vadimio's Full Review: Halo: Combat Evolved for Xbox
Sadly, I did not purchase Halo for a very long time. When I first got my Xbox, I was too busy trying other stuff, and when I settled down after my initial excitement, I promised myself that I would never buy another game for the regular $49.99 price tag. So I waited and waited, for almost half a year. Then, on a marvelous Sunday in June, I spotted a splendid sale and purchased Halo: Combat Evolved brand new for a tad under thirty bucks. I was completely ecstatic and was hooked right away.
First of all, the story behind the game is very intense and grappling. By reading the instruction manual and playing the first few missions, you learn that the year is 2552, and since there are now too many humans on Earth, humans have been forced to colonize and live on different galaxies, and have been successful. But then, to make a long story short, a race of highly evolved aliens, who do not have a particular liking of humans, have waged a holy war and are now headed for Earth itself to wreak utter havoc. In the meantime, human engineers have been developing cyborg super soldiers to wipe out the Covenants. The colony that is home to these soldiers is attacked a few days before the special mission, and only one ship carrying the last cyborg super soldier, called Master Chief, escapes. You take control of Master Chief, and it is up to you to save the human race.
There are ten missions in all in the single player campaign. Throughout the game, you will fight thousands of different Covenant forces in various environments. The Covenants consists of Grunts, Jackals, Elites, and Hunters. Grunts are the smallest and weakest greatest creatures, and they remind me of Ewoks from the old Star Wars movies. They usually wield a small plasma pistol or a needler and a few grenades, are located in clusters and are very easy to kill. Jackals are slightly bigger and have more health than Grunts; they have shield that cannot be penetrated unless you use a very strong weapon. The Elites are much larger than the two I have described above, they require much more bullets to kill and they tout heavier weapons such as the plasma rifle. Then we come to the fearsome and gruesome Hunters. These guys are blue, bulky, and very, very strong. The only weapon that can kill them with one hit is the rocket launcher, as not even a grenade will do the job. Shooting them will take forever. They, on the other hand, shoot huge charged green plasma blobs at you, and boy, do they hurt. They can also hit you with their huge shield as a melee attack, and this can be lethal. A few invisible and very powerful creatures touting huge yellow swords are also present in most levels, and you can barely distinguish them from the environment, therefore running into them is not very rare.
However, most of the levels in the second half of the game will also have you facing off against the Flood, which is another race, than fights not only you, but the Covenants as well. The Flood is a real pain in the neck. They consist of zombies carrying zombies, skinny monsters that can jump like thirty feet and equipped with whips, little mushroom-like parasite guys that do minimal damage but are often found in packs of 20-50, and larger versions of them that erupt and turn into about 10 of the little guys. Fighting the Flood is very annoying, the levels featuring only the Flood were dreadful in my opinion and thankfully Covenants are not on their side.
Halo is a first person shooter, with emphasis on the shooter part. There are two types of weapons: the normal weapons and Covenant weapons. The main difference between them is that most Covenant weapon are powered with a battery, and when the battery runs out, you must throw away that weapon. Normal, human weapons use actual bullets and you must find ammo, therefore you do not have to throw away your favorite gun. There are more human weapons available. You can wield a pistol, which can fire bullets rapidly and has a 2x scope, making it very useful and lethal. The standard weapon is the assault rifle, which will feature a scope in Halo 2, and fires 60 bullets before needing a reload. A shotgun is available, and this is a very high-damage weapon that can perform a one-shot kill on tough enemies if you aim for the head. The sniper rifle is the most accurate weapon, with a very good zoom, but can hold few bullets and takes a long time to reload. Finally, one of my favorites, is the rocket launcher, which can hold two bullets at a time, and if you learn how to use it, it will instantly kill any enemy. Covenant weapons include the Plasma Pistol, Plasma Grenade and Needler. The Plasma guns shoot plasma, have a battery that cannot be recharged, and the Plasma Pistol can emit a high-damage shot if you press the shoot button for a few seconds before releasing it. If you have run out of bullets completely, you can use the weapons as a melee weapon, and hit your opponent on the head, which is a useful, high-damage trick that you should learn. Halo features two types of grenades, normal and plasma grenades. Plasma grenades stick to objects and it is fun to stick a grenade to your opponent and them watch them run around before exploding. You can only carry two weapons and four grenades of each kind at a time.
What set Halo apart from other FPS games was the use of vehicles. There are four different vehicles that you can use, and they are all very unique and well developed. The humans have the Warthog, which is a Jeep with a large machine gun in the back. Three people can sit in a Warthog, one is a driver, another sits in the front seat and shoots him own weapon, and a third person sits in the back and fires the machine gun. Driving the Warthog took me a while to get used to but I got the hang of it after a few missions. In Halo, some missions have Marines, which are humans that are on your side and assist you, and sometimes they hop in with you while you drive the Jeep. In Halo 2, rumor has it that Marines will be able to drive the Warthog while you shoot. The second human vehicle is the Scorpion, which is a massive tank. One person climbs inside and controls the movement, can fire a machine gun or the very high-damage torpedo/missile every few seconds, which can blow up anything and anybody. Up to four marines can sit on the side of the Scorpion and shoot nearby enemies. The Scorpion was my favorite vehicle, but sadly, you can only use it in one mission.
