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When Xbox launched in 2001, Halo was there to lead the march. Not only was Halo hailed as the single best Xbox shooter available, it was hailed by many as one of the best shooters ever. Halo featured varied gameplay, interesting characters, and a great story. 3 years later, Bungie has finally released the successor to their single greatest achievement ever, and the hype is out of this world. Was the hype justified? Read on.

To me, the most important part of Halo 2 is the single player campaign. Yeah, I loved the multiplayer element of Halo, but I spent my fondest memories with it in single player. Unfortunately, Bungie has failed to deliver this time. Halo 2 has a good story, one worthy of the Halo franchise, but it’s the ending that catches you. I was literally just getting really into the game, and poof, the screen goes black and credits begin to roll. Not everyone will loath Bungie for their choice of endings in Halo 2, but many will. I’m sure Bungie has a good reason for doing what they did, maybe to keep you anticipated for what is surely to be Halo 3, to keep you on the edge of your seat, leave you wanting more. In one way, it worked: I want more. The problem is, I want it now, not in 3 years, not in 3 months. Now. I don’t feel a level of anticipation for the next chapter, I feel cheated out of this one. You have to experience it to know what I mean, because I refuse to include spoilers in my review.

Now that I got my personal gripe with the game out of the way, I have to say that the bulk of my time with Halo 2 was a grand experience. The game has that same epic scale feel that Halo had, and does it with a flair unlike any other title on the market today. The entire story is filled with twists and turns, keeping you interested the whole way through. Thanks to Bungies mass level of secrecy regarding the single player story, most everything you see and experience in Halo 2 will come as a surprise. Bungie knows how to tell a story, and Halo 2 is very much so proof of that.

Unlike Halo, which took place largely in one place (that one place being Halo), Halo 2 will have you traveling over a variety of locales, none of which I can reveal to you, sadly, because it would spoil the game for you. Suffice to say though, each of the games areas are massive in scope, and beautifully detailed. One of the biggest issues Halo suffered from was the backtracking after the first half of the game was done. Not to fear, Bungie isn’t dumb enough to make the same mistake twice. Not only will you never have to go back to the same level twice in the course of the game, you’re hardly ever in 2 places that look familiar to each other. Almost every level in the game is a totally new experience from that last. This doesn’t only help the game progress better than Halo did, it keeps everything very fresh feeling from beginning to end. While the levels might be varied, one of Halo’s original problems has come back to haunt it’s successor: repetitive feeling, often confusing level design. In the first Halo, it was possible, and very frequent that you would get lost inside a level simply because the rooms and hallways looked very much alike, so you didn’t know if you were going forward or backward half the time. Unfortunately, Halo 2 suffers from the same issue, though not quite as often, or on such an extreme level. Still, seeing it was a major complaint in the original Halo, one would think Bungie would have gone to a bit of trouble to eliminate the problem from the super-sequel.

When Bungie first talked up Halo 2, they described it as Halo on fire. After countless hours of play time, I have to say that’s about as accurate a description as one could conjure up. Halo 2 is bigger than Halo in every aspect. Nearly every aspect of the gameplay has been impoved, if not perfected now, making for one of the single best experiences on Xbox to date.

Kicking off the long list of improvements is weapon selection. Halo included a nice list of weapons for players to utilize, most of which were pretty useful, with a couple small exceptions. This time, the number of weapons has increased dramatically, and some old favorites have received makeovers. I’ve been sworn to secrecy on a couple of the games weapons, but I can tell you that there’s a new share of covenant weapons to be had now, including a covenant sniper rifle, the Brute Shot, the energy sword, and an upgraded plasma rifle. Humans too, have upgraded their arsenal, though not quite as extensively. You can now go gung-ho with SMGs, which is the only real addition to the human weaponry list. Instead of adding a lot of human weapons, all the oldies are back, and with a new feel. The assault rifle now shoots in small bursts, instead of the steady rain of shots it did in the first, the pistol has been seriously downgraded, which is no longer the killing machine it once was. One of the best changes in the games arsenal is that the Needler isn’t useless anymore. In fact, you dual wield a couple Needlers, and storm a room, and boom!

