flashbacks, where you take control of other squad members, in which you will have to complete side missions and collect more information. And so the mystery of your missing six hours, and indeed the truth behind your mission to New Mombasa, is gradually revealed. After about 6 hours of gaming you will have completed ODST, and that is one of the complaints I have about this game. For a franchise this rich in story and characters I feel it could have been longer and more engaging. Don't get me wrong, it is an enjoyable 6 hours of playing, but ODST does not really add anything to Halo or the genre. It is using the same graphics engine as Halo 3, the characters are shallow, and to be honest I didn't really care for the story much either. If that was it, I would not recommend you buy this game.But let's have a few home truths here. Most shooters these days do not rely on a great story. You do not always need awesome and mind blowing graphics. You do not need realistic physics and inch perfect collision detection. These need to be of a standard where by they do not impact gameplay. The point is that you need to get something right with the game itself. And the one thing that Bungie and Microsoft have combined to create is arguably the best FPS multiplayer experience money can buy. And this is ODST's raison d'être.Halo 3: ODST has a second disc. This disc contains all of the maps you can buy for Halo 3. It also contains a few new maps to boot. And it also has something called Firefight, and whilst the concept may sound familiar this certainly should not detract from the amount of fun to be had playing it.Firefight is a four player co-op mode that sees you and your three counterparts defending yourselves against waves of random enemies. As you defeat wave then another one comes, and so on, in increasing difficulty each time until your team runs out of lives. Technicalities aside (it is four players instead of five), the premise is pretty much the same as Gears of War 2's Horde Mode. Except in theory there are an infinite number of levels, and that the only thing stopping you are the limited number of lives your team has got. Get someone who is a bit careless and/or rubbish on your team and Horse is a bit more forgiving. In Firefight after so many deaths your team is out and you have to start again. Harsh, I know, but that's the reality. And believe me it adds to the tension. You will literally be wetting your pants with excitement and nerves.Plus you get all the old stuff from Halo 3. It is a bargain, right?Well here is the problem. Fans of the Halo series will have seen much of this stuff before. The campaign is a slight deviation, but really offers very little that is new and exciting. A couple of new guns and characters (none of which are Master Chief, who in the FPS world is cooler than Coolio on a block of ice in the middle of the North pole) doesn't quite add up to being more than an expansion. Fans will have bought the DLC and will have played on a majority of the multiplayer stuff ODST is offering. What they will be getting is three new maps and a new mode (as awesome as that might just be). This is hardly value for money, and in my opinion does not justify the full RRP.If you have not played Halo before, on the other hand, this seems a lot more appealing. You are getting a bit of an introduction into the Halo universe, whilst getting your hands on a load of extra maps for one of the best online experiences around. But then again, you are not getting Master Chief, and you are not getting the Halo story, and in that respect doesn't give you access into the franchise proper.I am really in two minds about this game. It is more than just an expansion, but does not quite justify being released as a full title. If you have bought this game already I daresay it was because of the trail that has already been blazed by Halo: CE, Halo 2 and Halo 3. Fans of Halo will have bought it for exactly that reason. Newbies to Halo will have bought it because it is a well known franchise and is good value for money if you don't own any of the DLC already. And for those of you who are stuck in the middle? I would say wait for a price drop in a month or two's time. The campaign is fun, but what you really want is the multiplayer content... especially Firefight co-op mode. You will have a lot of fun with this I can guarantee, and this is the reason you should buy this game.I am going give this game two scores, as I think it really depends on the experience of Halo. For people who are familiar with Halo I would score this game 75%. It is still a strong FPS, but I think it will disappoint fans a little. It is different, but does not offer enough that is new. If you have been living in a box and are new to Halo I would award a score of 90%. You will be buying into a well grounded franchise, and this will give you a good introduction into Halo (but not Master Chief). The second disc will also give you just about everything you need at the moment for the best online experince available.

