Lead to Halo on PC: Halo Reach Review

And now it's time for the most relevant game as of now, as it's due to release in the near future for PC, Halo Reach. Bungie's final game in the Halo series before they moved on to Destiny, is Halo Reach's attempt to return to the past a fitting swansong, or could it have used some improvement's?

Set 2 months before Halo 1, Halo Reach follows the Fall of Reach, the battle that leads to Halo 1. The focus here though is on a group of Spartans who try to stop it called Noble Team consisting of Carter, the gruff no nonsense leader; Kat, a mischievous tech specialist with a knack for getting a bit in over her head; Jun, a sniper unafraid to speak his mind; Emile, a explosives and CQB specialist who enjoys all the blood and killing; and Jorge, a Spartan from the older class that the Master Chief came from and a heavy weapons specialist with a fondness for people that the rest of Noble doesn't share. Of course, we don't play as them we play as, and say it with me now, a new recruit who doesn't speak much and has no real personality to speak of. Because they really liked that idea from ODST, which is fine, so long as Noble Team can hold together a story.

Which is a shame that Noble is a worse team than the cast of ODST. Don't get me wrong, they're not awful, but it feels like the cast of ODST has better chemistry and can hold up a plot with their banter, and Noble just.... can't. I know, the whole point is that the squad are hyper focused on the job, and there are character moments in the game but they're not as well developed as ODST's. The only one I really liked was Jorge, as he does have a lot more moments and bounces of well with the rest of the cast and his rivalry with Emile is pretty neat. But it's only for like 3 minutes and is basically the only moment where Noble gets any true development, once Jorge slips out of the plot it's basically all down hill from there. It honestly feels like the writing is sloppy all around, Carter and Jun are woefully underdeveloped, Emile and Kat have some moments but not enough, and the newbie, Six, just has nothing in terms of personality. I mean, I went over this in a previous article but Reach is weak on story even though it tries harder, and that's a bit sad.

Though to Reach's credit you can customize the main protagonist, which is probably why they're so bland, to project yourself on to the hero. In regards to that we're gonna need to dip into multiplayer for a bit, as each match rewards you with points to buy armor pieces, allowing you to mix and match the usual from 3 on top of wrists, certain chests giving you mechanical arms, leg pieces, and even Firefight voice clips. It's a much more expansive option list than 3 was, and especially ODST which was almost non-existent. But again, I think you could have given 6 the personality and the armor permutations, none of this middle of the road shit, it drags the story down.

While the story itself isn't all that great, the actual campaign itself is almost as well designed as 3. My only real problem with it is that some environments repeat a bit much, there's a lot of desert here and one map is even reused, though not nearly as bad as Halo 1's Two Betrayals level as it's not just a previous level fucking backwards and the ending of the level is different. But whether it's sniping your way though an enemy camp under the cover of night or flying through a destroyed city in a open world level, Reach to it's credit always does something new and varied. It's less epic than something like 3 mind you, but it's still pretty good.

That said, everything else on the other hand has received some overhauls. The art style is much more grainy, I assume in an attempt to be more like a war movie. It's still a good looking game and some of the scenery is fantastic, namely in New Alexandria. But everything is much more muted than in 3 or ODST, and I was always a fan of the more vibrant artstyle, it starts to feel a bit too much like Halo 2 at times. Cutscenes now have first person viewpoint at certain points, which was a thing in ODST but is a lot more prominent in Reach, usually book ending a cutscene. The games score is still fantastic, with Marty O'Donnell bowing out of the franchise with more traditionally orchestral pieces and some fantastic tracks like Tip of the Spear.

In terms of enemies there have been some changes as well. The style of elite armor has changed to make differences in rank show in the armor design as opposed to just coloration, though each class of Elite still has a striking color design so you can make them out. Also yeah, Elite's are back as enemies. Actually every species returns, Grunts see the same change as Elite's while Brutes and Drones resemble a cross of their Halo 2 and Halo 3 designs. Jackals have had the biggest change however, with a new sub-type introduced, the skirmisher, which look more feathery and focus more on agility than defense so have no shielding except for higher ranking unit's they're like drones if they couldn't fly.

