Reader Reviews

Halo 2 (Xbox)

by deathgibbon

Halo 2. The game that works up a frenzy every time a new piece of information or even a screenshot is released. Bungie have taken three years to deliver the sequel to one of the best Xbox games ever, but has lightning struck twice? Yes, and what a jolt of lightning it is...

Halo 2 starts off pretty much where First Strike left off. Master Chief (with his snazzy new Mark VII armour), is aboard the Cairo station with Sgt. Johnson, just outside Earth. After all the usual kerfuffle (just in case you haven't mastered the right analogue stick yet), the game gets underway in a big way. I'll let you find out how...

One of the touted new systems in Halo 2 is dual wielding. Hardly original, I hear you say, but in Halo 2 it's pulled off to perfection. It doesn't take long to get used to at all, and you'll wonder how you got along without it in Halo 1. It does have its problems though. Let's take this example: You're carrying two SMGs and your Battle Rifle is out of ammo. You're in a battle and you spy a Covenant Carbine from a felled Jackal. To pick it up, you have to drop your left SMG, switch to the Battle Rifle, hold X to switch it (Which sometimes doesn't work and you end up reloading your weapon), then switch back to your SMG and dual-wield the other one. Annoying. Another problem with, say, activating a lift, is that, even if you've only used one bullet, you'll end up reloading your weapon. I may just be doing something wrong, but I've never encountered anything like it in any other FPS.

The other new system is vehicle jacking. Great in multiplayer, not so good in single-player. There aren't any situations where you absolutely have to use it, it's just there. It is cool, and can occasionally help, but it's not an essential system unless your friend's just about to splat you in a Ghost.

The story in Halo 2 has been criticized for being rather poor overall. I don't quite agree. I think the ending is classic and leaves it all open for Halo 3 (or another book). This could backfire on Bungie tremendously though. After three years of waiting to find out if Master Chief will save Earth, the storyline is only advanced a small bit. Fans could then lose trust in Bungie and decide not to bother with Halo 3 if the same thing happens. There are a couple of major events near the end, but apart from that it's all filler. On the same note, Bungie's advertising has been misleading. After hyping it to be about Master Chief's desperate struggle to save Earth, only two levels are actually on it. After that, it's Covenant ships and certain other places. A disappointment. If Bungie hadn't advertised it the way they did, it would have been more accepted in the Xbox community.

Now onto the graphics. Halo 2 is possibly the best looking Xbox game yet. After looking at some Doom 3 Xbox shots, and then Halo 2's, Bungie have shown up id tremendously and have pointed out (perhaps unwittingly) that PC development is lazy. Bungie have really worked with the Xbox and have got every little bit out of it. Fantastic vistas, wonderful reflections and great water. Does it get any better than this?

The sound in Halo 2 is possibly the greatest soundtrack ever seen in a videogame. Marvellous orchestral scores pump up the atmosphere (say, when an enemy is about to attack), and in the case of the menu screen, give you goosebumps. There are odd tracks from some pop rock bands, but you don't really notice them in-game. It's just too engrossing. I would buy the soundtrack, but you have to buy it imported from America. Gah!

One of the major problems in Halo 1 was, erm, the levels. It was copy-and-paste design and got very boring, very quickly. Has the problem been solved in Halo 2? Partly. Most of the levels are engrossing and have completely different rooms and fields, but a few are disappointing and you just end up running past the enemies to finish the level and get onto the next one. There are 16 levels in the game, and considering only a couple are like that, I think Bungie have done a great job and really pushed the boat out when it comes to level design, at least on Xbox.

Some of you may be now expecting a multiplayer segment. Well, there isn't one. Why? I don't have Xbox Live. I have played multiplayer with some friends, but here's a quick summary of what I've experienced so far. I get bored of multiplayer in FPSs really quickly. Even in Halo 1, I could only last 10 minutes before I was putting the controller down in boredom. In Halo 2, however, no such thing has happened. When I was playing, I was completely engrossed in the game for two hours. The only FPS ever made that's held my attention in multiplayer. Truly great.