Having grown up the stereotypical geek I have a tendency to hate popular things for no other reason than those damned cool kids like it. My love of Halo: Combat Evolved was always torn between admiration for a well designed campaign and the hatred of beanie wearing frat boys that found the multiplayer to be “off the hook”. My hatred for Blood Gulch runs like a thick syrup of contempt slowly smothering a heap of innocent fluffy pancakes.

I was hesitant about Halo: Reach, yet the promises of “doing things right this time” kept nagging at the back of my mind. I succumbed to Bungie’s Siren song, and it is perhaps that same tune that has me so in love with this game. Is it truly the penultimate Halo experience on the 360? Or am I just so starved for something even slightly resembling the first game that I’ll latch onto the next best thing?

As always, the truth is very simple. For old fans such as myself there is no replacing Combat Evolved. The only way to live up to it would be a rerelease with online co-op and multiplayer functionality (hey, Microsoft? Guess whose 10th year anniversary is next year?). For regular fans of the franchise it may prove to be the best campaign yet. For those that have never been sold on the series, it is just another Halo game.

What truly matters is that the package is certainly one complete game with the potential to entertain all audiences for hours. The original Halo was a perfect combination of well-designed shooter gameplay that carried the player through corridors, open fields and into heavy terrain vehicles. It was well balanced and offered many opportunities, including something I found very essential to the atmosphere. Overwhelming odds, where the player had to overcome more powerful enemies than himself. Having to face off against an enemy tank is easy enough when you have a vehicle, but it’s quite a different story when you have nothing but the guns on your back. If you’re lucky one of them is a rocket launcher, but don’t always count on it.

This element of design became lost in Halo 3, where every conflict with a vehicle was matched with a vehicle of your own. In fact, everything became balanced. Whereas Halo 2 was restricted to way too many corridors, Halo 3 limited itself to even odds. Foes had few opportunities to flank the player and all fights with Covenant on foot took place in corridor style environments. The only open sections of terrain were traveled in Warthogs and Tanks.

Reach returns to the strengths of the first game. Open environments even within corridors. Any route you may take to flank the enemy is likely already flooded by foes looking to surround you. Combat is intense because enemy fire can come from any direction, and you aren’t always equipped with an even weapon to handle the situation.

Which brings us to the other strength of Combat Evolved. Resourcefulness was a key element to completing the game on harder difficulties. If you relied on the base weapons of assault rifle and pistol you were bound to run out of ammunition fast and have a hard time of it. The secondary weapons such as the plasma pistol and needler proved incredibly valuable, and limiting the player to two weapons either made them careful in deciding what weapons to wield or always keeping an eye out for dropped guns from dead foes. Nothing was worthless.

This same resourcefulness is not only present, but encouraged through a lack of ammunition in Reach. Ammunition is kept plentiful enough, but as with Combat Evolved relying on any one type of gun will result in the swift loss of ammunition. The game thus encourages players to be resourceful, and while not all weapons can be equally useful most of them are.

Of course there are some new changes that interfere a bit with the old style of combat. Elites have stronger shields based on their rank, and sometimes a single plasma grenade is not enough to take them out as before. This is quite the surprise, certainly, but while it can be frustrating in a similar fashion as the Brutes of Halo 3, it is not so bad since they can still be wiped out by a charged plasma pistol or an explosive combine from the needler.

In truth the game’s greatest weaknesses would have to be in the friendly A.I. and the story. Not so much the typical marine A.I., but that of your fellow Spartans. They do not seem to know how to flank and instead stick close to the player like glue, which becomes troublesome when you need time to, say, line up a perfect head shot. One would count on fellow Spartans being a bit smarter than your typical marine, but sometimes it instead feels as if they are more stupid. It is no wonder they all get wiped out.

Which brings to the story. Now, Bungie had a tough project ahead of them. Not everyone can turn a tragedy into a well written experience. Just the knowledge that everything will end badly pulls you out of it. The fact that the game had very little time to establish the characters in any way hurts it further, as all you see is one cliché going down in a rather cliché manner. There were certainly attempts to make a number of the characters seem deep, and in fact the one character that goes out precisely like Bruce Willis in Armageddon builds depth outside of cut-scenes more than he does within (that is, if you’re willing to pay attention, as in Combat Evolved and its narrative). Yet it just isn’t enough.

As for the big surprise of the story, that itself is enough to cause conflict with anyone familiar with the canon. I’m not even talking about people that read the God awful Fall of Reach novel and are crying foul. I mean just consistency with the opening few minutes of the very first game.

Yet in the end, the story is not the reason to play the game, and Bungie can at least be credited for trying something other studios haven’t (Hell, Irrational Games had a perfect opportunity for the “good” ending of Bioshock and they went and fucked it up).

The combat is the real reason to jump into Halo: Reach, and for more than just the campaign. The multiplayer itself is so incredibly robust it is hard to not find something for everyone. Believe me, I am no fan of competitive multiplayer, and after a few matched battles anyone that is a casual player will find themselves being outclassed by those who eat, sleep and breath Halo.

The Firefight mode is incredible, however. The base concept is still the same as ODST, where you choose a map and waves of foes spawn endlessly. However, there are now a variety of game types to choose from, including a score attack for more solo players and generator defense for slightly more competitive ones.

Most valuable of all, however, is the new use of mutators. A forgotten relic of Unreal Tournament long ago, Bungie has taken the concept of skulls and create a much more in-depth system that allows players to transform their gaming experience down to the smallest detail. Even if it means cheating and granting all players invulnerability to nail those Firefight score achievements, the player can now modify the game however they want. Even the foes that spawn are now of their choosing!

On a more cosmetic basis, Bungie has also taken all the armor unlocks and customization previously restricted to competitive multiplayer and opened it up to all game types. It is no longer restricted to versus play or ranked matches. Playing single player campaign, firefight or private matches will all net you points that go towards your rank and character customization options.

Halo: Reach is not going to be a game for everyone, at least not worth $60, but they certainly did a damn fine job trying to make sure it was. It’s hard to imagine any one developer could create such a varied and complex multiplayer system and still have a fully realized and well done campaign. As that stereotypical geek it pains me to say this about a mainstream title, but Reach really does set a new standard. It is a fully realized game with so many strengths its hard to see the flaws. It’s like looking at the statue of liberty from so far away. Sure if you walk up close you can see scratches in the paint and pidgeon droppings, but to peer that closely you miss the whole picture.

Halo: Reach may very well be the best damned Halo game made. If you aren’t a fan of the franchise, this means nothing. If you are, then there is only one option. Buy this game. You won’t regret it.

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