28.9.2009

I pre-ordered this game, as I'm a massive fan of the halo series, got them all, and I loved Halo 3 multiplayer. I wasn't disappointedMostly, your alone, playing through various flash-back missions trying to find out what happened to your scattered squad mates, and also why your mission was changed.If you've played previous Halo's, you'll be on familiar footing. The health system has changed though, you don't have a recharging health bar any more, you need healthpacks to heal, and your shield has been replaced with an invisible stamina level.One thing to remember is that your no longer a super human SPARTAN. Your only human, which means you can't jump as high or beat down as hard or take as much damage.This coupled with no dual wielding and no helpful equipment. and ODST warrants a new kind of longer range clever combat with good use of the sometimes scarce ammo and weapons.There's also plenty of collectables in form of terminals spread around the city map, which not only provides an interesting back story, but helps you in game. As you find them, you unlock weapon and vehicle caches around the map, which helps you tackle the more difficult enemies. As well as this there is an Artificial Intelligence which oversees the city, guiding on your way by lighting signs to guide you in the right path and alert you about incoming foes.The overall mood has changed as well. Your predominately alone in a hostile city at night, which gives a greater sense of vulnerability and fear when you come across a big group of enemies.Your character, whilst still armoured up and faceless, is silent which really gives the sense that you are a rookie, alone without your squad.As you'd expect form a Halo game the soundtrack is incredible. It really fits well with the darker mood, predominately slow jazz sounds that give a sense of loneliness. Coming from a game that is renound for having a good score, Marty O'Donnell really did well to top the original trilogy and has created one of the best gaming soundtracks yet.Characters are surprisingly good. They aren't mindless automatons as you would expect, nor are they all clichés of the tough soldier character. Most give the feeling that they have a back story, and each has their quirks that give them a personality, either lovable, cool, or just down right annoying. They team, when together, partake in a little A-Team-esque banter but not too much to take away form the story.The story itself is a bit slow to get off the ground, with the first couple of missions drawing together all the squad. Bungie does well to tie the different strands together for the end but I had to admit that I felt that the ending was disappointing, a little anti-climactic and ends a but too suddenly for the what you did in the previous missions, although I did like how well they managed to tie the whole game in with Halo 2.Co-op is a blast, and is particularly useful on the harder difficulties due to the new toughness of the enemies.The graphics are an improvement on Halo 3's, the city on New Mombasa is well designed, and the levels are colourful and well planned, but the engine is starting to show its age, next to the higher end graphics of newer titles.The campaign is a good 7-8 hours on Heroic, give or take a few hours on the easier and more difficult settingsODST comes with a brand new feature for the Halo franchise, Firefight. Much like Horde in Gears of War 2, you and up to 3 friends take on increasingly difficult waves of enemies on a variety of maps.To mix things up, as you progress different skulls will turn on which affects you or your enemies. It could be Iron, which has not recharging stamina and makes you beat down enemies to regain it, or catch which makes your foes throw grenades all too frequently.Conserving ammo or choosing when and where to use the more powerful weapons is crucial on higher difficulties, as is team work to take down the more powerful Covenant.The main characters are available to unlock through playing the story for use in Firefight, but the ways in which to do this are not challenging. There are only a 6, and there's not any of the customisability there has was in Halo 3, but with only a few players, each person can take a character.They only downside is that there is no Firefight matchmaking, as it runs on the same system as Halo's campaign. This means that unless your friends are online and willing, your on your own, and it's not nearly as fun. I really thought that this let ODST down a huge amount as we are in the age of social gaming.Despite enjoying both Firefight and the campaign, I didn't think that just these two features warranted a full price, and might have been able to be released in two separate DLC packs to add-on to Halo 3.The only reason that I bought it at full price was that it includes the whole Halo 3 multiplayer experience on a second disc. This encompasses a all 24 maps, 3 of which are only available by buying ODST, the much praised Forge map editing mode, as well as Theatre and Custom Games.Despite having all previous map packs, I love Halo 3's match making, and regularly use Forge to just muck around with friends or make new maps. I wanted to get the three new maps, which I have to say are some of the best.It takes all DLC's and puts them on a disc, so if you don't have Halo 3, and like the look of multiplayer, then I fully recommend picking up a copy of this game, as I believe the second disc adds enough content to warrant the full price.The one star is deducted for the lack of firefight matchmaking, and, despite wanting to buy it, I acknowledge that the majority of purchasers are going to be Halo fans, so would most likely have Halo 3 and its maps and played to to death, so I feel that the addition of the second disc is simply to add enough content.Overall, a great game, that I thoroughly enjoyed.

