If you’re one of those gamers looking to resolve your Halo craving then you should look no further to Microsoft’s upcoming real-time strategy game, Halo Wars. Based prior to the start of Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo Wars tells the story of Forge, Captain Cutter and Anders as they unravel the secret plans of the Covenant that threaten the ever existence of humanity. Along the course of your journey to discover what the Covenant are up to while running into Brutes, the Elites, and several other Covenant species ready to die for their cause. Of course, you should expect a few surprises along the way such as the Flood showing their dirty faces and a few heroes lending their strength to either side. Having played through the entire game from start to finish, we are glad to be bringing you full hands-on impressions of one of Microsoft’s most important releases in the early months of 2009.
So what should diehard Halo fans expect from Halo Wars? Well first off, the obvious is that this isn’t a first-person shooter. You’ll be granted the ability to see a whole map (with the usual fog of war) as you select your units and build up your bases. Rather than building anywhere you want in the game, gamers only have the ability to build upon select base sites. What this boils down to is that you can’t naturally fortify and garrison your units like you could in the Age of Empires series. But then again, Halo Wars is designed from the ground up for the consoles. Catered to action fans, Halo Wars won’t disappoint gamers who need non-stop action to keep their attention rather sitting at their base for 30 to 40 minutes building up a fortress. One single game of Halo Wars could literally last only 10 minutes if you decide to rush your opponent before they could build up a good defense.
As mentioned earlier, the storyline focuses on new human heroes as they face the wrath of the Covenant. If you’ve grown tired of bald space marines, you won’t be happy to hear that Halo Wars has its own resident bald hero that looks eerily similar to Captain Shepard from Mass Effect. On top of that, Forge, our main hero of Halo Wars, spits out clichéd line after clichéd line that I was wishing the Master Chief would enter the foray to save the graphically gorgeous cinematic scenes. But alas, Forge receives the spotlight and the Master Chief is nowhere to be seen. Luckily, there are a handful of named Spartans (such as Alice) showing their beautiful mugs as heroes on the battlefield and they have the unique ability to “jack” any vehicle and turn it into the UNSC side of the battle.
The storyline will take anywhere from seven to ten hours to beat the fifteen missions provided. There are four difficulty levels to choose from along with skulls and secret boxes to find on every map. While the replay value of the single-player isn’t extremely high since the strategies of victory aren’t as complex as normal PC real-time strategy titles, Halo Wars still has a small portion of longevity if gamers never go online and play against human opponents. Majority of the time, I would incorporate supply buildings at all of my base slots outside of a barracks and a reactor, then rush the opponent with the units as soon as I could. Normally this attack was effective, even on the Heroic difficulty level.
Speaking about the online portion, Halo Wars utilizes matchmaking for up to six players to play against each other in 3 vs. 3 matches. If you’re not into competitive multiplayer, players are eligible to join in co-op matches with friends or strangers to complete the storyline together. Over the course of the upcoming week, the developers will be playing online against the media so our impressions for the online multiplayer will only become clearer as we continue to try out the features Ensemble Studios has implemented.
Lastly, it’s safe to say that RTS players won’t have to fear horrible implementation of controls. Easily accessible and a cinch to master, the controls are among the best features in Halo Wars. Players have a wide arrange of controls that allows players to zip across the map in a matter of seconds to work on your bases, advance your units, setting rally points and much more. From the D-Pad controls of flip-flopping between your bases, going to your armies and calling in leader powers to pressing the A Button to select a certain amount of units, Halo Wars sports one of the most user-friendly control schemes on the Xbox 360 for a RTS. After seeing the amazing cinematic scenes and finishing the storyline, we can’t wait to see how gamers react when the game hits store shelves on March 3. Our full review will be live in a few weeks so stay tuned to our coverage of Halo Wars over the course of the month. For now we need this preview to silence all the haters out there, Halo Wars is just that good.
