Look to Halo 4 and the future.

"Chief I need you" - Cortana CTN 0452-9. Calling the Master Chief for help during the teaser trailer of Halo 4.

Well Bungies part in the Halo series is now over. It is time for 343 Industries to take their place. 343 of course is a reference to the monitor and A.I in control of Installation 04, 343 Guilty Spark. The developers released their first game, Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, in November 2011, to coincide with Halo: Combat Evolved's release date and its ten year anniversary. This was just a remade version of Halo however, featuring new graphics engine and not much else. Capturing the magic of the original but with added skulls.

They now have their sites planned on starting a new triology for the Halo series, spanning games Halo 4-6. This trilogy is going to be called the "reclaimer" trilogy. Reclaimer being what the humans and Master Chief are referred to by Guilty Spark, hinting that the forerunners, creators of the rings, left humanity to reclaim their technologies.

The prospect however of a new game leaves me a little confused. The flood have been silenced, with no way off their research facilities or Halo rings its almost impossible for them to pose a significant threat to the galaxy again. The Covenant is disbanded and the Ark, central location for the Halo rings has been destroyed. The Chief is left floating into space and now apparently there is a new threat for him to fight? I call cash cow milking on this one.

According to the developers the Covenant will still be a threat. How this is possible we are not sure. All its leaders are dead and the army is in ruins. The Elites broke off and returned to their home planets, leaving humanity to re-colonize and lick their wounds from the most devastating war they had experienced.

It should also be worth noting that Cortana's current condition is unknown, if she has descended into rampancy yet or not. Part of me thinks that a part of at least one of these games will involve the Chief needing to silence Cortana who will go rampant at some point. This will most likely be a way to keep interest and tension in the series but this is just me speculating here.

343 also said they want to improve multi-player. The vid-docs of the game, which can be viewed on youtube and over Xbox Live do look impressive and some real graphical updates appear to have been made. Gameplay remains the same it seems and still has that "Halo feel" to it but I still remain skeptical that the game can live up to Bungies standard that they constantly improved over their games.

This is a new beginning for the games and the series over all and despite what I say I really want the fourth installment of the series to be good but sometimes its best to let heroes die. Whether the Chief has reached that state yet remains to be seen.

Thank you for reading this recap blog. I may do more in the future :)

Halo Reach. Back to the start

"WORT WORT WORT" - Several Elites during various Battles of Reach.

Throughout the Halo series several characters make reference to a planet called Reach. This reference was first made by Cortana in Halo: Combat Evolved when she mentions being tracked from Reach. After that Reach is usually referred to as a place where a lot of bad stuff happened and generally a huge loss for human forces. For those who read the 2001 novel "Halo: The Fall of Reach" the reasons behind this were quite clear. But for the gamers who hadn't yet read the books, this game would shed all the light needed.

Bungie had kept Reach a secret for a long time. They only released information regarding what they had planned and what was new for the game closer to the release date. Until then players only had a short trailer depicting a planet being "glassed" from far space before an ominous radio voice pointed out the presence of SPARTAN super soldiers. When they started to reveal what was in store for Reach it shocked many fans. The previous three games had failed to even feature a Halo Ring with ODST not even featuring a SPARTAN and everyone was already guessing there'd be little to do with the rings or the flood in this one which made some players skeptical. When Bungie showed us what they had done however it blew our minds. The updates to everything were amazing. Graphically enhanced and using a new gameplay engine allowed for them to make more detailed environments which keeping with the style many players were familiar with. This new engine, which would be known as the "Reach" Engine, also allowed Bungie to add numerous game-play feature in.

Gone were the old equipment used in Halo 3 such as trip mines and power drains. Instead players were able to choose a "load out" featuring an armor ability. These abilities were built into the armors that the SPARTANs were fighting in and allowed them to use power from the armor itself. Abilities such as Armor lock allowed players to remain stationary but become invulnerable for a limited period of time, very handy for dealing with a charging ghost. While jet packs made players almost scream with delight at the prospect of being able to fly. There were some abilites which were a little stupid for instance like "sprint". As the name suggests it lets the player sprint, kind of pointless when you're meant to be playing the ultimate human warrior, you'd think they'd have the brain cells to realize how to run, or does the ability unlock the 95% of their brains that aren't "move, shoot, drive". Perhaps that's a little cynical but come on, sprint? really?

