Halo 3

Written by Troy Matsumiya  on October 05, 2007

Review: Believe indeed.

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I would have been your daddy
As for multiplayer, no one in the industry can do it better than Bungie. While the gametypes are pretty much the same as every other shooter Ц deathmatch, team deathmatch, capture the flag, the Battlefield-inspired Territories, and so on Ц it's the vast array of user tweakable options that really make playing with your buddies the best time you'll ever have in a video game. Halo vets know that even a slight alteration of a default setting can create some wildly fun times; my personal favorite is randomizing all weapons and vehicles.



Halo 3 takes things even further with the new Forge map editor. Actually, the term Уmap editorФ is a bit misleading since you can't actually change the layout or geography of the maps. Instead, the Forge lets you change things like player respawn locations, vehicle, weapon and powerup spawns, and add things like crates and explosive barrels called fusion cores. It sounds pretty simplistic but once you start playing around with it you can see how deep your options really are. Simply changing the player spawn points on the map can make a surprising difference in how the game plays. Now imagine changing everything else and you'll quickly see how much you can actually customize the game.

While editing, you and your buddies can still run around and kill each other too. In editing mode, you turn into Guilty Spark and can fly around the map; you can't shoot in this mode but you can certainly die quite easily. However, you can exact revenge by dropping fusion cores and tanks on top of your buddies.

You can also do some crazy things just for the hell of it; for example, one of my Xbox Live buddies stuffed a ton of fusion cores underneath the massive Elephant sandcrawler and managed to blow it several hundred feet into the air.

There are limits to the number of items you can put on the map, however. Each item has a set quantity and has a УcostФ associated with it. Combined with a limited УbudgetФ you are prevented from going overboard and plastering every inch of the map with fusion cores and a gazillion tanks. Having said that, your budget is still quite generous and you shouldn't have to worry about not being able to do what you want.

Playing around with the 11 maps is fun, but of course the real fun is playingon the maps, whether with friends in private games or through Bungie's outstanding Matchmaking system which should be a standard feature in every multiplayer game.

Like the campaign, multiplayer is pure Halo with a few tweaks like the fun Уman cannonФ that can throw you halfway across the map. Vets will be pleased to know that the Plasma Sword is not as overpowered as before; you have to be much closer to get a kill (no more instant leaping death from ridiculous distances) and if you encounter another player with a sword and you swing at the same time, your blades will clash light saber style. Very cool.

One default gametype that has quickly become the most popular is Rocket Race Ц which by itself is probably worth the price of the game. It's a team game where each team consists of a driver and a VIP. You both hop onto a Mongoose and the driver has to deliver the VIP to a capture point on the map; first to ten captures wins. Oh, and everyone is armed with rocket launchers with unlimited ammo. Don't worry, though; everyone is invulnerable to weapons fire and can only be killed by whacking them on the back of the head with a melee attack. The rockets are instead used for blowing opponents off course, giving you an opportunity to reach the capture point first. On paper it doesn't sound too exciting but once you give it a try, you probably won't remember a funnier time you've had online. You'll get blown into the air numerous times, doing some wild and crazy spins, and enjoying every second of it. The only downside is that it's only playable on two maps; hopefully Bungie will provide some more Rocket Race-friendly maps in future downloadable content.

Overall, few games can capture the fun and thrills of Halo multiplayer. The only black mark against it is the unfortunate return of the hated Уpush-to-talkФ feature. To be perfectly blunt, this is the stupidest and most unacceptable feature that has no reason to exist in this or any other game. It is extremely frustrating to be relaying important information to your teammates only to discover too late that they didn't hear you because you forgot to push the D-pad to turn on global team chat. Team chat should be enabled from the start without the need to push a damn button; other games have this so why not Halo? It makes no sense and really sucks a lot of the fun out of the online experience.

ЕAnd the horse you rode in on
Perhaps the most talked about new feature is the Theater, which allows you to revisit your past exploits in an unprecedented fashion. Want to view that great triple kill in multiplayer? Or that dramatic moment in the campaign? Maybe some crazy Warthog stunt? Enter the Theater and you can view real-time movies of the Campaign (but only from the last check point) and up to 25 complete multiplayer matches.

While replaying, you can detach the camera and move around the map to view the battle from any angle, pause, fast forward, rewind and take screenshots or records short video clips. If you have Xbox Live Gold, you can upload your clips and screenshots to bungie.net and share them with friends. What better way to brag about your l33t skillz or embarrass your noobish friends? It's a very cool feature that has gaming forums buzzing with screenshots and really helps build the game's community. The videos and screenshots use a surprisingly small amount of disk space so you will never have to worry about running out of room. The only criticism is that the interface is a bit clunky and the menu setup isn't exactly intuitive, but otherwise it's an outstanding addition that really adds to the fun factor.