Wow reading the reviews for Halo 3: ODST was a dizzying feat. Scores were all over the board. You can really tell who the Bungie Fan Boys are, and you can tell who tried to prove a point. Well thank god I don’t give ratings. Because it would be really hard to rate this game. By now, unless you are still under your rock, you know that Halo 3 ODST is expansion to the Halo 3 series released as a stand alone “full price” title. Of the two discs Disc One includes campaign mode, co-op campaign, and firefight. While disc two is a repack of all of Halo 3’s multiplayer, all existing DLC plus Mythic. So thats a helluva lot of content in the game right? Well it is and it isn’t. It’s no Orange Box but it is alot. My main gripe with ODST is the price. I already paid for all the map packs, and these extra three will probably get little if any play time. With Modern Warfare and other games coming down the pipe a two year old multiplayer experience is not something I am looking to spend copious amounts of time playing. Three new maps is not rekindling any flames for me in any way. So my Halo ODST experience will be limited to the campaign and Firefight game modes. I know this is not the case for everyone, but even then can you justify the price of ODST? Well the simple answer to this is yes, if you are a Halo fan.

ODST does some things well, the campaign is rather magical. Bungie went in a new direction with the campaign and showed the range of the Halo Universe. Something I have been wanting to see, and had expected more of in the last installment. Instead of Master Chief you are given control of an Orbital Drop Shock Trooper. As an ODST you are deployed forcombat from above, Orbital Drop Shock Troopers are dropped into battle in single manned pods. The story begins as your team of ODST are preparing to be deployed for combat. Halo ODST takes place during the events of Halo2, and you are getting dropped in at the precise time that the Prophet of Regret is making his emergency escape. This slipstream causes a disruption in your drop trajectories and your team is scattered across the fictional city of New Mombasa. Cracking open your pod and stepping foot into this fictional city for the first time you will notice that this is not your normal Halo landscape. The area is very dimly lit, quiet, and seemingly dangerous. Without going into too much detail, Bungie crafts the story in a way that is not as linear as previous Halo titles. Giving you control of all characters in your squad as the story pieces it self together like a carefully crafted and while dated still beautiful jigsaw puzzle. Each characters particular story is different in someway, be it minor stealth elements, heavy gun play, vehicles, it was varied and fun. The graphics engine for Halo 3 is not necessarily the greatest anymore and it shows, but some of the other elements really pull this campaign together to make it a great run through. Spliced in with combat you will find (if you keep your eyes open) collectible recordings that tell a little more of the back story to what has happened in New Mombasa. Coupled with the music and the general ambiance of the levels you get a much more artistic and engaging experience that what Halo games have done in the past. The only problem is It’s Short! Real short! Did I mention its short. Just when you don’t want it to end, it ends. Not in a ok that was the perfect amount of time ending, but in the Whaa? I think I got robbed ending. I guess you always want more of a good thing right? Well its not like they are giving it away, for $60 bucks I just expected a little more.

So if you into blammin covenant baddies there’s Firefight. The game mode that keeps on giving, much like World at War, Gears of War, and Left 4 Dead, Halo 3 now has its very own survival mode. Of course it varies from these other games that I have mentioned, but the premise is pretty much the same. Kill wave after wave of increasingly difficult enemies until they get so strong that you succumb to their AI powers. Firefight is hectic in ODST, the enemies are being dropped in non-stop. Playing with friends is a fun time for all and can lead to hours of covenant bloodshed. With increasingly difficult enemies, and game modifiers called skulls the game has an infinitely large amount of replayabilty. There are 8 levels that shipped with ODST and I would imagine the Bungie money train will get us for more maps in the near future. Unfortunately, if you are friendless on Xbox Live you will have no option to play Firefight through any matchmaking system. Unfortunate, but you will need to organize something with strangers.

I like the Halo stories, the universe, the games, the level of quality that you get from a game by Bungie. That said I am very happy with ODST. Hell, I have been very happy with plenty of games that are substandard to what is being released in proximity to them. Judging by some of the reviews that I have read about this game I think the perfect scores are unjustified.This game is great but its far from perfection. I think  many people are gonna feel short changed on this one, after the initial Halo mania wears off. Personally I loved it the campaign and the Firefight modes are exceptionally fun. This fun comes with a feeling getting shortchanged a bit with the repackaged multiplayer and extra short campaign.
Worth a play through though.