Game-play wise it doesn't differ much from the winning formula that has kept Halo going for such a long time. The only change from recent games is that instead of fighting just Brutes the Elites have returned as the main military force behind the Covenant. This does make sense as it is a prequel. Many players were happy to see the Elites return as Brutes were never a fan favourite but these ones are super-Elites. On Legendary some can take orbital bombardments to the face and survive with shields left. This does make for a more challenging game and to match this threat Bungie did give players new weapons to combat these enemies. Completely re-designed weapons with newer more sophisticated looks like the remade assault rifle wowed players in the beta and new additions such as the DMR, replacing the BR were instant hits, with many players preferring it as a weapon of elegance. New Heavy weapons like the Target Locator and Plasma Launcher featured to deal with vehicles and armored targets but you will always find the player who will use the heavy weapons on one grunt.

Story wise it is exactly what a fan would expect. The game details the fall of Reach, from the first discovery of the Covenant, to a mission to try and stop them, right up to the final confrontation and escort of the A.I Cortana to the Pillar of Autumn where she would eventually be bought to the Halo ring and begin the original trilogy with Master Chief. The player assumes the role of Noble 6, a SPARTAN III who has been assigned to Noble Team of Soldiers after they lost a squad member off planet. The game features a variety of levels including one where the player takes control of a space craft in an attempt to disable to Covenant frigate in space, the level is reminicent of Star Wars Battlefront II space levels. I won't reveal every detail of the story just in case people haven't played it yet but suffice it to say it delivers a great ending to Bungies final game. Reach went out with a bang and so did Bungie.

Multiplayer takes the same roots as Halo 3 did, with the major differences being rather than gaining experience, players now gained credits which were used to level up and purchase new pieces or armor. The winning team weren't the only ones gaining credits and level ups now. The game ranked players on how well they did as individuals, taking into account commendations, medals, kills and the newly added slot machine to give players credits. It is also worth noting that any armor applied to the players multiplayer avatar also applied in story mode, being present in cut scenes and game play too. A nice little touch which made me happy. Reach also included firefight mode, just as ODST had. This one was a little fairer as players now had control over SPARTANs but even they cannot survive indefinitely against never ending waves of alien menaces.

With Reach being the last game that Bungie would release they would hand over control of the franchise to 343 studios. Who have no released Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, an updated version of Halo: Combat Evolved using the Reach Engine and have something new planned for the franchise.

Halo 3: ODST. Not a SPARTAN in sight.

"Remember Reach" - Various Graffiti on the walls of New Mombassa

With the third party produced Halo Wars not doing as well as Bungie had hoped for in the sales department it was about time they released their latest project. Halo 3: ODST had previously been called Halo 3: Recon and was only supposed to be an expansion pack, featuring missions explaining what happened to Earth forces in New Mombassa during the events of Halo 2.

Originally ODST was meant to include a few story missions and the main feature would be the final map pack for players. What would also feature would be a special code for Bungies last and final games beta release. Halo: Reach. A project which was shrouded in mystery at the point but was promised to be huge.

ODST was eventually released as an entirely separate game on two discs. Disc one would feature the story mode, which one again bought something new to the franchise. Disc two would feature the multiplayer maps for Halo 3 along with the possibility of unlocking the famous and coveted Recon armor for multiplayer mode, previously only available to players who achieved significant feats in Halo or created amazing machinima such as the famous Red vs Blue series creators.

The story of this new game focussed on a squad of ODSTs (Orbital. Drop. Shock. Troopers) or Hell Jumpers. Who were deployed from low earth orbit to mop up covenant forces in the town of New Mombassa just after the Master Chief blasted his was through and took out a Scarab class battle platform. During the drop however the Covenant carrier performs a slip space jump, sending out a huge pulse wave and knocking the squad apart. The player initially assumes the role of the rookie. A silent protagonist who is the newest member of the squad. The player then explores the ruined streets of New Mombassa at night, while avoiding or engaging Covenant forces to try and track down to find out what happened to your squad mates. The game takes a sort of free roam aspect to it, with the player being able to freely explore New Mombassa and find out what happened to each squad member in any order. When a clue is found to the whereabouts of a squad member the player assumes the role of said member and plays through a short mission as each one. Once each squad member is located the player is given the option to begin the final mission and complete the game, or continue roaming around the sometimes confusing labyrinth of New Mombassas streets.

