Seven years later, Halo 3 is still the best Halo campaign

Can't remember how many times I've played through the Halo 3 campaign. I'll probably play through it again tonight.

My favorite campaign of all time.
 
gollumsluvslave said:
For all the folks saying the CE is 'nostalgia' or rose tinted or whatever, I only recently went through a full run of all Halo games after completing Halo 4 on Legendary, in order - played OG Xbox CE, Halo 2, Halo 3, ODST, then Halo CE Anniversary, Halo 4 again, then Reach.

I've played CE through on legendary more times than I can count and it NEVER gets old, just perfection for me.

However, I'll be interested to see how things stack up with the new MCC collection.

Best thing I liked about Halo 3 was the introduction of campaign scoring, and I really missed that in Halo 4.

One thing I'd emphasise again is something another poster noted - there is a big difference in the series when played via co-op as opposed to solo. Iwould probably have to agree that Halo 3 and Reach become much better propositions when played in co-op, as opposed to solo. ODST is the opposite, it's whole feel and vibe is perfect for solo play.

So to reiterate:-

Solo Campaigns

Halo CE > Halo 3: ODST > Halo3 | Halo 4 > Halo Reach > Halo 2

Co-Op Campaigns

Halo 3 > Halo Reach > Halo CE > Halo 2 > Halo 4 | Halo 3: ODST
(not played much co-op in Halo 4 and ODST)

I'll leave multiplayer to the folks that are more qualified to chime in!
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Yep, that would be me.

Of this though, we are certainly agreed. :-D
 
IJoel said:
How about the below scenario on Legendary? :D

tsavo_hwy_legendary1.jpg
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You can walk up this...hill and on top find a sniper that really helps with that encounter. It's so great.
 
Something I really enjoyed in Halo 3 was Master Chief being alone for 90% of the game, Cortana not being around adds a lot of time for introspection after combat. Halo 3 on legendary is really neat thematically. All friendly AI usually gets killed, piles of grunts and brutes, but Chief will survive. Seeing bodies littered around after every battle, I felt like a mystical creature that deals death and destruction, something that will never falter.

Halo 3 also has the best combat settings and environments, a mix of close quarters brawling and open, long range firefights. Halo 3 has the best set piece battles in the series. Fighting 5 invisible brutes, fighting hammer bros brutes, fighting off choppers with rockets in the desert, any scarab battle. The entire game is mixed up when it comes to confrontations and what you do in those confrontations.
 
GOAT Halo campaign.

H3>Reach>ODST>CE>H2>H4

The padding and re-used levels in CE have made that game age pretty badly imo. CE Anniversary shattered my memories of that game
 
MormaPope said:
Something I really enjoyed in Halo 3 was Master Chief being alone for 90% of the game, Cortana not being around adds a lot of time for introspection after combat. Halo 3 on legendary is really neat thematically. All friendly AI usually gets killed, piles of grunts and brutes, but Chief will survive. Seeing bodies littered around after every battle, I felt like a mystical creature that deals death and destruction, something that will never falter.

Halo 3 also has the best combat settings and environments, a mix of close quarters brawling and open, long range firefights. Halo 3 has the best set piece battles in the series. Fighting 5 invisible brutes, fighting hammer bros brutes, fighting off choppers with rockets in the desert, any scarab battle. The entire game is mixed up when it comes to confrontations and what you do in those confrontations.
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Going on foot, the game gave you so many ways to take out the vehicles without even hopping in one. Not getting in a vehicle for Tsavo Highway, The Storm, The Ark, and The Covenant is an entirely different experience and rewarding in their own right.
 
Dabanton said:
Same here.

'The Silent Cartographer' is still one of my fave stages ever.
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That's my favourite level in a Halo game as well, the problem is that every other level is super bland and cookie-cutter.

Every time I want to play Halo CE I play The Silent Cartographer and once that's finished I lose interest real fast.
 
It's close between Halo 1 and 3, but I give the nod to 3 just because it doesn't have that fucking library level.

