When the Xbox first launched, it had one of the best launch titles in console history, Halo. At first Halo was expected to be a game that would fail after its showing at E3 ( the game had horrible framerate problems and graphical glitches ) but Bungie managed to fix it up and get it ready for launch. Halo was the greatest experience an Xbox gamer could have at the time. They got to delve into a great story-driven single player where you play as a augmented super soldier and help save the galaxy. On the outside it seemed like a simple story, but the ones who wanted to get deeper unveiled one of the deepest plots of the FPS genre.

When Bungie made this game, they earned a fanbase that added onto their previous fanbase from the Marathon games. These guys loved the single player, the co-op, and the multiplayer. While multiplayer was only splitscreen at the time, it is arguably better than most online experiences. It was balanced, and it was fun.

The only thing that people expected after this was a sequel. And of course, Bungie delivered. However Bungie misinterpreted its fans and focused a little more on multiplayer this time around because they had to incorporate it with Xbox Live. And altogether this led to a lackluster single player experience that barely compared with the first one. While it still stuck to the deep plot, it just didn’t feel the same. Multiplayer, however, was the best Xbox Live experience you could have on the Xbox. You had a party system, ranks, custom games, and a huge community.

Now it’s time for Halo 3 where I think Bungie isn’t going to ditch the single player, or the multiplayer. They are going to deliver on both ends and end the Halo franchise with a bang.

Now there is the people who say Halo is ‘unoriginal’ or ‘boring’ or just all around ’suckage.’  I don’t know why, I really don’t. Whether they just want to be different and hate Halo, or they just don’t like the game. The game pretty much reinvented the genre of the console FPS and set the bar for great online multiplayer. Without Halo, I don’t think games today would be as good.

I just wanted to make this post to thank Bungie for such a great experience with all the Halo games, and I am really pumped for the 3rd installment.

This entry was posted on Friday, June 29th, 2007 at 4:41 am and is filed under Xbox 360. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.