Yes, dual wield. You knew it was in Halo 2, we all did. Thankfully, it’s not only handled well, it’s possibly the best system for dual wielding in any game thus far. Previously, in other games that allowed dual wielding (Perfect Dark, Goldeneye, etc) you could only dual wield 2 of the same weapon type. In Halo 2, you can dual wield any 2 one handed weapons you can get your paws on. This opens the game up to a variety of options to the player. One could dual wield plasma rifles, and blast away at a room until they both overheat, or you could use them one at a time, making a constant stream of fire, starting the next gun after the first overheats. Dual wield a couple Needlers and lay waster to a whole room of enemies, pop out a couple SMGs, a Needler and a plasma rifle, the possibilities are staggering.

Even cooler than the dual wielding capabilities (in my opinion) is the addition to the covenant energy sword as a part of your artillery. In Halo, one of the funnest things to do in the game was to bash enemies with your gun, but nothing beats the feeling of charging an entire room of Jackals and Elites and clearing them all out melee-style with an energy sword. Like previous melee moves in Halo, the energy sword is a one hit kill. The one factor that stops the energy sword from being over powered is that it, like every other gun in the game, runs out. The energy sword doesn’t have ammo per say, but rather, its energy drains with use. Your sword will start at 100 energy, and deplete as you hit things. You can’t pick up ammo for the sword, but rather can just pick up a new one with more energy if an enemy happens to drop it. In the event that you run out of sword energy, the sword disappears, and any further attacks are executed by Master Chief punching enemies, which is a nice touch.

AI for Halo 2 has been improved slightly over its predecessor. Enemy AI is now more prone to ducking for cover and using tactics to kill you instead of strafing back and forth, shooting and hoping for a hit. Your allies AI has also been improved, though they still falter in the one area that I would have really liked to work well: driving. In Halo, you always had to be the one driving the warthog, while your soldiers hopped on the artillery and passenger seat, but no more. In Halo 2, you can gun the turret while your friendly AI drives you for a change. This, as it turns out, isn’t as good in execution as in thought. Your Marine friends will constantly drive in circles, or just generally not know what the hell they’re doing, often to the point that you just get out and kick them out of the driver’s seat to do it yourself. This disappointed me, since I was really looking forward to doing some damage from the turret.

Of course, Halo 2 wouldn’t be Halo 2 without the inclusion of some new badass vehicles to strut your Spartan stuff in. In Halo, you had access to 4 vehicles: Warthog, Scorpion Tank, Ghost and Banshee. Halo 2, being the leap over it’s predecessor that it is, has a good chunk more. The unfortunate part about that is, I can’t really divulge any information on the new rides, so you’ll just have to check them out yourself. The Warthog and Scorpion Tank remain largely untouched, while the Ghost and Banshee have seen multiple changes each. The Ghost and Banshee now both feature a boost, which when activated, not only speed up your forward movement substantially, but stop you from being able to shoot. This is a fair tradeoff, since speeding up makes you a harder target to hit. The Banshee also can do evasive rolls which will help you avoid getting yourself blasted out of the sky. There are a couple variations on the Warthog this time around, but no drastic changes like the rocket launcher Warthog from Halo PC. The Scorpion Tank remains a massive beast capable of plowing through multitudes of enemies. As an added bonus, you get to use it more than once in the single player campaign!

Of course, I couldn’t move on from talking about the games vehicles if I didn’t point out the lovely art of hijacking an enemy vehicle. In either multiplayer or single player, you have the ability to steal an enemy vehicle right out from under they’re seat. Hop to the side of the vehicle, press the B button, and tah dah! You’re on board. At this point, you can opt to hurl punches at your enemy, chuck a grenade into the cockpit, or just plain whip him out of the pilot seat and take things over. It’s simple to execute, but you have to be quick on the B button, especially when jacking a Ghost, or likewise fast moving vehicle. This is probably one of the most significant changes in the game, especially when factoring in the sheer level of depth it adds to the games multiplayer mode.

Unfortunately, I have to add, the one area Halo 2 doesn’t improve upon Halo is length. There was once a point where Bungie promised us a game that was probably twice the length of the original Halo. The game we got, while amazing, is only roughly 10-15 hours through. This is a very disappointing length as far as I’m concerned. I guess though, Bungie put the most effort into creating a phenomenal online experience, instead of a lengthy single player campaign.

The single player campaign of Halo 2 is an amazing experience, yes, but you’ll be hitting up Halo 2 on Xbox Live ages after the single player game has worn thin. Simply put, Halo 2 offers the single most complete Live experience available anywhere. Bungie has redefined what Xbox Live should be. Have you poured countless hours into Halo’s multiplayer mode over XBC? With friends split screen? You’ve seen nothing yet. Say good bye to your life: Halo 2’s multiplayer owns you.