There are some awfully goofy moments in Halo 3 though. I still cringe whenever someone references that cutscene where a soldier asks Commander Lady-dude where the troops should head and she says "to war" (cue drums and dramatic fade to black).
 
Halo 3 is the 2nd best campaign after Combat Evolved.

Not sure why this is.

Halo 3 has way more environmental variety, enemy types & lare more epic set pieces than Halo 1 ever had.
 
I just got to the final level/stage of Halo 3.

I guess the best rule of thumb for the entire series is "fuck the Flood levels". I've yet to play one in three games that wasn't a complete fucking chore to play.
 
industrian said:
I just got to the final level/stage of Halo 3.

I guess the best rule of thumb for the entire series is "fuck the Flood levels". I've yet to play one in three games that wasn't a complete fucking chore to play.
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Halo CE, Guilty Spark and Keyes on Legendary, Library if you are up to it. They aren't a chore on Legendary, just extremely intense and challenging. Plasma weapons, Pistol and the Shotgun are required.
 
Sorry I thought Reach, ODST and CE have far better campaigns.

In fact I barely put Halo 3 above Halo 2 in terms of single player. It had some good set pieces but I thought it was a repetitive ugly mess.
 
Halo Reach was way better. And H3 isn't the most overhyped game ever. That still goes to HL2. Then Zelda OOT, then Diablo3 or Starcraft 2.

I played H3 once then never again.
 
Ya know, people shit on the Library, but I think Keyes has got to be the low point in Halo CE, if not the whole damn Bungie Halo series. That level is straight TRASH, yo
 
ViewtifulJC said:
Ya know, people shit on the Library, but I think Keyes has got to be the low point in Halo CE, if not the whole damn Bungie Halo series. That level is straight TRASH, yo
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Play it on Legendary, it's batshit insane, Platinum Elites throw Plasma Grenades like Peyton Manning. There is no bad level in Halo CE in my opinion, AI and gameplay mechanics overcome any flaws in Mission or Level design. Especially on Heroic and Legendary.
 
I never understood peoples beef with the Flood, was it because they were used too much and became a tired trope? Granted I only started playing Halo in the 360 era with 3, ODST, Reach and 4 but I kinda like the enemy type. Splodgy, zombie symbiote aliens with shotguns and other guns attached to them and then the creepy bag enemies that would burst with spiders inside straight up Dead Space style. I always liked their music too, that intense thumping alarm.
 
I really didn't like how the Brutes were the main enemy in the game. I just found them to be not as fun as the Elites. There were still some classic encounters in the game though.
 
RazielCuts said:
I never understood peoples beef with the Flood, was it because they were used too much and became a tired trope? Granted I only started playing Halo in the 360 era with 3, ODST, Reach and 4 but I kinda like the enemy type. Splodgy, zombie symbiote aliens with shotguns and other guns attached to them and then the creepy bag enemies that would burst with spiders inside straight up Dead Space style. I always liked their music too, that intense thumping alarm.
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Flood aren't too bad to fight, they are just a form of Zombies, enemy onslaughts can be fun, and tiring. No Halo game has overused them, but in Halo CE they were the most fun to fight because of the weapons and mechanics available to the player.
Hindle said:
I really didn't like how the Brutes were the main enemy in the game. I just found them to be not as fun as the Elites. There were still some classic encounters in the game though.
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Elites are always the better, and more interesting adversary compared to Brutes. They have similar AI patterns, but the shield mechanic and AI response of the Elite is way more interesting in combat compared to Brutes. I don't understand why Bungie made Brutes their de facto enemy in Halo 3, beside story beats. Halo CE and the first 2/3 of Halo 2 displayed the brilliance of Elites as Master Chief's primary adversary.
 
Booshka said:
Flood aren't too bad to fight, they are just a form of Zombies, enemy onslaughts can be fun, and tiring. No Halo game has overused them, but in Halo CE they were the most fun to fight because of the weapons and mechanics available to the player.