28.9.2009

Ok so Halo is back but is it ant good? Halo 3 ODST was originally supposed to be merely an add on for Halo 3, but with a brand new campaign, multiplayer maps and new firefight mode, it is now brought to us as a new installment in the Halo franchise. You are a a rookie ODST (orbital drop shock trooper) that gets seperated from your squad whilst on a drop. Stranded in new mombasa, it is your job to locate the rest of your team and unravel clues as to thier dissapearence. Whilst your playing as the Rookie, the game plays out as a sort of murder mystery. At night it is your job to locate beacons/objects your teammates have left behind. Once you do this you then play the scenario related to that particular teammate,learning more about thier dissapearence etc and the fights they were involved in. The concept is fresh and makes for some enjoyable gaming.Graphics/ Game engineThe game uses the Halo 3 engine yet this time you have a visor vision mode, which allows you to easily identify enemies in nearby territory. The visor mode highlights objects within the area in a yellow formation, making it easier to identify objects/clues (whilst in rookie mode) and passages etc that you otherwise maybe would not see in normal vision. Character decals and shading is to normal Halo level, yet the purples and grey colour scale from previous Halo games has been removed for a more sharper look to the game. The result is a more realistic feel and look. The game engine handles ingame skirmish well with up to 20 enemies on screen at one time with no reported lag. Expect to rely more heavily on healthpacks this time though as the shield aspect has been removed, because you are a weaker soldier to the Spartans. Some clever thinking and covering will help you to avoid dying constantly.Sound music scoreExpect the good old fashioned Halo music here that we all know and love. The music score is well done with fast paced orchestral tracks for when your in the heat of battle and more somber tones when youve discovered something crucial about the games story that causes you to reflect for a while. A lot of thought has gone into this aspect of the game and make sure you have the volume on high to make the most of this experience.StoryWithout giving anything away, the campaign mode is short but memorable. A lot of people seem to complain nowadays as to the length of a game. This is understandable as you want more bang for your buck. However, the campaign can be immense fun at times and its better for a good game to be short and sweet that be eeked out only to be ruined. The story is well scripted and told well. Whilst playing as the Rookie, your merely piecing the puzzle together in relation to your lost comarades. A few firefights take place but expect only the odd skirmish or straggler. The Rookie part of the game takes place at night and gives you a feel of the isolation of new mombasa after the immense firefight that has taken place previously. The main action is to be found when you play your other comrades missions (this occurs after you find each of thier clues as the Rookie). You get to board tanks, warthogs, defend a pelican... all the usual halo fun. The enemies seem more polished than before and there are some new weapons to be found. A red plasma rifle for one, that is more powerful than its blue predecessor, allowing you to take down enemies with shields far quicker than before.ControlsNot much to be said about the controls really. They are practically the same as before, yet this time x is no longer the reload button. The x button now toggles your vision mode on and off, so reload has been moved to the right bumper button. Inverted aim can be toggled on and off in the ingame menu if you choose, and at the start of the game you get to choose your control preferences also.MultiplayerOn the campaign disc of the game a new addition known as firefight has been added. Similar to Gears of War Horde mode, firefight allows up to four players to play a chosen map in the game with wave upon wave of increasingly difficult covenant enemies. It really is great fun and the maps are very well polished and look fanatstic. On the multiplayer disc , the entire 24 maps of Halo are included, including a new sandbox mode and 3 extra maps exclusive to Halo 3 ODST. Have fun in checking all this out well after you have finished the campaign mode. For those without xbox live, dont worry. Firefight mode will be sure to keep you entertained as the challenge of just 1 player against waves of enemies proves challenging but a lot of fun.OverallHalo is back with a new campaign, new hero and extras to keep you entertained for many hours. While the campaign mode is short (5-6 hours on most difficulties) it is memorable and this game does not feel like a cash in for Bungie. Some real thought has been put into various aspects of the game to allow players to experience a different side of the story ( as opposed to the Masterchief). Dont expect anything majorly groundbreaking but for most halo and fps fans it wont dissapoint. There's good fun to be had here friends.Overall rating 4/5 stars

