Halo: Combat Evolved

Halo: Combat Evolved

Xbox - USA - 1st edition.

Developer Bungie Studios, Gearbox Software, Westlake Interactive Publisher Microsoft, MacSoft Published 2001-11-15 Platforms Macintosh, Windows, Xbox, Xbox 360 Genres Action, First-person shooter, Shooter Themes Military, Science fiction Series Halo Multiplayer Simultaneous co-op, Simultaneous teams, Simultaneous versus Distribution Commercial

Halo: Combat Evolved is a first-person shooter developed by Bungie Studios and published by Microsoft as an Xbox exclusive on 2001-11-15. It was ported to Windows by Gearbox Software and Macintosh by Westlake Interactive, both in 2003, and remastered for the Anniversary Edition in 2011 for Xbox 360 and Windows. It is the first in the the Halo series and was followed up by Halo 2.

You play as Master Chief, a cybernetically enhanced Super Soldier from Earth who is at war with an alien race called the Covenant. Your goal is to prevent then from infiltrating a massive artificial ring-shaped planet called Halo.

Personal

Own?	Yes. On Steam in the Halo: The Master Chief Collection.
Won?	Yes. Windows HD remaster port. Normal difficulty.
Finished	2025-03-10.

I didn't play Halo when it was popular, as I didn't have any of the sixth generation consoles or any desire to play their games. I saw a few screenshots online and thought Red vs. Blue was hilarious, but that was about all I knew about the game. I think I played Halo 3 in deathmatch briefly in the late 2000s, but I didn't like it. It wasn't until the Master Chief Collection was sold in a a cheap bundle that I decided to buy the game. After finishing Halo: Reach, I waited several months before wanting to tackle another Halo game. This one took me quite a while to finish because I became bored halfway through and only played in half-hour installments.

Review

6	7	6	7	6

Best Version: Windows - Anniversary Edition

Good

• Having the tutorial be part of the thawing sequence was a good idea, as was entering you into the action as soon as possible.
• By limiting ammo, it requires the player to frequently swap out their weapon with the Covenant. This was a great idea because it forces the player to try the game's different weapons and not fixate on one. Well, until the Flood is released anyway.
• There are a nice assortment of claustrophobic corridors and wide open outdoors areas.
• Cortana is an enjoyable sidekick, and 343 Guilty Spark is an interesting character.
• I like how, if you kill an alien while it's shooting, it will shoot off a few random shots as it collapses. There are also nice ragdoll physics for when an explosion happens near a corpse, and it's cool how dropped grenades can be detonated with a nearby explosion.
• The controls for driving the Warthog are very refined, and the Ghost is pretty good as well.
• The enemy AI is pretty good. They seek cover, try to flank you, and even dive out of your way when you're trying to run them over.
• The double zoom on the sniper rifle is wonderful.
• I like how ammo is displayed on various weapons and you can see targets through the rifle scope even when not aiming.
• The Flood is a nice a creepy enemy.
• The ending sequence with its ticking clock and jumping over explosions is right out of a Michael Bay movie.
• Adding multiplayer and deathmatch really adds to the replay value.

Bad

• I would prefer a better use of checkpoints. I found that several times, when I died, I didn't restart at the cusp of a big battle, but needed to blast through some grunts and re-listen to the same dialogue over again, which I didn't like.
• I wish there were a way to increase the volume of just the dialogue. I sometimes had a hard time hearing it over the other sounds.
• I don't like how your fellow marines would often abandon you to progress alone even when they had no reason to not accompany you.
• I don't like that you reset to a specific load-out at the start of new chapters. I would end one with an assault rifle and shotgun, only to start the next one with Covenant weapons when I didn't have access to them. It kind of hurt immersion.
• The Flood really drags on. The only safe way I could find to deal with them was to slowly inch your way through the station killing them as they pop up, which takes a long time since the section is so long. You're just clearing out the same repeating map several times. I also couldn't hear most of what Spark was saying due to all the shooting I had to do to stay alive. Also, After Doom and Half-Life, space zombies was becoming a bit old hat.
• Occasionally, items would get stuck in the floor and make a loud crashing noise as the engine repeatedly tried and failed to eject them.
• In the beginning, ambushes are created by having well-placed enemies or relying on their clever AI. Later in the game, with the Flood, enemies just start magically appearing in tunnels and rooms that you've already cleared out with no other exits, which is a cheap way of creating an ambush.
• The Banshee is not easy or intuitive to fly.
• I would sometimes drive right through enemies in a warthog only to have it do nothing to them.

Ugly

• The game reuses the same maps far too often. Infiltrating the Covenant control room requires you to go through similar arenas several times, forwards and then backwards later in the game, then across similar bridges, also forwards and backwards. The repeating maps in the Halo/Flood section are even worse as they're all essentially the same for about an hour of play. The game changes up the enemies a little for variety in these maps, but it's not nearly enough.

Media

Cover Art

• 

  Windows - USA.

• 

  Xbox - USA.

• 

  Xbox - Japan.

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  Xbox 360 - USA.

Documentation

• 

  Manual - Windows - USA.

• 

  Manual - Xbox - USA.

Videos

Trailer - Xbox.

Longplay - Xbox.

Longplay - Windows - Anniversary Edition.

Representation

Strong female character?	Pass	Cortana is a pretty impressive sidekick, and is very capable.
Bechdel test?	Pass	Cortana talks with the pilot of the Foe Hammer.
Strong person of color character?	Fail	The pilot of the Foe Hammer is black, but she isn't that strong.
Queer character?	Fail	There are no queer characters.

Links

           

• halopedia.org/Halo:_Combat_Evolved - Halopedia.