Techtite's PC Game Reviews!

"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..."

---from the review

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Halo

Click picture to order this game (PC/windows version)

A Techtite Review

Back when X-Box was first launched, few games caused as much of a stir as Halo. Sure, there were many good games for the system, and come on now: how cool is a game system with its own hard drive...? However, Halo in particular was interesting to PC gamers, because it was an X-Box exclusive, never before playable on PCs...until now.

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; many pre-orders for this game came free with the 300+ page novel to this game's prologue! If you missed this free novel with pre-order; here's the order link, though it's safe to say you know enough about the story by now, right...? Right.

So, you probably already know about the cyborg soldier Master Chief (you), who has had downloaded into his cyborg chips an A.I. construct named Cortana who holds within her the secret of Earth; a secret that you must protect from humanity's latest enemy, the Covenant, at all costs. Yada yada yada, your ship crashes on a strange space station shaped like a "Halo," whose ancient alien ruins hold a secret that threatens all sentient life in the universe. You're the only hope to keep this from happening, so...good luck!

The real thrills in the PC version are twofold. One, multiplayer is real multiplayer, unlike the pre-X-Box-live Halo, which offered only LAN and "split screen" multiplayer. This is internet multiplayer 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. Oh well; multiplayer Halo is good enough!

The second asset of the PC version is graphic power. While being able to connect your X-Box to the family room projection TV is pretty cool, it could never offer these Halo worlds in the high resolutions they deserve. However, as always: with high-power graphics comes the need for a high-power system. Even though one of my computers had a 256 MB video card with 512 MB of memory, it had 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