6.10.2009

Halo ODST is based around the events of Halo 2, leading up to Halo 3. If you haven't played theses, you probably wont know much about the time setting you are in, or about what's going on outside of the city ODST is set in but Bungie did a great job of making this not a problem as the whole story behind this game is very character specific and only focus' on the present time, not requiring players to understand the Halo trilogy storyline, so this game is newbie friendly. Straying massively from Master Cheif's world saving adventures, ODST is based on a group of soldiers trying to regroup with their squad members and escape the destroyed city they are stuck in after crash landing.The story is played out interestingly as you swap back and forwards between the present time and flashbacks.After your squad crashes, the 'Rookie' awakens 6 hours after impact. As the Rookie you play at night, alone in the city. Your only aim is to head to the suspected area of the next clue on the were-bouts of your squad mates. The city can be explored in any way you want and does not restrict you to one rout, there are multiple paths to take to each destination, each direction might have different enemies or different things too see. There is also an easily accessible map to prevent being lost. This may sound like fun, but walking around the city really isn't that fun after a while, a lot of the surroundings look similar and the enemy encounters are usually rather repetitive as it ends up usually being one brute and 4 grunts, sometimes you will wonder into an area which is specifically set out to hold lots of enemies, but these can be accidently missed. To sum up, you will mostly want to move through the city without lingering to get to your objective so you can get too the real meat of this game.Whenever you get find a clue within the city as the Rookie, it will take you back in time to play as one of your other squad mates to uncover the mystery of how the item the Rookie found, came to be there. These missions are usually in daylight, are a lot more linear and mission based and packed with a lot more heated fire fights and vehicle based action. I wont go into too much detail, but these missions are great fun.Overall the story plays out interestingly with the changes of pase keeping it fresh. Its not very long, but its a nice addition for Halo fans and is a cool perspective of the civilians view of the war.Just a quick note saying the graphics have slightly improved since Halo 3, everything looks a little more polished and sharper, nothing too huge but the game looks decent. The music in the game is amazing as expected, Bungie always does a great job and doesn't let us down this time.Next onto Firefight mode, firefight mode is quite similar to horde mode in Gears of War. If you don't know what that is, its when you are confined to one map while enemies spawn in hordes and try to murder you dead and you have to survive. Your team shares a set amount of lifes, so team work is require. After each group of 5 waves a skull is added which tweaks the difficulty by giving the enigmas more health or making them throw more grenades ect. After completing 5 waves your health packs and ammo are replenished and lives are added, so with good team work at hand, its never too hard to make it the later levels. There are 10 maps and they are all fantastic. A Firefight is amazing fun but there is one complaint and this is the reason I only rated it 4 starts instead of 5.THERE IS NO MATCHMAKINGThats right, you can only play with your friends. Hoping to get some of the 4 player achievements but your friends arn't online? Tough luck you will have to sit around and wait until they get online. IN my opinion, If I have game, want to play it but I cant because the way the game is designed... its a fault so its the reason it loses a star.The only gameplay changes from Halo 3 are that you have a health bar. When you lose all your shields, any additional damage will de-pleat your health bar unless you don't run for cover. It doesn't make the game frustrating like I thought it would, it just forces your to play less aggressive which is a nice change in my opinion. Oh you also have night vision, a new pistol and a silence SMG. SMG is no different. Pistol is amazing.Overall ODST is an amazing game, Bungie has failed to... fail.. yet again and has created another brilliant title. In my opinion its not up too the magnitude of Halo 3, but it wasn't intended to, so for what it set out to do, it did it fantastically.

