Halo fans are going to be very happy with ODST
An unapologetic fan to the end, I love me the Haloz – every one, and even though I was disappointed with the end, I liked Halo 2 – and can’t be more excited for ODST or Halo: Reach.
Halo 3 was supposed to be the end of the trilogy, and with Bungie’s separation from Microsoft, one could assume the worst and that Microsoft would whore out the franchise and turn it into a yearly release. After reading Luke’s post two Fridays ago — if you like Halo and are not reading Bungie’s weekly update, you’re missing some very entertaining and informative writing — I was anxious to see Bungie’s next project, Halo or not.
Then at E3 we get our first real look at ODST gameplay and a Halo: Reach trailer and just then I soiled myself. For Halo fans, this was a great big deal.
But the complaints started rolling in from the PS3 fanboys and Halo haters on message boards:
- Too much Halo
- ODST plays like Halo, what’s the big deal?
- I’m sick of Halo
- The Halo story sucks, I don’t care
Luckily, Bungie’s not catering to them. They’re catering to the nearly 800,000 unique online deathmatchers who booted up a two-year-old game yesterday despite there being so many awesome games available right now. It’s a community that played almost 2 million matches over the last 24 hours and that are still contributing to a campaign kill count of 10.624 billion (not a typo).
Those people will buy ODST and love it.
Enough with the rambling, it’s time to get to the meat of this post — my thoughts on ODST.
The story
ODST will be a fun but fractured bit of storytelling. I’ll play it before passing judgement, but I’m not sure how I’m going to like the episodic nature of the story, or the fact I’ll be switching between this whole team of Orbital Drop Shock Troopers.
The gameplay
The gameplay is decidedly Halo, with some tweaks — they’ve tweaked every edition so far, and I’ve been happy with all of them, so no complaints here.
You’re typical weapon loadout is a silenced SMG and a modified Halo 1 pistol. If you are unaware, the Halo 1 pistol was a scoped headshot machine, like a battle rifle. You only fired off one shot at a time compared to the BR’s four, but you could fire as fast as you could pull the trigger. It was a monster in multiplayer.
However, during one of the flashback episodes in the E3 demo, an ODST carried a Spartan Laser. On Bugnie’s Meet the Squad page, other marines hold rocket launchers, snipers and assault rifles, so you’ll be putting them to use as well.
Players will use a visor that pinpoints items of interest and clearly defines enemies and allies within view.
Extras
More info from Bungie’s ODST Field Guide:
- Enemies you will kill without remorse include drones, hunters, brutes and jackals.
- Healthpacks return. You are not a Spartan, merely a human with a fancy suit. Your shield depletes more rapidly than Master Chiefs and, like in Halo 1, you’ll need to seek first aid after you’ve taken damage.
- Buck, Dare, Dutch, Mickey, and Romeo are your squadmates. Dutch and Mickey are heavy weapons experts. Romeo’s the sniper. Buck is a gunnery sergeant who uses an assault rifle. Dare’s file is classified at www.bungie.net, however, she’s wearing Spartan Recon armor. Yes, I said she.
- There’s no word on boss fights or vehicle use.
- More info on ODST will seep out to us between now and the September 22 release.
Halo 3 multiplayer and new maps
And while that’s it for the ODST part of this rather lengthy story, an ODST purchase will net you two discs: One is ODST, the other is the complete Halo 3 multiplayer experience. That experience included all the maps from all the map packs and three new maps: Heretic, Longshore and Citadel.
Heretic has been virtually confirmed as a remake of Halo 2 multiplayer ultra-classic Midship (get me a napkin, I’m salivating over here, in case you couldn’t tell from the ridiculous hyphenated adjectives).
No word on the others, but I wouldn’t be surprised if at least one of the other two were re-imaginings of previous maps. If I was a guessing man, and I am, I’d say Longshore would make a nice name for Relic.
Citadel could be Terminal, Headlong, Ivory Tower or Turf.
In any case, you get all the map packs, plus the three new maps and you can play it all on that disc without loading Halo 3.
Halo: Reach beta
Finally, anyone who purchases Halo 3: ODST gets an automatic invite to the Halo: Reach multiplayer beta in 2010ish. There will be no codes this time, probably to avoid the mess they had the first couple days of the Halo 3 beta. The only way to get in is to purchase ODST — the beta will be accessed directly from the games menu — and considering the value jammed into the package, I consider the multiplayer beta a bonus.
Halo 3 multiplayer, with all the maps and the three new ones alone is enough to justify the cost of a full game, but in this case you also get ODST and the beta invite.
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