Halo War-ing
I’ve never been one to hunker down and play a RTS (Real Time Strategy) game. Mostly because I enjoy actually playing video games and I’m also not allergic to natural sunlight. But I’m a huge tool who enjoys the Halo series, and I may or may not become giddy when I see Spartans on the cover of a game. Those fuckers piqued my interest, hooked me and opened my goddamned wallet. I’m such a loser.
I am a very stupid individual. This comes from years of playing videogames, I imagine. This is one of the reasons why I assume RTS games have completely bewildered me as a genre. I could never really get into them. That’s not to say I haven’t tried to get in on this genre before. I’ve played a good number of them, Command & Conquer, Starcraft, Age of Empires, and more recently Company of Heroes. Aside from just name-dropping, I’m letting you know that these games kicked my ass. After CoH, I kept my distance from the genre, assuming from that point on, RTS stuff wasn’t for me. Then I started hearing about a new Halo game…
I feel like the crew here on the Internauts are part of a small group of people who are fans of the Halo story, rather than just the multiplayer experience. This probably means we’re nerds (and by “probably” I actually mean “definitely”). Not to say I’m above tea bagging 9 year olds X-Box Live, but I’m pretty sure I finished the campaign before jumping into Matchmaking. That being said, I was only slightly interested in Halo Wars, it was a RTS after all.
The cut scenes in Halo Wars look phenomenal, giving a genuinely cinematic feeling. Unfortunately, the gameplay graphics suffer a bit. Most of the game looks great, but when you’re in the heat of an epic battle, every so often you’ll get clipping, slowdown or graphic hiccups. None of this is ever a big enough issue to hinder gameplay or ruin your experience.
I can’t help but stress how awesome some of the cut scenes are in this game. I have a hard time considering the events of an RTS as being epic, or even investing myself into the genre at all. The cut scenes in Halo Wars, oddly enough, helped keep me invested in the actual game. Even if you don’t buy or rent the game, I want you to go on Youtube and find the FMV that happens before the final level. Halo fan or not, you won’t be able to deny how badass it is.
As interested in the game as I might have been, I was apprehensive about the online multiplayer experience. Halo is a series that is heavily built upon a foundation of amazing multiplayer experiences, and this was completely against the “norm” in that respect. The first few matches I played on launch day were actually really entertaining, and fun. I have never played an online match in a RTS game that I can classify as fun. Halo Wars also has a co-op mode for the story campaign, so I went back through and played the game with another person. In doing so, I was able to find way more shit that was just scattered across the maps (skulls, energy, etc.). The downside to playing the game like this is how quickly you’ll find yourself completing missions; the game really just becomes a breeze to complete, lacking the difficulty curve that should be expected.
The game seems to be very streamlined in comparison to other RTS games, and this leads to a lot of the issues people have with it. A lot of people seem to be either completely against this “dumbed-down” RTS game, or against the fact that it’s on a console. This really shouldn’t be such an issue, considering the fact that it is an incredibly decent game, one that was handled by a company other than Bungie, and it was handled really well. This streamlined style helped me not be completely turned off by the gameplay. I didn’t feel ostracized, or made to feel like an asshole because I hadn’t spent my life playing games in the genre. It was a welcoming experience; one that actually made me want to play other RTS games, and invest more time into titles I had previously attempted. Sure, the Halo story hooked my interest, but the gameplay ensured that I pressed on and was able to finish the game (even when being brutally raped without lubricant in online matches).
Halo Wars isn’t a completely traditional RTS game. People complain that it’s too easy, that the mechanics are dumbed down, but it could prove to be the gateway drug into other RTS games. I found the game incredibly endearing, leaving me wanting to get strung out on other titles in the genre. I can obviously recommend the game to Halo nerds (not so much the fanboys who were expecting another FPS), but I’d also recommend this game to anyone who has had negative experiences with RTS games in the past… This might be exactly what you need to give the genre another shot.
