Friday, November 12, 2004

More Halo 2

After several more hours of play, I like the single-player campaign quite a bit more than I did initially. Just like in the original Halo, the first mission seems to be, by far, the weakest mission in the game. The first mission is like an elaborate hazing ritual to lower your expectations.

I've also noticed that Bungie has done some very clever things to compensate for the inherent imprecision of aiming with the analog stick. For one, there's a weapon (not a missile or rocket) that has a homing feature. There are also several missions where you are using weapons that have a very large blast radius. That is very clever design.

One last note. I picked up the strategy guide last night and it nearly qualifies as a work of art--it should be in a museum somewhere. Very, very impressive. I usually avoid strategy guides, but I also don't like spending an hour trying to figure out if I can squeeze the tank I'm driving through a particular opening in a wall, and the strategy guide helps me forego situations like that.

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