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"The Five Best Things About Halo 3
Over the last three weeks, we've been tasked with bringing a slew of information and finding different ways to present it. All of the information we've dug up, we dredged in a single day spent at Bungie's studio. What's best about the pre-alpha version of Halo 3 that we played?
The MAC6 Assault Rifle:
From the Halo 3 announcement trailer, we saw Master Chief carrying a new(ish) weapon. Like we've detailed previously, the revised assault rifle is the new starting weapon in Halo 3. Here's what we said:
With the MA5C Assault Rifle, the clip-size has been drastically reduced from 60 to 32, and as a trade-off, the weapon's accuracy at long-range has been increased.
The revamped assault rifle is a near-perfect addition to the Halo repertoire. As a starting weapon it is perfectly utilitarian -- it's the intersection where balance meets functionality. In fact, the MA5C is so functional, it relegates weapons like the Battle Rifle to non-essential status in player equips on a given map. Sure, if you can get to a Battle Rifle it's still worth picking up, but the mid-short range functionality of the Assault Rifle outclasses the BR in several respects.
More than just reducing the importance of the Battle Rifle, the Assault Rifle also minimizes the importance of dual-wielding because it allows players to be competitive from the moment they spawn, until the moment they are waiting to respawn. When the playing field is leveled across the core weapon sets, like with the Assault Rifle, it allows the power weapons to truly shine in multiplayer play. Unfortunately, the only "power weapon" we've toyed with is the brand new anti-personnel and anti-vehicle shoulder-mounted Death Star, the Spartan Laser.
Described as an anti-vehicle weapon, the Spartan laser fires a small red "sighting" laser to spot your target. While that laser is pointing, the shoulder mounted monstrosity charges for three seconds, red energy collecting in a swirling orb before ejecting a stream of certain death.
On Valhalla, the wielder of the Spartan Laser controls the map -- at least with the weapon set that was appearing on the version of the map we played. The team that controls the laser most consistently stops Mongooses as they skip across the map and Warthogs as they hum by toting flag runners.
Compared with a weapon like the Rocket Launcher -- its lower-tech cousin -- the Spartan Laser fits right in to the Haloverse. Visually, its art style matches the other weapons and it brings a more focused functionality to the Halo weapon sandbox. Because of its sniper-like functionality and vehicle decimating prowess, the Spartan Laser is a bit of a hybrid among the weapon sets. Unlike the Sniper Rifle, though, the Spartan Laser is held back from being totally imbalanced and broken (hey, Energy Sword) because of its small clip size. In the build we played, the Spartan Laser fired four times before the clip was empty.
Controller Evolved:
The nervous stares that greeted us when we arrived at Bungie were due, in part, to the changes Bungie is making to the Halo 3 control scheme.
Reload has been remapped off of the X-button and onto the respective bumpers. When dual-wielding, RB reloads the right weapon while LB reloads the left weapon. Similarly, RB replaces the X-button as the action button. Boarding vehicles, picking up weapons, everything the X-button used to do is now done on RB. At first, this change felt a bit iffy. There were a handful of times early in the day when I was gunned down while standing over a sniper rifle mashing X to pick it up.
After stumbling around like a newb, the controls started to stick. Having the reload right near the trigger frees up key real estate on the Xbox controller. With reload and fire being fingered by the index finger (in a classic control scheme) players can still look using the right stick, while reloading. Topically, this may seem like a small change, but it will lead to more flexibility in what players can accomplish in the midst of battle.
Bungie has freed up the X button on the controller for an unannounced feature that may appear in Halo 3 -- this build is a pre-Alpha build and it is entirely possible that the feature could ultimately be scrapped (but we doubt it will disappear). Bungie staffer Brian Jarrard said that the guys didn't even have to "activate their X buttons" to beat us in the next-gen Humpday Challenge -- what kind of feature would you activate?
The Highest Ground:
While it lacks the novelty of Snowbound's shield doors or the pleasant familiarity of Valhalla's sprawling symmetry, if High Ground is setting the standards for Halo 3's maps, we're all in for a treat next year.