28.9.2009

I finished playing this last night (on Heroic level) and I've got to say that I thought it was great. I confess that maybe I'm a little biased being such a devout fan of the Halo universe but I did have my concerns on this version.I was always aware that it's initial conception had been that of an expansion pack to Halo 3 and hence wondered how good it would be. I shouldn't have worried.Playing as the rookie, alone and scouting round New Mombassa at night was really great for adding real atmosphere. When you pick up clues to the rest of your team, you get to engage in some epic battles / set pieces that remind you of all the things that are great in Halo games.So the night stuff adds the sense of isolation yet is nicely juxtaposed with the team work big scale `all in it together' scenes during the day.Although working on the Halo 3 engine I thought the graphics were still very good, especially when you watch some parts of the game back in theatre mode. It's worth switching off the night vision visor at some moments for the ambience and lighting in the dark is just fabulous.The sound, as ever a strong point in Halo films, continues to add another level in atmosphere generation whether in the wonderful score that sweeps from haunting loneliness to battle adrenaline, excellent sound effects or the comments from other characters.Another stalwart of the Halo games, the enemy AI is great for giving you some cracking little tussles whether taking out a lone sniper that's being bugging you or being in the middle of some ferocious firefight.I like how the game makes you feel more like an average human soldier, albeit an excellent one, with it's health pack driven game play as opposed to the super soldier Spartans that Masterchief is. Although not as tough and able to take as much damage, it's almost like playing the previous games gives you the `training' (for want of a better word) that makes you rise above the ranks of a `normal' soldier.I seemed to slot back into the flow and movement far quicker than I'd expected and enjoyed sticking many a plasma grenade onto the face of an approaching jackal or using the needler to turn a grunt into a running bomb.You still feel great in being able to take on brutes and hunters and win, yet the victory feels almost better and harder won because you are more of a human soldier. The design of the superintendent, level design and relevant menus, maps etc are all top notch and indicative of the kind of polish that Bungie bring to their games.I liked the inclusion of the mongoose so you can track back through previous areas on a bike with quick stops at junctions to check your map and almost feel like Steve McQueen from The Great Escape! You also get your hands on other vehicles including warthogs, scorpions and banshees and it's still a marvel how well all the vehicles work within the game.Overall I felt the game was thoroughly rewarding and engrossing. It's cool to be back in the Halo world after a two year absence and I commend Bungie for realising the depth of the universe that they can expand it without losing any of it's magic. I like Masterchief but the Halo world is rich enough and deep enough to be mined for other avenues. To me there is just something comforting and re-assuring in having that distinctive Halo main menu on your TV.I'm not so motivated by online play so I'm grateful that the makers haven't completely taken their eye off the campaign and still know how (and want) to tell a story to those players that don't pop the disc in the tray and immediately go online to kill others in 0.13 seconds.It really makes you wonder what they have planned for Reach because with every game you feel more in tune with the controls, the weaponry and now another part of the UNSC fighting force. Maybe we'll get to play as both Spartans and Hell jumpers. Great entertainment and I look forward to tackling the single player on legendary, along with a co-operative run through and some system link firefight.Nice work Bungie. My needs are satisfied until the fall of 2010.

25.10.2009

Play legendary to force yourself out of spartan habits------------------------------------------------------------If you're a seasoned FPS pro, jump straight in with legendary. It's not that hard but hopefully it's tough enough that you have to find some cover. If you can run through all the confrontations like a spartan you're on the wrong difficulty and you've ruined the game - don't even bother buying it. It's very much a shame that Bungie didn't hike the difficulty more - Legendary needs to be much harder, the kind of difficulty where you *need* a friend to play with you. Easy / Normal / Heroic are a complete waste of time.New and different is good------------------------------------------------------------Now you have something passable as a challenge,sit back in the shadows, play ODST how Bungie intended. This Rookie wasn't designed to be an invincible man-tank, ODST is about working with what you've got - an advantage in the dark, the ability to be sneaky, cunning, and a pistol that rewards head shots (and can't take out Banshees :oP). The change in game play style is refreshing. Respect to Bungie for trying something new.Story Telling is improved------------------------------------------------------------The story is *not* just the same old linear "you must kill everything" from Halo 3 - there's some good chopped up chronology, with flash back sequences - more interesting still if you to play the flash backs in the wrong order and piece it back together (you are granted this freedom, although Bungie guides you through from oldest to newest). Additionally a second storyline is weaved in through audio clips picked up through the game. Sadly this is very much down to you to track down, and although it makes a lovely "hidden package" style achievement, the game would be much better with this complexity forced upon you - my first play through missed far too much of this.Characters and Context------------------------------------------------------------You play as a range of different characters - there's a lovely element of character development that has previously been somewhat lacking, and each flash back mission has a nice switch of game play focus from the stealth Rookie to missions in tanks, sniping, flying, the good old SpLaser. Variety is good!The game also pads out parts of the Halo universe that were previously only available in the books - and not so subtly eludes to Reach from time to time.The music is atmospheric and a pleasant change - it fits the gameplay well.So what's wrong with it?------------------------------------------------------------The Rookie missions (which does account for a reasonable part of the game) are less well structured, and quickly repetitive. You only need 2 guns - 1 of each pistol type - to take out ANYTHING."No multiplayer" as such in that there isn't an ODST multiplayer mode (practically SWAT / MLG game type and the grenade mayhem would have been awesome!!), although if you're a hardcore Halo 3 fan you need the extra 3 maps, only available on the multiplayer disc.Fire Fight is repetitive - although I don't understand people who claim Gears Horde is better - that's just a bad - at least Fire Fight plays with the skulls to tweak the difficulty is different ways (before also becoming repetitive). Maybe it would be more interesting if Bungie let us tweak some options e.g. set what weapons were available, game rules, enemies (Custom Fire Fight).

