What's so good about Halo?

Cianos

I've been playing through Halo, I think I'm about half way through. I really don't see what all the fuss is about with this game.

The levels are boring, no navigation required and very little difference between them...either metallic rooms and corridors or grassy openings with dull long distance battles.

The weapons can be annoying...the assault rifle is frustratingly inaccurate, and then the aliens weapons are not much better. The only good weapon is the one you get from the elites, that fires rapidly.

The enemies are also boring, they rarely pose a major threat and their AI is poor. You just have to mill through them with whatever weapon you have...every battle is very repetitive.

It's fun driving the warthog, but even then all you're really doing is saving time from walking, it's not like it adds much to the games progress.

There's no story either...just go here, do that, save the human race, yay.

There are some nice things to it, but overall I don't see much special about it at all. Maybe I'm missing out on something?!

Kinetic^

This way to the Halo forum!

Overheal

Judging by your post you either arent playing on the higher difficulty (Heroic, or better yet Legendary) and I wonder if you've made it to the swamp yet.

silvine

The highlights of the single player campaign is the missions involving vehicles or the missions outdoors eg Tsao Highway. The ending and the missions involving the flood are very anti-climatic. To be honest the single player campaign is good but hardly the best campaign out there. COD4's for example is far better.

The best thing about Halo is the multiplayer. There is a huge variety of game types to play with a challenging ranking system. Playing 16 player on Avalanche with everyone in Ghosts, Jeeps and prowlers is great fun while 6 player on Guardian can be tense and challenging. And Bungie constantly add new playlists, maps, and game variants meaning if you like the multiplayer you'll rarely get bored with it. Check out Bungie.net, they update it every week.

CiaranC

silvine wrote: »

The highlights of the single player campaign is the missions involving vehicles or the missions outdoors eg Tsao Highway. The ending and the missions involving the flood are very anti-climatic. To be honest the single player campaign is good but hardly the best campaign out there. COD4's for example is far better.

Halo was released in 2001, COD4 in 2008. Hardly fair to compare the two.

Halo was groundbreaking for its time in that it was a playable FPS on a console with decent multiplayer. PC FPS fans of the time were mystified about the hype, there were far better FPS titles availble a decade before on that platform.

It was well put together, had a decent enough storyline and looked well. Thats about it.

Retr0gamer

Cianos wrote: »

Maybe I'm missing out on something?!

No your aren't. The Halo franchise is one of the most overrated around and can be summed up with the word 'meh'. Halo 1 was great when it appeared on the Xbox. It was buy far the best representation of the FPS genre on a console but was totally outclassed by games on the PC. It also died on it's arse halfway through the main campaign. Halo 2 was totally obsolete when it came out. A single player campaign that took all of the bad things from the first game and expanded on them horribly despite a decent opening. The multiplayer was good, for a console, but again the PC was way ahead.

Halo 3 improved quite a bit on the second game but it was a matter of too little too late. It's totally outclassed by other FPS games like CoD4.

RoosterIllusion

The original was great because it was the first console FPS I ever played that was better than most pc fps's and it had great co-op play

Halo 2 was a load of sh!t, in my opinion. I hated that game.

I sat down with Halo 3 for about ten minutes when it came out and never played it since, basically a Halo 2 rehash.

The original Halo was great for the time and I really enjoyed it, as for the general hype surrounding the Halo franchise? I have no faith in Halo since they released Halo 2.

Stephen

I never got the big deal about Halo either, but as above I'm coming from a PC background with a steady supply of excellent shooters that just make Halo feel utterly 'meh'. I still my 360 though, but not for FPS.

Helix

the halo games are fun

thats their draw for me

krudler

I've played all 3 games through once and once only on single player, have no intention of playing them again, multiplayer is fantastic though

Genghiz Cohen

CiaranC wrote: »

Halo was released in 2001, COD4 in 2008. Hardly fair to compare the two.

System Shock
Half Life
BattleToads for gods sake.
Age does not define quality.

Halo was average however you slice it.

silvine

CiaranC wrote: »

Halo was released in 2001, COD4 in 2008. Hardly fair to compare the two.

Halo was groundbreaking for its time in that it was a playable FPS on a console with decent multiplayer. PC FPS fans of the time were mystified about the hype, there were far better FPS titles availble a decade before on that platform.

It was well put together, had a decent enough storyline and looked well. Thats about it.

I presumed the OP was refering to the latest Halo. The comparison still stands albeit Halo 1 vs COD1.

0ubliette

Retr0gamer wrote: »

No your aren't. The Halo franchise is one of the most overrated around and can be summed up with the word 'meh'. Halo 1 was great when it appeared on the Xbox. It was buy far the best representation of the FPS genre on a console but was totally outclassed by games on the PC. It also died on it's arse halfway through the main campaign. Halo 2 was totally obsolete when it came out. A single player campaign that took all of the bad things from the first game and expanded on them horribly despite a decent opening. The multiplayer was good, for a console, but again the PC was way ahead.

