"Halo: Combat Evolved" changed the way I play video games. I discovered the game, known colloquially as just "Halo," when I was a sophomore in college. At the time, I was a loyal PlayStation man, and spent many a beer-and-smoke filled night with old high school friends and new college chums sitting around doing GTA:3 stunts, railing on Microsoft for the lamentable state of its newly released console, the Xbox. Our beloved Sony console had effectively slain Nintendo's GameCube and Sega's Dreamcast. If two of the titans from the Golden Age of Gaming couldn't compete with our new Japanese overlord, why did Microsoft think they had more than a snowflake's chance in hell?
The first time I played "Halo: Combat Evolved" I suddenly understood.
The original Halo changed video games for me forever. It taught me about intrinsic strategies for moving in a first-person format, how to manage multiple enemy types in any shooter and, above all, headshots headshots headshots! To this day, every FPS game I play, I try to move like its Halo to discover what the limits are.
Unless I happen to be playing Halo 4. Because Halo 4 has virtually no limits and is, in my opinion, the most complete game the franchise has ever had.
I won't argue that it's the "best." That's a debate almost impossible to win, especially considering the deified state of the original. And not just in my own mind, but in the minds of Halo fans everywhere. There was something undeniably special about the first game, there's no disputing that. But Halo 4 represents a peak for the franchise, a game that seems to be the penultimate sum of all the parts of every Halo title since 2001.
Echoes of past games are found in the architecture of the Campaign mode. Maps feel familiar because they have the oft-criticized recycled design. Doorways, hallways, ramps, etc. have a look and design uniquely Halo. It's hard to go through the campaign and not feel like you're playing "The Silent Cartographer" or "The Library." "Valhalla," unquestionably the most popular online map in franchise history, is deliberately reborn in Halo 4. 343 Industires took over development of the franchise from Bungie and have treated the Halo universe and fanbase with tremendous respect. It comes through in every single facet of the game, starting with how they handled the story.
The guiding story for Halo 4 is the most emotional, human plotline to date. Cortana, the omnipotent AI, is in a rapid state of decline. Master Chief sets out to save her. It's a basic story, but given everything players have been through with Cortana at their side, it's second-nature to care about her safety. Surely Cortana will be in Halo 5, right? This doubt drives players emotional investment in the story, and worrying about Cortana becomes a very real thing. 343 Industires knows how to tug your heart strings and does so for maximum effect.
That story pits players against a new enemy type, the Forerunners. Keepers of a vast and ancient blah, blah, blah (No spoilers. You're welcome.) the Forerunners are fast, tough and present a challenge different than those players grew accustomed to fighting the same types of Covenant and Flood over the years. In particular, teleporting Promethean Knights deliver heart-attack-level "Oh Sh-t!" moments when they suddenly zoom from the comfortably lethal confines of your scope to that spot RIGHT BEHIND YOU! Fundamentally, they move and fight like Elites. You shoot 'em till their shields drop and pop 'em in the domepiece. Simple, but not as easy as it sounds.
Crawlers are a combination of the much-reviled Covenant Drones and the crawl-anywhere Flood. Crawlers look like robot dogs ( actually a lot like Borderlands' Skags if you ask me) and attack in packs. They have the ability to shoot and are accurate even at long ranges. Looking for them on ceilings and pillars and walls adds a little bit of panic in what would otherwise be a straight Point-A-to-B type game.
Somewhere between the Knights and Crawlers exist the Watchers. Basically armed remote-controlled helicopters, Watchers do more than provide aerial offense. They can drop shields to aid flailing enemies, turn into devastating sentries or resurrect fallen foes. The latter is no small thing. There are few moments in the game more frustrating than draining two weapons worth of bullets to take out a rampaging Promethean Knight, only to have it rezzed on the spot by some Watcher you didn't even know was there. Watching the skies for these guys becomes priority one during battle, a tactic that leaves you exposed to the could-be-anywhere gunfire of the Crawlers and the teleporting melee attacks of the Knights. It's an incredible amount of fun.
