Halo 2

There’s a famous GDC talk by gaming pioneer Warren Spector on the making of Deus Ex about rebuilding the game after completing it. They finished everything they needed to but realized the game simply wasn’t fun. With player feedback, better knowledge of their systems and a solid understanding of the full narrative, they rebuilt everything. The end result was a coherent game story from beginning to end.

I have never played a game that needed this kind of editing more than Halo 2. The game was incredibly rushed, with Bungee spending over half of its development in crunch time. The team was trying to do so many things at once that they never considered how all the pieces would fit together. This scattered approach results in empty spectacles, incoherent themes and a lot of wasted potential.

It’s difficult to discuss how the game doesn’t fit together without talking about all the individual pieces and their place in the bigger picture. Halo 2 opens with a story of duality, how two warriors in similar places take radically different paths in life, how one’s success necessitates the other’s failure, how the UNSC’s military meritocracy is stronger than the covenant’s uneasy theocratic alliance. The game ends with two completely different characters locked on ship while the real protagonists have no closure. The conjoining pieces are split between Chief’s bombastic sections (attempting to recreate the gung-ho militarism of Halo 1’s first half) and The Arbiter, a powerful but disgraced elite born into a new life of servitude. Chief’s sections are enjoyable but irrelevant to the other characters. He’s a demon to the covenant. He’s too distant from the rest of the characters to feel welcome in the covenant story. The Arbiter is at the center of the entire conflict, but he doesn’t get anything approaching thematic closure. The game robs him of his agency halfway through and abruptly ends without concluding his story. This game never has Chief and the Arbiter confront each other or fight side by side as brothers. The themes established in the opening stay in the opening while missions waffle from place to place.

With some more time I imagine Bungee could have cut the fluff that doesn’t work and actually utilized their two-protagonist system for the better. As it stands the end result is messy, incoherent and lacks direction.

My review of Halo 2 is for the campaign only of the Master Chief Collection version on Steam, played with a PS4 controller. I had some prior experience of Halo 2 from over a decade ago but had almost no recollection of its content.

When I reviewed Halo: Combat Evolved, my review was rightly criticised. It lacked structure – I embarked with a criticism of the assault rifle in that game which would only have been proportionate to the strength of my feeling about it in the context of the game's guns as a whole if the review was of a similar length to a published thesis. People objected to my lack of coverage of other guns in the game.

Suffice it to say I wouldn't repeat that mistake; regardless, Halo 2 does not give me an opportunity to. It introduces a number of new weapons, essentially all of which meet the gold standard for video game weapons. The battle rifle and covenant carbine's ubiquity ensure that at most points in the game, the player has access to a general-purpose weapon which rewards accuracy by registering headshots. The beam rifle doesn't have quite as satisfying a sound as the human sniper rifle, but again, the regularity with which one finds it rewards a playstyle of slowly picking off enemies from afar.

The SMG is perhaps the most direct equivalent to the CE assault rifle, but substantial recoil and faster fire rate causes it to benefit more from a burst-fire approach, rather than simply spraying it all over the place. The ability to dual-wield plasma weapons is a welcome introduction (although, given the primary use case of the plasma pistol being charged shots dropping shields, I didn't find much of a use case for dual-wielding it – perhaps someone will enlighten me). The energy sword is iconic and is responsible for some of the most thrilling moments of Halo 2, whether that's using it yourself (the rapid covering of distance between yourself and a target when within range provides a visual thrill), or by the immediate danger presented by an enemy closing in on you with one.

Regarding the campaign itself, I have little but praise for it. The pacing is excellent and a significant improvement on CE – this is really helped by the introduction of levels in which the player plays as the Arbiter. While, mechanically, he plays essentially identically to Master Chief (having a camo powerup instead of a light being the primary – only? - difference; and I must confess my main interaction with the camouflage mechanic was reminding myself to use it more every time I tried to turn on the light), his levels create variety in weapons and to a lesser extent enemy composition.

