Halo: Combat Evolved – Anniversary Edition Review [XBox 360]

By Michael Atkinson / June 24, 2016

rating:3.5

10 years ago I was working at video-game store and fellow employees - friends some of them - would tell tale after tale of their 16-man gaming nights hunched in front of their Xboxes holding giant controllers celebrating the graphical appearance of grass. But no matter how good that grass looked I consistently bit back with, €œyeah, but it's not quite Goldeneye is it?€. Of course having recently plugged in my Nintendo 64 I found out that time seems to have smeared vaseline over every game I own for that console, so the release of Halo:CE€“Anniversary gives me the chance to get my nostalgia fix and play a game I enjoyed and appreciated, but never quite truly loved. I should begin by mentioning my main gripe with the original game and its subsequent sequels was always the control system. There was a floatiness to Halo that I could never master as my aiming was all over the Citadel, but coupled with moments of repetition and moments of repetition I found with these niggles that I could mask my failings with erudite whoppers. So how would I fare a decade later? Answer - exactly the same.

The controls are classic Halo as in truth they have deviated very little throughout every incarnation. The warthog has Benjamin Button disease forgetting everything it learned to do with movement, and there's to be no running in The Maw remember - how soon I forget that sprinting here is not an option. This game is exactly what you played years ago. Accompanying the control system 343 Industries have gone beyond other HD remakes and jazzed up the visuals closer to today's standards. They won't 'WOW' you like some higher end modern games but they do a great job of making the game seem relevant, and just about convincing as an entirely new game (provided you can switch off the alarms that scream its familiarity and fame). The ability to jump back to the original appearance is almost standard formula in remakes and here is no different: looking back you realise the shear amount of work that has clearly gone into this redo to not only maintain the style, but to maintain the atmosphere and spirit. Lighting in particular has seen the biggest improvement, which is typical of how the industry's technology is moving now - though at times it does seem to lack the original's sci-fi eeriness that was born both through great art design, and the limits with the technology. I also always forget how purple Halo games are...

Visuals aside the levels themselves are clones of the original, giving the player the chance to relive such gems as Silent Cartographer and such chores as Library. Nothing has been fixed here and so it shouldn't - after all, for all Halo's foibles this is part and parcel of what people loved. You will find yourself back-tracking through corridors or up mountains as Halo isn't as linear as today's shooters, which comes with both positive and negative connotations. The moments of calm help raise the intensity during firefights but can often feel tiresome, and whether or not that was originally a design choice in creating the world or it was a flaw in level design, only die-hard Halo fans will argue that it's a great thing. The musical score that accompanies Halo is at times, genius. It's the moments in between the serenity and excitement that really work, and by dulling down the score during certain battles Master Chief becomes that Superhero he was built up to be, slaughtering covenant nonchalantly as he ponders if he would be as attracted to Cortana if she was on the Atari Jaguar. But again, this calm before the storm elevates the larger firefights to something beyond what they otherwise might have been. For multiplayer, the Halo:Reach engine is ported in with 6 'original' maps and their updated cousins from sequels. Accompanying this are 'classic' game-modes with the original rules and no armour abilities as in Reach. I personally enjoyed the Reach multiplayer more than any other version of Halo and yet it turns out that I'm still terrible at it (€œIt's not Goldeneye€ shouts my misguided memory). I do wonder however if long-term fans will appreciate the subtle changes in a multiplayer which wants to incorporate more than just the original multiplayer design, particularly as this is a remaster of a game they so fondly remember.

Judging this remaster out of 5 seems oddly futile as it doesn't take into account the variables with which it should be judged, but this old warhorse of a game that meant so much to so many, not least Microsoft's gaming division, is a classic that manages to stand up one last time before it retires. It will manage to please and indulge fans of the original and it provides a good enough experience to those who enjoyed the newer games such as Reach and want to see where it all began. For how much longer I'm not sure though: it is dated, it is tired, but then, it still teaches the younger generation of shooters a thing or two.

Halo: Combat Evolved - Anniversary Edition is available to buy now.