Halo: Combat Evolved

"Incredible"

There aren't many games like Halo. Sure, it can be classified as a Sci-Fi game in the First Person Shooter genre. But Halo is something more, something so very special that it really can't be put in a class, something so special, it's in a class all of its own. Halo is a game that makes you become the character, a game where you are no longer playing a game, a game that so convincingly portrays its world, grabbing your senses to the point that you're in the game. Yes, it's one of those games. Halo possesses the very elements that just about all of my favorite games possess, Halo is a game I put in the ranks of a Shenmue, or a Zelda: Ocarina of Time, a Jet Grind Radio, a game that is just so incredibly atmospheric, so fresh and new and beautiful in execution, one of those games that you just can't stop playing. Halo owns you.

Let me explain just why I hold this game in the regard I do. Let's forget about the game play, let's forget about the sound, the graphics. What now are you left with, what element do you have when you take away all of a game's technical merits? I'll tell you what you have; you have atmosphere! Sure, any game now days with a competent group of programmers behind it can look great or sound great, but atmosphere is what you feel in a game. Atmosphere is what you get when a game combines the visuals, the sounds, everything in the game so perfectly. The feeling that you are actually in the game's world, the illusion that you really are in a corridor, working with a team, overcoming the odds, and loving every minute of it. Now days so many games are so heartless, either a big company wants to cash in on a popular license, or a small company can only hire no-talent programmers, -whatever the case- it just seems like recently the heart in games has been lost, only manifesting in those special games for those of us that look good and hard. Let me tell you, this game isn't just special, it's something more.

Halo's story tells a familiar tale of intergalactic warfare, though it is told so brilliantly and sucks you into it like nothing else, so despite having heard dozens of sci-fi space-war stories, Halo's still feels very special and has plenty of subtlety all its own.

Anyway, the story goes something like this: The time is far into the future, year 2552. Earth is still around, but it became largely over-populated and soon humans were forced to depart from Earth and colonize many other planets. A keystone in Humanity's ability to live on and continue to colonize lies in a planet called Reach, a Navel planet where civilian colony ships and military warships are constructed and housed. Reach is also Humanity's flagship arm in technology and sciences.

32 years earlier, contact with an outer colony called Harvest was lost. When a battle group was sent to investigate, they were largely demolished, with only one very damaged ship coming back to report of an incredibly powerful alien race. This was humankind's first encounter with the Covenant, a coalition between several alien races with the objective of obliterating all humans (because of religious beliefs no less. Yes, aliens with religious beliefs :P). The Covenant eventually destroyed many human war ships and was getting close to discovering Reach, so humankind had to devise a soldier that could compete with the Covenant, these super soldiers would come to be called Spartan IIs. Unfortunately, Reach wasn't able to mass produce these soldiers before the Covenant found Reach and obliterated the entire colony.

The Covenant was on Earth's doorstep, and only one ship was able to make it out alive -your ship- the Pillar of Autumn. The ship immediately jumped into hyper space to try to lead the Covenant away from Earth...

The game finds you playing as a character named Master Chief, one of the last Spartan IIs, and a bad ass that the Covenant will soon grow to hate. You're given the mission of getting off the ship -which is now under attack- and getting onto the closest planet, which is a ring planet (similar to the rings of Saturn, only solid) called Halo.

Once on Halo, you'll soon find out just why I love this game so much. The game's environments and atmosphere are just so incredible, making you believe you're on another planet. These aren't just graphics anymore, these are bushes and plains, these are mountains, beaches, are swamps and marshes.

One of the main things that really adds to the believability factor is how the game is always moving. It keeps the scripted events always a step ahead, so you never see a soldier standing there waiting for you to move past a certain line, or an enemy that stares blindly at you until you enter a circle of vision. The characters are constantly moving, ships constantly landing and taking off, enemies flanking, dodging, hiding, diving, driving, flying, it feels like there's a large scale war going on all around you. And don't think your fellow soldiers aren't just as smart as the enemies, no, the AI is incredible for both sides of the game. I've never seen a computer controlled ally so genuinely want to help you succeed. The AI is just so good that you really get a feeling for the enemies and allies like no other game I've ever played.

All of the characters are full of personality too, you'll even grow to love the enemies with their hilarious speech and gestures. For instance, if you take down a large alien when there are small ones watching, they'll all run (or waddle, rather) for the hills screaming 'we're all gonna die!' or 'here he comes!' in their hilarious high-pitched voice. Another favorite is when they take you down, you'll actually hear them laugh at you! And if one of the small ones (the funnier of the group) takes you down, he'll even run over to you shouting 'I get his gun!'. Don't count out your allies either, they're also full of personality, shouting plenty of witty remarks and one liners as they fry the bad guys. The team is also extremely organized, more so than I've ever seen in a game, which is further testament to the incredible AI in the game. Not only will you see your team mates working together while they fight, but they will actually shout out commands to each other as they do it! If a soldier shouts out 'flank left!' the team actually flanks left!

Now Halo isn't all about team warfare, in fact a majority of the time you're by yourself. The game never feels like you're doing anything mindlessly though, there's always a reason you're doing everything, you're never finding yourself running through corridor after corridor wondering 'what the hell am I doing?!'. Well actually, there is one level where you're not mindlessly going down corridors, but there's just too many of them. I won't go into it too much because it would spoil a lot, but don't worry, it doesn't take much from the game.