This leads into the more complex relationships displayed between the Covenant factions in Halo 2. CE was a fine military romp of good guys against bad guys with nebulous motivations with a near-flawless badass as a protagonist. The interactions shown between elites, brutes and prophets shown through cutscenes makes me care about the Covenant to a much greater degree, and counter-intuitively, this makes me care more about what I'm trying to save. I understand that these cutscenes were reworked for the anniversary edition I've played; I haven't seen the originals but what I saw were well-integrated and feature-film quality.

Of course, the flood can't be used as a surprise this time around – the question was always 'when' rather than 'if'. However, I think the flood are mechanically extremely satisfying this time around. This is largely due to a rework to the number and operation of the small spawn – Halopedia says these are called 'Pod infectors' but I think 'little fuckers' is far more apt. In CE, they were far more numerous, as were the bloated flood which spawned into little fuckers, and this led to a constant deluge of them which needed to be dealt with but ultimately only posed a real threat in extremely significant numbers. This was more effective for the horror dynamics in CE and wouldn't benefit from change in that game, but resulted in less satisfying shooting to my mind.

In contrast, the little fuckers in Halo 2 are a bit more of a threat. They come in smaller numbers and thus almost never pose a meaningful risk from actually attacking the player (except for the risk posed by the damage preventing shields from recharging), but the player is far more incentivised to kill them – if left to their own devices, they have a far higher chance of finding a host body to create a more dangerous flood at a 1:1 rate. This means their presence encourages an aggressive playstyle to prevent them from finding hosts in the first place – a welcome contrast to the slower, methodical approach I found to be more effective for most of the rest of the game.

The corollary of this change is that the horror aspects are somewhat diminished. However, Halo 2 keeps the general theme and its excellent use of lighting in later levels, coupled with the (thematically appropriate) possibility of flood spawning behind the player creates a number of jumpscares on a non-scripted basis. This is balanced well – levels have both darker and lighter passages, and thus I never reached the stage of feeling tired of, or not surprised by these.

The only aspect I was a little less keen on was vehicle combat. I'll begin with the notable exception – the limited passages in which the player is able to commandeer a scorpion tank offer one of the few points in the game of feeling extreme power. These are limited enough to remain a delight when played, and seeing enemy vehicles melt in front of you for a few minutes offers visceral pleasure.

However, when in a warthog, ghost or banshee, I didn't have such a great time. The former is perhaps well-documented as one of the hardest vehicles to handle in all of gaming, which leads only to frustration when flipping it back over and waiting for NPC teammates to get back in the damn thing. If handling the gun, it suffers from the same issue as the ghost and the banshee: the fact there is no downside to simply holding down the right trigger on a permanent basis, and it reduces combat to a case of pointing in the right direction.

This is a limited criticism. Those passages are still fine – certainly not bad or unenjoyable – and they don't last long enough to detract in any major way from one of the better FPS campaigns I've ever played.

Halo 2 was one of the most disappointing games I had ever played on release. I remember buying it on the way to work and ringing in sick before I even left HMV with it. At the time, I adored Halo: Combat Evolved. It was the reason I owned an Xbox. It was the game I sat playing at my friends’ houses, either co-op or versus… Halo 2 absolutely ruined both of those things for me…

My friends and I loved playing couch co-op on Legendary on Halo CE. It didn’t matter to us that we weren’t “doing it for real, solo”. It was just so much fun going through those missions together. We played it so many times. Dying and watching our co-op partner frantically running to get to a safe space to allow us to respawn…So when Halo 2 came out with a new rule on Legendary, that rule being that if one player died, both were reset to the last check point, that destroyed how I loved to play the game.

But all was not lost. Couch Versus modes. I’d spent thousands of hours playing 4 player split screen on Halo CE. Rocket Matches on Hang Em High, FFA on Rat Race… great times. In walks Halo 2 and yeah, its still got 4 player split screen but… the game was the launch title for Xbox Live. The multiplayer wasn’t designed for 4 players. The maps were all far too big for my friends and I to really play with 4 players.

So, there it is. Halo 2 ruined everything I loved about Halo CE, and I haven’t even mentioned having to play as the fucking Arbiter yet.

