Halo isn't a very good first person shooter.
The
HUD of Halo is just annoying. Instead of being like other
contemporary FPSs, Halo insists on representing all of its ammo
onscreen as lots and lots of tiny bullets, instead of simple easy to
read numbers. This is lame. There is no need to fill up the top corner
of the screen with rows and rows of bullet symbols, just show us a
fucking number. Like... if it said 60 in the corner? That would be
fine, that would work for me. I can read and count, I know what 60
means. 60 means that there are 60 rounds in my magazine, I don't need
to see a ton of tiny fucking bullets up there.
Halo's universe
is a complete ripoff of Aliens and various other scifi properties.
This shows a startling dearth of imagination on Bungie's part.
Seriously, it's not an homage, it's a straight ripoff. This is not
subtle, this is hitting you over your head with a sledgehammer. The
right way to do it would be something along the lines of Mass Effect.
With ME, you can tell that the creators at BioWare had an appreciation
and respect for scifi and were influenced by all those works, while
creating their own unique and imaginative new universe. They had
influences, they did not outright copy. Halo does not do this, Halo is
the result of Bungie ripping off other scifi works and cobbling them
all together. I find this deeply objectionable.
Let's look at
Master Chief. Master Chief as a super soldier is a ripoff of a lot of
stuff like BattleTech and Warhammer 40K. He has been surgically
engineered to be a superhuman warrior, just like the Space Marines of
the Imperium in WH40k. He is physically much larger then a normal human
being and possesses much greater strength and athletic capabilities,
just like Space Marines and also the genetically engineered Clan
Elementals in BattleTech. Then he dons the advanced Mjolnir power
armor. This power armor further enhances his strength and
survivability in combat, just like Space Marine armor and Elemental
suits. Starship Troopers is another example of scifi power armor. His
training and origin story in "The Fall of Reach" novel even reads just
like Robert Thurston's classic "The Way of the Clans" BattleTech
novel. In the Halo novel, the Spartan program takes children and forms
them into training cadres to teach them how to become highly capable
and skilled soldiers. Their sole purpose is to become the best warrior
mankind can produce. This is almost identical to the sibkos, or
sibling companies, that the Clans use in BattleTech. If you liked The
Fall of Reach, I recommend you go and check out "The Jade Phoenix
Trilogy" omnibus edition, which contains "The Way of the Clans."
You'll find that The Fall of Reach is simply a pale shadow of
Thurston's work.
Most of what Halo rips off is Aliens, however.
That's really the core complaint. Bungie just decided to watch Aliens a
lot and uh... rip off the entire film. If they were making an Aliens
FPS, this wouldn't be a problem. In fact, that would be great.
However, I find it appalling that they ripped off this great film to
create their brand new IP. That's incredibly distasteful. And no, it
wasn't just ripping off the vague concept of a "space marine." Doom
did that and that was fine. There is nothing wrong with taking a
general concept like a "space marine" and doing your own thing with
it. However, Bungie went far beyond just using that idea. They ripped
off almost every element of Aliens. Let's take a closer look at the
stuff they ripped off.
Master Chief's cryo chamber at the
beginning of Halo is a ripoff of the cryostasis chamber in Aliens. Same
exact design and function. The Pelican dropship is a clear ripoff of
Aliens' UD4L Cheyenne dropship. In Halo 3, there's even a cinematic
cutscene that shows the cockpit layout of the Pelican, which has two
seats, one lower down and to the right, with another elevated position
on the left. This is almost identical to the cockpit positions on the
Cheyenne. I'm not sure if any dropship pilot in a Halo game ever
uttered the line, "We're in the pipe, 5 by 5." but it would not
surprise me at all if they did.
UNSC Marines in Halo
look like Colonial Marines in Aliens. They're both wearing brownish
body armor and helmets. Marines in Halo get eyepieces that drop down
from their helmets, just like how Colonial Marines in Aliens have
eyepieces. The Assault Rifle in Halo is similar to the M41A pulse
rifle in Aliens, with both having an ammo counter and an underslung
accessory, grenade launcher in Aliens, flashlight in Halo. Both pack
rather substantial ammo in a single magazine, 60 in Halo, 99 in
Aliens. Master Chief possesses a sort of radar that shows him nearby
hostiles, just like the motion sensor in Aliens. Sgt Johnson in Halo is
a ripoff of Sgt Apone from Aliens. Both are black non-commissioned
officers who like cigars. Cmon, you can't deny this sort of blatant
plagiarism. It's just so fucking obvious.
