Halo 3 Single-Player Review

This is going to be a very unusual review for FiringSquad. I'm going to review just the single player aspects of a certain game without going into the online multiplayer features. The game I am reviewing is, of course, Halo 3, the long awaited Xbox 360 first person shooter from Microsoft's internal developer Bungie. We got an advanced copy of the game to play a couple of days ago and have played through the entire single player campaign. We have also checked out some of the very impressive online community features as well as the Forge multiplayer map editor.

However, we cannot comment on the online multiplayer aspects of Halo 3 just yet. The reason is as I write this review (a few hours before the noon PT embargo that has been set up for all reviews of Halo 3 that are supposed to be posted) the online matchmaking servers for the game are not online yet. So there is no way to actually review the online multiplayer aspects of the game which, let's face it, is a massive reason behind the success of the game's previous installment, Halo 2. So we feel that posting up a review of the multiplayer portions of the game would be inappropriate until the online servers are working. We will post up a multiplayer review of the game (hopefully on Monday) when we get some actual trigger time online.


With that rather large caveat out of the way, let's take a look at the rest of Halo 3 which, as it turns out, is a pretty great game even if online multiplayer wasn't part of the package.

An introduction to the Halo series

The saga of Halo's development is actually interesting in of itself. The game series began life as a sci-fi RTS game at Bungie Studios in the late 1990's. At the time Bungie was an acclaimed independent developer who had great success with its Marathon sci-fi first person shooter series which was made exclusively (at first) for Apple's Macintosh computers. Their plans for Halo as an RTS game got sidetracked however, and they decided to make the game a third person shooter. At a MacWorld event in 1999, Apple head man Steve Jobs introduced the first public trailer for the game which blew the audience away with its detailed outdoor level graphics which was unusual for an action game at that time. At the time the game was going to be released for multiple platforms.

Cut to March of 2000 as Apple rival Microsoft and its head man Bill Gates officially revealed what had been rumored for months; they were entering into the competitive field of console gaming with the original Xbox. Many doubted that Microsoft would be able to compete with Sony and Nintendo. At E3 2000 in May, Bungie showed off a new trailer for Halo which improved on the already impressive looking gameplay. Just a few weeks later, Microsoft shocked the game industry again when it announced it had purchased Bungie for the sole purpose of having Halo as an Xbox exclusive title. The game was switched yet again to a first person shooter and after a somewhat lackluster demo at E3 2001, Halo: Combat Evolved became an Xbox launch title. Despite no online multiplayer options, the game was a huge success for Microsoft with its solid single player campaign and its offline multiplayer modes inspiring "Halo parties". Selling millions of copies Halo became a system mover for the original Xbox in the US and Europe.

Two years later, PC and Mac owners finally got their Halo port with developer Gearbox Software adding online multiplayer support. The game was a best seller for the PC despite mixed reviews.

Three years after its Xbox debut, Microsoft released the long awaited Halo 2 for the original Xbox. Once again the game was a huge success in terms of sales selling millions of copies thanks in part to finally adding online multiplayer via Xbox Live. However, fans were disappointed that the single player game ended in the middle of a storyline and even Bungie team members admitted after its release that Halo 2 wasn't the game they had hoped for. (Halo 2 was released for the PC just a few months ago but it got mediocre reviews and because it was a Vista exclusive wasn't a sales success).



Between Halo 2 and Halo 3, Microsoft decided to quickly release a successor to the original Xbox to get a head start on Sony and Nintendo's next-gen console plans. The Xbox 360 debuted just a year after Halo 2's release in 2005 and at the time became a highly prized entertainment present. While Halo 3 didn't get released in 2006 at the time of the PS3 and Wii debuts, Microsoft's Xbox 360 third person action game Gears of War (developed by Epic Games) was a huge sales success and helped to move more console hardware.

And now is 2007 and Microsoft, fresh off a price cut of the Xbox 360, is hoping that the release of Halo 3 will cement their dominance of the PS3 console (which has struggled in its first year thanks to its high price and lack of popular software) and will close the gap on the surprising success of the Nintendo Wii (thanks to its low price and its emphasis on casual games using its Wiimote). Microsoft is sparing no expense to let folks know about Halo 3; it's promoting the game's release like it was a big budget motion picture with merchandising deals, TV specials and more and many analysts believe it could sell as many as 3 million copies in its first 12 days.

So has Halo 3 lived up to the massive attention and hopes for fans of this franchise? Based on playing the single player campaign and checking out its community and editing features we would have to give it a qualified "yes" but again we will have a separate review for its online multiplayer features.