23.9.2009

I am sick of killing those annoying, cartoon-like grunts. I find them so bloody irritating. Their voices, the way the bound around, run away and then turn around to shoot, like they forgot they were scared of you. I'm also tired of killing the brutes. You empty round after round into them and all it does is make them angry. The assault rifle is next to useless, but the sniper rifle can kill them with one shot? Please. It's this that put me off Halo 3 online in the first place. But i'm a Counter-Strike man, albeit not a great one.If you were to remove the Halo-ness from this game, you have to ask yourself what are you left with? I'm not big on the design of the city,as futristic cities depicted by games are usually sterile and uninteresting. Just like this one. You get the odd exceptions like HL2, Killzone 2 (again, not the greatest of games but the city was well depicted) and Gears 1&2, but I just found the environment quite dated and uninteresting.The voice acting isn't great, generic space marine speak has never been my favourite. And the recorded messages you find around the city are cheesy at best. After years and years of killing the same baddies with the same weapons, this gamer is a slightly jaded one. Halo Reach, in my eyes, needs to be different, but probably wont be due to the amount of Halo nuts out there that will probably buy anything remotely connected to the franchise and will reject anything that may push the franchise forward. Good money spinner is Halo...It is still a solid shooter, especially when you compare it to the dross out there (Blacksite, Soldier of Fortune, Resistance 1). The graphics are pretty good, I like the variation in locales, the variation of gameplay styles, it is very challenging. There are some very difficult bits, especially on Heroic difficulty, but these tend to get very frustrating very quickly. Almost to the point where I've thought "I just can't be bothered, i'm not finding this experience that rewarding anyway". That is until you think "This is a Bungie game, so there must be another way to do this". And usually that is the case. It's nice seeing the ol' Bungie magic shining through in these moments.As much as I grumble about this game, I do still like it. The new multiplayer is solid, but even that is a double-edged sword. Bungie don't seem to have any ideas to call their own anymore, Firefight mode being a modified version of Horde in GoW2, Horde being a rip-off of L4D. These Halo games have become so commitee designed, so safely designed, they seem to be shying away from any innovation, anything truly remarkable.We all know how well Halo plays, there is no denying this game plays well. Just like Halo. But the day has come where I am grumbling about a Halo game, and it is a sad day. If you love Halo, buy it. If you aren't sure, rent it. I'm glad I bought it, no regrets, but I wanted it to be better. Shame.As a side note, I have just picked up Chronicles of Riddick, thinking it was just a shameless self promoting marketing excercise for Vin Diesel. I have been proven wrong. If this doesn't float your boat, give that one a go.

