Halo Reach is Bungie's last Halo game before they leave Microsoft Game Studios, and head off to Activision, so its fair to say, this is bungie's final attempt at creating the greatest Halo game after many previous attempts over the last 10 years.
Halo Reach uses a complete new physics engine, rebuilt from scratch, this is clearly visible throughout the entire game, with amazing vista's to refined detail close up.
We'll start with the campaign, you play as Noble Six, a new recruit into the Noble Team, you join them just as the day starts when Noble teams orders are to investigate a disturbance, which soon leads to a discovery that an Alien race are sent on a mission to destroy the planet Reach.
You play the storyline in which Noble Teams hard efforts to repel the enemy invasion fail, and as hardcore fans on the Halo Universe know, reach is destroyed.
But what is interesting is following the storyline.
While Bungie have a reputation for making life difficult in understanding their storyline, the story is pretty basic in this one, so they do a good job of character building throughout the first half of the game, completing a couple missions with sol members of the team, and you start to feel connected to a couple of major characters, then the deaths come.
The first death is indeed a sad moment as you watch one of your team members sacrifice themselves thinking they've saved Reach, only to see to see thousand of enemy space ships appear.
From there the inevitable deaths of the other characters are someone quick and meaning-less almost feeling you have been robbed, this is a shame as they are some of the best characters you'll meet and they're just killed off almost simultaneously.
As you'll notice when playing Halo Reach is how serious this Halo addition is compared to Halo 3 or Halo ODST, this is reflected in Martin O'Donnels music.
The soundtrack throughout is one on passion and meaning, some of the tracks really drag you into the game and in-captivate you.
The game has some incredible sounds, from the sound of a plasma pistol to the bombshell of the MAC blasts, and with Dolby Digital DTS 5.1 HD surround sound the game really can make you living room feel as though its in a epic adventure.
With Voice acting from Hakeem Kae-Kazim (24, Pirates Of The Caribbean: At Worlds End, Lost) Aisha Tyler (24, Friends, Bedtime Stories) the characters really come alive, they are various accents, which is good as these are characters that are from various planets, the only problem is Kat's accent, sometimes you don't understand what shes saying.
This is the most complete Halo adventure available on sale, with competative multiplayer and great co-op there are various game modes avaiable.
With Halo 3, although it had great competitive multiplayer, the only co-opperative mode was the campaign, which after a few play through got very repetitive.
Halo 3 ODST had a great mode called Firefight but this wasn't available in matchmaking, so you could only play with friends or recently played with people, this really restricted that amount of Firefight that was used, as a result, this has been improved in Halo Reach, matchmaking firefight is a great addition, meeting 3 friends in a lobby and fighting waves of enemies is great, as you can see different players tactics.
Halo Reach keeps the great competitive multiplayer that Halo 2 and 3 had made perfect in the previous series, with basic deathmatches to fun game modes like Oddball, with various different maps both large scale and small, there are hours of fun to be had.
Not only are you given these great game modes, you've also got Forge this is a mode where you can create your own maps from scratch.
this give players unrestricted creativity to create new and innovative maps that can be complex and fun.
Halo Reach also has a experience system that is integrated into Mutiplayer, Campaign, Forge, Firefight and Co-op. every match or level you play you gain experience, which can be exchanged for difference armor, helmets, voices and perks, so you can completely customize your Spartan, which is viewed in all game modes.
Halo Reach really is the defined "Halo" experience, with hours of fun, a great story, an overall package that has brought back the Halo faith to its players, who had lost faith with the release of the disastrous Halo 3 ODST.
Halo Reach is a game that all Xbox 360 must play.
Graphics 10/10
Audio 10/10
Soundtrack 10/10
AI 8/10
Story 9/10
Total 94% (A*) Outstanding
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