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Halo 3: ODST (Xbox 360) review

"Halo: Combat Evolved was almost a perfect game, until it tanked halfway through when the Flood showed up. For all of the praise the Halo series gets for ultra-intelligent AI, let’s keep in mind that it’s always been lousy AI that brings these games down: Bungie teases us by pitting us against the genuinely smart Covenant, only to then switch things up and unleash what are essentially fast-moving, mindless zombies in their place. And every game in the trilogy suffered because of it...."

Halo: Combat Evolved was almost a perfect game, until it tanked halfway through when the Flood showed up. For all of the praise the Halo series gets for ultra-intelligent AI, let’s keep in mind that it’s always been lousy AI that brings these games down: Bungie teases us by pitting us against the genuinely smart Covenant, only to then switch things up and unleash what are essentially fast-moving, mindless zombies in their place. And every game in the trilogy suffered because of it. Halo 3: ODST, set entirely in the African city of New Mombasa in the aftermath of the slipspace rupture that occurred in the second game, in the first in the series to run its course without a single Flood encounter. As such, it should be the Halo game of my dreams, shouldn’t it?

Except, whoops! Halo 3: ODST is an expansion pack, not a full-blown sequel. I suppose it’s a shame Bungie ended the trilogy before they figured out what made it tick.

That’s right! You don’t fool me, Microsoft! You may be selling Halo 3: ODST at full price and inflating the experience to two whole discs, but even Bungie themselves have billed it as an expansion, and that didn’t change after you figured out you could get away with selling it for the price of an actual game!

But I digress. I’m not here to criticize Microsoft’s crafty pricing strategies, but to judge Bungie’s talent as a developer. (And I didn’t pay for my copy of the game, anyway.) It’s clear from playing Halo 3: ODST that they’ve had fun toying with what has otherwise become a very familiar formula. It’s difficult to say whether excluding the Flood was a deliberate decision or whether it’s due to the setting. We know the Flood don’t arrive on Earth until they hijack a Covenant cruiser and arrive halfway through the third game, and Halo 3: ODST, despite the “3” in its title, is set long before that ever happens. Either way, it’s such a vast improvement that despite the shortness of the campaign, I’d have been prepared to recommend the expansion as the best Halo title ever had Bungie’s experiments not gotten in the way.

ODST stands for “orbital drop shock trooper.” (I know you were dying to know that.) This is important because the campaign opens with one such drop into New Mombasa just as Regret’s ship is making the slipspace jump that shook the city in Halo 2. Your nameless (and voiceless) soldier wakes up hours later after nightfall and is forced to play detective, following the tracks of his squad mates and trying to figure out what’s become of them. Each clue he finds triggers a flashback, during which the player actually controls one of the ODSTs (each of whom is voiced by a member of the Firefly cast, I’m told) as we examine the aftermath of the slipspace jump through their eyes.

The flashbacks themselves are pure, vintage Halo, and I mean that in the best way possible: Big, open environments, intelligent adversaries, and an abundance of sticky situations in which the player’s success depends entirely on his approach to combat. Playing as a human does offer a few minor changes – health is handled a bit differently, and the brutes sure look a lot bigger now – but once you re-adjust to the controls, it’s first-person shooting as tight and exciting as anything else on the market. All of the series’ major vehicles get their moment in the spotlight, too. This is the part where I’d start citing some examples of just how cool Halo 3: ODST’s campaign gets, but it’s so short that I frankly don’t want to ruin anything. Believe me: If you’re familiar with this series, and you like what you’ve seen so far, Halo 3: ODST has some terrific standout moments for you.

I wish I could say the same about the hub sections that act as a segue between flashbacks. Halo 3: ODST has you exploring an almost post-apocalyptic New Mombasa that gradually opens up the deeper you are into the campaign, and introducing the familiar open-world concept to the Halo universe is not something I’m automatically opposed to, but I want this place to feel like a battlefield. The environments here are dark and repetitive, and the action is sparse. Plotting out your route is simply a matter of taking the shortest, least complicated path to your next destination while dealing with any Covenant patrols you happen to run into. These segments aren’t bad, but they lack the energy that makes the flashbacks so enjoyable.

Plus, there’s this side quest that has you exploring the city and collecting… wait… this can’t be right… audio logs? Really? Audio logs? In a Halo game? In 2009?

Multiplayer gets its own disc, which makes it all the more shocking when you realize it’s the exact same multiplayer package found in Halo 3, albeit with a few new maps and Firefight, an endurance-style mode where you and a few friends battle off waves of Covenant until you die. Granted, it’s a good multiplayer package, although anyone who’s interested in it probably already has it on another disc. As for Firefight… well, you’ve seen this sort of thing before. It worked better when Gears of War 2 did it, since that game’s play style is more appropriate for team-based combat. It’s fine here, though, and should provide a satisfying diversion assuming your multiplayer sessions aren’t currently being dominated by Modern Warfare 2.

It’s difficult to straight-up recommend Halo 3: ODST as it is, partly because so much of what’s here is recycled, and partly because not all of what’s new works especially well. On the other hand, those flashbacks really are a lot of fun, and any Halo fans who outright dismiss this package will be missing out on some seriously great content. Play it, but don’t pay full price for it. Hell, do what I did: Put it on your Christmas list, and leave spending too much money to someone else.

Rating: 7/10

Community review by Suskie (January 04, 2010)

Mike Suskie is a freelance writer who has contributed to GamesRadar and has a blog. He can usually be found on Twitter at @MikeSuskie.

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