Aliens isn't the
only scifi property that Bungie ripped off. Let's take a look at the
Elites. As I see it, Elites are a ripoff of Predator. Elites carry
energy swords, which are vicious dual pronged melee weapons, just like
wristblades in Predator. Elites can cloak themselves, just like a
Predator. Elites have four mandibles on their mouth, just like a
Predator. It seems clear that Bungie apparently desired to make
something like an Aliens vs Predator game, but couldn't get the
license, so they ripped off all the concepts and called it Halo.
Elites and Predators are both warrior societies that emphasize skill
and a certain alien sort of honor code. Elites and Predators both use
plasma energy weaponry. About the only thing that distinguishes Elites
from Predators is that Elites pack personal shields.
I'm not even gonna go into Ringworld.
Okay,
so we've covered everything that Halo ripped off. That's pretty
clear, Bungie really enjoys copying other people's work. Well, now
let's talk about the actual game itself, the gameplay and how it's
good or bad. The most basic enemy in Halo are Grunts. Grunts are lame.
They sound comedic. They spew gibberish in high pitched voices. Why
would you rip off Aliens and Predator, while giving us these
incredibly pathetic and amusing opponents? It doesn't make any sense.
There's supposed to be a desperate struggle for mankind's survival
against the Covenant, right? Aren't they glassing our colonies,
searching for Earth? We're all trying to save ourselves from galactic
annihilation. So... why the short waddling idiots with the wacky
voices? The whole thing doesn't gel right. The grunts just kinda
ruined whatever Bungie was trying to go for with their atmosphere and
lore and whatever. They shot themselves in the foot.
In my
opinion, Halo is a bad FPS because the weapons suck. They are pretty
awful. The Shotgun sucks, because it has no range. Past ten feet or
so, it's completely useless. But that's okay, because it's a shotgun.
Surely there are going to be other weapons that can function at longer
ranges. Well, let's look at the Covenant weapons. Well, the Covenant
weapons suck, because they too have no range. Needler, Plasma pistol,
Plasma rifle... they're all quite short ranged. None of them have much
reach. You can fire at far off targets if you want to, but the spread
and inaccuracy means you're not gonna hit anything. Their crosshairs
are simply enormous. There's no targeting lockon for the Needler at
anything beyond short range.
The other thing about weapons in
Halo is that they abide by a rather strange design decision. See,
human weapons are supposed to be less effective against shields, while
being more effective against flesh. Covenant energy weapons are more
effective against shields, while being less effective at damaging
flesh. This dichotomy makes no sense at all. You're telling me that
this sort of intense plasma weaponry that burns its way through
shielding so quickly, will somehow prove to be ineffective against
biological tissue? This high energy bolt can slice its way past
advanced shields but won't be all that great at destroying mere flesh?
I find that very hard to believe. It's a game balancing decision that
just doesn't make any sense when you really examine it. If it's
powerful enough to demolish your shields, it's probably going to be
powerful enough to burn up your fragile tissue in horrifying ways.
Let's
continue with Halo weaponry. The human Assault Rifle frankly sucks.
This weapon is supposed to be the mainstay of the UNSC Marines and
Master Chief for the entire game, but uh... it's actually awful past
15 feet. This Assault Rifle has terrible spread for a two handed
rifle. It's like a shotgun, only in rifle form. The crosshairs for
this gun are fucking huge. I'd played PC FPSs for many years and had
never seen a crosshair as big as the one for the assault rifle in
Halo. What the hell is the point of this thing? It carries 60 rounds in
a magazine, which sounds very impressive and bountiful, but you're
still probably going to be reloading more often then you want to,
because of just how inaccurate this rifle is. Most of your 60 rounds
are going to be wasted with the kind of spread it has. Unless you're
firing at point blank range, anyways. And of course, each individual
bullet is incredibly weak, meaning you'll need all 60. This just makes
for a frustrating weapon to use.