The gameplay remains the same as most Halo games, with a few weapons being absent such as the Energy sword, Battle Rifle and Assault Rifle. Instead the ODSTs are given a silenced SMG and Pistol, both of which can be used for stealth attacks on unsuspecting targets. These however seem to be mostly useless as stealth weapons as enemies seem to know exactly where you are whether or not you sneak or not. While sneaking doesn't always work it is heavily emphasised that players take that route to avoid death. ODST units lack the shields and armor of SPARTAN super soldiers and as such are more reliant on their skills in combat. They also lack the strength to dual wield weapons and are restricted to wielding one weapon at a time. This puts ODSTs at a disadvantage against enemies like the Brutes and Hunters who are mincemeat compared to SPARTAN soldiers but against marines are more than formidable.

The ODST units do have one thing which SPARTANs lack. A visual rendering mode which uses rendering to light dark areas and highlight friend and foe based on existing data, VISR mode. This mode is mostly by the rookie as he is navigating the streets of New Mombassa however and isn't all that useful outside of night time as it acts like night vision, blinding the player if they attempt to use it in the day time, making it only good for about half the game.

The story itself is nothing to write home about, an average attempt to flesh out and give evidence for what happened to the town after the Prophet of Regret almost nuked the place in Halo 2.

ODST did however introduce a new game mode to the Halo series, Firefight. Similar to the horde mode of Gears of War, Firefight sees up to four players taking on wave after wave of Covenant Enemies on a variety of maps with a limited number of waves. It is essentially a survival test, seeing how long players can last for a certain amount of time. This mode did give ODST more replay ability and provided good multiplayer fun on a game which was primarily single player.

For me ODST was the lowest point in the Halo series. A game which was meant to be nothing more than an expansion pack with some maps ended up being bigger than it should of been. ODSTs themselves were never really playable after that and even in the Halo games the AI ODSTs are no better than marines with maybe a few extra hit points. Overall ODST only really served to introduce firefight and give players the Reach Beta to experience Bungies last project. One which would blow the others out of the water.

Halo Wars: A new direction?

After the release of Halo 3 Bungie had already set their sights on releasing a lot of downloadable content for the games. Map packs such as the Heroic and Legendary Map pack were being released giving players new features in forge mode and new maps to mess around on and a teaser trailer for a new expansion, entitled Recon, was on it's way. But before recon there came Halo wars.

The game took the Halo franchise in a new direction. Instead of being the first person shooter that Halo was, it turned it into an RTS ( Real Time Strategy ). The game itself was not a bad game and for a genre which Halo probably wouldn't have been thought of as, it did a good job in creating a game which was accessible and also fun at the same time.

The game used the classic top down view of many RTS games and featured a variety of units, vehicles and aircraft which could be created and upgraded by both The Covenant and Human players. The player usually selects a "leader" to play as from either the Covenant or Human forces. This leader is able to call in unique powers or units for themselves. The only difference being that Human Leaders remain off the battlefield and rely on their unique units and powers to assist them in battle, such as ODST soldiers and Carpet Bombs. Covenant leaders are deployed onto the battlefield and use powers such as Cleansing beam, a giant space laser, to clear the way for their forces. Covenant leaders are also able to be directly controlled by players.

Bases for resource gathering, power supply, unit production and research

are built on set places on maps in both story and skirmish (multiplayer) mode. This limits the amount of bases which one player can hold at a time while also providing fair competition for their opponent, although usually one base is more than enough to win a game on anything up to Heroic difficulty.

The game used a basic control system which many hard core RTS fans of games like Starcraft 2 and Command & Conquer would call stupid and pointless but it got the job done. The developers, Ensemble Studios, knew that most Halo Fans would probably have not ventured out of the FPS genre much. Creating a control scheme which was simple and functional for a simple game was the logical choice, and it worked too. After selecting units its just a case of pressing the X button on where you want them to go or what you want them to attack, with the Y button being used for a special attack such as grenades or missile barrages.

The story of the game was quite exceptional. Set twenty years before the first Halo, just after the first contact with the Covenant. It follows the UNSC ship "Spirit of Fire" with Sergeant John Forge, Professor Ellen Anders, and Captain James Cutter as they follow the Covenant to an ancient forerunner world which could hold a tipping point in the war, tipping the scales hugely in the covenants favour. Story mode plays like a series of skirmish games with objectives only slightly differing from "take out this base in x.xx amount of time". While this sounds a little tedious it is very fun once the game starts giving you the big guns like Grizzly tanks or Vulture Gunships. The game features beautifully rendered cut-scenes too, ones which I would say are the most beautiful in all the Halo games, with great action and choreography they really bring to life action outside the game play, but its hard for me to describe, i'll just show you.