The Covenant, of course, are up to their old tricks of attempting to wipe out humanity. Popping Grunt skulls with pistol shots has the same nostalgic feel as stomping Goombas does in Super Mario Bros. Elites, Jackals and Hunters all return to deliver fresh challenges. The levels capture the open-air style that is a hallmark of the franchise, but plenty of tight quarters combat on shifting platforms gives a more claustrophobic feel. Suddenly all the circling and jumping and serpentine running gets negated by being on a tight walkway or in a small room. As players progress through the levels there is a constant shifting of environment types that keeps things from feeling repetitive. Prepare for some great battles with Hunters in this one, btw. They have a habit of appearing in the worst places at the worst times. You'll find yourself looking for that meaty, exposed orange backside more than you think.
I did experience some AI problems when facing Elites, particularly when piloting Banshees. Overall, they're not as smart as they used to be, it seems, and I found myself worrying more about Grunts with fuel rod cannons than I did energy-sword wielding Elites. That this is the only flaw I found in campaign mode as a die-hard (and extremely picky) Halo fan speaks volumes to the campaigns overall design.
Granted, all the experience fans have playing Halo can't be negated, and veteran players will have no trouble making it through the campaign on Legendary difficulty. The biggest challenges come from the Forerunners, a sign that 343 did something right when introducing this new class of enemy to the Halo game world. Depending on difficulty, players can make it through the campaign in about 6-10 hours. Along the way they'll experience the nostalgia, euphoria and sense of accomplishment that come from only the finest franchise installments.
And that's only a fraction of what Halo 4 has to offer.
The reason this game is the most complete in franchise history is the flawless online play. All the players grumbling online about not liking this or that are just stuck in their old ways. Many are players who've spent the last couple years dominating Halo:Reach multiplayer games keep so they're griping about minor changes, like the lack of shotguns for loadouts or inaccurate ordinance drops.
Ignore them.
The genius of Halo 4's online play is that it actually delivers two fully-realized options for gamers: War Games and Spartan Ops.
War Games delivers those classic multiplayer game modes that are the bread-and-Nutella of the Halo online experience. The maps are fantastic. They're not universally suited to each game type, however, giving the maps a different feel depending on what you're playing. "Complex" plays like a different map on SWAT than it does on Capture the Flag, for example. This adds some depth to a somewhat short list of available maps. (There will undoubtedly be map packs upon map packs released in the future.) But as players discover more and more nooks and crannies to snipe or stalk from, the maps are opening up and doing what they should do: inspiring combat creativity.
343 Industires added a loadout feature for Halo 4's multiplayer, a move borrowed (or "ripped off" depending on who you talk to) from the undisputed heavyweight champ of the FPS genre "Call of Duty." Regardless of the inspiration, its inclusion in the multiplayer world of Halo 4 is a welcome addition and adds incentives for gaining XP. The loadouts aren't so imbalanced as to give veteran players an absolutely dominating advantage over lesser-ranked opponents. There are some cool features, like unlimited sprint or the ability to carry an additional primary weapon (Carbines, DMRs, Battle Rifles, etc.) instead of a pistol. Promethean Vision, a new ability, provides a scan of the map that sees through walls and floors to reveal enemy locations. Very helpful, if a little on the cheap side. Many of the armor abilities and weapon types I unlocked don't get used often during multiplayer matches. Sprinting, jumping and accurate headshots are still your surest path to victory.
Along with loadouts, emblem designs and armor sets also add incentive to build up XP. I was disappointed to find the emblem I had used for years in previous Halo games wasn't available at first, which gave me motivation to feverishly play until I reached the rank I needed to unlock it. I know I'm not the only one who did that. The armor pieces available to players are just OK, in my opinion Halo: Reach had a better variety of armor types to unlock, but hey, as my grandma's bumper reads "Pobody's Nerfect!"
But 343 gets it nearly Nerfect with the other online game mode in Halo 4: Spartan Ops.
Unlike most FPS shooters that offer online, non-PvP co-op, Spartan Ops is more than a glorified horde mode. Instead of gunning down wave after wave of predictable enemies like mindless zombies, Spartan Ops provides story-driven objective based missions on a lot of different maps. Prepare to face everything from Grunts and Chargers to Hunters and Knights. 343 is releasing new episodes, five missions each, every week. The latest episode featured some of the best combat I've ever played in any Halo game EVER. And the amazing thing is that this content comes free (for now, at least). The Spartan Ops mode dishes out tons of XP and tells a story outside the campaign. The fact that there are more episodes on the horizon illustrates 343's commitment to providing something excellent for Halo fans.
In return, fans are providing something excellent to 343 Industires: their approval
