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June 6, 2009 | 4:44 AM PST
What the Game's About
Halo, arguably the most powerful brand in the gaming industry at this juncture, ascended to the status of cultural phenomenon by putting players into the boots of a genetically engineered badass and delivering the most fully-featured multiplayer experience the console market had ever seen. So it makes perfect sense that for their next Halo title, Bungie is ripping players out of the Master Chief's body armor and abandoning competitive multiplayer entirely. Wait, what?! Yes, from fiction to focus, Halo 3 ODST presents a completely new perspective on beloved Halo universe and delivers gameplay to match. Make no mistake, this still has all the marvelous hallmarks of a Halo title, but it also feels completely fresh. This is the right way to expand and monetize a franchise.
What's Hot
I was never actually a huge Halo fan until Halo 3 hit, and even then it took me a month or two to uncover all of the nuances of the gameplay balance that makes it, to this day, one of my favorite first-person shooters ever. There were however, complaints from those gamers that loved, obsessed over and played the absolute hell out of the previous Halo titles that Halo 3 felt too much like a Halo 2.5. I disagree but can understand the origins of the sentiment, since even I played enough of Halo: CE and Halo 2 to know that the fundamental gameplay model hadn't changed enormously over the course of the trilogy. By the time the third and best entry came along and perfected the formula, many were ready and hoping for a monumental change. There will be no such complaints this time. ODST feels noticeably different from the core trilogy. It's still unmistakably Halo though, from the flawless controls and weapon feedback to the brilliant enemy AI and distinct color palette, and still an absolute blast to play.
Orbital Dropship Shock Troopers are badasses in the Halo universe, but they're not on the same level as Spartans like Master Chief. They aren't strong enough to dual-wield weapons, they don't have fancy armor with recharging shields, they can't leap ten feet into the air or drop fifty feet without a scratch. Hell, the military wont even shell out the cash to give you a motion tracker! As an ODST you'll have to approach combat more thoughtfully, analyze the situation from a distance, attack from an advantageous position, and know when to get the hell out of there. It's not a stealth game, but the newfound vulnerability definitely adds a new layer of tension to the firefights. These soldiers know how to fight, they just know how to fight differently. To that end, the ODSTs have access to some special equipment that help them get the drop on their more powerful adversaries, including silenced weaponry like an improved SMG and a zoom-capable pistol similar to game-breaking abomination from the original.
The most important tool at the ODSTs disposal is the VISR HUD, which amplifies light and highlights enemies and allies for night-time fighting. The VISR HUD also interfaces with the Superintendent, a sentient AI in charge of New Mombasa city's infrastructure that can spotlight areas of interest and direct you to them, and alert you to enemy presence ahead of time. New Mombasa is a familiar locale for anyone that played through the last two Halo titles, but those games just scratched the surface of the city. In H3: ODST, New Mombasa acts as a gigantic enemy-filled hub-world, the largest environment Bungie has ever created in fact, that you'll have to traverse through in order to initiate the core, storyline missions. These missions can be tackled in any order and are initiated through a cute story-telling mechanism wherein you'll find clues about what happened to your squad-mates and experience 'flash-backs' into those characters' boots and play through past or concurrent events.
After walking me through the campaign demo, Bungie finally let me get my grubby mitts on the controller to try out their new FireFight multiplayer mode. Firefight is a cooperative mode in the vein of Gears of War 2's 'Horde Mode' that puts four players together against waves of increasingly powerful enemies. Ironically, Bungie's take on the mode feels a great deal more tactical than the one in Gears of War 2 thanks to the fact that all four players draw on the same 'pot' of lives. Losing all your lives means starting over from wave one, so keeping each other alive becomes a huge priority. That and the enemies in Gears of War just seem more manageable for one player, whereas the Brutes required a team-effort to put down effectively. But maybe I'm just that awesome at GoW2. Bungie throws additional twists into the mix by introducing those pesky skulls after the completion of each round, thereby giving players less ammo, more agile enemies, and other annoyances to deal with. The medals and scoring system from Halo 3's multiplayer and single-player meta-game return for this mode, and a post-game carnage report illustrates who pulled their weight and/or carried the team on their back.
The feel of the gameplay can best be described as a cross between Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 3. The speed and refinement return from Bungie's last project, but the weaker player character forces you to play the game a little bit more methodically, giving the battles an ebb-and-flow in line with that of the original. The silenced SMG feels like a fair starting weapon and I found myself using it as my go-to-gun for most of the matches I played. Fans of the original pistol will love the new one, I still find it unsatisfying. From the kickback animations to the sound effects, to the damage modeling, I'm far more comfortable with a battle-rifle in my hands. Neither of the Firefight maps I played featured a battle-rifle, which definitely hurt my performance (I came in second both times), but I won't hold that against them. They were both large and filled with cover and verticality, giving me and my makeshift comrades plenty of options for flanking, retreat and tactical positioning. I came out of the demo begging for more. This mode definitely has the potential to ruin my life.