10.10.2009

Bungee have to be respected for their devotion to taking the Halo series and improving it each time. ODST feels both comfortably familiar to and refreshingly different from the Halo trilogy. There are no Elites and no Flood, but that has to be taken in the context of the story - which has to be canon with Halo 3, of course. The Brutes have been improved and you see far more of the Drones and Jackal snipers than in any other game. Even the Grunts are more fearsome, travelling in greater numbers and sometimes charging at you with lit plasma grenades. The Hunters travel in pairs as usual. Hunters are Hunters in any Halo game - they used to be the worst enemy to face; now it's pairs of Brutes withhammers.The scripting and the environs are so well conceived that the campaign mode is better in gameplay terms than in any of the Halos so far. The game is set in the occupied city of New Mombassa and you start off as The Rookie, dazed, separated from your squad (yes, in ODST you are part of a squad), and wandering the city at night searching for clues as to what happened to them. Assisted by the Superintendent - an A.I. that runs all the city's systems and communicates with you in a unique way (saying more would be a spoiler) - you gather clues about what happened to the rest of your squad in the time you were unconscious after your drop pod crashed. On finding a clue, you get to play as one of your squad in a long flashback to a mission carried out during the hours of daylight. Each of these missions beats any Halo chapter gone before hands down for fun, variety and sheer distilled pleasure hectic mayhem (Googlewhack!).Though you are fighting in close quarters, you do get to drive and fly and blow up vehicles. You even get to blow up a bridge. A new feature is the ability to switch to a visor friend-or-foe system that outlines friendlies in green and enemies in red. Useable items show up in blue and collectibles in yellow.There are some fun achievements to get, and one gigantic Easter Egg built into the game in 30 collectable parts. Sadie's Story - a combination of audio and comic - tells the story of a civilian caught up in the invasion of New Mombassa. It at first informs the backstory of the Covenant occupation, and then later weaves in with the main storyline. It's not only extremely well written, the voice acting is excellent. Speaking of speaking, fans of Firefly will be overjoyed to discover that Nathan Fillion, Adam Baldwin and Alan Tudyk voice your squadmates, along with Tricia Helfer from Battlestar Galactica.Fans of Gears Of War 2's Hoard mode will love Firefight, which takes areas of the city and throws wave after wave of Covenant against one or more players. The game also comes with a bonus disc with a cornucopia of Halo multiplayer maps. If you have Halo 3, this also unlocks extra achievements for finding skulls on certain maps.Don't let the name fool you - "Halo 3 ODST" it may be called, but it isn't just an expansion - it's a whole feature length game, and the best game to come out for the Xbox 360 since Fallout 3!

23.9.2009

I never really realised that I was a real Halo fan until I bought an Xbox 360 for Halo 3. That game really changed Halo- Excellent new AI, stunning new graphics, enhanced gameplay and an amazing Multiplayer that made it the undisputed king for quite some time. Don't expect that from this. If you played Halo 3, then you really shouldn't think of this as anything but an expansion pack- an expensive one. The Graphics engine has had a nice rework, but not overhaul, the AI has been improved, but not overhauled, and the protagonist has been changed, but not revolutionised. This game after all was planned as an expansion pack, but just continued to expand.That's why you'll be seing much of the same as from Halo 3.As peturbing as all that sounds remember a few frank things- firstly, Halo 3's combat system and AI is among the best in the genre, much in the same of these isn't intrinsically a bad thing- and after all, they HAVE been improved, albeit marginally. The multiplayer in Halo 3 is very good, and this is definitely a continuation of that- You do get ALL of the map packs from Halo 3 (although this may leave a bitter taste in mouths of hardcore Halo fans, who probably shelled out for them anyway) which will give a huge Halo online experience, as well as an addition in the form of Firefight. Firefight (a glorified Horde mode ala GOW) may lack the intensity and grit of the more cover based GOW but gets truly frantic in the later levels as more and more variables are thrown in, with all running simultaneously as soon as they are unlocked. It really is great fun to play with friends and promises to be a huge hit in the near future.The campaign is a pleasure to play. Set in New Mombassa, a once bustling metropolis in tatters after certain events (I wont ruin the story) is a joy to traverse, and linking in to Virgil, the 'superintendant' of the city who basically helps you get around is really fun. Virgil is a sort of kind hearted HAL which runs the city, but is rather limited, who will help you all he can with subtle nuances, like huge 'Detour' signs lighting up pointing you in a direction which is useful. The city itself is a wonderful nightime film noir setting, with accompanying music to really capture the mood of the 'rookie' looking for his squad detective style, with playable flashbacks filling in parts of the story. The gameplay itself therefore is a wonderfully different experience, but the combat is much of the same, which as before mentioned, isn't a bad thing really. It is however a little bit short, which is a shame, but all in all concise and well thought out, lending itself to re-playability, and that isn't really so different from COD 4 Modern Warfare, now is it?

