Halo 3, Conquered

Mere hours after purchasing what some will call the biggest videogame sensation of the year, and possibly the coming year, I am pleased to announce that, in cooperation with The Boy, have conquered the game. It took us about 7 hour of straight playing, predicated by an embarrassing number of Deathmatch losses to The Boy.

We had fun, we laughed, we cried, we cussed the game numerous times. In the end, we watched the sun set on the Halo franchise.

*Update*

Following our late-into-the-night campaign to save Earth and the human existence in the universe, I began to ponder the finer details of the game along with its plot twists and turns. One advantage I have over other adults my age is the vicarious thrill of playing though a game beside a teenager, one who still possesses child-like wonder and amazement. It's kind of like how we grown-ups enjoy Christmas once more when there are kids in the house.

The other advantage I have over this teenager is that I can see so much of my own experiences in the past present in the game. For example, when I was his age, I would have never imagined I would be walking, running, jumping, and fighting my way across Larry Niven's Ringworld.

Even the ancient origins of such "halo-shaped" worlds is similar to Niven's idea of an ancient race. Granted, Niven probably never imagined his creation would serve as the foundation for a multi-million dollar virtual experience. Nonetheless, I probably grasped the concept of such a world far more readily than those teens and others who are unfamiliar with classics of SciFi literature.

The next similarity was in the main character himself. Again, reaching to the classics of the past, I saw the Master Chief character from Halo to bear a striking resemblance to one Samus, from another line of iconic videogames, Metroid.

Getting more into recent games, the Halo experience itself is obviously derived from a still-living online game experience known as Starsiege: Tribes. Like Halo, this game featured large, free-roaming environments in which to kill other players using a variety of hidden weapons, vehicles, and building advantages. Unlike Halo, however, Tribes' worlds were massive, almost to scale as large as their real life inspirations. The graphics of Tribes were never updated to even spitting distance of those from Halo, yet the game still enjoys a relatively large online following.

While this may seem to have been a review for Halo, not to mention a swipe at calling it unoriginal, my overall impression of the game is positive. It was tremendously fun and far advanced over its inspirations from the past. It gives me pause to reflect back over the beginnings of my videogame obsessions even as it makes me really wonder what lies in store for the future. No doubt, I will still be there, fighting some cosmic battle, thoroughly enjoying myself and wasting large chunks of days, plugged into a shiny box and television.