Smaller than H2's Zanzibar, High Ground offers some of the same mechanics: A base, a gate to open, multiple entrance points -- and while not on the version of the map we played, an armory's worth of weaponry for both the assaulting and defending teams. Frank O'Connor and Brian Jarrard detailed some of the new stuff on High Ground since we saw it last month on a recent 1UP Network podcast. Now, in addition to the Spike Rifles, Spike Grenades and Sniper Rifle on the map, Bungie has added a Spartan Laser to the base-team configuration. In a cave along the left side of the map (approaching from the beach), they've added a Rocket Launcher -- and there's a Sword (now with depleting energy) in the small tube inside the base. Apparently, the new, non-terrible single-wieldable Needler is on the map, as well.
With the Sword, Rocket Launcher, Sniper Rifle and Spartan Laser on a map built for 8-10 players, there's a load of weapons to keep cycling through depending on where you are and the situation you're facing on the map. We haven't really seen weapon options or the need to constantly switch weapons like this in a Halo multiplayer experience before. In past Halos, there's been a particular weapon setup that works best and the game centered on acquiring those -- in Halo 3, that doesn't seem to be the case.
Matchmaking Remade:
If you missed out on our Q&A with Bungie about Halo 3's matchmaking service you might have missed on what's best about Halo 3, period.
Changes like the call sign system, where players will have a self-chose identification number for their Spartan, instead of an image of a golden bee (think "L75") are examples of the little touches Bungie is adding into their matchmaking and online experience in Halo 3.
One of the biggest problems with Halo 2's matchmaking system was that it didn't have a similar functionality for Custom games. If players wanted to play a particular map or a custom gametype and couldn't get enough people in the room, there was no way for players to find that game. It segregated Custom Games and Matchmade games, completely. In Halo 3, that's changing. While Matchmaking and Custom games are still completely separate (ranks will only increase in the confines of Bungie's matchmaking service), for players who just want to play Custom Games, Bungie has created XBL Public.
XBL Public is where players can advertise their custom games and then players will be able to seek out modes, maps and gametypes. If a player is looking for a Team Slayer match on High Ground, he'll be able to find the ones that are available and they'll be sorted by how good the connection to the match will be.
There's a two-fold ranking system in Halo 3's matchmaking. One is fueled by Skill and the other by Experience. Ranking up via Skill will advance your profile through a fictional UNSC (or possibly Covenant) military ranking system. Ranks like Private, Sergeant will be attained based on the skill ranking. However, while a rank like Sergeant may require a level 20 in Matchmaking, the next level rank might mean players have to reach level 30 -- what happens if they can't? Well, that's where the Experience ranking system comes into play. The more games you play the further through the Sergeant tree your rank will move. Your progression in the Experience tree might move from Sergeant to First Sergeant to Master Sergeant -- those changes will be reflected in your rank. There are two forms of progression now to (hopefully) discourage cheating.
Halo 3 is Closer Than You Think:
Bungie's announcement of a public multiplayer beta for Halo 3 is something we haven't seen in the console space before (public beta testing is far more prominent in PC gaming). The beta is currently scheduled for Spring 2007. What this means is that before you know it, you'll be playing Halo 3 in some form on your Xbox 360. And what will you be playing? We don't know for sure, but it's safe to say that it will be more polished, refined and tuned than what we played at Bungie in October.
There's still no official word on how you'll acquire the beta, but Microsoft's recent implementation of downloading HD movies that leave your hard drive after a certain amount of time could be a hint at how the beta experience will unfold. Could the beta be a timed download that lasts for a month before it self erases like the HD movies? Could it be distributed on a game disc (that'd be a way to boost a title's sales, wouldn't it?)? Will it just be a microtransaction on the Xbox Live Marketplace? Right now, we don't know. What we do know is that a few months from now, we'll be reading your impressions of Halo 3."
http://www.1up.com/do/previewPage?cId=3155479
:: The 5 best things about Halo 3 :: 
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