I know a lot of people were upset when Halo ODST's price was announced. I thought $60 was way too much for what Bungie was calling an expansion back at TGS 08. After seeing everything that ODST had to offer so far from my meeting with Bungie, I think the price is actually justifiable.
ODST takes place between the events of Halo 2 and Halo 3 and the main character you play as is the new recruit to the ODST team. The Oribital Drop Shock Troopers are sent in to deal with a Covenant threat but things don't go according to plan.
Hit the break for more.
Before all this takes place, there's a cutscene with the ODST soldiers and I'm pretty sure it's the longest intro cutscene the Halos has ever had. This is a great sign to me as the last two Halo games really lacked a detailed plot and ODST could be rich in story. Here's hoping anyway.
The main character you play as is the Rookie who gets knocked out for six hours after crash landing. His part of the game is about exploration and mystery. He's trying to figure out what's happened to the city and his teammates since the time he was knocked out. The Rookie will find clues and that will trigger a flash back cutting to one of the Rookie's ODST squad mates.
Playing as other ODST members will take place during the day and the gameplay focus shifts to the action/combat style most players are familiar with from Halo 3. You'll play as every single ODST member during the campaign in these flashbacks sequences.
As an ODST, you have to change up how you play Halo. You don't have an energy shield, you have to find health packs to heal and you even take fall damage now. You're not a super solider, you're a regular human and you can't be all gun-ho like the Master Chief.
It was interesting watching the Rookie take on Grunts and Brutes. The demoer would engage the Covenant, back off, and then reengage them. Again, you're just a human. You can get hurt easily so you have to be smart about how you take enemies on. But not that smart -- there seemed to be plenty of health stations around the destroyed African city.
ODST has two new weapons coming with it, one pistol and one machine gun. They're both silenced weapons and they both seem stronger than the pistol and machine gun from Halo 3. The pistol, in fact, was taking out Brutes with just one head shot after their shields were depleted.
Another big change with ODST is its non-linear focus. Pressing the back button brings up a real time map of one of the largest environments Bungie has ever created for a Halo game. There are multiple paths all around the city and multiple points of interest for the player to explore. Players can set down waypoints on the map and an indicator on the ODST's compass will show him which direction to go to get to his target. The city's AI will also try to be helpful and light up signs pointing the player to where he needs to go as well as telling him that there's danger ahead.
One final thing to note is just how amazing ODST looks. It's hard to believe that this is actually the same engine from Halo 3. They've had plenty of time to mess around with the engine and it really shows in ODST.
Check back a little later today for a look at Halo ODST's Firefight game mode. In the mean time, how's ODST sounding to you so far?
Contest:
4:00 PM on 06.05.2009
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Seeing how there is nightvision goggles in the singleplayer campaign in the video demo. I wonder if there will be night modes in multiplayer matches? Or heck maybe there will be maps with dynamic lighting where the map will be bright and sunny one moment and complete darkness another couple of minutes.
Wasnt this game like 4-hour long.
You said the price is justified, but after reading your article. I can sum it up with;
1. Longest intro cutscene
2. Play as different squad members through the game
3. Youre not a super solider
4. Open-ended huge map offering non-linear gameplay
5. Two New Weapons
6. Visuals polished
I'm not really sure how those come to $60 full retail game. I'd expect half of those. So seems like a pretty strong expansion. But just that. An Expansion.
Aziz Light!
The structure sounds a lot like Eternal Darkness, which is a good thing.
I find the story of ODST is really appealing. The whole solving a mystery aspect is pretty cool, even if I don't like the disjointed nature of "playing flashbacks through another's eyes" thing.
Also, wow has the "Horde Mode" become the gimmick of 2009 or what? It's appearing in everything now. Its a good feature though.
I think there's price justification because of comments like those from AngryJoeShow. Even though its just the cost of a frankly expensive hobby, its good to have insight on what's actually in the box.
tgammet: I felt the need to justify because this was originally assumed to be something very minor in terms of content. Most people were expecting $40. This game needs to be justified in terms of pricing because of that.
It looks like a lot of fun too.
Not entirely relevant but something which crossed my mind.
No health regen?
If this is true, im now sold.
Deus Ex is a supremely better series than Half-Life and Halo though. Both of the latter two games are WAY too scripted and boring the 2nd play-through. Deus Ex has tons of a replay value with multiple endings and alternative paths. HL and Halo? Not so much.
I hate Halo and HL fanboys pretty much equally, but the elitism on the PC side is a little sickening.
So its sorta more like Halo 1 style, rather than just non recharging health and thats it.
While quite removed from being a fanboy and believing everyone is entitled to their opinion, yours is wrong.
Half-Life is not underrated while Half-Life 2 elevated the series quite a bit. Can you say the same for Deus-Ex? While the first is - maybe was, I dont think it's aged well - one of my favourite games, the second is pretty crap. Just because a game has multiple paths and endings doesn't make it good, just by the same token that if a game is linear it doesn't automatically make it bad. That's a pretty narrow mindset to have, I can think of a lot of non-linear games that suck big time.