Weapons across the board have been changed, alongside the artstyle change. The pistol is basically the Halo 1 pistol but with reduced damage and four less rounds in the mag. The Battle Rifle is now the Designated Marksman Rifle, which works better at longer range but has weapon bloom which means you have to pace your 15 shots per mag. The Shotgun, Spartan Laser, Rocket Launcher, Sniper Rifle and Assault Rifle have received redesigns to be more clunky and militaristic. And a new weapon has been added, the Grenade Launcher, which can do great crowd damage and EMP vehicles alongside having a hold feature to choose when to detonate.Mean while the Hornet has been replaced by the falcon, which works more like a flying warthog with two turrets. Also some of the UNSC vehicles have seen redesigns and the Warthog's chaingun can overheat.

The Covenant haven't really seen massive weapon redesigns like humanity did, but there are some changes made. The Carbine is now the Needle Rifle, which is part Needler and part Carbine; there's a new Plasma Grande Launcher; and the Plasma Rifle has seen a sister in the Plasma Repeater which can endlessly fire but slows down the more it heats up. There is a new vehicle in the Revenant, which is a cross of a Wraith and a Mongoose with a limited boost which has been applied to the Ghost and Banshee. Everything else is an aesthetic change otherwise and even then a minor one; it's clear where the redesign focus was, on the UNSC which works for Reach's new artstyle, allowing the Covenant to feel their most alien.

Overall these changes work well as does the next addition, the armor abilities. The replacement for equipment, these puppies allow you to do an additional extra feature which can be used for stealth, combat, or health. This is also how sprint is added to the series, as it is an equippable armor ability. You also get to choose classes now, but it's usually only used to change armor abilities and cannot be changed by the player except for custom games. Most of these armor abilities are fine except for one, one that ruins Halo Reach's multiplayer. Armor Lock, FUCKING ARMOR LOCK. THE DEPTHS OF HELL CANNOT HOLD BACK MY HATRED FOR ARMOR LOCK. This fucking ability allows you to ignore everything, let out an EMP, and ruins the game idea that everything should have balance as there's not balance to armor lock, snipers can be located, shotgunners get EMP punched and explosives get wasted and those are rare. Fuck armor lock, it's terrible and it makes small scale games unplayable.

On the multiplayer note, multiplayer has seen some new modes like Invasion, a Spartan vs Elites objective mode, and Headhunter, which is like oddball and Kill Confirmed; it's pretty neat. Forge has gotten bigger with the addition of Forge World though the downside is that a lot of matchmaking maps are are Forge Word maps, but that should be a testament for the capability to make new things in Forge World. Oh and a testament to the semi-laziness of the maps, as some are just pulled from the Campaign whole hog, which is new for the franchise. On another note, little pet peeve, but Elites are essentially gone from Matchmaking and their armor customization is limited to sets. Freaking weak as hell and a bad sign for later on.

Firefight is back though and it's different, more of an arcade mode than survival and allows you to customize and change it like a custom game, which makes sense given how less weak you are in Reach. You can have Brutes swarm you, you can be given Rocket launchers against ranger elites, or be stuck inside of Warthogs. You can even customize your loadouts, my favorite being DMR, Shotgun, and Drop Shield. And it certainly helps Reach's Firefight standout from ODST's Firefight, there can even be defined endpoints now. It certainly does for Firefight what 3 did for custom games, giving what some could consider the best Firefight in the series.

However, while Reach pushes the Halo series forward, there are some things holding it back. Though I will admit, these are more personal issues, namely the character interactions and armor lock drag things down for me. While the multiplayer maps being reused campaign levels, lessening of playable Elites, and the more muted colors do nag in the back of my mind as minor nuisances. All in all, a decent bow out for Bungie, but now the franchise shifts its dev team to 343 Industries, the new masters of Halo, and boy is this ride gonna get bumpy.