However, …

This is how I felt in 2004. Fast-forward 19 years and I absolutely adore Halo 2. Co-op? I don’t play co-op… I am the only person I know who plays Halo these days so it doesn’t bother me that “Iron is always on” in co-op. And the multiplayer? Man, when a Halo 2 game rolls round in Masterchief Collection, I am 100% in awe of how good this game is online. However, this review will be 90% focused on the campaign, and further to that, it will be based on the Anniversary edition of the game from 2014, with the beautifully redone graphics.

So, Halo 2’s campaign, amirite? This is the game where like, 95% of Halo lore comes from. Prior to this, the story was largely just “Super soldier fights Aliens, holy fuck what is this awful brainless enemy and why to they have rocket launchers?” Well… there were novels and comics etc, but who the fuck reads them? Do you think that I, a man who spends an inordinate amount of time reviewing music and computer games for free on the internet, is in fact a fucking nerd? Come on bro…

Halo 2 shows you the Covenant, it gives them personality beyond “Wort Wort Wort!” and honestly, it works incredibly well. The story is pure sci fi schlock and is all the better for it. We already knew humanity was losing the war with the technologically superior Covenant. We already knew they were religious maniacs, hellbent on their ‘Great Journey’ but we had no idea how their civilisation was built, who was in charge or anything. And yeah, it doesn’t really matter does it? That Elite over there, whether he is being lied to by false prophets or not, the result is the same. I’m stripping his shield with a plasma pistol and then headshotting him with a Battle Rifle. But the story is there none the less and seeing it all through the eyes of the disgraced Arbiter (Who has another name I am not nerdy enough to Google) is interesting. Plus, you know, The Covenant largely defeats itself, so it’s good to see that playing out.

Seeing Arby, a character I was gutted you had to play as when the game released, learn the truth of his Prophets betrayal and the subsequent shattering of the Covenant itself is fantastic and his missions in the game are also great, largely because there are no fucking Jackal Snipers in them. Fuck those guys. Seriously, get fucked. It gives the game this sci fi schlock that I just fucking love though and it’s a crying shame you didn’t get to be him again in Halo 3. Bungie listened to fans on that one, further proof that Games Developers should never, ever listen to fans.

But yeah, the story is great and… unfinished. Who can forget that ending? “Finishing this fight” roll credits. That is the thing with Halo 2; Bungie’s ambitions, both narratively and with gameplay itself, could not be supported on the Original Xbox, both due to the consoles lack of power by the time of release and the Developers lack time to get the game finished. Now, this is on Bungie, they should have toned it down a bit, and the campaign and story both suffer accordingly but the result is a glorious mess. A game who’s ambition sometimes outstrips its engineering, but fucking hell, what an incredible game.

The first thing everyone mentions about Halo 2 is… Well, it’s the Sniper Jackals, but the second thing they mention is the games brutal difficulty on Legendary (The only way to play a Halo game). Why is Halo 2 so fucking hard? Well, its simple really, Masterchief has the least health of any single thing in game outside of Flood Infection forms. Couple this with the Covenant being able to dual wield their weapons, and there being no negative to this, they literally just shred your shields twice as fast as the already ridiculous speed they do with one weapon… you’re going to die. A lot. Dark Souls has nothing on this game in terms of difficulty.

But why is it like this? And again, it’s simple; there wasn’t enough time to test it. The game is stupidly unbalanced. You die in fractions of a second, but the enemies, particularly the new Brutes, are just ridiculous bullet sponges. Its flawed, there are no two ways about that, but the sheer ambition of the campaign is something to behold. A level of ambition that wouldn’t be met with the technology to do it justice until Halo 3. Just take the Scarabs for example. The walking tanks of the Covenant are nothing but a scripted even in Halo 2. It was mind blowing at the time, but it wouldn’t be until Halo 3 that they would be proper, AI driven participants on the battlefield.

