Well, biased or not, the following are my thoughts.
I have been hearing the preaching about how awesome Halo was for some 3 years now, but I never had the chance to experience it. Hell, I haven't even touched the X-Box yet! And without a good computer system I couldn't satisfy my curiosity with the PC version either. That was the case until the previous year when I bought my computer. Anyway, I started playing Halo as well as finishing it this year. My thoughts: Overrated. I don't know how standard or not of a fare were the additions Halo brought at that time (AI, 2 weapons, melee attacks, vehicles) but simply speaking I was bored to death by the game. The problem with Halo was that while it had good bases on it, it didn't expand on them greatly. It was an ugly mixture of the good and the bad. Its graphics were good for its age, the music was good, the voice-acting fine, the story interesting and the above mentioned additions also good, but alas, the bad were also not things that you can easily ignore. Horribly repetitive level design. How many times did I feel deja-vu? I don't know. How many times have I passed that circular room? How much gray have I seen? But it wasn't just the level design that was repetitive. It was also both the combat and the situations repeated. Every once in a while predictable combat with the hillariously English voiced Covenant troopers or the swarming encounters with the Flood. The encounters weren't particularly difficult and the fact that there were many of them didn't help wash the bore from them. Or of course how can someone forget the totally infamous and unbelievably hated repetition that was suffered when that stupid Monitor took you along and you had to repeat the same thing four times! The only spots that I didn't feel bored to death or reluctant to do were the first 2-3 stages and the final stage, where the game, at least IMO, really kicks off! Just imagine the whole game filled with the energy from the last level. Then it would really be awesome! Of course, that would be difficult but never mind. I must admit that I may be a bit unfair considering that I have experienced the awesomeness of both F.E.A.R. and Far Cry beforehand (Strangely enough I haven't played Half-Life yet, but I'm considering the possibility of buying the special package containing all the Half-Lifes including the 2nd Episode when it is released). And these are my thoughts of Halo: Combat Evolved.
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