Sticking up for the ODST

Halo 3 ODST copped a pretty bad wrap because of its crippling lack of PvP multiplayer and that firefight mode lacked depth. Some have even said that the one thing the game has, its storyline, was shocking. I reckon it is the best game in the series after Halo 1.

Lets look at its weakest point. The lack of a more traditional multiplayer. It appears to me that Bungie were trying something new. Instead of having people trying to kill each other you would have people work together toward a common goal. Yeah its a good way of uniting the community but in reality its just the campaign without any discernable plot besides the Earth is being invaded by aliens and your job is to holdout as long as you can. Oh wait, that is the storyline. A developer can never fully satisfy the whole community with a sequel but in order to make future games better sometimes you've got to make mistakes. Still, firefight mode made it into Halo Reach and really complemented Halos traditional deathmatch.

The selling point of Halo ODST was the campaign. It was a simple story that had you as an ODST exploring New Mombasa to discover what had happened to the rest of your squad. While the exploration between levels felt like the game buying itself time it did mean you could play the game in any order you wanted to. That being said the side story of the girl who would argue with the superintendent (the A.I for the city. Yes she was arguing with the city itself) did inspire me to explore the city and discover all its secrets.

Without a doubt the music in this game is the best by a mile. The smooth jazz gave the whole game a noir feel set in a sci-fi universe. Plus it added to the game and didn't distract you from it. I'm a huge jazz fan so to see it appear in a game automatically earns it points because it is a genre hardly used by games but one that has a lot to offer them.

All in all the game put the superman like powers of master chief aside and gave players a challenge. One that I had not seen since Halo 1. For a game that was originally intended to be an add on to Halo 3 it has done incredibly well.

Till next week, peace.