The Nerd Next Door

I love Halo , but recently I've been realizing that Halo has a serious weapon sandbox issue. It's not that the guns aren't fun to use, far from it, the problem is that Halo has for so long diluted it's weapon sandbox. It's resulted in cases where either one weapon dominates the sandbox or every weapon except power weapons have their role in the sandbox left unclear to the player.  Unlike other games like Call of Duty , this is a major issue for Halo as it relies more on it's weapon sandbox than COD's loadout system. Halo is a series defined by it's weapon sandbox, how one approaches a situation with the tools at hand or has to dip until they can find better tools. But in terms of those tools no Halo has done it better than Halo 1 , every other game has been a steady downward spiral. Halo 1 is the game with the least amount of overlap and therefore dilution in it's weapon choice. You had your bullet weapons for tearing through flesh and plasma weapo...

With Jak II complete, it's time to head back to Halo 2 . Now I have a long history with this game, one of the people who worked for my Mom got the Limited Collectors Edition for me as a Secret Santa gift when I was 8 in 2004 and my Mom "acquiesced" to me playing it (turns out she bought the game and had them give it to me).  Halo 2 quickly became my go to game and I fell in love with shooter's as a result, putting me one a path that leads to, well writing in general. All this to say that, with 15 years experience, I could have easily reviewed this off memory alone, but I decided to give it a normal mode play-through and give it a fair judgement. How did that fare? Let's find out. Set 1 month after blowing up Halo during, well, Halo , and arriving back in human space (and having a totally bitchin adventure in the process). The Master Chief is attending an award ceremony on a orbital defense platform when the Covenant decide to invade Earth. This begins a ...