Occam Thoughts: Halo: Reach Edition

Halo: Reach has arrived. Thus far, I have beaten the campaign solo on heroic and spent more than a few hours playing multiplayer matches with the 360 FNF crew. Here are some of my thoughts.

-The campaign was about what I expected. The storyline was mostly forgettable and more of an excuse to get to the next big set piece than really resonate emotionally with the player. Though the big guy, Jorge, grew on me and had a bit of character development. I kept trying to take his chain gun though. Chain guns are so rad. There was one moment, a dramatic scene that I imagine was supposed to be sad where I stood up off the couch, wiped the cheetos dust off my shirt and danced with glee. This thing happened that I have been waiting for since the first mission. It was nice when it did. It was long overdue but very satisfying. The story they tell is fine for what it is and really, Halo is more about killing than it is paying attention to why you are killing. I don't need to have an emotional connection to a female Spartan in pink armor (that's me!) to beat a grunt to death with a rifle. The act in and of itself is satisfying enough.



-The multiplayer is a hoot. Nice variety of maps and game types though if I have to play Infection one more damn time I will sigh loudly and passive aggressively make snide comments. I don't understand why people love that game type so much. It seems boring to me, or at least not as fun as good ol' Slayer or even Invasion. Also, the two on two matches are ace. Give those a shot.



-I haven't tried the Forge yet. I fear I will get lost in it and just try to recreate one of Georgia O'Keefe's vagina flower paintings as a level and no one will want to play it. Though kudos to Bungie for giving the community such an extensive tool set to play with.

-You can level up and gain new ranks which unlocks new gear for your character to wear. Most of it is ok looking, nothing special but there is an armor effect that makes it look like lightning is shooting out of your head. I want this badly. Unfortunately it costs 2,000,000 credits. So I'll put that on my wish list, alongside my mech suit and the guitar Jimi Hendrix played at Woodstock.



-I like the new armor abilities. Sprint is the go-to and very useful. The bubble shield has a womb-like effect for me. Armor lock is flashy and can take out an over enthusiastic Banshee as garethxxgod showed me and the active camo makes me feel like a Predator in ways that Chris Hansen could only dream of. But then there's the jet pack. I am.....torn about this. I see the jet pack as the Halo equivalent of when frat boys wear those sunglasses with the rubber bands on them so they don't fall off their neck.

Side note: Why? Even as someone who appreciates fashion accessories in all their various forms and functions, I don't understand those.

-So yeah, the jet pack. As an armor ability, I can see the benefit of wanting to get to a better sniping vantage point but in attempting to do so, you become a giant, dumb looking target in the sky which I (and more than a few others) will gladly sacrifice a life in order to take out. Now I have danced with the devil and tried out the jet pack a few times and I can say it is.....pleasant in an Adam Sandler buddy comedy sense. I found myself yelling out JETPACK every time I activated it which may have more to do with me being emotionally around twelve years old than any sort of gameplay enhancer. So it's dumb fun but not particularly useful, like a clown prostitute outside a Mormon temple. Also, the people I see using the jet pack actively tend to have screen names like 420Kid or xxKAOSchildxx which leads me to believe they are, in fact, human garbage. Now I know every jet pack user isn't human garbage but if you have a gamertag like JUggAloDaWg and use the jet pack, I'm going to go ahead and label you a bad person.



-Halo: Reach has added assassination moves. Sneak up behind someone and you can break their neck, stab them in the head, run them through with the sword or, my absolute favorite, stab them in the dick. They are awesome, ridiculous and totally pisses off the recipient. They are comparable to the infamous chainsaw kills from the Gears of War series. Fellow Dtoider and the Anakin to my Obi-Wan of Star Wars slash fic, mrandydixon and I have a thing for those chainsaw kills. And by "thing" I mean it makes our souls wet. Blood, viscera, screams, mechanical noises....it's all so intoxicating and pleasurable that we go out of our way to make them happen. So the assassinations in Halo: Reach, though definitely harder to pull off, are just as rewarding. Plus, as I said earlier, you can stab someone in the dick. Dick stab. Dick. Stab. That's appeals to the inner Occam in a way that words cannot do justice.



-I would like to take a brief moment in this rambling mess to thank the 360 FNF crew. Without you guys I would not be enjoying the stabbing of dicks and comradery that I get to look forward to just about every night online. To anyone out there who thinks online gaming isn't their gig, I implore you to give it a shot. As a former gaming hermit, I understand the disdain at trying to play online what with the legions of mouth breathing fuck wads that populate most games with an online component. However, all you need are some great, like-minded people who all have phone sex voices and it can open a whole new world for you as a gamer and as a person. I can't ever imagine going back to my hermit ways having played with these guys.

So those are my thoughts. Thanks for reading and have a lovely day.