Halo 3 - Max Out Forum Review

[Xandercore]

Release: September 26th 2007

First of all, let’s start off with the campaign. The Halo series has had one of the greatest storylines I have ever seen in any game. Ever. It’s original, very creative and exceptionally interesting. I won’t go into any precise details on the storyline so that you guys can avoid spoilers if you haven’t played it yet. But, although the storyline is fantastic, this game definitely has the weakest campaign out of any of the Halo games. The missions are always completely linear, and only occasionally do you get some elements of exploration where you have to back-track and go a different way instead. It’s fairly dissapointing.

But that is the main storyline I am talking about. On every single level in the game they have hidden skulls, which you can collect in order to get achievements. This adds an exploration element to the game, which is definitely needed. The skulls are sometimes easy to find, but for a lot of them you will have to completely go out of your way in order to find them. Another thing that Bungie (The creators) added to the game was a bunch of easter eggs, A.K.A hidden little secrets dotted around the place. On the first level, there is a hidden family of monkeys, all with the face of one of the developers. On the very last level, there are several easter eggs which are very difficult to get to, and they require a lot of exploration and skill to actually find them.

And then there is the co-op aspect. If it weren’t for the co-op, Halo 3’s campaign would be nowhere near as good as it is. One person will play as the Master Chief (obviously), another as his Elite companion, the Arbiter, and up to two additional players who will play as other Elites. All of the characters are balanced, so it is fair. And the best thing about co-op campaign is when you just mess about. Obviously it is quite fun to do the campaign as a team, but when you’re playing with your friends, it opens up a tonne of new opportunities for having fun.

Campaign: 8/10

Now I will go onto multiplayer, the highlight of Halo 3. Halo 3 has what I believe to be the most effective matchmaking system I’ve seen in any game, for instead of people just dropping in and out of games because they are doing poorly, the game matches people up, and then keeps them in a game together. People are less likely to drop out of matches because of the exp penalty, and once somebody has left a game, nobody can join the game that is already in progress. This means when you start searching for a match, you won’t be put into a game where the opposing team has almost won, and all you gain from it is another loss.

Now that I have spoken about the matchmaking system, let’s talk about the multiplayer itself. The gameplay in the multiplayer is by far, without a doubt, the best multiplayer system I’ve ever seen. The combat is very well balanced, the weapons are perfect for the game, and virtually all of the maps are fantastic. In most games you will play, there will be at least one map that you absolutely hate. But in this game, the maps are so well made that it is quite difficult to single out one map as being the worst, and the same goes for being the best. There aren’t really any cheap tactics on Halo apart from the inevitable camping that you will get in any first person shooter, and even that is harder in this game because of how long it takes to kill people.

That is another aspect that I love about Halo, the fact that the player has shields. Instead of the game being about having quick reactions and such, it focuses a lot more on the skill of the player. I’m not saying it doesn’t take skill to play games like Call Of Duty, because it does, but to keep shooting a keep in a battle for longer than half a second requires skill to win. There is also the competetive side to matchmaking as well, with seperate social and ranked playlists. The social playlists are mainly for people who just want to have fun on the game, and they will still earn experience for their win, but the ranked playlists are for people who want to play the game competetively, by matching them into a game with players of a similar rank, and the reward of ranking up if they win. The higher your rank on a playlist, the higher your total rank in any game mode.

And that’s just the public side of it. Custom games, in my eyes, is where the magic happens. That’s because, although you have your standard slayer and capture the flag gametypes, anybody can make their own gametype that they want to, so long as it is based on another gametype. Thanks to this, combined with Forge mode (which I will go into later), people can make something that is completely different to halo, yet still the same. With a huge thriving community, there is an endless supplt of new puzzle maps, race tracks, mini-games and many more. This is why I love Halo, because it is more than just a first-person shooter: It can be almost anything.

