Thanks to last week's price drop, I finally got my hands on an X-Box 360 after three years of waiting, and the first game I had to play was HALO 3! I loved the first one, loved the second one even more, and have been waiting a loooooong time to play this. So what did you think of the game?
While some aspects disappointed me, I greatly enjoyed it. I played it through on Normal with no prob, and now I'm going back through on Heroic and enjoying the increased difficulty very much.
GRAPHICS: Wow. This is my first 360 experience, and I'm playing it on split-screen co-op, and it still looks amazing. The thing that blows me away the most is the life-like lighting. If you're in a cave and see daylight it glares out your screen until you get in the light then it goes back. And the textures! You can walk right up to any surface and it still looks life-like, with all sorts of details and pockmarks. I can only imagine how it looks on the full screen.
GAME PLAY: My favorite thing about 1 & 2 are the flawless gameplay, the perfect intuitive controls. This time, I found things a little confusing. I didn't like how the bumper is both reload and weapons swap. I never even used the equipment items b/c of the button placement and not understanding what the little icon meant (not in the manual!). Also, the first time through I found the vehicles VERY unwieldy, though playing through again they don't feel as bad. Maybe it's just an adjustment to the new controller but I feel this was a tick inferior to the past games.
Oh and speaking of vehicles. Why the HELL do you only get to use a flying machine ONCE in the entire game in the 3rd to last level?! WTF was that?! Flying is like my favorite thing to do!
LENGTH: I found the game to be waaaay too short, but I think that's because I played it on Normal. On Heroic it takes twice as long since you can't just barrel forward guns blazing. Still, only 9 missions?! Of course, I complained how short 2 was, but then when I went back to play 1 it felt ridiculously long, repetitive, and drawn out. It was just the same damn room over and over. That said, I noticed that half of the levels on 3 were basically walk to here then walk back the way you came, which I didn't care for.
ENEMIES: I was disappointed we didn't meet any new enemies, aside from two new Flood forms. I was hoping for a new faction, like the Forerunners or something. Those Flood teethy wallcrawlers were goddamn freaky, and the Flood armor forms were ridiculously tough (on Normal!). Another odd thing: we never saw any other Prophet-race characters. So those 3 Prophets were the only survivors of their entire species?
I would have like to have seen the occasional dude in a power chair as a mini-boss.
BOSSES: This is my number one complaint. NO BOSS FIGHTS! My favorite thing about 2 was the addition of bosses. We would play Tartarus over and over, man. So I was pretty damn pissed there was no bosses in this one. The closest they came was the little fight with Guilty Spark. No fight with Truth?! The worst thing is there was no final fight with Gravemind. I waited two damn games for the final epic multi-stage battle with that big goddamn Little Shop of Horrors and it never came!
STORY: Here's where I'm most interested. I was dying to see how it ended. For the most part, I thought it was a great ending story-wise with a few notable exceptions. I really enjoyed seeing the humans and the Elites working together side by side. I loved how the Arbiter was the Chief's best buddy and right hand man. That said, it is a shame the Arbiter didn't have story emphasis whatsoever after 2. I loved how 2 played like a great movie with plot twists and set pieces; this was more straightforward.
Another disappointment: in the TV ads for the game they played up the Chief as a Jesus/savior figure that all the humans looked up to with awe. I was really hoping to see this in the game, with all the Marines treating him like a god. There was basically one nice scene where Marines watched him and the Arbiter gear up and move out, but that's about it. Missed opportunity.
I was surprised to see Guilty Spark return as an ally. Nice twist. Also loved the brief bit where you work WITH the Flood. Another nice twist.
My number one complaint story-wise: we didn't see the end of Gravemind. They left it totally open for him to return. We never saw him in person. We don't know if he actually died or not. We didn't get to fight him. There was a period between the end of 2 and the part in 3 where High Charity appears at Earth that he could have been going to other planets spreading his seed; indeed why WOULDN'T he?
I also thought the villains weren't as well developed this time around. 2 did a great job of building up the Prophets and Tartarus as villains with character and personality. We barely see Truth this time around and get no development of his character; if you didn't play 2 you would have no idea what this guy is about. I was hoping they would develop the next Brute leader, but nope.
One part of the story I did really like was the understated love story between the Chief and Cortana. It really seemed to be more than just professional respect going on there. The way she held out under torture for him, waiting for him to rescue her, the way he goes back for against all odds... good stuff.
As for the ending. Again, I'm pissed there was no boss fight with Gravemind. Also, they just redid the original ending of driving the Warthog out the exploding base to the rescue ship. Enh. For the final cut scene, I was shocked and angry that they killed the Chief off-screen. I couldn't believe it. What a stupid ending! And then I read afterwards that if I had stayed through the credits I would have seen him alive Oh well. Guess they're just setting up the hypothetical fourth game.
So in conclusion, I really loved playing this game, and it's something we're going to replay a great many times until we've memorized every level and troop placement. But I'm pissed there weren't any bosses. In many ways, it felt like a strange hybrid of 1 and 2; a shortened level design and story-sense of 1 with the game play of 2.
