I beat Halo 3 last week, actually, and was so incensed the night I did so, I wanted to write a review right away. But it was like 3 in the morning, and I decided to go to sleep. Eventually, yes, I woke up, but at that point I just didn't want to think about the game anymore. But I guess now I am ready to complain. No spoilers, unless you see spoiler tags.
First off, though, I should note that, gameplay-wise, I really enjoyed Halo 3. It's probably the most intense of the 3 games, and except for the second-last level, it is an above-average, kickass action game experience. There's a good deal of variety to the gameplay, so it never gets boring, something that other FPSes sometimes lack (say... Bioshock. Which maybe I should write my thoughts on already, too). You'll be jumping in and out of numerous vehicles, almost all of which are awesome to drive (the Brute Chopper being the main exception. I hate that thing. Even though it looks really cool. Which just makes things even more disappointing, actually, when you find out it handles like ass), which really helps to mix things up a lot. And the very last part of the last level is the coolest thing I've played in a long time.
The music is fantastic. The Halo theme, as always, is fun to listen to while you're killing things, but there's other music this time around that's also really good - something that was lacking a bit in the other games, where most of the music didn't really do anything for me.
And the game looks gorgeous. I don't know why people keep saying it's not that great, or that it doesn't hold up to other modern games - I think it looks phenomenal. I'd say it's as pretty looking as Gears of War, imo. Maybe it's not as technically impressive, I dunno, but the visual and artistic style in most areas is top notch, which just really elevates it above other games. The character models are probably the weakest part, but they're still pretty nice. The Brutes and the Flood in particular both look really sweet this time out.
That said, the story is ass. It is
asstacular. None --
none -- of the fucking mysteries of the Halo universe get any resolution whatsoever. In fact, they don't even get mentioned, except maybe through some hidden terminals that contain snippets of conversations that when pieced together gives you a minuscule amount of background info about a major event in Halo's past. Forgive me for being so bitter about this, but when you take into account all the fucking
secrecy that Bungie engaged in regarding their story for like the last 2 years, I was expecting a couple of, I don't know, surprises. It didn't help matters that reviews I read before playing the game indicated that the story was full of plot twists and, you know, resolutions. Gamespy, for example, said "Not only are the tattered strands of Halo 2's loose ends tied up, but a whole host of shocking new events unfold", and Gamespot similarly argues "All you really need to know if you're on the fence about Halo 3's campaign is that it's a delicate balancing act that manages to provide satisfying closure for the trilogy, [and] make perfect sense of all the cryptic events in Halo 2." These comments are
blatant lies. I don't normally put too much stock in accusations that certain reviewers have been bribed for their reviews of certain games, but it's not really too hard for me to believe something like
this may have had something to do with the distinct lack of complaints about Halo 3's awful, bland story. You want to know what
shocking new events unfold in Halo 3? I'll put these in spoiler tags, because, I mean, they are spoilers, but if you can't guess this stuff simply by knowing Halo 3 is the last in the trilogy, you have never experienced fiction in any of its forms, ever. Here they are, though, get ready, this is gonna be shocking:
-Master Chief beats the Covenant.
-Master Chief beats the Flood.
-Master Chief saves Cortana.
That's it. That's all that happens in the game. Maybe you're thinking, "but how does he beat the Covenant? Surely that's exciting to find out?" No, he just tracks down the Prophet of Truth and kills him. Basically exactly what he said he was gonna do at the end of Halo 2. They didn't even need a Halo 3, they could have just added a line of narration on screen at the end of 2 after Master Chief promises to finish the fight that says something like "and then he does. The end" and it would have been equally satisfying.
How does he beat the Flood? He blows them up. I guess the Forerunners didn't think of that one. They preferred to wipe out all life in the universe except the Flood, whom they kept samples of in each of the Halos. Clearly, when compared to Master Chief's solution, that is the more sensible approach. Seriously though, if you wanted a good explanation for why the Forerunners felt that was the only way to beat the Flood, you are not going to get it.
What was the significance of Cortana's cryptic remarks, as seen in that first Halo 3 trailer, and throughout the game? Nothing. Literally, nothing. There is no significance, she was just temporarily crazy. Once you find her, she's like "oh, you came back for me. Well, I guess I'll stop being crazy." That's not even an exaggeration, she seriously just gets up and stops being crazy, and it quickly becomes apparent that none of the things she said meant anything at all, they were just bits of cryptic bullshit to make the story seem more interesting than it actually is.
Why did the Covenant consider humanity's very existence to be blasphemous, and try to wipe us out? No clue. I guess they were bored.
What was the Gravemind's plan, and why did he say such weird things about himself and the Flood like "I am a testament to all your sins"? If you think I have an answer to this question ready for you, you are missing the point of this review.
The game has
no plot twists. Nothing unexpected happens or is revealed, there is not a single point at which the plot
twists. It is a straight line. It plays out exactly the way you'd expect, with no revelations of any kind whatsoever, not even in the chapter that is actually called "Revelation". Overall, it is severely disappointing. I hope the rumours of the Bungie staff leaving Microsoft turn out to be true, because they clearly do not know how to handle their own story, and I'm sure someone else can do a much better job (maybe not on the gameplay side, though).
It is an interesting story, in theory.
Also, the multiplayer is pretty fun, but the maps are too small, and unless I'm missing something, you can't even choose which map you want to play on, which is pretty lame. You can choose which type of game you want to play (deathmatch, team deathmatch, ctf, etc.), and then the service just picks a map for you. Why this is preferable to the standard multiplayer setup where you get a list of games in progress, and you join whichever one you want based on the number of players and/or the map being played, I'm not sure. But it's still fun, so I'm not that bitter, it just seems weird. I never played the other Halo games in multiplayer, so I guess I wasn't prepared for this lameness to the same extent other people might have been.
So yeah, that's my review. If you have no interest in the Halo story, you will really enjoy this game. If you have interest in the story, drop it, there's nothing to get excited about here.
I've already played through a number of the levels over again, skipping all the cutscenes, and it is much more enjoyable then when I was pumped up, hoping (expecting, even) to see some kind of conclusion to the lingering questions of the game's universe. It's a pretty sweet action game, and definitely worth experiencing on that front alone.
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