Multiplayer: 10/10

As I mentioned earlier, Halo 3 has a mode called Forge mode. In this mode, you can go onto any multiplayer map in the game,transform into the floating orb, and create a new level based around the original base by deleting already existing items, vehicles, weapons, spawns etc. and then placing new ones wherever you want.You can also at any time transform back from forge mode and run around as a standard player, so that you can test the map whilst you are still creating it. And although on most maps you can only delete so much of what is on those maps, there are two maps in the game designed specifically for forging: Sandbox and Foundry, as the names hint to their purposes. On these maps, you can delete everything you need to in order to completely make your own, and you can place your own items and weapons and spawn points etc. to make any map you want, suited to any game mode you want. So long as you have the patience, that is.

The reason I say that is because Forge mode does have it’s flaws. Placing items onto maps can be extremely fiddly, for sometimes things like thin walls that you place will fall over, and you’ll have to pick it up again and try to balance it, and there is nothing like a 90 degree snap, so you could possibly be spending ages just trying to slot something into the right place to no avail. But, good things come to those who wait, and if you are patient enough you can create a masterpiece of a level. If you look through the community files of Halo 3, some of the maps that have been forged are absolutely mindblowing, and end up being virtually completely new maps in itself. Also worthy of note is that forge mode is not just single player, you can invite other people into your game and build maps with them, or mess around with them if you want to.

Forge Mode: 8/10

The final game mode to mention is the revolutionary theatre mode, which has never been seen in any game before now. Thanks to theatre mode, you can save films of any game that you want to, and watch them again whenever you want. But that’s not the extent of it. At any time you want to, you can break out into thrid person mode, and watch the gameplay from an over the shoulder perspective, and then even break out into a free roaming camera, which is very easily manouverable and allows you to make cinematic style shots. It is thanks to this revolutionary theatre mode that there are so many machinima’s of this game; Theatre mode, combined with maps created in forge mode, combined with the many customizable options in custom games, has opened up a new world of video game film making, accessible by many people. And not only can you make films and save them, but you can also take screenshots of moments in game, and this has also lead to a lot of creativity and some very artistic screenshots, which can be automatically uploaded to the internet after they’ve been taken.

Theatre Mode: 10/10

Graphics-wise, this game is nothing groundbreaking. The visuals are average for an Xbox 360 game, and they do their job. The same goes for the 30 frames-per-second frame rate, which isn’t completely smooth, but does it’s job well enough. And to make up for it, the scenery in the background of levels is outstanding, and the majority of the textures are decent too. Musically though, this game is fantastic. Marty O’Donnell, who composes all of the music for the Halo series, is frankly a genuis with the songs he write, for not only are they epic in themselves, with a full orchestra and choir, but the music fit’s perfectly for the game. The music is only featured on the menu’s and in campaign mode, though, because they felt that the music is too distracting when you’re playing multiplayer, and you can always put on your own music if you want to.

Visual/Audio: 8/10

There is no doubt that this is a fantastic game, and has revolutionised gaming as we know it. It’s just a shame about those small little niggles, but they are definitely very minor.

Rating: 9/10

[admin]

nice review
forge is brilliant i think. not many games have that option in game!
how do you work the theatre mode?

[Xandercore]

In theatre mode, you basically can fly around the map while the game is playing, as if there's another player there, but without affecting any of the other players in game. You can rewind it, fast forward it or even fly around while it is paused, like a panorama

[Bryanx54]

i thought the campaign was rather good but nothing beats the multiplayer its fun when you shot other players so they have no armor and just whack them over the head lol aint done that in while. Too busy having fun with plasma granades lol.

[Xandercore]

Still, I miss the Halo 2 days, with the legendary bxr combo
Basically, you hit them so they had no shield, then instantly fired a headshot with the battle rifle to finish them off. Oh, the good old days :')

[admin]

I hadn't heard about Halo until Halo 3 came out

Is Halo 2 only avaliable on the XBOX original

[modernpipes]

Halo 2 is on PC

[Xandercore]

Yeah, you can get Halo 2 vista on PC, seeing as Halo 2 on xbox has been shut down D:

[Kingwayz]

Great, detailed review.

[Xandercore]

Yay, thanks
I'm gonna be doing an in-depth review of Halo 3: ODST soon, look out for that to be on the forum sometime next week.

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