Halo 3 owns. Even 13 years after release this game managed to grab me with such a tight grip that I finished the game in one sitting with a few breaks, and it was a blast.
The semi-tactical sandbox combat envisioned but not fully realised by previous 2 games just finally worked without reservation. Halo 3 is the Halo that suffers the least from the rut of point-and-click midrange hitscan since nearly every weapon is good for something and the balancing is just right. You find close quarters combat and rush attacks to be a viable approach for a lot of situations, and that's something I felt was lacking from previous games. It owes a lot here to revised brutes who succeeds at being the enemy with interesting AI and behavior patterns to play around yet also be massive sacks of meat willing to charge at your position and engage in melee combat.
And Halo 3 didn't only find solid footing in combat, the campaign itself is a rollicking gautlet of great levels. It's varied, it's perfectly paced, level layouts make for intense and fun combat scenarios, venicle sections are always there for a good gameplay reason and they never drag it down. Not only it avoids almost all issues I had with other campaigns, it also managed to blow me away with certain set pieces that weren't just great visual feast, they also provided incredible gameplay scenarios that perfectly complimented game's combat framework. Kudos for pulling off the thing most action games try and fail at.
Sadly it's not all perfect. After peaking in The Covenant mission the game dwindles a bit and hits you with two pretty monotonous (though not bad) levels instead of taking it even further with intensity of encounters. The story has the right tone going on and new allies are fun but plot isn't worth separate discussion. Still I didn't expect a Halo game win me over so much. A new fav.
The semi-tactical sandbox combat envisioned but not fully realised by previous 2 games just finally worked without reservation. Halo 3 is the Halo that suffers the least from the rut of point-and-click midrange hitscan since nearly every weapon is good for something and the balancing is just right. You find close quarters combat and rush attacks to be a viable approach for a lot of situations, and that's something I felt was lacking from previous games. It owes a lot here to revised brutes who succeeds at being the enemy with interesting AI and behavior patterns to play around yet also be massive sacks of meat willing to charge at your position and engage in melee combat.
And Halo 3 didn't only find solid footing in combat, the campaign itself is a rollicking gautlet of great levels. It's varied, it's perfectly paced, level layouts make for intense and fun combat scenarios, venicle sections are always there for a good gameplay reason and they never drag it down. Not only it avoids almost all issues I had with other campaigns, it also managed to blow me away with certain set pieces that weren't just great visual feast, they also provided incredible gameplay scenarios that perfectly complimented game's combat framework. Kudos for pulling off the thing most action games try and fail at.
Sadly it's not all perfect. After peaking in The Covenant mission the game dwindles a bit and hits you with two pretty monotonous (though not bad) levels instead of taking it even further with intensity of encounters. The story has the right tone going on and new allies are fun but plot isn't worth separate discussion. Still I didn't expect a Halo game win me over so much. A new fav.