Disappointing campaign, but amazing online multiplayer.
The Downs: Unbalanced weapon collection; poor campaign mode.
The Bottom Line: Play it for the multiplayer. Ignore the story mode.
------
PLOT/STORY: Who cares? Nobody plays this game for its campaign. Honestly, I played it through two, maybe three times total. Storylines are always a little hard to follow in FPS's, and Halo 2 is no exception. Between the Elite rebellion, the flood (and Gravemind), and everything else that's going on, it's hard to pay attention, and I found myself waiting for the end of each cutscene so I could keep shooting stuff.
GAMEPLAY: Campaign mode's gameplay was decent, at best. There was a noticeable lack of variety as far as environment and combat situations. It would have been nice to have a few more objectives besides "kill everything in this room."
CONTROLS/COMBAT: Nothing really to report there. You move, shoot, and throw grenades. There's really no bright side or dark side to the control set-up. The combat is similar to HCE's, save the removal of the health meter and health packs.
MUSIC/SOUND: I think the game really excells in this department. Halo 2 has an amazing soundtrack, rivalling even the music used in its predecessor. The sounds of all the different weapons, enemeies, and vehicles were very creative and sometimes funny.
MULTIPLAYER: It's no secret that Halo 2's multiplayer is the best part about the game. Bungie added the ability to dual wield the hand-held weapons, making for several interesting weapon combinations, each useful in its own way depending on the map. The weapon system is a little unbalanced with the addition of the energy sword, which has an unlimited amount of energy and can lunge the Master Chief obscenely far. An auto-target ability was also implemented, making it extremely easy for even the novice sniper to land a killing head-shot. Each player is skilled in his own way, however, and the more skilled players will find it fairly easy to work around this minor unbalance. This game focused a little bit more on teamwork than the first installment did; with no health bar, it is very easy to get overwhelmed and killed if you are by yourself. The level system was an innovative idea, but it's very difficult to move through. Though a player can reach a maximum level of 50, it is very difficult for even skilled gamers to get past level 30, and those who have done so probably (and unfortunately) cheated to get there. This was slowed down by the occasional patch from Bungie, but was never completely eradicated.
All in all, the frequent addition of new content as well as the endless variety of opponents make Halo 2 a spectacular multiplayer experience.