Techtite's Macintosh Game Reviews!

"The jewel in X-Box's crown upon launch is now for the Mac, with the same multiplayer/ single- player coolness."

---from the review

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Halo

Click picture to order this game (Macintosh version)

A Techtite Review

Games for the Macintosh are sadly very long in "porting" from the systems they originated from. However; at least the majority of them are consistently only a year away, like this year's Game of the Year from last year, Knights of the Old Republic. However, how well does Halo do on the Mac; a game that was first played, in its original version, way back in 2001, on the X-Box? The answer could surprise you.

I won't get into the story, for two reasons. One, anyone who's played the original game (or read my review) has learned all they need to know about the story. Second; if you really wanted to know the story, you probably already read it in print via the novel, which encompasses the whole pre-story to the game. If that novel can't be borrowed from a friend who got it for free when pre-ordering the PC or X-Box counterpart; here's the order link. That said, let's move on to the game.

Here's all the back story you need to know to jump right into the game. Master Chief (you), is Earth's prototype super cyborg soldier, to defend Earth from an alien horde known as The Covenant. They only know of Earth's colonies, though, not humanity's home planet, and it is up to you to keep it that way. Your commanding officer has downloaded into your cyborg chips an A.I. construct named Cortana, who holds within her all of the most important mission codes and parameters of your fleet...including the location of Earth. That's a secret that you must protect from humanity's latest enemy, the Covenant, at all costs. 

Yada yada yada, your ship makes an impromptu hyper-jump in space, and crashes on a strange alien space station. Said space contruct, "Halo," houses ancient alien ruins that hold a secret that threatens all sentient life in the universe. Of course, you must prevent this, but the idiot horde of the Covenant is right on your tail. This isn't even getting into the space station's own robotic defenses.

The real thrills in the Mac version are twofold. One, multiplayer is real multiplayer, unlike the original Halo, which was offered in a pre-internet-compatible age of the X-Box system (i.e., pre-X-Box-Live). That version, as a result, offered only local networked, or worse, "split screen" multiplayer. This Mac version's multiplayer is internet gaming in the best possible way, and they've even added more maps! The downside is; the same cannot be said for the single-player game, which if memory serves is exactly as I remember it. However, the good news is that this means you can get the official strategy manual for the X-Box version of the single-player game, and use it for the Mac version as well.

The second asset of the Mac version is graphic firepower, especially on a modern day iMac. While being able to play the X-Box version on a projection TV is pretty cool, it can never offer these magnificently rendered Halo worlds in the high resolutions they deserve. However, as always: with high-power graphics comes the need for a high-power system. Even on a system with 256 MB video RAM and 512 MB of standard memory, there is serious frame rate drops compared to a 128MB video card system, with a whole 1 Gig of memory. Go figure. A patch may be out by the time you read this which corrects the frame drops I mention, and indeed, there are no frame drops worth noticing, if you properly adjust the graphics to limits best suited for your system. However; you want to see Halo in the best possible graphics, right? Well, let's hope a patch is out soon...

The game interface is as intuitive as it could be. Just in case though --brilliantly interwoven into the storyline-- is a tutorial masquerading as a pre-battle system check to see if each function of your suit still operates properly after cryogenic sleep. During this systems check, you see how well the translation is, from a gamepad-savvy X-Box to a (as a rule) keyboard-and-mouse PC. It takes some getting used to for people used to the gamepad controls of the X-Box, though they are intuitive enough, and frankly, not much different from any typical First Person Shooter on a PC. You'll be playing in no time. Best of all is how the mouse is and always will be a better aim mechanism than the standard analog gamepad or joystick. So there, X-Boxers!

Wisely, the best parts of the original game are unchanged. For one, Cortana is plugged into your cyborg parts, so her AI voice is "in your head" for (nearly) the entire game, telling you where to go next in case the ongoing story doesn't make it more clear. As for weaponry; if your guns run out of ammo, simply exchange it for an alien weapon lying about, which often have even snazzier FX to enjoy when fired; coooool! Best of all, the game rewards thinking as well as quick shooting, by allowing you to sneak up on enemies and use your "melee attack" to defeat them with one hit. This isn't easy, though it's nice to see thinking rewarded in a shooter game. That's one more plus of many in this game, in both versions.

Some have said the game maps are repetitive. Correction: there is backtracking, in one "chapter." Yes this means they are using the same levels all over again, and yet spoilers notwithstanding; it's a whole different ball game at this point, so it's not like it's the exact same environment per se. Besides: it's not like you'll be so bored fighting a whole new array of enemies that you'll take time to notice if the pretty little bushes have changed their colors or not. Trust me on that one.

Oh, and then there are the vehicles! Some of your marines were able to escape in fully loaded drop ships, complete with jeeps and even a tank. Once again, there's also the option (very frequently; I liked that!) to use alien vehicles they've left lying around, including some really cool flying and hover crafts. If you accidentally overturn the vehicles, don't worry; a still-operable vehicle can be turned right side up again with a simple click of your action button, ready for re-use. What's even more fun; driving near fellow marines makes them hop on board a tank or jeep, shooting at nearby aliens as you drive. Get off the jeep to explore nearby ruins, and your marine passengers follow you to help; get on the jeep again, and they hop back on. Talk about cooperative soldier AI.

Now, X-Boxers did have one trait that was sorely lacking in the PC version. Specifically, they had the option to have a friend play alongside them in single-player mode, to play the game as a duo of "Master Chiefs." This made the game far more interesting in the single-player missions, though it wasn't really a multiplayer option per se. So you can see why in the PC version, this isn't offered, because there's rarely two people playing on one PC, like they would on an X-Box. Bummer.

One more gripe is a gripe held over from the original game. Here's the deal: you're the premiere game offered for a brand new game system with a hard drive, so what do you do...? You offer game saves only at key "checkpoints," that's what! This was silly then, and it's even sillier now, on a PC version where nearly every self-respecting PC has at least a 60 Gigabyte hard drive. This game (particularly in tougher action modes) just begs for a "quicksave" button, but there isn't one. If you have to go eat lunch, powder a nose or just simply go to bed, you'd better hope you're near a checkpoint or else everything you've done in the past, say, 5 or 15 minutes will have to be repeated. However, most checkpoints are actually quite numerous per level, so...whatever.

There's was never anything major worth griping about Halo on the X-Box, in my opinion, so this being an almost 99.9% exact translation, there's little to gripe about here, either. Yes, you've probably already heard about the ending being a bit less-than-hoped-for, though when you think about it it's typical of most sci-fi action films of this type (I won't mention them or else you'll know the ending PDQ). BTW: Halo 2 is about to come out for X-Box in mere months, so this ending is obviously just the end of "part one," as it were. This isn't even getting into the best reason to get Halo on the PC at all, and it's a doozy. Time to put your suit back on, Master Chief. The coolness of real multiplayer gaming demands it.

---Techtite