What's Not
Last year Far Cry 2 demonstrated some of the problems that open-world shooters can pose to developers and gamers alike. The idea of navigating around a huge environment, engaging or ignoring enemies as you see fit is an attractive one, but in practice the lack of developer control over the player's movements and the specifics of triggering events often leads to less-than-spectacular and often repetitive battles. Obviously Bungie's penchant for fantastic dynamic AI gives us good reason to suspect that ODST will fare better than Ubisoft's effort, but there's certainly a chance that players will skip exploring the massive environment and contending with Covenant patrols in order to get to the story-missions and their epic, carefully scripted battles. Nonlinear storylines also have a history of being less engrossing in practice than they appear on paper, and only time will tell if Bungie's use of five characters and the crux of finding clues to tie their storylines together will be a suitable replacement for Master Chief's quest to save humankind. It definitely has the potential to be a more human story.
I was shocked to hear that Halo 3: ODST would not feature any competitive multiplayer. The game will ship with a stand-alone version of Halo 3's multiplayer modes complete with all the DLC that has arrived since that game's release, but those hoping to put the new Halo: CE inspired gameplay balance through its paces against other players are sure to be sorely disappointed. Honestly, I think Ill be too addicted to Firefight to give the issue much thought, but I really did enjoy the feel of the new gameplay balance and would have liked to have seen it operate within the context of a capture-the-flag match, or perhaps a new objective-based mode. There's also the question of whether a single-player campaign and one multiplayer gametype warrants the full retail release, especially since the replay-enhancing forge mode doesn't work with Firefight because of AI issues. We'd have to know more about the campaigns length, the number of Firefight maps included, and the host's match customization options to make that conclusion.
Outlook
Halo 3: ODST looks like it will be a fine addition to the Halo franchise. By offering a fresh perspective on the fiction and the gameplay, Bungie is injecting new life into a universe that, for some, was starting to feel tired. With games like Halo Wars and now Halo 3: ODST, Microsoft and Bungie are doing a great job of expanding the Halo universe without selling its soul. Now isn't that better than a kart racing game? We'll have a transcript of our post-demo interview up in the near future.
Halo, arguably the most powerful brand in the gaming industry at this juncture, ascended to the status of cultural phenomenon by putting players into the boots of a genetically engineered badass and delivering the most fully-featured multiplayer experience the console market had ever seen. So it makes perfect sense that for their next Halo title, Bungie is ripping players out of the Master Chief's body armor and abandoning competitive multiplayer entirely. Wait, what?! Yes, from fiction to focus, Halo 3 ODST presents a completely new perspective on beloved Halo universe and delivers gameplay to match. Make no mistake, this still has all the marvelous hallmarks of a Halo title, but it also feels completely fresh. This is the right way to expand and monetize a franchise.
What's Hot
I was never actually a huge Halo fan until Halo 3 hit, and even then it took me a month or two to uncover all of the nuances of the gameplay balance that makes it, to this day, one of my favorite first-person shooters ever. There were however, complaints from those gamers that loved, obsessed over and played the absolute hell out of the previous Halo titles that Halo 3 felt too much like a Halo 2.5. I disagree but can understand the origins of the sentiment, since even I played enough of Halo: CE and Halo 2 to know that the fundamental gameplay model hadn't changed enormously over the course of the trilogy. By the time the third and best entry came along and perfected the formula, many were ready and hoping for a monumental change. There will be no such complaints this time. ODST feels noticeably different from the core trilogy. It's still unmistakably Halo though, from the flawless controls and weapon feedback to the brilliant enemy AI and distinct color palette, and still an absolute blast to play.
Orbital Dropship Shock Troopers are badasses in the Halo universe, but they're not on the same level as Spartans like Master Chief. They aren't strong enough to dual-wield weapons, they don't have fancy armor with recharging shields, they can't leap ten feet into the air or drop fifty feet without a scratch. Hell, the military wont even shell out the cash to give you a motion tracker! As an ODST you'll have to approach combat more thoughtfully, analyze the situation from a distance, attack from an advantageous position, and know when to get the hell out of there. It's not a stealth game, but the newfound vulnerability definitely adds a new layer of tension to the firefights. These soldiers know how to fight, they just know how to fight differently. To that end, the ODSTs have access to some special equipment that help them get the drop on their more powerful adversaries, including silenced weaponry like an improved SMG and a zoom-capable pistol similar to game-breaking abomination from the original.
