| 14 September 2010
My pre-ordered copy of Halo: Reach came in the mail today from Amazon, and I gave the disc a few spins this afternoon.
The visuals look a little better than Halo 3 and ODST, but it definitely doesn't hold a candle to a lot of other games out there today. It doesn't look bad or anything, but it seems like the characters and immediate landscape could have used a little more polish. The gameplay is tried-and-true Halo, although there are some "improvements" that I didn't care for - for instance the melee button is mapped to the right bumper by default, which is really awkward. Luckily there are a good number of button configurations available and I was able to find something that suited my fancy. One neat aspect is that first thing, the game forces you to customize a character - this configuration follows you through both the campaign and multiplayer, which adds a great feel of consistency to the somewhat daunting level of game modes that Halo: Reach sports. My character looks like a Ninja Turtle.
The campaign itself feels like a solid mix of frantic gunning and story-driven action; I'm only a few missions into it but I am looking forward to finishing it (more than any other Halo game I've played). The whole game feels like a marriage of Halo 3 and ODST, and although I enjoyed those two games, I never LOVED them; that being said, Reach (and its glorious absence of Master Chief and Cortana) could very well end up being my favorite game in the Haloverse.
I tried a few rounds of multiplayer, which was familiar and new at the same time. There are two main types of team slayer that I saw, one in which everyone has a standard sprinting armor ability, and another one with multiple loadouts and armor abilities (jetpacks, etc). The second type of match was really disorienting at first, but I started to see that these new gameplay aspects will add a ton of depth to the game (but also possibly leave room for shameless exploitation if Bungie doesn't tweak it just right). I have yet to try the Firefight mode, which I've heard is the best part of the multiplayer, but I'm looking forward to it.
It's been three years since Halo 3 was released, which has probably been the perfect time in between these two games. I feel that Bungie has put these past few years to good use; we're treated to a true sequel with so much content that I'm happy with its release-day price point.
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