Is Halo 3 Really Deserving of the Hype it is Getting?

The Halo series was a big success from day one. With each iteration it has had more and more sales and the fan base is growing by the day. I'm going to state a few reasons why I think the Halo series is a tad overrated.

STORY
The story of halo, for those that don't know, is your standard sci-fi adventure. The story can be quite compelling and engaging at times, but something about it just didn't do it for me. It was a little cliche'd.. but what video game isn't now a days. I think one of it's major drawbacks was it's delivery. It doesn't matter how solid of a story you have, if you can't tell it. Other things held the story back. I think making the player split his game up in Halo 2, by also playing as the Arbiter, was a big mistake. I think all of halo 2's story was just bad. Halo 3 had it's high points, but I don't want to spoil it for anyone who is waiting to play it. There are a few other reasons the game didn't really appeal to me, a major one is in the section below.

CHARACTERS
There are three characters that I think deserve a mention in here. The first would be Cortana. Cortana is Master Chief's AI companion. Cortana is probably my favorite of the Halo characters. She takes the thinking evolving AI concept and takes it one step further. She has a mortality. It is noted that although Cortana is given the ability to think and learn, th side affect to this would be her life span of 7 years. This means basically creating a thinking, feeling, living thing with a pre-determined life span of 7 years. It's pretty deep, if you think about it. Cortana's sacrifices and the like give players an emotional attachment to her. She is the only character in the game I had any attachment to at all. The next character to talk about is the Arbiter. I see the Arbiter more as a plot device than anything. I think they could have fleshed out much more important things if they left him alone, as a non-playable character.

This brings me to my least favorite character. Master Chief. And the main reason I disliked the story, as well as part of the reason I think Halo is overrated. Master Chief might be one of the most boring characters I have ever played. They attempt to give him the "Strong Silent Type" attitude, but it comes off as more robotic than anything. He's just.. boring. There is almost no character development for him. The only thing I've seen him do that gives him any personality is when he goes to save Cortana. And the supporting characters don't help to flesh him out either. There are plenty of characters that don't talk at all and see more character development than MC. They say they did this to give the player the ability to put their own personality into MC, and to give him the "too cool to say anything" feeling. But I think this backfires. There are much better options to give to the player to let them mold their characters personality. Like moral choices, story branches, and dialogue entry. The whole covered face thing has also been done to death, but I'm not that bothered by that, since it fits nicely into the Sci-Fi atmosphere.

COMMUNITY
Putting the story aside, Halo is by far a multiplayer game at heart. It sparked party play on the Xbox with Halo: Combat Evolved. It Improved upon it greatly in Halo 2. And in Halo 3, it looks to perfect it. Even though Bungie really has no control over the online community, it's still a part of the game, like it or not. Now I thought the community was bad in Halo 1, but it only got worse. There is an insane amount of "Fanboys" in the game. They curse, they yell, they accuse, and they make the game a lot less enjoyable. It's not like these are special cases either, almost every game has one or two of these "kids" playing. Killing one will only result in the verbal abuse of you and your mother by a 12 year old. It's really a shame too. Being online without these people is great though, there is nothing to complain about when dealing with Halo's online mode. And don't get me wrong, there are plenty of people out there who can play the game in a civilized manner, but this game probably has the worst uncivilized to civilized ratio out there.

GAMEPLAY
The gameplay in halo remains the same from Halo 1 to Halo 3. There are very minor changes between each game. The addition of weapons, vehicles, and dual wielding are really the only thing that changes. You can't really blame them, it's a formula that works. But I don't think everytime a new Halo comes out, it should be revered as a masterpiece, since the gameplay is the same.

GRAPHICS
Before I get attacked, I'll say the graphics in Halo 3 are good. Especially the Spartan model. But for 360's biggest title ever... you think they would have made it stand out a bit. While it does have good graphics, there are games out there that have better graphics. Specifically the character models for the supporting characters. They just.. are not that great.

OVERALL
To finish up this winded article, I'll recap my points. While the story is good, it isn't anything amazing. The main character of the game comes off as more of a robot than a human, and is overly boring. While online is stellar, the community can make it very frustrating. Gameplay is solid but the formula is almost identical to halo 1. And while the graphics are good, I'd expect more for the 360's flagship title.

And before you go off burning me at the stake, let me remind you. I still think Halo 3 is an exceptional game. It's a great game that's just fun to play. But the whole point of this article, is to show why I think it's overrated. Overrated doesn't make it a bad game. It just means people make it out to be more than what it is. As I type this, review sites and critics everywhere are giving it near perfect scores. I think famed webcomic artist Tim Buckley of Ctrl-Alt-Del put it best when he said "But I just can't get behind this "greatest game ever" stuff. Personally, I think a lot of the review scores were given in the reviewers heads before the game even arrived, and some of the score may be attributed more to the juggernaut franchise that Halo is, and less to the actual game itself."

On that note, I'll end it. If you spent the time to read this, I greatly appreciate it. And if you want to leave a comment or message me or something, please realize that this is my opinion. I came at it from a very open-minded viewpoint. If you do choose to message/comment me in any way, please keep an open mind. At this point in my life, I don't bother replying to just flat out stupid statements.