While some aspects disappointed me, I greatly enjoyed it. I played it through on Normal with no prob, and now I'm going back through on Heroic and enjoying the increased difficulty very much.
GRAPHICS: Wow. This is my first 360 experience, and I'm playing it on split-screen co-op, and it still looks amazing. The thing that blows me away the most is the life-like lighting. If you're in a cave and see daylight it glares out your screen until you get in the light then it goes back. And the textures! You can walk right up to any surface and it still looks life-like, with all sorts of details and pockmarks. I can only imagine how it looks on the full screen.
GAME PLAY: My favorite thing about 1 & 2 are the flawless gameplay, the perfect intuitive controls. This time, I found things a little confusing. I didn't like how the bumper is both reload and weapons swap. I never even used the equipment items b/c of the button placement and not understanding what the little icon meant (not in the manual!). Also, the first time through I found the vehicles VERY unwieldy, though playing through again they don't feel as bad. Maybe it's just an adjustment to the new controller but I feel this was a tick inferior to the past games.
Oh and speaking of vehicles. Why the HELL do you only get to use a flying machine ONCE in the entire game in the 3rd to last level?! WTF was that?! Flying is like my favorite thing to do!
LENGTH: I found the game to be waaaay too short, but I think that's because I played it on Normal. On Heroic it takes twice as long since you can't just barrel forward guns blazing. Still, only 9 missions?! Of course, I complained how short 2 was, but then when I went back to play 1 it felt ridiculously long, repetitive, and drawn out. It was just the same damn room over and over. That said, I noticed that half of the levels on 3 were basically walk to here then walk back the way you came, which I didn't care for.
ENEMIES: I was disappointed we didn't meet any new enemies, aside from two new Flood forms. I was hoping for a new faction, like the Forerunners or something. Those Flood teethy wallcrawlers were goddamn freaky, and the Flood armor forms were ridiculously tough (on Normal!). Another odd thing: we never saw any other Prophet-race characters. So those 3 Prophets were the only survivors of their entire species?
I would have like to have seen the occasional dude in a power chair as a mini-boss.BOSSES: This is my number one complaint. NO BOSS FIGHTS! My favorite thing about 2 was the addition of bosses. We would play Tartarus over and over, man. So I was pretty damn pissed there was no bosses in this one. The closest they came was the little fight with Guilty Spark. No fight with Truth?! The worst thing is there was no final fight with Gravemind. I waited two damn games for the final epic multi-stage battle with that big goddamn Little Shop of Horrors and it never came!
STORY: Here's where I'm most interested. I was dying to see how it ended. For the most part, I thought it was a great ending story-wise with a few notable exceptions. I really enjoyed seeing the humans and the Elites working together side by side. I loved how the Arbiter was the Chief's best buddy and right hand man. That said, it is a shame the Arbiter didn't have story emphasis whatsoever after 2. I loved how 2 played like a great movie with plot twists and set pieces; this was more straightforward.
Another disappointment: in the TV ads for the game they played up the Chief as a Jesus/savior figure that all the humans looked up to with awe. I was really hoping to see this in the game, with all the Marines treating him like a god. There was basically one nice scene where Marines watched him and the Arbiter gear up and move out, but that's about it. Missed opportunity.
I was surprised to see Guilty Spark return as an ally. Nice twist. Also loved the brief bit where you work WITH the Flood. Another nice twist.
My number one complaint story-wise: we didn't see the end of Gravemind. They left it totally open for him to return. We never saw him in person. We don't know if he actually died or not. We didn't get to fight him. There was a period between the end of 2 and the part in 3 where High Charity appears at Earth that he could have been going to other planets spreading his seed; indeed why WOULDN'T he?
I also thought the villains weren't as well developed this time around. 2 did a great job of building up the Prophets and Tartarus as villains with character and personality. We barely see Truth this time around and get no development of his character; if you didn't play 2 you would have no idea what this guy is about. I was hoping they would develop the next Brute leader, but nope.
One part of the story I did really like was the understated love story between the Chief and Cortana. It really seemed to be more than just professional respect going on there. The way she held out under torture for him, waiting for him to rescue her, the way he goes back for against all odds... good stuff.
As for the ending. Again, I'm pissed there was no boss fight with Gravemind. Also, they just redid the original ending of driving the Warthog out the exploding base to the rescue ship. Enh. For the final cut scene, I was shocked and angry that they killed the Chief off-screen. I couldn't believe it. What a stupid ending! And then I read afterwards that if I had stayed through the credits I would have seen him alive
Oh well. Guess they're just setting up the hypothetical fourth game.So in conclusion, I really loved playing this game, and it's something we're going to replay a great many times until we've memorized every level and troop placement. But I'm pissed there weren't any bosses. In many ways, it felt like a strange hybrid of 1 and 2; a shortened level design and story-sense of 1 with the game play of 2.
Last edited:
