First Halo 3 review

[Craig]

I got it yesterday but apparently my router isn't compatible with XBox Live and my NAT, instead of being open, is on moderate, meaning I can't play on Live unless we buy a new internet router....

[MinionZombie]

Ooh, Coin's stuck in a HPOTD opinion battle, hehe...I've been there my friend, but I ain't coming to back you up. Why not treat yourself to brand new expensive games? Because you've just splashed all your dosh to get the console itself! Besides, why pay store price when you can get it online for £40 (which is still around $80, thank you very much) ... in stores indeed, it's £50 or $100...so nyah... Also, if you're not desperate to get a game brand new, there's no need to ditch the cash right away, play some older games first and then play catch up - heck, it's what I've been doing. Or buy them from GameStation 2-for-40-quid, like I did with Crackdown and Gears of War (second hand admittedly) rather than paying double for both brand new. The last games I bought brand new though were Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter (which I played over 7 days) and Rainbow Six Vegas (which I'm still to complete, but got pissed off at a bit on the dam where you have to wait for some door to open or something)...but those were something like £15 and £18 respectively...cos while they were brand new copies, they weren't hot off the press. I do have GTAIV and Alan Wake on pre-order though, so those I'll get brand-spanking-still-gooey-and-smelly-and-screaming-for-a-juicy-booby-new ... also, it's sometimes good to wait a moment and see if the game causes any other gamers to have console problems or anything. I treat my 360 like a King, and waiting on new games is part of the process... As for Halo 3 - what's the difficulty like? How long is it? And so on... But I'm not buying a new game yet, might get PGR4 when it comes out, but I've just ditched over twenty quid on books (World War Z - which arrived today ... and Grindhouse).

[capncnut]

Why even bother buying a $400 console if you're not going to pony up $60 for its biggest game? Halo 3 is easily the most content-packed piece of software I've played. You get 4 player campaign. A million multiplayer options. The Forge utility so that you can make your own multiplayer games. Saved films for both single and multiplayer. Rankings. Downloadable content. Yeah, I know what you mean. Like when Halo 3 came out, the money FLEW out of my wallet without thinking because £40 ain't such a bad price for a disc that offers so much fun (not only that but you get another disc and that 'beastie' book. Like I'll buy the most important games to ME but for the titles that I'm just 'curious' about, I'll wait until they come down in price or do a trade in. So really, I'm only buying one game every month/two months. But yeah, I do agree - folks who pay out for a console really have no rights to complain about the price of games. It's not as if it's really all that crippling... ...and yeah, The Forge is s**t HOT mate.

[bassman]

I get what you guys are saying, but I guess I'm just not THAT excited to play Halo 3 immediately. I was actually rather let down by Halo 2. It wasn't all that much of an improvement on Halo, imo. Although....the way you guys keep talking about it is making it very tempting.

[dmbfanintn]

I get what you guys are saying, but I guess I'm just not THAT excited to play Halo 3 immediately. I was actually rather let down by Halo 2. It wasn't all that much of an improvement on Halo, imo. Although....the way you guys keep talking about it is making it very tempting. Bass, If you were a fan of Halo 1, you need to get 3! We got it on release night and I stayed up until my eyeballs were about to fall out, playing it. Then was up the next afternoon playing it again (I took a vacation day from work, just so i could play Halo 3 all day tuesday) It beat the campaign in two sittings, about 5.5 hours total on "Hard" difficulty. I agree that H2 was a huge letdown, but it made up for its lackluster campaign by giving us an awesome multiplayer that could be played over xbox live. H3 has upped the bar by not only giving us a single player that harkens back to the H1 campaign, but a re-vamped multiplayer that is leaps and bounds more fun that its H2 counter-part! I have been playng the COD4 demo a lot before Halo3 cam out, and am seeing alot of comments around the net comapring the two, for me (of course this is based onthe COD4 demo) Halo 3 wins it hands down. COD4 is beautiful in appearance, no doubt! But it just doenst give me that, "I gotta play one more match" feeling that I get when playing H3 multiplayer. If anyone wants to play some H3 online, look me up: gamertag, dmbfanintn

[SoCalLoco]

It beat the campaign in two sittings, about 5.5 hours total on "Hard" difficulty. By "hard", I take it you mean heroic or legendary? If you beat heroic or legendary in five and a half hours (w/o 4 player co-op) all by yourself, then i'll bow down and kiss your feet. I tried playing legendary solo and got to the downed pelican part on sierra 117. I died 52 times, so i finally said **** it. Now, i'm playing heroic and i'm stuck on floodgate. I'm about ready to pull my goddamn hair out. H3 is definitely the hardest game i've played. Online is a blast. It's more tactical than H2 was. But I wish ranked matches were SLAYER, TEAM SLAYER and CTF. Shotty snipers and oddball should be social games only.

