You'd better get very familiar with this guy. Odds are, your kids love him. The Covenant have finally found the location of Earth. Humanity is losing the war. Master Chief is back and ready to end the war single-handedly. Finish the fight.
1. Gameplay
This game handles like few others. Instead of trying to achieve the level of realism that the Call of Duty series has worked towards, Halo 3 gives players an environment where jumping absurd heights is not only allowable, it’s required. Combat is less about cover and strategy as much as it is about fast movements and well-placed shots while jumping, reloading, throwing grenades, avoiding getting shot, etc. I’m still not quite sure how the developers managed to include so much into a single game. The graphics are well-made, the gameplay is smooth, the enemies never feel absurdly overpowered and you always feel like you’re one wrong move away from being completely overrun, especially on the higher difficulty levels. Enemies are not idiotic either, they’re actually quite smart. Large enemies know to charge you (since their size is their biggest advantage), small enemies know to use shielding and cover. All enemies know how to dodge grenades and vehicles, which makes it difficult to run them over unless you surprise them or trap them. The campaign is long, really long, but in a good way. Players never have to feel like the final chapter of this saga was too short. It ends very well despite being a sort of cliffhanger. In addition, the campaign designed to allow for up to three additional friends to play cooperatively. That’s also in addition to an extremely popular multiplayer game mode in which you can link up with your friends and play together both with and against enemies from across the globe. And as if that wasn’t enough, Halo includes both a “Theater” mode and a “Forge” mode. In Theater, players are able to rewatch the matches they’ve played (from both campaign and multiplayer). This isn’t the typical replays, though. The replays cover the entire game and allow players to pause / slow down video, move around the map in real time and look at everything, take screenshots of what they’re looking at, and record video at any point and any place in the map. The Forge mode allows players to build their own maps and share these maps with their friends. It’s absolutely incredible how much freedom the Forge mode gives players. I can’t describe it adequately. Halo 3 is an excellent, well made game with few major flaws.
As mentioned before, the length of the campaign increases exponentially since it can be played with up to three other friends. Higher difficulty levels, such as the notorious “legendary”, all but require four very skilled players to work together. There is also an extremely popular multiplayer mode with a decent variety of game types. Standard game modes such as team deathmatch are mixed with new twists such as territories and grifball. Those players that think they can come up with even better twists onto game types can create new maps in Forge and play these maps instantly with their friends. There have been some very interesting and popular maps made by average users.
The “Legendary” difficulty of the campaign can seem almost impossible at times. It is, however, designed to be played with four people. Even four players with average skill could get through the entire campaign on legendary with few major problems. 2. Parental Notices
Blood splatters do stay on the ground. Flood forces can be dismembered by shooting off arms, but the “squishy” nature of the Flood is almost comical. No other forces other than the flood can be dismembered in any way. The most violent aspect of the normal gameplay is the "grunt birthday party" setting that can be turned on and off. When turned on, if the player gets a headshot on a grunt (a small, common, relatively harmless enemy), the grunts head will "pop" into confetti and kids will shout "yaaaaay!" It's quite amusing and not very violent, but it's still noticeable. In total, the violence in this game is very mild. I’d consider it only slightly more violent than the average round of paintball (and is just about as colorful).
Unfortunately, there are also some elements that are not child appropriate. Some semi-creative gamers have come up with ways to create pornographic pictures using well placed items. Instead of using their talents to come up with something fun or useful, they’ve decided that using weapons to create pictures of naked women is the way to go. What I have posted here is really only the tip of the iceberg. While it wouldn’t deter me from buying this game for any younger audience, I would definitely keep a close eye on the pictures that they download. There are also some supposedly “adult” maps, but most of these just have the player battle other players in “adult” locations, such as in an extremely fake and boxy strip-club. Not really worth the download, but like I said before, keep an eye on what your kids are playing.
It’s really just a matter of the entire Covenant species placing religious symbolism onto existing technology, but it’s definitely a key element of the overall storyline.
As annoying as getting massacred by better players is, this wouldn’t be so bad if it weren’t for the fact that there are so many very young players attempting to compete as well. I wouldn’t know for sure of their age except for the fact that far too many of them use microphones and insist on talking openly to a completely silent room. Fortunately, the developers were smart enough to include a “mute” button, which has been put to liberal use in many matches. Unfortunately, even a single player with a low skill-level is dead weight to a team and can often be the deciding factor in whether a match results in victory or defeat. It can be extremely frustrating when every member on the team does well except for a single player, who single-handedly throws the match to the opponents. I have never been a huge fan of any Halo multiplayer (mostly because of the play style, as discussed earlier), but Halo 3’s popularity has resulted in a disproportionate number of players I wish I could ask, “When did that ever seem like a good idea to you?” I am specifically referring to players who do things that are tactically insane, such as running into a room to shoot at the entire enemy team. I can usually dismiss careless mistakes (I make tons of them), but I get aggrivated when players go from careless to suicidal. That being said, if you buy this game, give the multiplayer a try. It’s worth 10-15 minutes of gameplay just to see if you like the overall feel. If you don’t, play the campaign with friends and enjoy yourself. It’s still worth the money you paid.
The opening sequence has the player’s character enter the earth’s atmosphere and free fall to the planet’s surface. And land. Without a parachute. Evidently Master Chief’s suit’s shielding protected him from being entirely obliterated. The ending sequence of the game requires the player to drive at fast speeds over an exploding installation. The end of this sequence has the player jump at high speeds from a metal ramp into the loading bay of a large starship.
The Flood, a parasitic alien race, takes human and Covenant hosts. These infested humans and Covenant look vaguely humanoid, but barely so. It's not really noticeable, especially considering you're running and shooting more often than you're analyzing what the enemies look like.
1 Comment
11/14/2011 03:33:35 am
You're right on again with this review. Great variety from scene to scene always managing to keep it fresh and non-repetitive. Not the same "kill massive quantities of aliens once again" boredom. For me the Halo series is also the best for repeat play enjoyment and this one is no exception.
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