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HALO 3: ODST Posted by Jon Wills on Sep 23, 2009 15:11 (179 days ago) |
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If I was to say Halo 3: ODST was like The Beatles Rock Band, you would probably laugh your head off, but let me explain. To enjoy The Beatles you need to be a Beatles fan. Likewise, if you didn’t like Halo, especially Halo 3, you will more-than-likely not enjoy this game. And herein lays our first problem, the games novelty value has now certainly worn off.
Not to rein on the Halo parade but the problems with ODST are pretty much evident from the start. The graphics are the first ‘flaw’. The engine is blatantly the same as Halo 3, which compared to Halo 2 on the old Xbox, weren’t really that much different to begin with. Then the developers try and cover this up with a new VISR look in which like Assassins Creed, you see the game as red for enemies and green for allies. This basically blocks the rest of the environment out making the game look impressive but just hides the lackluster exterior and when you take VISR outside, it’s so bright; you can’t actually see a single event, especially during the broad daylight.
 Secondly, the loading screens are also an issue. The initial loading screen can take in excess of one minute, with further cutscenes lasting up to 30 seconds. It is the longest screens Halo has ever had and they believe it’s due to the following reasons, the new open world environment.
While this can be pretty cool, you soon realise the levels are still as corridor as before. You press up or down on the d-pad, it will show you the way to the only open door. Plus enemies seem to have been precoded to come out of certain areas which highlight the way. For all the normally inaccessible areas, it appears to be cut and paste environments. Nice idea, but not well implemented.
There are two major new weapons in the game, but one appears to be massively underpowered, meaning it will take three shots to kill the flood and an extensive close-combat bashing on big enemies, while the other is the old Halo 1 overpowered pistol. Both have scarce ammo and along with the new health system in the game which no longer regenerates but depletes until you get a new health pack, quite frankly disappoint. The health system does add a new level of challenge but it would be better if they put health packs in a more visible location.
As for the missions there are 6 split into 3 sections in the game totaling around 7 hours. It is quite a gripping a story, with some relatively new environments but when you start getting the old weapons back, along with distinct environments and enemies, you suddenly feel this is more of an expansion pack rather than a full priced title. The tutorial itself is also very absent, the only thing it does is highlight a couple of new features.
Firefight is the new awesome GOW2 ‘Horde’ mode, playable by one or up to four players via Xbox Live. As with GOW2, it gives you wave after wave of countless enemies and unlimited ammo. It certainly adds some spice to the somewhat dry career mode the game built for itself. It also gives offline players a chance to play some of the maps they missed out on.
 For those who love Halo 3, ODST has been kitted out with all of the multiplayer maps from the original game thanks to the included second disc, this allows players to play all of the expansion maps as well as the originals which is nice if you never owned the previous game. As you would expect all of the usual co-op modes are also included in ODST, so you won’t be short of multiplayer games to play on your new (or not so new maps).
In all honesty, the game could have been better. The fans hoped for many things to go ahead, but came out with nothing. A few new features don’t really constitute a game and from this title it seems that the Halo series may have had its day.
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Nov 10, 2009 18:40:23 (131 days ago)