The Covenants also have two vehicles that you can utilize, called the Banshee and the Ghost. The Ghost is reminiscent of a pod in the Star Wars movies, as it flies only slightly above the ground and shoots lasers. The Banshee is a flying vehicle that can go as high as you want it to and shoots larger lasers. If you are in a situation where you are being attacked by a person in a Ghost or a Banshee, if you place a grenade onto the vehicle or shoot it continuously, you can blow the vehicle up. Or you can take it one with a grenade launcher or Scorpion.
Master Chief has not only health but a shield meter as well. When he is fired at, his shield goes down. After his shield is completely gone, then the health goes down. If you kill your enemy before you die, then the shield recharges itself to 100%. The shield always recharges automatically, and it is possible to walk around with 5% health but a 100% shield. Health, on the other hand, can only be replenished with health packs, which are fairly uncommon. If you die, then you start over from the last checkpoint, and checkpoints are very common so you won’t have to repeat a lot.
Co-op mode is available, which means that you can go through all of the missions with two players instead of by yourself. This makes the game a little easier, but a lot more fun. I beat Halo the first time on co-op mode. The only nuisance is that if you are still fighting enemies and your partner runs ahead and reaches a checkpoint, you will be teleported to that same point, so you don’t get to finish of that Grunt you were crushing. If one dies, they are teleported right next to their friend, but if they are in a battle, you will have to wait until all enemies have been killed before you are revived. If your partner dies, you both start from the last checkpoint.
The campaign can be played on four different degrees of difficulty, which are Easy, Normal, Heroic and Legendary. Normal features more opponents than Easy, Heroic has tougher enemies, while legendary is frankly suicide.
Halo also features multi-player mode. The only con about Halo is the fact that you cannot have bots (computer controlled opponents), which is really a shame. You can play split-screen with up to four players going at it at the same time, or system link play, where you can hook up a few Xboxs for even more players. Halo is not Live enabled. You can find many power-ups in this mode, including an overshield and invisibility for about a minute. These multi-player modes have a bunch of different modes, including Slayer (kill each other until a specific number of kills is achieved), Oddball (find the skull and hold it for two seconds), Capture the Flag and many more. Usually I play Slayer, but I recently found a fun mode where you must be “it” for two minutes. First one person shoots another, and the person that is alive is “it”. To take this title away, you must kill the player that is “it”, and then you become “it”. When you are it, you become slower, so this is really fun but is best when playing on a small map, and about 10 maps are available.
The controls are superb, and Brute Force copied them. A is used for jumping, B for the melee attack, Y to switch weapons and X to pick up weapons on the ground, reload human weapons and it is also the action button. The black button switches between plasma and normal grenades. You can utilize the flashlight, which is to be used in dark places, and you can switch it on with the white button. The left thumbstick is used for move while the right thumbstick is for aiming, which is a great combination. If you press down on the left thumbstick, you crouch, while pressing the right thumbstick will allow you to turn the scope on/off if it is available. The left trigger is used for throwing grenades, while the right trigger is for shooting your weapon. I really loved these controls and it was easy to become accustomed to them.
The graphics in Halo truly are superb. In between each level there is a cutscene, which looks great and realistic, in a sci-fi futuristic way. Master Chief is animated extremely well. The guns to be as real as any other FPS game, and you can easily distinguish the weapons. I did not experience any slowdown at all, even in the levels with dozen of explosions and enemies everywhere. Also, if you melee attack a dead Covenant, more blue or purple “blood” will gush out. The framerate does not even seem to fall during multi-player mode. All of the surroundings in the environment, such as rocks, hills, ice and trees are well placed and are very detailed. Halo looks great, and although I am not an expert in describing graphics, trust me, they are very nice.
The music is awesome and touching, from the beginning, when you are choosing your mode of play and hear chanting to all of the intense music to make the scenario during gunfights. The in-game sounds are wonderful. Each weapon has a distinctive sound when fired. I especially loved the sounds make by the vehicles, from the soft purr of the Warthog engine, to the sound make when you squash Grunts while driving the Scorpion. Master Chief has a deep, mysterious voice, while the other characters, such Captain Keyes and Cortana fit their appearances. The Captain looks like a beefy drill sergeant and sounds like one, too. The opponents are voiced well, and I loved the shrill cries made by the Grunts.
Overall, Halo is a revolutionary first person shooter and one of the best available for the Xbox. It was voted Game of the Year for a reason, and that is because it is a great and awesome game. I recommend this game to all, and I mean all, but I am sure that most Xbox owners already own Halo. This is the game that makes the Xbox special at the current time, as it is Xbox exclusive. Even after beating all of the missions, I had an urge to repeat most of them again, especially the level with the Scorpion. The multi-player mode will have you coming back for more if you invite some friends over, so Halo has a lot of replay value. I can’t wait for Halo 2!
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