[kidgloves]

Well, i caved in and bought Halo 3. Superb single player. Finished it in 2 days. Very impressed with the game and some really nice touches but........... i hate the multiplayer. Im going to give it more of a chance but my idea of fun isn't watching other players bunny hopping around then racing to get the most powerful weapon. Who pays £50 for a game? What rubbish. Even instore they are £40. I've paid £33 for Bioshock, £30 for DiRT, £30 for Overlord and £34 for Halo 3. All through the internet and delivered the day before release.

[MinionZombie]

Well, i caved in and bought Halo 3. Superb single player. Finished it in 2 days. Very impressed with the game and some really nice touches but........... i hate the multiplayer. Im going to give it more of a chance but my idea of fun isn't watching other players bunny hopping around then racing to get the most powerful weapon. Who pays £50 for a game? What rubbish. Even instore they are £40. I've paid £33 for Bioshock, £30 for DiRT, £30 for Overlord and £34 for Halo 3. All through the internet and delivered the day before release. Where are you getting your games that cheap and early from?

[dmbfanintn]

By "hard", I take it you mean heroic or legendary? If you beat heroic or legendary in five and a half hours (w/o 4 player co-op) all by yourself, then i'll bow down and kiss your feet. I tried playing legendary solo and got to the downed pelican part on sierra 117. I died 52 times, so i finally said **** it. Now, i'm playing heroic and i'm stuck on floodgate. I'm about ready to pull my goddamn hair out. H3 is definitely the hardest game i've played. Online is a blast. It's more tactical than H2 was. But I wish ranked matches were SLAYER, TEAM SLAYER and CTF. Shotty snipers and oddball should be social games only. Kiss away dude! I meant on Heroic. I tried Legendary and it is defintiely tough! I will beat it eventually on Legendary. Bad thing is, I am 34, my 14 year old son beat Heroic in less time than I did, maybe we should kiss his feet instead! He is playing a legendary campaign now, I will see how long it takes him to beat that. The only way to beat it on the higher difficulties is to use tactics. The run, spray and pray method will not work. you have to stay hidden and out of sight and take most of the enemies out stealthy like. I agree, I HATE Shotty snipers.

[kidgloves]

Where are you getting your games that cheap and early from? http://www.shopto.net/ I got Halo 3 from Blockbusters

[Danny]

4 hours. It tok 4 hours for me to beat halo 3, considering my brother paid 170 or wahtever for it its fair to say im not impressed, especially the cop out ending, im gonna retry it on legendary instead of heroic later but i hope these some extended stuff cus for that price its definatley not worth it for the single player alone, so if you dont have live and love the halo multiplayer id say hold off till its cheaper, i definatley prefer halo 2, i mean 9 levels for gos sake, talk about a band and a whimper...

[mista_mo]

Halo 3 is possibly the best game i have ever played. My friend got it opening day, and we spent 6 hours in his basement playing it, and finished the campaign the same day. We tried heroic and got our ass handed to us on the pelican part in the first mission lol, it was the damn jackel snipers that did us in, they were the only reason we died, oh, and being stuck by grunts ffs. The single player was hands down far better then halo 2, by leaps and bounds. now, i wasn't that excited for halo 3, i mean, i thought it was goign to be the most overblown piece of crap that wouldn't be able to live up to it's own hype, but i was soooooo wrong. The single player was in depth, and engrossing, u felt like you were there, and honest to god, i held in my piss for about 2 hours to get that much extra gameplay out of it. The multplayer is a blast as well, all the new weapons, and vehicles add to the fun level, and don't forget the new items and levels. I have yet to play the forge thingy tho, but look foreword to it. it is definitly worth the $67.

[CoinReturn]

mista_mo nailed it. The amount of flat out fun is unmatched, in any game I've ever played. The campaign is short because its meant to be played over and over again. With the campaign scoring system and the hidden skulls, I can see myself playing through it at least 3 or 4 times. The enemy encounters are amazing on legendary, and I've only gotten to the 5th level. The majority of my time spent with Halo 3 has been with the multiplayer. Its hard to put in to words on how I feel about it. They nailed everything. The controls, the map design, the weapon balance, the melee, and the new items. Everything is so finely tuned, and every match is guaranteed fun. As for the mode of Shotty-Snipers, I used to hate it, but I've grown to like it quite a bit. Edit: Is anyone else amazed by the amount of voice work there is?? Every time I play the marines have something new to say. And the chatter between the grunts is hilarious, "You killed my best friend!", lol

[Danny]

whilst i agree the voice work was fantastic i gotta say the marines were still tard's of a royale class, i got in the gunner seat of a warthog with a marine driving, halfway through that big fight against all those brute choppers and wraiths in africa he stopped, reversed up a rock and stopped moving all together. que a good two minutes of me swearing at the screen

[CoinReturn]

Yeah dude, never let the AI marine drive. The friendly AI kinda all around sucks, to be honest. Thats my only gripe with the game, though the enemy AI is spectacular.