The most important tool at the ODSTs disposal is the VISR HUD, which amplifies light and highlights enemies and allies for night-time fighting. The VISR HUD also interfaces with the Superintendent, a sentient AI in charge of New Mombasa city's infrastructure that can spotlight areas of interest and direct you to them, and alert you to enemy presence ahead of time. New Mombasa is a familiar locale for anyone that played through the last two Halo titles, but those games just scratched the surface of the city. In H3: ODST, New Mombasa acts as a gigantic enemy-filled hub-world, the largest environment Bungie has ever created in fact, that you'll have to traverse through in order to initiate the core, storyline missions. These missions can be tackled in any order and are initiated through a cute story-telling mechanism wherein you'll find clues about what happened to your squad-mates and experience 'flash-backs' into those characters' boots and play through past or concurrent events.
After walking me through the campaign demo, Bungie finally let me get my grubby mitts on the controller to try out their new FireFight multiplayer mode. Firefight is a cooperative mode in the vein of Gears of War 2's 'Horde Mode' that puts four players together against waves of increasingly powerful enemies. Ironically, Bungie's take on the mode feels a great deal more tactical than the one in Gears of War 2 thanks to the fact that all four players draw on the same 'pot' of lives. Losing all your lives means starting over from wave one, so keeping each other alive becomes a huge priority. That and the enemies in Gears of War just seem more manageable for one player, whereas the Brutes required a team-effort to put down effectively. But maybe I'm just that awesome at GoW2. Bungie throws additional twists into the mix by introducing those pesky skulls after the completion of each round, thereby giving players less ammo, more agile enemies, and other annoyances to deal with. The medals and scoring system from Halo 3's multiplayer and single-player meta-game return for this mode, and a post-game carnage report illustrates who pulled their weight and/or carried the team on their back.
The feel of the gameplay can best be described as a cross between Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 3. The speed and refinement return from Bungie's last project, but the weaker player character forces you to play the game a little bit more methodically, giving the battles an ebb-and-flow in line with that of the original. The silenced SMG feels like a fair starting weapon and I found myself using it as my go-to-gun for most of the matches I played. Fans of the original pistol will love the new one, I still find it unsatisfying. From the kickback animations to the sound effects, to the damage modeling, I'm far more comfortable with a battle-rifle in my hands. Neither of the Firefight maps I played featured a battle-rifle, which definitely hurt my performance (I came in second both times), but I won't hold that against them. They were both large and filled with cover and verticality, giving me and my makeshift comrades plenty of options for flanking, retreat and tactical positioning. I came out of the demo begging for more. This mode definitely has the potential to ruin my life.
What's Not
Last year Far Cry 2 demonstrated some of the problems that open-world shooters can pose to developers and gamers alike. The idea of navigating around a huge environment, engaging or ignoring enemies as you see fit is an attractive one, but in practice the lack of developer control over the player's movements and the specifics of triggering events often leads to less-than-spectacular and often repetitive battles. Obviously Bungie's penchant for fantastic dynamic AI gives us good reason to suspect that ODST will fare better than Ubisoft's effort, but there's certainly a chance that players will skip exploring the massive environment and contending with Covenant patrols in order to get to the story-missions and their epic, carefully scripted battles. Nonlinear storylines also have a history of being less engrossing in practice than they appear on paper, and only time will tell if Bungie's use of five characters and the crux of finding clues to tie their storylines together will be a suitable replacement for Master Chief's quest to save humankind. It definitely has the potential to be a more human story.
I was shocked to hear that Halo 3: ODST would not feature any competitive multiplayer. The game will ship with a stand-alone version of Halo 3's multiplayer modes complete with all the DLC that has arrived since that game's release, but those hoping to put the new Halo: CE inspired gameplay balance through its paces against other players are sure to be sorely disappointed. Honestly, I think Ill be too addicted to Firefight to give the issue much thought, but I really did enjoy the feel of the new gameplay balance and would have liked to have seen it operate within the context of a capture-the-flag match, or perhaps a new objective-based mode. There's also the question of whether a single-player campaign and one multiplayer gametype warrants the full retail release, especially since the replay-enhancing forge mode doesn't work with Firefight because of AI issues. We'd have to know more about the campaigns length, the number of Firefight maps included, and the host's match customization options to make that conclusion.
Outlook
Halo 3: ODST looks like it will be a fine addition to the Halo franchise. By offering a fresh perspective on the fiction and the gameplay, Bungie is injecting new life into a universe that, for some, was starting to feel tired. With games like Halo Wars and now Halo 3: ODST, Microsoft and Bungie are doing a great job of expanding the Halo universe without selling its soul. Now isn't that better than a kart racing game? We'll have a transcript of our post-demo interview up in the near future.
November 20, 2009
