Halo: Reach Member Review for the Xbox360

The Good: Best Halo multiplayer suite to date, more outdoor environments, co-op campaign, good ending to the campaign

The Bad: Armory is a gimmick, campaign is highly recycled, doesn't look up to par, enough Halo already

Halo. That word is loved and hated by many, but Halo did help define the FPS genre and FPS multiplayer for consoles. If it weren't for Halo we wouldn't have regenerating health, or solid FPS multiplayer, but Reach perfects the Halo multiplayer in many ways, but before we get there let's dive into the single player campaign.

Reach has you playing as the generic Noble 6 who is part of other numbered Noble team members. You can create your character this time around, and swap out different armor parts, but you have to advance your rank and earn credits through multiplayer and playing the campaign. This is more of a gimmick and doesn't do anything than to add filler to the already bloated series. After the disappointing ODST we get another campaign with more nobodies instead of Master Chief. The game is set before the first one so you are experiencing the first contact with the Covenant. You are just hopping around Reach trying to save the planet only to realize you can't, and then you have to  use desperate measures to save the human race, but the story doesn't get interesting until the final cut scene (surprised?) and it's a shocker.

The game is pretty much another recycling of the same Covenant aliens with better graphics. The same grunts, elites, brutes, and even vehicles; you name it. Is it ever exciting? Maybe in the very beginning because it's been awhile since the last Halo, but after the first couple chapters you just want the game to end already. The game just adds everything we've seen since 2001, and even takes away dual wielding which is good or bad depending on how you look at it. There are maybe one or two new weapons and vehicles, but everything's been recycled so much I can't tell! They couldn't even add an iron sight option since the left trigger is no longer used for a second weapon? C'mon!

Other than that the mission structure is the same kill this wave, press this button, defend this place, backtrack and re-kill Covenant that suddenly appeared again. It goes on for ten chapters! There are a couple of space flight missions that are kind of fun, but it's not enough to keep you from yawning on the rehashed crap. Sure the campaign is solid and challenging, but it's not as spectacular as say Halo 2. At least the flood are absent which is a Godsend!

But after slogging through the campaign you're going to come back for multiplayer right? Right. Which is the best the series has with tons of modes and playlists, and all the modes we've grown to love and a mix of favorite maps from past Halo campaigns. I'm not a Halo multiplayer vet so I can't tell you every tiny change, but I know enough that saving every match, sharing with friends, picking through their highlights, and so on is a lot of fun, and the Forge mode has been re-done to be a little more intuitive, but it's still no LittleBigPlanet, or say, TimeSplitters. The new daily challenges are the biggest incentive to come back since they advance your rank. They change daily and are a lot of fun to aim for, but the only thing you can do is unlock stuff in the armory with this, and that's not too exciting on it's own, but it's better than nothing.

Reach is also the best looking game, but it still doesn't look up to par, and this is sad being Microsoft's flagship series. The game looks good technically, but artistically it's kind of bland, but there a lot more open environments, and not too many indoor ones, so it's a lot more to look at this time around. All the same sounds are recycled as well, so you know what to expect in that department. With a so-so story, characters you can't get attached to, and a great mutliplayer suite, maybe Reach should have been multiplayer only? Sure, no one would miss the campaign, but it's there. If you want to play through it again go online and play it co-op even if you have to, or try the hardest difficulty. Actually scratch that it's almost impossible.