Elites are always the better, and more interesting adversary compared to Brutes. They have similar AI patterns, but the shield mechanic and AI response of the Elite is way more interesting in combat compared to Brutes. I don't understand why Bungie made Brutes their de facto enemy in Halo 3, beside story beats. Halo CE and the first 2/3 of Halo 2 displayed the brilliance of Elites as Master Chief's primary adversary.
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Pretty much yea. It's strange that in 12 years, Bungie or 343 have never came up with a new alien race thats as fun as the Elites to fight. The Prometheans were just dire, and the Brutes whilst ok, are no way near as iconic as the Elites.
 
Hindle said:
Pretty much yea. It's strange that in 12 years, Bungie or 343 have never came up with a new alien race thats as fun as the Elites to fight. The Prometheans were just dire, and the Brutes whilst ok, are no way near as iconic as the Elites.
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The Elites in Halo 4 were tragically stupid and inept compared to CE and Reach. A major reason why CE and Reach are my favorite Halo games is because Elites are handled so well. They are the best Halo enemy by far and those two games treat them like the formidable, dynamic and challenging enemy that they are.
 
Insaniac said:
agreed. It's vehicle sections are what make the campaign the most enjoyable for me
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I think we can all agree it has the best vehicle sections in the series.

ODST and Halo 4 had some good ones, too.
Yes, I said something positive about Halo 4!
 
Honestly always found the Elites a bit overrated when people put their 1/2 versions on a pedestal. They're cool and all, but I never felt threaten by any of them unless they're invisible fuckers with the swords or the Reach variants that are really fast and slick dodges, especially the White ones.
 
Booshka said:
Play it on Legendary, it's batshit insane, Platinum Elites throw Plasma Grenades like Peyton Manning. There is no bad level in Halo CE in my opinion, AI and gameplay mechanics overcome any flaws in Mission or Level design. Especially on Heroic and Legendary.
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Yep. Heroic was my fav. Just hard enough to be a challenge but not enough to be a chore. On heroic difficulty i could be a pistol slinging fool. Loved the pistol so much. Man i miss it.
 
JdFoX187 said:
Halo: Combat Evolved shits on it from the highest mountain. Halo 3 had the most disappointing campaigns of the Bungie entrees. There were just so many things that were bad all around.

1) Brutes were just not fun to fight. Sorry, but Elites were night and day better. Their ability to use the world around them to their advantage -- especially in Combat Evolved -- is still unparalleled in the later Halo games. Everyone hypes the Brutes' use of equipment, but it devolved into nothing more than one throwing a bubble shield or a regen down while fighting. That was about as fun as it was in multiplayer -- i.e. absolutely fucking horrible. Occasionally, one would throw a flare down. Great, I just got blinded by an AI. Fun! Their AI and tactics were rudimentary. They had no personality, at all. They were just bland, straight down to popping their armor with a few shots and sending them into the predictable rage mode. They were better than in Halo 2, but that's not saying a whole lot.

2) The story was fucking awful. Remember that epic cutscene at the end of the game? Bungie promising FINALLY, we will have the invasion of Earth that was promised in Halo 2? All that "glorious" battle happens off-screen. We're left with yet another couple missions through Earth and then jump back into a ship and go across the galaxy -- again. Something, something, new Halo ring being built, must destroy Ark. Cortana's rampant state and her "deal" with Gravemind at the end of Halo 2 are glossed over and dropped. The Gravemind itself is essentially an afterthought, aside from those awful moments in The Storm, where your player slowed to an absolute crawl while voices played through the game. Real good idea with that one.

3) The character assassination was unforgivable. The Arbiter is the single BEST character in the series. He's better than Chief, he's better than Cortana, he's better than the walking stereotype that is Sgt. Johnson. Yet he's relegated to a one liner to start the game, a few choice comments throughout the campaign and a cutscene at the end. What happened to his arc that began in Halo 2? He was a fleshed out, believable and sympathetic character relegated to the token sidekick in Halo 3.