Halo 3 improved quite a bit on the second game but it was a matter of too little too late. It's totally outclassed by other FPS games like CoD4.

What straight FPS games (not deux ex or tribes, theyre not fps's) on PC in 2001 outclassed Halo? Cause for the life of me i cant think of many that had such large open ended sandbox style levels. The best stright up FPS i had on PC back then was RTCW, or Call of duty 1. both great games but not nearly as innovative as the original halo

humanji

0ubliette wrote: »

What straight FPS games (not deux ex or tribes, theyre not fps's) on PC in 2001 outclassed Halo? Cause for the life of me i cant think of many that had such large open ended sandbox style levels. The best stright up FPS i had on PC back then was RTCW, or Call of duty 1. both great games but not nearly as innovative as the original halo

Actually, I'd say Deus Ex is a perfect example of how the PC games were miles ahead of the console games at the time. The PC had moved on from straight shooters and diversified. And if you want sandbox play, Operation Flashpoint came out that year too.

Vegeta

Cianos wrote: »

The enemies are also boring, they rarely pose a major threat and their AI is poor.

Wow you must be playing it on easy or something. The AI is one of the only things in Halo that still impresses me. Its 7 years old and has better AI than most games I play today.

On a different note, Halo 3 multiplayer is enjoyable

Ri_Nollaig

I never saw what the big fuss was about halo either, got all three with in a week of their launch dates.
Got halo 3 as I thought I would be playing it for the year on xbox live, little did I knew cod4 was going to be 10 times better but it is great fun playing 4 v 4 serial link ...something you cant do with cod4


/edit: 4 on each console that is

L31mr0d

Halo 1 was the first game I played that balanced weapons with vehicles effectively. In fact I can't think of an FPS that preceded it that even had vehicles to the extent that Halo did. This feature was quickly copied and bettered in UT04 and now it is odd to see any FPS that doesn't at least have 1 or 2 vehicle stages.

I remember we got the demo in college and managed to install it on a load of PC's. We played Blood Gultch over and over for weeks.

At the time there was nothing else like it.

But, much like classic old movies like the Godfather, which have been hackneyed numerous times since, if you where to play it for the first time now it will feel like gameplay you have seen numerous times before. You have to understand that at the time of its release it was groundbreaking, which is why its been copied so much.

In saying that the sequals really haven't bettered the series and the innovation of the first has been lost in the quagmire of minor graphical updates and fanboy pandering.

Ross_Mahon

Play the game on the hardest difficulty while playing Co-op, The first Halo is much darker than the other two, A very enjoyable experience for the start of the Halo games.

It introduced unique Vehicles, Weapons and enemys, It was certainly a breath of fresh air for fans of FPS games, But you had to play it at the time it was released to understand.

Cunny-Funt

Retr0gamer wrote: »

No your aren't. The Halo franchise is one of the most overrated around and can be summed up with the word 'meh'. Halo 1 was great when it appeared on the Xbox. It was buy far the best representation of the FPS genre on a console but was totally outclassed by games on the PC. It also died on it's arse halfway through the main campaign. Halo 2 was totally obsolete when it came out. A single player campaign that took all of the bad things from the first game and expanded on them horribly despite a decent opening. The multiplayer was good, for a console, but again the PC was way ahead.

Halo 3 improved quite a bit on the second game but it was a matter of too little too late. It's totally outclassed by other FPS games like CoD4.

Totally agree. While for the console gamers it was fantastic cause there just simply wasnt really any other decent FPS on the xbox at the time. On the PC it was very very mediocre compared to what was out for the PC at the time.

That plus a lot of hype and xbox fan boys. Its overrated as ****.

PogMoThoin

Couldn't resist

Soby

Didnt see the big fuss either..Only played the third one.Felt like i was fighting cartoon characters.It looked amazing but i dunno.Just didnt suit me

Kristok

yea i also found halo games boring, first one wehn it came out was cool enough only because it was a decent fps on a console. Second one single player campaign bored me to death playing it. And just couldnt be bothered playing the third one after that.

NunianVonFuch

Kristok wrote: »

yea i also found halo games boring, first one wehn it came out was cool enough only because it was a decent fps on a console. Second one single player campaign bored me to death playing it. And just couldnt be bothered playing the third one after that.

Agreed. Although I played the first on pc and persevered with the 2nd and 3rd only through co-op with a mate. Storyline was awful, prophets all looked the same. Gameplay was decent except whenever the flood popped up. Which sadly is quite often.