Halo wars was a beautiful game and probably number two on my favourite games from the series. Its just a shame that Ensemble studios were forced to go bankrupt after bad decisions during production as it cost more to produce the game than they were making from sales. While Halo Wars was the only game in the series which didn't adhere to FPS house style it showed people that Halo need not be confined to a first person perspective and provide great detail on the lore of the Halo universe.

Halo 3. Finishing The Fight

"Master Chief? Do you mind telling me what the hell you're doing on that ship?" - Admiral Lord Hood.

"Sir. Finishing this Fight" - John 117, The Master Chief.

The Halo series was at an end. Ironic that such a great series would end with the birth of the Xbox 360. 2007 saw the release of arguably Bungies best game since Halo: Combat evolved. Halo 3 was the game that fans had been waiting for since the Chief put them on the cliffhanger at the end of Halo 2. Such a popular series launching its "final" game with the launch of Microsoft's new console was a great combination, allowing the Xbox 360 to score huge sales numbers across the world, but these were still only half of what Nintendo sold with their Wii when that was released.

While Halo 3 would not be the absolute final game in the franchise what followed was two prequels and a midquel. Namely Halo: Reach, Halo Wars and Halo 3: ODST. All of which will be reviewed in this recap in the next segments.

Halo 3 had already been confirmed ever since the ending of Halo 2. Pretty much the only thing that could stop it would have been Bungie folding, and even then Microsoft would probably have never let such a huge cash cow go without milking it a few more times anyway. Halo 3 would launch at the same time as the Xbox 360, most often bundled with and stated as being its premiere launch title along with other games such as Gears of War and Mass Effect. All of which have had at least two new games released since their first launch back in 2007.

Halo 3 was quoted as being "the game of the century" by several UK magazines and it did live up to the title. The vastly improved graphics allowed more and more detail to be added to character faces and the power of the 360 was conveyed through one of its first games.

Personally i'd call Halo 3 one of the most beautiful games of its time but others argue it was too light.

The Chief reprises his role yet again as the savior of the universe and once again returns to it solo. The Arbiter did return but his part was mostly as an NPC to accompany the Chief through certain parts of the campaign or as a second player in co-operative. Right from the start you can enjoy smashing through the covenant with your favorite weapons from the previous games along with the newly added Gravity Hammer, spiker and the returning Assault Rifle. The player also has a variety of equipment at their disposal such as temporary power-ups, trip mines and shields. While the dual wielding feature returned it was heavily powered down with some weapons like the needler being reduced to single wielding as Bungie felt that the improved fire rate of the weapon would make it too over-powered to dual wield.

The story in this final chapter was compelling and innovative as is what players have come to expect from the series. The Covenant and The Flood return as primary antagonists however humanity is now assisted by the revolting Elites who join the human fleet in their assault on The Covenant controlled "Ark" the structure said to control all the Halo rings, mentioned at the end of Halo 2. The varied environments the player navigates through is complimented by the many ways to get across these environments. Walking is always good but when you have a Scorpion Tank, an old favorite from the series or the newly added Hornet Aircraft to blast through the enemy with it makes your feet seem a little slow. Why be a walking tank when you can just get in one?

The mutiplayer experience returns strong as ever. The newest feature added in was the "forge" mode. This mode allowed players to add objects such as structures or weapons into ready made maps and create their own maps with their own game modes to share with the community. This ability and focus on community content allowed a much larger variety of game modes and maps all created by the community for the community. Game types such as"Ice Cream Man" and "Cat and Mouse" were downloaded and played many times by the players in offline custom games with their friends. The experience gaining system in Halo 3 with regard to multiplayer was odd however. Rather than gain experience per kill it was judged that only the winning team or individual in a ranked game could gain experience and therefore progress to level up. This system was widely criticized by the community but would not be changed until Halo: Reach.

Halo 3 was definitly one of the best selling and most beautiful games on the Xbox 360 and would have been a great ending for Bungie to go out on, if they hadn't decided to milk the cash cow further.