Halo: Reach

If you’re expecting Halo: Reach to be a revolutionary and unpredictable game – one which completely abandons the Halo formula, building it up again from scratch and standing as something so unique and original that even the most ardent series haters would be able to love it – well, then you’d be wrong. Reach is still Halo, and very much the Halo that we all know and either love or hate. It doesn’t reinvent the wheel. It never boldly goes where no Spartan has gone before.

Instead, Reach iterates. Subtly, delicately and above all else ingeniously, it takes what the series has been doing since its thunderous debut, and tweaks it, tunes it and adjusts it. The changes might not be earth-shattering, but they’re never less than significant. In short, Reach is Halo: Combat Evolved Even Further. Series fans will find it to be pleasantly and instantly familiar, but with enough fresh touches and additions to reel them in all over again. Non-believers will probably not have their minds changed, but Reach is loaded with enough new tricks to make it worth a second look, and as a prequel to the other Halo games, it’s also an excellent place for series newcomers to start.

The campaign – which is more or less the same length as those of previous games – sees you fill the armour of the latest, unnamed addition to a six-strong team of Spartans known as Noble Team, investigating a rebel insurgence on planet Reach. When this turns out to actually be a full-on Covenant attack, your character and his comrades battle through increasingly unfavourable odds to try and salvage the planet. The story has a distinctly sombre tone this time around; anyone who knows anything about the Halo mythos will know how this tale ends. But this more serious pitch does not prevent Reach from having the same sharp writing as earlier entries, even when the plot is a mostly standard, clichéd fare. Halo is never going to be gaming’s War and Peace, but it just might be its Star Wars, and Reach’s simple but involving narrative is testament to this even when some scenes which are intended to be heavily emotional fall a little flat.

It’s impossible to discuss Halo without talking about its weapons, the quality of which has always been one of the series’ hallmarks. Reach is no exception. Your old favourites are all here, but not in exactly the same way you remember them. The iconic assault rifle feels more accurate and powerful than it has before, with a more pronounced sense of weight to it. The battle rifle replacement, now called the DMR, received a similar treatment, and the magnum pistol is once again the hard-hitting powerhouse that it was in the very first game. The arsenal has been expanded to include a host of new toys (the needle rifle and focus rifle are particularly wonderful), and despite the even greater diversity in weapons, the trademark Halo near-perfect balance has been maintained, with no weapon being either under- or over-powered.

Going hand-in-hand with the weaponry are the armour abilities, possibly Reach’s most significant contribution to the franchise. Granting your Spartan some cool new tricks – jetpacks! invulnerability! sprinting! – the armour abilities add a whole new element to the gameplay. Halo’s campaigns have always been best when throwing the player into small-scale sandboxes restrained by as little scripting as possible, letting them use the tools at their disposal to allow their own individual set-pieces to emerge. This is why Halo 3’s Theatre mode (which is back again, thankfully) was such an inspired feature, as two players seldom experience the exact same action sequence during the same stretch of campaign. The armour abilities multiply this degree of individuality, producing an even broader scope for players to etch out their own playing style. It’s not dissimilar to the class-based systems of other games, but is a more dynamic and fluid implementation of the same base idea.

With this being their last Halo game, Bungie clearly focused on the series’ strengths when putting the campaign together. Corridor crawling is kept to a bare minimum, with the larger and more open, free-flowing clashes being the order of the day. Battles also tend to be bigger, and simply feel more visceral and frenetic than in previous games.

These more intense skirmishes are partly the consequence of the new and improved graphics engine. The visuals represent perhaps Reach’s most noticeable improvement over earlier games. While better graphics were certainly expected – it’s been three years since Halo 3, after all – Reach’s engine looks to be the result of an almost generational leap from that used in its two current-gen predecessors. Not only have the resolution and draw distance been upped, but the amount of detail and visual effects visible on screen at any given time will stun any Halo 3 player. Going beyond mere eye candy, it allows for more enemies to be on screen at once. It all tends to run extremely well, too. Sure, there are a few slight stutters in the frame rate, but these are far between and never constitute a problem.

All this improved technology wouldn’t have meant much if it weren’t for Reach’s stunning artistic design. In a genre often criticised for its overuse of greys and browns, Halo’s brighter, more colourful palette has always made for a very distinctive look. This is still the case, but planet Reach is especially pretty; its gorgeous, sweeping vistas provide the most beautiful environments yet seen in the series. Few developers are able to pull off truly epic presentation to the extent that Bungie does, with the team still masterfully employing camera angles and audio design to deliver one cinematic moment after another.

It’s also great to see Reach borrow from its underwhelming (by series standards) forebear, ODST. If there’s one thing which that game did absolutely right, it was setting a mood, and Bungie has built on and refined this in Reach. Some campaign sections are incredibly atmospheric, constructing a powerful ambiance from both the beautiful visuals and the moving score, which is yet again a collage of orchestral arrangements, electronica and choral performances. You will want to purchase the soundtrack too.

Of course, ODST’s other memorable contribution to the franchise was the cooperative Firefight mode. It’s back again, but Reach’s implementation is a decidedly fuller, better experience. Individual game types set to the Firefight template provide more variety to the mode, and its appeal has definitely been expanded through matchmaking support.

Speaking of matchmaking, multiplayer is ultimately where you expect to spend the majority of your Halo time. Reach’s online design is a rather major overhaul of Halo 3’s, with the game types and ranking systems markedly revamped. Tying in with Firefight’s move to more variety, matchmaking in a playlist now presents players with several different game types, allowing you to vote for the one you’d like to play. Any given playlist feels like an altogether more engaging affair than before, as it’s not just the same thing over and over again. The most popular game types of earlier entries have all been included, but the armour abilities have empowered Reach to not only spruce up old favourites, but birth new and exciting types as well. Regardless of your tastes, you’re bound to find plenty to love when tackling Reach’s online components. And with all bases covered, this embodies Halo’s best multiplayer experience yet.

The only negative to Reach’s online side is that the map selection can at first feel a little meagre, packing just eight base maps along with several variations on Forge World (more on this later). But even this ceases to be a problem once it becomes clear how masterfully crafted each of the maps are, with their intricate design lending itself beautifully and naturally to a host of different game types.

Besides, if you miss the older games’ maps, you could probably just remake them. Reach takes Halo 3’s Forge mode and vastly extends it, allowing you more tools and options in building your own creations. At the heart of this lies Forge World, a massive stretch of varied terrain on which you can construct your maps. Even so soon after release, the number of quality, player-made maps in circulation is impressive, with some recreations of older fan favourites already appearing.

Perfectly complementing Forge mode is the general degree of customizability that comes with the Reach experience. As with Halo 3, you’re provided with the tools to create the ideal game type and multiplayer experience for you and your friends – even in Firefight – and share these creations with others. But the depth to which you can tailor each game has been increased considerably. You’re also given far more options in customising the look of your Spartan, unlocking even more by gaining experience in the online modes and completing the daily- and weekly challenges set by Bungie, all of which add additional, fun goals to strive for and help boost the game’s longevity.

This dizzying set of customisation options and features perhaps constitute Bungie’s final, biggest gift to Halo fans. Reach is already a great package now, packed to bursting point with rich features, near-faultless design and some of the finest gameplay in the business. But it would be naive to imagine that it’s already fulfilling its potential. Bungie’s ambitions with the game were vast, and are on full display in the final result, but the game’s long-term value and relevance will ultimately be defined and extended by the players tinkering away in the virtual workshop left for them, outfitting Spartans, tweaking game types and churning out new map designs. As such, Halo: Reach is one game whose grasp might just exceed its reach.

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