Halo 2 permits 2-16 players via Xbox Live spanned over 11 multiplayer maps to start you off. The levels all range very nicely in size and style to make it very clear that certain maps are made for small skirmishes for groups of 4-6 while others are created for all out chaotic 12-16 battles. The levels themselves are varied in look and locale, much like the maps from the original Halo were, offering up a fresh experience with each new map. With Bungie’s promise of new downloadable maps in the future, you just might be playing Halo 2 well beyond any other game in your collection.

They say the devil is in the details, and Halo 2 is a devilish beast indeed. Just like Halo, Halo 2 has a vast array of customizable options, even more so now than the original had. In every one of the games multiplayer modes, you’ll be able to customize near every detail of play to your personal specifications. Starting weapons, vehicles, time settings, available weapons, all can be changed with a couple simple clicks. Some of the options even have sub-options, which means even deeper customization than you thought there’d be in the first place.

You can even choose your race this time around. In the original Halo, you were just a Spartan soldier, period. Not anymore. Now, you can choose to be a Spartan, or Covenant Elite. You still get to choose your armor color, but now you can choose your under-armor color, background and foreground colors, outline colors, etc. The level of control you have over your characters appearance is staggering.

Most of Halo 2’s multiplayer match-types come straight from the first Halo: Slayer, King of the Hill, CTF, Oddball, etc. but now there are a couple additions, such as Assault, where the objective is to plant a bomb in the enemy base and then protect the bomb carrier. There’s also King of the Hill, but with multiple hills to conquer, that change throughout the match. There isn’t a stale match in the bunch, though most gamers will find at least one mode they’re not overly fond of. Personally though, there’s good times to be had in any of the modes with the right crowd of players. Games like Slayer and CTF are made far more frantic than they ever once were with the additions of dual wielding and vehicle jacking. Good times, good times.

Clans are likely to play a key role in Halo 2’s multiplayer success. Clans can be created with as many as 100 players, but you can only ever belong to one clan at a time. The founder of the clan can recruit staff, members and peons, each title providing different abilities and privileges within the clan. Your clan is ranked and tracked over the retooled Bungie.net website, and are all welcome to their own homepage, forum and so much more. Of course, when you have a clan, you want to go out and waste other clans, and so you shall. Clan matches will up your rank, and are separate from your individual ranking system. You can challenge clans for large scale battles or small ones, depending on how many members will be available on either side.

In Halo 2, multiplayer is broken up into Matchmade Games, which are tracked and ranked by Bungie, and help raise your ranking (for the competitive hardcore player) and Arranged Games, which aren’t (for the gamer who just wants to have fun). This means that the hardcore super gamers won’t be cheating they’re way up the ranking system by laying waste to new players, and new players don’t have to worry about becoming dinner. This is an excellent system that I think needs to be included in every online game.

Since the initial footage, it was remarkably clear that Halo 2 was destined to become the single best looking Xbox game ever released. Well, here we are, and yes it is. The entire game is nothing short of a visual masterpiece. Each and every item, character and vehicle is modeled with the utmost attention to detail. Normal mapping is the real highlight of the games visuals, making everyone and everything so much more realistic looking, especially the Chief himself. Animations are smooth and believable, and facial animations are a huge step up from what we saw in Halo. Unfortunately, there are some issues in the games visuals that distract from its overall beauty. In a lot of the games cut scenes, you will witness some pop up issues, and some texture problems. While these aren’t huge complaints, they are rather distracting, and hold back an otherwise brilliant visual execution.

Halo 2’s audio is also an excellent work in itself. Just like the original Halo, all your Marine buddies have numerous quips to say during the game, as do the Covenant. All the voice acting, in game or during cut scenes is excellently done, and extremely well presented. None of the games lines feel forced, and often add a lot of personality to the games characters. The games soundtrack is a masterful piece of work that stands out as one of the better sets seen in gaming lately. There’s a healthy mix of orchestra and guitar lending itself to the action on the screen at any given time. Much like every other aspect of Halo 2, it’s bigger, better and badder than what we saw in the original.

The first thing I did after watching the ending credits to Halo 2 was start it over again on the next difficulty setting. I just can’t stop. Between the excellent (albeit slightly short) single player campaign, and the masterpiece of Xbox Live gaming that is the games multiplayer mode, I’m hooked. I may have a couple gripes with the game on a personal level, but even they can’t deter me from saying, simply: Halo 2 is the single best experience any gamer can have on their Xbox.