16.3.2011

I'm a casual gamer, but I'm also a big HALO fan. I've played every HALO game except HALO WARS, so maybe I'm a bit biased here.ODST, like REACH, is quite a departure from the traditional HALO story arc. Instead of playing as the Spartan, MasterChief (which just so you know stands for Master Chief Petty Officer), you instead take control of several human soldiers known as Orbital Drop Strike Troopers. You crash land in the middle of a city - New Mombasa - which is now controlled by Covenant forces. Your team is scattered throughout the city and your job is to link up with them and coordinate a fight-back against the Covenant, battling to survive with whatever weapon comes to hand.

19.10.2009

A superb addition to the Halo-verse, ODST puts you in the boots of the titular special forces troops in a cross-city battle against the Covenant through New Mombasa during event set at the time of the second Halo game. The game is built around an 'open' central hub where missions are accessed by fighting your way, as the Rookie, to various points on the map as you try to track down your lost comrades. Each of these missions are presented as flash-backs to the different squad mates predicaments at the time of drop and take place at different times during the same single timeline.Playing the missions is like playing Halo: Greatest Hits. Each level almost takes the form of a particular discipline.

7.10.2009

Everyone knows this is just an expansion of Halo 3, set whilst the Master Chief is busy on Delta Halo. It comprises of a series of missions undertaken by the Orbital Drop Shock Troopers, where you get to play as a vareity of troopers, though primarily as "The Rookie".To start with, the graphics equal those on Halo 3, and it could even be said that they are slightly better. It has very similiar gameplay, yet I'd say that it is far superior on this game. The addition of new guns (silenced pistol and silenced SMG) adds more fun, and the health system makes slight alterations to battle tactics. This last feature also helps reinforce the fact that you're not playing as the indestructable Spartan.

7.7.2012

As a big fan of Halo, despite being probably not that great at it, I decided to order Halo: ODST basically for the full story as well as the actual fun of shooting Covenant scum.Although you're not Master Chief and you don't have the assistance of Cortana, it doesn't matter as all aliens die eventually and I didn't see this as a problem, especially since this new character lends itself to a unique (especially for Halo) campaign. I would have preffered Cortana (or the like) but having the HUD got the job done in the end and this was different also. The graphics seemed improved also (compared to Halo 3) - secifically the actual gameplay. My biggest praise is for the improvement of the manouverability of the vehicles.

24.2.2014

Without a doubt this is my favourite of the Halo games. The atmosphere of exploring the destroyed city during an apocalyptic neon-drenched night is extremely effective, the sky indeed the colour of a television tuned to a dead channel. I also welcomed the opportunity to be a normal, NON-cyborg-supersoldier over the usual cod heroics of 'Master Chief' and his cling-film wrapped shiny girlfriend. Pseudo-stealth was a nice addition to the game engine with suppressed weapons and concrete advantages to striking from the shadows or from behind cover. Indeed, as merely a very well trained human this was the only sensible way to play if you wanted to stay alive for long.The voice cast are extremely good indeed.

3.11.2009

Being a huge halo fan, I naturally appreciated this game and its admirable efforts in trying to redirect the spotlight from the heroric beloved juggernaut of Master Cheif to a complete mr nobody ODST trooper known as the rookie.It must be firstly noted that although the story is still worth the attention it is by no means as gripping as its predasseor Halo 3, yet it does succeed in emphasizing and improving the options for gameplay. The campaign is a bit short yet is fun nonetheless, and to be honest there is no difference in graphics and general gameply. Although having said that the role of the ODST presents a gameplay mechanic simular to Halo combat evolved with the reintroduction of a health bar and sheild which I much appreciated.

Halo 3 - ODST (Xbox 360) - Reviews

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