The Prophet of Truth was even worse. For one, you swap out the amazing voice acting of Michael Wincott in Halo 2 and replace him with the most phoned in performance from Terrance Stamp -- eclipsed only seven years later by Peter Dinklage in Destiny. The Prophet goes from being a conniving, manipulative character who may or may not believe the religious babble he's spouting in Halo 2, to being a complete raving religious zealot loon in Halo 3, only to be killed in the most anti-climatic way.

4. Cortana. Do we really need to say anything else about this level? People love to shit on Library in Halo: Combat Evolved or sniper alley in Outskirts in Halo 2, but NONE of that reaches the stupendously awful levels that is Cortana. This is the 10th circle of hell, just without the frozen wastes. Let's design a level with the ugliest art throughout the entire game -- which is really bad considering Crow's Nest and the awful human environments are ever present. Let's turn this into one giant circle of death and offer few landmarks to actually guide players through it. Let's then populate it with Flood. And not just the mildly annoying type that make some of us reminisce of Serious Sam. No, let's add in juggernauts and little fuckers that crawl on the walls and ceilings and shoot barbs at us. And let's take a page out of Call of Duty's playbook and add in infinite spawning. No. No game, no matter how high the highs are, can ever be considered the best in its series when it has a level like this.

5. The Scarab battles are vastly overrated. Granted, they are better than the travesty of Halo 2, but that's not saying a whole lot. Sure, they look really fucking cool when you first engage one. You've got marines flying around on Mongeese shooting rockets, you've got Covenant on Ghosts zipping about and you've got this giant fucking robot you somehow have to bring down. And then after that five seconds of awe passes, you realize how ridiculously simple it is to take them out. Shoot the legs, climb on board, shoot the ass, it's over. That's it. That's the most shallow "boss" fight I'd played up to some of the garbage in "Destiny." At least they had the common sense back then not to fill it with a ridiculous amount of hit points.

I could go on. There's the awful Ghost and Mongeese run at the end, which tries to pay homage to the superior Maw run in Combat Evolved, but just becomes more of an exercise in frustration and futility. There's the awful waste of space that is Johnson's character -- including that cringe-worthy ending and "boss fight" with Guilty Spark. There's the HORRIBLE character models -- looking at you Lord Hood -- that are somehow worse looking than Halo 2. There's nothing in the game that has the highs of battling through Assault on the Control Room or attacking the beach in Silent Cartographer in Combat Evolved. There's none of the awe or mystery of Halo in Combat Evolved. There's not even the big story payoff promised in Halo 2. It's just not good. It was three years of hype built up to this amazing payoff that fell flatter than The Dark Knight Rises.
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I agree with so much of this. You even nailed Bungie on their ridiculous mishandling of the Prophet of Truth's character and voice actors.

Vooduu said:
Out of all of them, I liked Halo 4 and CE the best.

Yes I said it, Halo 4. Come rape me GAF.
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Classy.
 
shinobi602 said:
Still Combat Evolved for me.
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Yep, it was the best in every regard. I preferred the weight that the Master Chief had, the brutality of the weapons, the health bar and medkits. The changes brought forth in Halo 2, outside of online play, were horrible. Everything after Halo 1 stopped being Halo for me.
 
I just beat it again last night, and I pretty much agree that its still a great game that's withstood the test of time so far.

Pros: Excellent gameplay and sci-fi elements. Bungie and Microsoft rocked it.

Cons: Soldiers constantly yelling "Woo hoo! This is why I signed up!" as they get slaughtered. Also, the last level was one level too much. It was a poorly executed thowback to the final level in Combat Evolved. It was pure bullshit.
 
industrian said:
I just got to the final level/stage of Halo 3.

I guess the best rule of thumb for the entire series is "fuck the Flood levels". I've yet to play one in three games that wasn't a complete fucking chore to play.
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This is why Reach is the best Halo. :D

And also Nobel 6 > Mastur Cheef
 
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