Let's say that the spread is
due to recoil from the weapon firing on full auto. Let's just say
that's what the problem is, the recoil of the gun. Let's think about
this for a moment. If Master Chief is super strong with his superhuman
strength and enhanced power armor, why is there so much spread due to
recoil on the assault rifle? Can't this super strong soldier in power
armor control the recoil of his rifle? If the recoil is so strong that
it's causing this ridiculous amount of spread for a super powered
Spartan II, just imagine how terrible it must be for a regular UNSC
Marine to fire this thing! It'd be incredible, right? Almost unusable.
Or does the super strength of Master Chief extend only to his melee
attacks and absurd ability to floaty jump everywhere and flip over
Warthogs and tanks?
If the spread isn't because of recoil, then
it must be the gun itself. Specifically, the barrel of the gun must be
terrible, thus causing the inaccuracy. Well... why is the barrel
itself so inaccurate? Isn't this the future? Shouldn't they be able to
craft really accurate gun barrels in the future? We make lots of
assault rifles these days that're accurate to hundreds of meters. Why
do they have assault rifles in the future that are only accurate out
to 15 feet? It doesn't make much sense.
The design of the
assault rifle itself is quite terrible. This rifle has an ammo counter
taking up the entire top portion. That's all there is, a giant
housing that gives you the current ammo count, and some kind of weird
compass. Now, doesn't it seem strange that that entire attachment is
devoted to just counting ammo and giving a compass? Isn't that
something that could've been made really small and not taken up the
entire upper portion of the gun? I mean, I think it could probably fit
on someone's watch, right? Isn't this the future? Mankind has advanced
and learned how to master interstellar travel, but has to have
ginormous attachments just to count ammo and give a compass bearing?
Also,
it should be pointed out that the assault rifle has no sights at all,
iron or otherwise. There's nothing up top but that ridiculous digital
screen telling you how much ammo you have, and a compass in case you
get lost in the woods. No iron sights at all. No red dot sights, no
sights period. Now, obviously... people can point out that there's
probably an uplink from the gun to Master Chief's HUD. Master Chief
doesn't need sights on the gun, he just aims the gun using the
crosshairs projected on his helmet HUD. Well, okay. And I guess this
could also work for UNSC Marines and their helmet visors.
But
wait a minute. How the hell do you aim if you aren't wearing a visor
or eyepiece? You still need some basic iron sights for those times
when you aren't wearing a visor or helmet, right? Is the UNSC
confident that anyone who ever needs to use an assault rifle is always
going to be wearing some sort of advanced digital display? That seems
a little foolish, don't you think? If you're unlucky enough to get
caught without a helmet or eyepiece, you're just gonna have to settle
for firing from the hip? Really? Is that really what they expect
people to do? Wouldn't it make more sense to give the rifles an iron
sight? Would that really be too much to ask? All it requires is
getting rid of that fucking retarded ammo counter/compass display!
Given the choice between being able to actually aim accurately, or
getting to see my ammo count, I'd take the former over the latter
every time. This is just ludicrous.
On the bottom of the
rifle is this huge fucking flashlight. And doesn't Master Chief
already mount a flashlight on his power armor? It's like, mounted on
the right side of his helmet, right? Couldn't the Marines also fit
small little flashlights to their helmets? Why the huge flashlight on
the bottom of the rifle? Seriously, look at this thing, it's big as
hell. Why is the flashlight so goddamn big? It's the future, shouldn't
they be able to make smaller compact flashlights? Wouldn't it have made
more sense if they had fit a grenade launcher on the bottom of the
rifle? They should've just taken off the ammo counter and flashlight,
and replaced them with a scope and a grenade launcher. That would've
actually made sense.
So... I've been complaining about all
the short ranged weapons in Halo, and how short ranged weapons aren't
very good. Now, Halo does have the sniper rifle. The sniper rifle is a
long ranged weapon. I do like the sniper rifle, it's very powerful.
But unfortunately, the sniper rifle is quite rare in this game. Ammo
is very rare. So... it's not usually an option.
And
finally, we come to the pistol. This pistol apparently has a scope for
no reason. Why does the pistol have a scope on it when the assault
rifle doesn't? I have no goddamn idea. However, it does, and this
makes it a superior weapon to the aforementioned assault rifle.