Now if you've played Half-Life you'll probably be familiar with how the levels work. The levels are actually loaded as you're playing. For example, if you've just went through a large area, you may find yourself going down a small hallway and the game will slow down for about a half second to load the next area on the fly. This was kind of out of place in Half-Life, but for the gigantic environments in Halo it's warranted (and hey, it never stops game play :P).

That brings me to my next point. It just amazes me how gigantic the environments in the game are. And it's not just because of sheer size, it's that even though they're so large, there's no inconsistency in the beauty of the game. All of the textures are simply gorgeous, and amplified even more by the excellent bump mapping. For example, if you're running in a snowy level and look at a frozen over lake, you can actually see all the texture of the bumps, everything shimmers and reflects incredibly. The same can be said for just about everything in the game. Alien war ships never looked so real!

Besides just the beauty of the levels and environments, besides that, is just how practical everything is. Nothing ever feels out of place, despite a setting with aliens and cyber soldiers and everything. Everything just feels so right in Halo, it gives such a great allusion of the world it's portraying, it's hard to put into words, but I'm sure you'll know it too.

Now let's get into the meat of the gameplay. All of this atmosphere doesn't mean anything if the core game play isn't there. Fortunately, it is, in spades even. Now don't think I'm a raving fan boy with no experience in this genre save for good ol' Golden Eye. No, first person shooters are actually one of my favorite genres. I've played just about every significant FPS since the advent of the genre so I think I can tell if one plays well or not. And boy does Halo play well.

I've never played an FPS that really made you think resourcefully like Halo. This is because Halo only lets you carry two weapons at a time (finally putting the 'how can he carry all those weapons?!' cliche to rest), so you really have to balance your weapons and decide what you think would be better suited for which situation.

This wouldn't mean anything if the weapons weren't balanced, but as if you didn't expect, they are. The weapons are a really great mix between alien and human weapons, all with many different advantages and disadvantages. For example, the assault rifle, while great against the smaller Covenant that don't carry shields, is very weak against shielded enemies. To the contrary, alien weapons are great against shielded enemies. Balancing the weapons between their different advantages just adds another element of strategy to things, and definitely makes you think twice about throwing that plasma rifle down.

Another element adding to the resourceful mind set Halo puts you in is that there is finally a dedicated melee attack for each weapon. Finally a game where you're not given your basic 'kick' or 'punch' melee attacks, but have to rely on your weapons. The melee attack is extremely useful, no more just relying on it when you run out of ammo, no, the melee attack is good for all close combat situations. Even better than most weapons at close range. There is also an element of stealth given to the melee attack because most Covenant soldiers like to doze off, so it's often that you'll find almost entire bunkers of Covenant sleeping. With the melee attack being silent, you can sneak up on them all and take them out in their sleep instead of risking it with gun fire, and save ammo in the process. You're also able to use the melee attack at all times, which is much more helpful than having to cycle through your weapons to get to it.

Grenades in Halo also take a much larger role than most FPSs. Since the enemy AI is so good, you really want to take out as many Covenant as possible as quick as possible. One of the best ways to do this (besides the rocket launcher of course :) ) is by throwing a grenade at a group. They'll all scatter of course, but if you throw a grenade straight at one of the group it will stick onto him and more often than not he'll run to the rest of the group to take out even more of em.

Another extremely cool and innovative addition to Halo is the incorporation of the vehicles. The physics and control of the vehicles are just brilliant. At first they will seem quite disorienting, but after you get the hang of it you really gain an appreciation of the controls and realize just how well they're implemented. The physics of the vehicles -namely the Warthog, the pick up truck-esq vehicle with a mounted chain gun in the back- have to be the best I've ever seen in a game. The wheels and body react so realistically and independently to everything that passes under them. When you go up or down a hill, you can see your wheels bouncing appropriately. Your team works with you in the vehicles as well (well not the Covenant vehicles), jumping in the passenger seat and gunner seat of the Warthog, and hitching on the sides of the Scorpion (a huge, powerful tank).

For even more of a kick to the senses, the music in Halo is just perfect. The sound is comprised of some of the coolest, most heart-pounding, chilling, epic pieces I've ever heard in a video game. This stuff just goes so well with the rest of the game, it's not just fitting atmospherically, it really makes you want to kick some Covenant ass! The sound effects are also superb, the guns and vehicles sound excellent and the voice work is brilliant. Even your footsteps sound great, with a different sound for each terrain type you walk on. The sound even affects the game play quite often, you may find yourself in a large quiet complex but not see any enemies, so you'll have to listen for their foot steps to find your way.

Now if you happen to have a couple friends lying around, you're in for some of the funnest experiences in your gaming career! The main multi-player mode in Halo is undoubtedly the CO-OP mode, which lets you play through the single player campaign with a buddy by your side. As subtle as it sounds, CO-OP is so incredibly fun. Not only do you have someone else to help you during tough missions, but it's the team work factor that's the real draw here. Sure, you'll be flanking enemies together on foot, dividing and conquering your foes, that's fun enough, but how about double-teaming with a Warthog? One can drive while the other takes the gun. Now that is what I call team work. That's not all though, no, the guys at Bungie have you covered on traditional multi-player as well. There are just so many different variations you can use to play. The variation that sets Halo apart though, is the ability to include vehicles in multi-player. Now how many FPS games have you played that let you do that?

All said, Halo is just a masterpiece of a game, definitely one of the best I've ever had the pleasure to play. I'd recommend it to any gamer that wants an enthralling experience on their shiny new Xbox (not like any other publications haven't said so already :P). And before asking, yes, this game is well worth the system's price of admission. Yes, this is just one of those games.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 01/04/02, Updated 01/04/02