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| Re: Halo - a look back over seven years | |
| Posted By: Rockslider | Date: 11/16/08 2:42 p.m. |
In Response To: Halo - a look back over seven years (Louis Wu) It may be seven years since Halo hit the streets, but it's only about six that I've been playing it, because it took about a year to persuade myself to part with my money and get an Xbox. Just as well too - it was about £100 cheaper by then! What eventually tipped the scale for me? That pretty much boils down to two reasons: DOA3 and Halo. And in that order, believe it or not! DOA3 had such impressive looking graphics; truly 'next generation' to me, especially when you bear in mind that the only games machine I'd had before that was a PS1, on which I'd mostly played Gran Turismo. I wasn't exactly a 'gamer' as such, and my only experience with shooters was in playing a few Tomb Raider demos on a Mac. My interest in Halo came from the buzz I'd heard about it, and from when I'd read of it ages ago, before it was even heading for the Xbox. I don't think it was even an FPS at that point, but there was talk about free-form exploration of the Halo world, and I liked the idea of landing on a big ring. That sounded like a good recipe for adventure to me. When I got my Xbox bundle I was mostly playing DOA3 initially. I kept getting motion sickness when I started Halo, and couldn't play more than ten minutes without feeling queasy! There really ought to be a message to novices saying that any motion sickness is likely to pass after a few sessions. I wonder how many people - maybe new to games entirely - have casually tried an FPS, started feeling queasy (especially if in a corridor-based environment), and consequently never picked up an FPS again, not realizing that the camera just needs a bit of getting used to. Also, it took me a couple of days and at least three sessions before I could find my way out of that first cryo area! I thought I was never going to get to fight an alien, and was getting pretty annoyed. In fact I distinctly remember thinking of taking the game back to the shop to swop it for something else. As a complete beginner, jumping over a pipe just never crossed my mind. I didn't know I could do that, and I wouldn't be surprised if some other FPS newbies had the same problem. In that regard I've always considered it a poor bit of design, especially as it's right at the start of the whole game, forming an obstacle to the fun beyond. Once I escaped and got to some actual fighting though, and got used to the camera so I no longer had motion sickness, it soon became Halo all the way for me. To begin with I recall having trouble on Easy though! Oh dear, that's almost embarrassing now. A massive part of what drew me into the campaign gameplay was the superbly animated Covenant. They moved about so believably and I also liked the comical aspects, notably the utterly hilarious Grunts, so brilliantly engineered. Another part was the fluency with which you can fight of course. The controls are just so good, and with the possible exception of the assault rifle which becomes badly underpowered once you're up to Heroic, the weaponry is great. I also liked that you could only carry two weapons at a time, adding a welcome sense of realism. Think how much Halo would've lost by allowing you to cart around a whole sackful of weapons at once. It would've lost a whole tactical dimension! More is not always better. If I'd known then how much Halo was going to end up meaning to me, I would've documented my early experiences just so I could remember them. As it is, I can't remember a lot. The big thing I do remember is something negative, namely the silly stunt drive right at the end, which seemed painfully out of place with the intelligent design up to that point. It seemed like the intelligence just went out the window, and now here was this wacky stunt course you were going to have to just learn by trial and error before having much chance of getting through. I remember switching the game off in disgust after a while, feeling terribly let down. So it wasn't all roses! Even when you do learn the course - at which point things become a lot more fun - there's still that massive jump you have to make at the end, which makes survival a mere lottery, something I hate. So the stunt course ending remains an uncomfortable blot on the copybook for me, but at least I learned to live with it. Anything else I can remember? Well, I rememer when I first brought down a Banshee with a pistol. I hadn't even bothered trying that beforehand, because it never crossed my mind that this feeble-looking thing would even make a dent. How wrong I was. Yep, once you've discovered the power of the pistol, there's no looking back. There was also my love affair with the needler of course. I forget exactly how we first met and it probably wasn't even love at first sight, but things went crashingly well thereafter and we've shared so much fun together. Work of art people! Oh, and I also remember AOTCR seeming to go on forever! Nowadays, that marathon aspect is part of what makes it by far my favourite level, and I'm sure I must've spent at least half my covie-saying career there. So anyway, time marched on and Halo became a reason for living. Spent waaaay too many hours saving humanity and whatnot, and I'm pretty sure the real world became something of a background blur for a while. I moved up to Heroic then Legendary, and then one day I entered the rockslide area in level 2, then drove straight back out just to be quirky. Returning later and coming to a halt beneath the Marine plateau, all hell broke loose as a mass of vicious covies swept forth and plastered my guts all over the scenery. Yes, I'd unknowingly waltzed into my first rockslide megabattle; and thus began a whole new chapter. I played and explored that megabatte for months and it was just fantastic, a massive step up from the intensity of normal campaign play. Yet I couldn't seem to find anything about it on tips pages or anything, so I figured I needed to spread the word. So I did a lot of writing and launched Bad Cyborg, thus beginning my participation in the Halo community. Including the HBO forum of course! Ah memories… Witness the almost embarassing youthful exuberance of my first post. That was just the start of much excessive verbiage of course, ha ha. Yeah suck it up Chavez, you know it's good for you. :) Some months later came what for me was sadly the crushing disappointment of Halo 2, which really shook my image of Bungie. Best not to dwell on that - it's too depressing. Things looked up when Halo 3 came along but the original game remains my real joy, which neither of the sequels even comes close to touching. I'm still trudging through AOTCR and loving it. And I haven't even got into any multiplayer yet! Ah well, maybe next decade - just as soon as I've got all these covies sorted out. Now, where did I put my snow-boots…
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