That’s the thing with Halo 2; the OG Xbox really struggles with the game. It struggles to maintain 30fps at 240p on the OG Hardware. The Anniversary edition of the game though… wow. Obviously on modern technology the game runs at whatever resolution or frame rate you want it to. I played it on Steam Deck, so I played it at 1080p60 on an external monitor and 720p60 on the consoles own screen. But that is obvious, the game is 20 years old. Of course, it runs flawlessly on modern hardware. But the Anniversary Edition does something more (Or rather, the same thing as the CE Remaster, only better). The game has been completely redone with modern graphics. Its all the original game, just a much more modern rendering engine driving the texturing and effects and it is absolutely fucking glorious. Of course, the bones of the game are still 20 years old, and covering them with new paint doesn’t change that, but also, it’s not meant to. Halo 2 is Halo 2 wart(hog)s and all but the remaster is truly beautiful to look at. The new graphics are much more in keeping with the OG game than those of the CE remaster and there are far less times where you shoot invisible scenery this time around.

The game is still frustratingly difficult on its hardest setting but too easy on anything less than that. Its still an unfinished mess at the end but my god, the things this did with the Halo CE sand box still stand up today. Dual Wielding can be a game change if for some reason you aren’t using the Noob Combo, and things like boarding enemy vehicles are revolutionary. Truly, Halo 2 will never be as revolutionary as the original, which introduces instant grenades, two weapon limits and recharging shields to the FPS world, as well as a control pad control scheme that worked. But as far as Halo goes, no other game would innovate as much as this one.

Its flawed, its unfinished and its too fucking hard most of the time, but the story and voice acting are fantastic (Special shout out to the redone cut scenes in the remaster) and the combat… man its almost perfect in this game. A truly legendary game and for my money, the most ‘special’ Halo game. The one that grew on me the most and the one I most likely to come back to the most… Well, so long as I am in the mood for teeth gnashing difficulty.

mm. christmas of 2004.

This is my favourite game in the halo franchise, it always has been because it has the best levels, mechanics and character dynamics the series has to offer.

Allow me to address the criticisms of this game and why they don't bother me, first off, the false advertisement. It's true that it was advertised as the earth needing to be saved by the master chief which he only does in two levels, admittedly this is more the case in the third game where he's on earth for much longer, but it's not complete false advertising here. The bigger issue is the introduction of the arbiter as a playable character, even the instruction manual doesn't mention this which makes his gameplay come completely out of nowhere. I'd agree this is a major issue if it weren't for the fact that his addition to the game is invaluable as he offers more of a stealth mechanic given his ability to camouflage himself at will in order to surprise his enemies. His character journey is well handled as he realises he's on the wrong side of history by fighting for the covenant, although that's about the only thing the story does right as its admittedly hot garbage. It's basically the franchises take on the cool aid cult to give you an idea of how ridiculous it is, although thankfully there isn't too much focus on the events unfolding. The real winner here is the dynamic between Cortana and master chief, specifically how they've reversed roles so that now she's the one coming up with crazy schemes that scares him, this culminates in her famous line "fortunately for you, I like crazy" showing how much she's grown as a character from the first game. My favourite character is Johnson, yes, he's the games version of Emil Foley from an officer and a gentleman, but I love that character and how Johnson interacts with everyone around him is a highlight for me. Miranda Keyes is also a huge improvement over her father as she's far more competent than he ever was, she's not perfect but I feel that's more to give our heroes and Johnson more chances to shine in order to save her. There's not much to say about the gameplay that I didn't cover in Halo: Combat Evolved, it's addictive as hell whether it's single player or multiplayer, the addition of greater weapons further emphasising this.

It's a classic that’s well worth your time, ignore those early negative reviews because those complaints no longer have merit to them.

Por mais relevante pra indústria que o primeiro Halo seja, pra mim, é no segundo jogo que a franquia ganha um corpo suficiente para sustentar um título mesmo quase duas décadas depois do lançamento.

Absolutamente tudo melhora: a campanha é mais interessante, as arenas são mais divertidas, as armas, mais variadas, e os cenários ganham muito mais personalidade. E, não sei explicar bem porque, achei que atirar nesse jogo é muito mais satisfatório.

O tom militaresco do roteiro ainda não é minha praia e o final é muito anticlimático, mas fora isso, Halo 2 é irretocável.