Halo 3: The Most Overhyped Game Since Killzone

I have played video games since the Atari 2600, and one thing that always irks me when it comes to game reviews or previews is how much the media overhypes certain games and praises them for innovation or originality that never occurred. A perfect example is the Halo series and Halo 3. I was one of the lucky ones to play the multiplayer beta and although I had fun, it was not innovative. Halo is not known for its “engaging” storyline, because much like most everything else in Halo, it was ripped straight from games that had come before it such as Unreal, Unreal Tournament, and Half-life. Halo is played mostly for its multiplayer capabilities, which by this time at its third iteration and supposed conclusion, should bring something new and fresh to the multiplayer scene. By that, I mean new player modes. I have been playing Capture the Flag, Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, and Capture Point matches since Quake and the First Unreal Tournament. It’s time for developers to sit down and actually become creative instead of repackaging the same crap with new eye candy and more worthless weapons.

Fanboys will scream that Halo was original in that it had vehicles when in fact Unreal Tournament was the first game with vehicle created by user modifications back in 1999. The only reason Halo received such fanfare was because unlike PCs which have a small user base and minimal advertisements, Halo was a console game backed by the biggest software company in the U.S., Microsoft. They had more than enough marketing dollars to hype the game up to consumers and pay off reviewers. I have played the other two Halo iterations and although fun online, after a few levels in the single player, I was bored of the tedium of levels that looked too similar and the boring storyline. The graphics in the beta weren’t great, but Bungie claims they will be better in the final version.

From what I have seen in the beta and screenshots, the game does not have stunning visuals like Gears of War, Assassin’s Creed, or Bioshock. Personally, I don’t expect Bioshock graphics just because the amount of enemies in Halo 3 will degrade performance tremendously for those kind of graphics, but I do expect at least Gears of War graphics. Now for the final conclusion, they are marketing specially painted XBOX 360 systems, which are basically a glorified Premium Console, which doesn’t even include the game, and a Legendary Edition game package that includes a ridiculous helmet replica and some behind the scenes DVD. It looks like now game studios are trying to make up for mediocre games by offering bonus content for a higher price. We shall see in a few weeks if Halo 3 lives up to the hype or remains as another mediocre game for a studio known for cranking out crap similar to movie studios creating movie tie-in games that are well known for being garbage.

High sales of crappy games do not equal success; it equals great marketing for crap and a lot of suckers. Luckily, I pre-ordered enough copies to sell on EBay to pay for this game and many others, so that I don’t feel guilty later for buying possible crap. I will post a full review when I get it in my hands the same day as most who pre-ordered. Hopefully, some studio out there will create a multiplayer game that will innovate and cause the FPS to change again, because it has been almost 10 years since the last real innovation (Unreal Tournament 1999), and too much mediocrity at premium prices exist.