However, while the pistol is a much better weapon then the rifle, it
also has its own problems. The pistol has some spread at medium range.
Even if you can clearly sight in on your target with the scope, there
will be some inaccuracy in the shot pattern. Also, the pistol has a
weakness in the form of its small magazine, meaning that in many
situations, you'll need to reload right when you knock the Elite's
shields down. I found this pretty annoying.
In conclusion, most
Halo weapons are short ranged, and this sucks. Fortunately, Halo 2
and 3 gave us the Battle Rifle and the Covenant Carbine, and those
games are quite a bit more enjoyable. Seriously, did anyone not use
the battle rifle/carbine combination in Halo 2 and 3? It was a
godsend. Finally... some reasonably long ranged rifles!
Halo
only allows you to carry two weapons. This seems to be a nod to
realism. However, it doesn't make any sense. Why does Master Chief
only get to carry two weapons if he's super strong? Now, this is
actually a pretty nice limitation in most first person shooters. The
fact is, a real person is not really capable of lugging around an
entire armory. Real soldiers will only carry their main weapon,
usually a rifle, along with a sidearm pistol on their thigh. Perhaps a
LAW on their back, so that's three. A pretty low amount compared to
the days of Doom, where you could collect 7 to 10 different weapons,
and all their ammo. That was just silly, if you value some form of
realism. And I think we all do, silly bullshit and unrestrained
fantasy whoop-dee-woo doesn't generally go hand in hand with
sophistication and good design. So the idea of making you choose your
favored weapon loadout instead of having access to every gun laying on
the ground is pretty awesome.
Now, that said... I think this
weapon limitation is bad in Halo. Why am I stating this after having
just said that I think limits on carrying guns is a good thing? Well,
because Halo is not like most first person shooters. In most FPSs, you
just play a regular human dude. With regular human limitations. The
character you play in Halo is not just some human dude. The character
you play in Halo is Master Chief, a super enhanced human being who has
superhuman abilities. And that's before he dons his famous shiny green
power armor. You see, this is why the weapon limitation is a bad
idea... Master Chief is uniquely gifted and fluff-driven to be the
sort of super soldier who would be able to carry an entire arsenal of
guns. He *should* have the strength and power to lug rifles, shotguns,
rocket launchers, and a gazillion grenades. After all, this is a guy
who can flip tanks over if they fall on their side. A great feature
that most other FPSs should have is sadly something odd and
unnecessary in Halo.
Halo's lore might be okay, some people
think it is... but it's never told well in the actual game. You play
through the game, and there's very little conveyed to the player. It's
out there, but you have to be obtain it from the novels. This is just
silly.
The Library levels are complete shit. Everyone knows this.
So
this is really everything I dislike about Halo. But to be fair, there
are also some good parts to Halo. It's not completely awful in every
respect. Even though I think it's quite poor compared to a lot of
FPSs, it did do a few things right:
The music in Halo is
quite good. I've never said anything bad about the orchestral score
for Halo. It fits well with the game and uh... yea. The music works
fine, no complaints.
Halo made throwing grenades actually fun
and useful. No need to actually switch to the grenade and leave
yourself vulnerable. You just press the throw grenade button and it
goes flying. This was a great choice and made grenades a much bigger
part of combat, whereas in most other FPSs you probably wouldn't
bother with grenades. Also, aiming grenades was fast and simple,
avoiding much of the obscure aiming in other FPSs that would often
lead to your grenade bouncing right back and exploding at your feet.
The
vehicle handling and combat in Halo was fine, I thought. Even though
driving vehicles in FPSs had been done before Halo, notably in Tribes,
it was quite enjoyable. Obviously, the Warthog had a nice loose
handling style that made for some fun romps around the terrain. Flying
the Banshee around was very liberating, while the Scorpion tank gave
you a very real sense of dominance and power. All the vehicle sections
in the campaign were a delight and gave a nice change of pace from
the usual FPS combat.
Enemy AI in Halo was very impressive.
Almost a bit too much at times, considering Elites had their shields.
I'm not entirely sure if Halo's AI was as good as Half-Life's enemy
AI, but it was very good compared to a lot of other FPSs. Kudos to
whoever designed the AI.
