Halo Review

HALO review from a PC gamer's perspective... And what is an Xbox game reviewer anyway? The game deserves respect and should be on the top of your Xmas wish list -- if you don't mind paying for a mini-PC that is...

Yes, you can tie me to a rotten tree on top of the highest mountain, nail my ass to the cross and let the ravens have their way with me, or whatever, but I simply cannot bring myself to admit this is a console review. I just can't... I remember the first time I saw HALO in action at E3 2000 - a bunch of us journalists had been shown the demo (a stripped down version of a game scene involving a buggy) running on a PC rig equipped with a TNT2 card... Don't quote me on this one, but if you check out this preview, I think you should get all the answers.

Hold this position!!

Let's go, team!

Back then, Bungie was still Take 2's puppy, and the Xbox was simply a couple of neat tech demos and a whole lot of bombastic announcements. Since that time, well, you all know what happened: Microsoft successfully managed to convince most people they're actually selling a console and NOT a PC, and now there's even talk of MS buying companies like Take 2 and Infogrames. HALO has since been promoted to the status of the Xbox flagship launch title, and although a PC version is on the cards, no significant moves have been made in that direction yet. So, it's now up to us to try hard and hold back our frustration because somebody had the nerve to make us buy this tiny-PC rig with a gamepad in order to play one of the best PC shooters ever made. Isn't this just typical behavior for you-know-who. Kind of like forcing you to surf with their proprietary browser if you decide to purchase their proprietary OS... "Neat" stuff, I'm sure you'll agree...

On to HALO... Years in the future, the human race is besieged by a group of aliens, known as the Covenant. Greatly outnumbered, humanity makes its last stand on an artificially created planet-like ring or "halo." It is your responsibility to defend, and ultimately preserve the human race. Pursued by alien warships to a massive and ancient ring construct deep in the void, you must single-handedly improvise a guerilla war over land, sea and air, and defeat the nasty buggers. It's a one-man-show tale of supernatural bravery, and it works just fine for me... HALO is an epic with a beautiful and consistent fantasy world, little in the way of character depth, but plenty in the way of dynamic plot developments (story twists), and beautiful and highly imaginative environments.

The rest of Bungie's work is damn-near perfect...

HALO is the most advanced all-around shooter I've played so far, in a sense that it successfully combines some of the most spectacular team based action and enemy AI, very good visuals and impressive sounds, and it does it all with a lot of style. The only game that comes close to being this good all-around is Remedy's Max Payne, but you cannot really compare the two since the design goals of both dev. teams were different.

As it stands, I've never played a FPS with such believable AI routines. The artificial intelligence is so intelligent it will make you forget you're actually playing a game. I swear this is the closest thing to a convincing AI I've seen in a computer game yet. Your teammates are efficient and cover you well; they follow certain military doctrines and formations, and will likely bail you out on more than one occasion. The enemy AI is right up there if not better - Covenant soldiers will try to flank you, they'll take up cover (efficiently), run away when they're hurt and even duck for cover like crazy when you throw a grenade at them. They'll realize the importance of in-game vehicle and try to stop you from jumping into one, and they'll use long-range weapons with efficiency and a hefty doze of cunningness. The level design and the dynamics of the incoming enemy units are perfectly complimentary to the great AI. The game is tough, but it's never tough enough to make you play ping-pong with your gamepad. The checkpoint save games are well implemented, so that players won't have to go through the frustration of replaying the whole level over again. As I said, the level design is masterfully done and the indoor to outdoor transitions make for welcome refreshment any time the game starts to feel even slightly claustrophobic. Naturally, this all spells out enticing and skillfully designed gameplay dynamics.