Everyone has played at least one game of Halo. If you somehow avoided doing this, you either lived in a cave off the coast of Madagascar at the turn of the millennium, or you are a dog. Halo redefined the modern first-person shooter, of course, and pretty much served as the game everybody talked about for, oh, around two years after it was released - that is, until Halo 2. The original Halo game combined a brilliant narrative with excellent gameplay, poising players as resilient hero Master Chief, whose stoic sensibilities made crushing evil alien forces all the more fun. Also: driving Banshees and Warthogs. There were tons of sequels and spin-offs, of course, but Combat Evolved marks the definitive experience.
Sam Hill is an ardent cinephile and has been writing about film professionally since 2008. He harbours a particular fondness for western and sci-fi movies.
