Question About the Halo Franchise

I pretty much have finished the Marathon games (or I've played just about all I want to play of them). I sort of enjoyed the gameplay (not just run-and-gun), although to be honest, I think the dated gameplay (and game design) really started to bother me, at least in the first game (a few levels seemed to have bugs that forced me to restart the levels, and sometimes the goal was not clear at all, causing much frustration). This prompted me to just find a website online that had transcriptions of all the terminals in the game(s). I was more interested in the story of these games anyway, so I didn't really care that I was missing out on some gameplay (might end up playing through the sequels since I'm guessing/hoping they're not as bad as the first).

So yeah, I had so-so impressions of the (single-player) gameplay, although that was mostly because of the evolution of gameplay design and mechanics that has occurred since the release of these games (playing these games when they were originally released would have been a real treat I imagine). On the other hand, the actual story in the game(s) is amazing (IMO). I'd probably rank it a little bit behind Deus Ex in terms of story in a FPS, and (quite a bit?) ahead of HL2. I guess something about games that include a focus on AI personalities that play a huge part in the story really intrigues me (might be part of the reason why I enjoy MGS as well, although they haven't really focused on the AI aspect...yet). Makes me want to play the System Shock games even more...or at least read up on the story (although I'd rather play them).

Anyway, back to Marathon, along with the main storyline, I enjoyed the few metaphors and hidden story elements found in some of the hard-to-find terminals. Probably a good thing I read transcripts online as opposed to playing the game since I would have missed some of these. Some of them seem really strange at first, but if you try and dissect them (with help from the Internet ), they seem to add a lot more to the overall story. If I'm not mistaken (may have to re-read the terminals again), I think Bungie mostly did this with the first game, and didn't seem to put as much effort into it with the sequels, which was a bit disappointing IMO (although I did find the story in the 2nd game to be better than the first). The "dialogue," if that's what you want to call it, seemed really good (given the limitations), especially in the second game. Some of my favorite lines from Durandal (minor spoilers I guess):

Spoiler

"My first ground attack against the Pfhor
garrison occurred a few hours ago, but was
largely unsuccessful. Basically the attack
failed because Bobs aren't fireproof and
the Pfhor flooded the area with lava."

"When my ship still answered to the Pfhor,
they called it Sfiera after their goddess
of lightning and passion. When you helped
us take control on Tau Ceti, the S'pht
rechristened it Narhl'Lar, "Freedom and
Vengeance.

I call it Boomer."

I will say that I mostly just went through the first two game. I tried Marathon Infinity, but I wasn't really feeling it. Of course, I really didn't know what was going on at first since I had no idea what the premise behind the game was. I thought it was a straight progression of the story after Marathon Durandal, but the beginning events in the game made it clear that this wasn't quite right. I'll probably play through it later (or somehow manage to read through the terminals online in a coherent fashion), but I think I'm happy right now just knowing what happened in the first two games.

I feel now that I have a basic understanding of the type of story that the guys at Bungie can come up with, and I'm certainly not disappointed. Not sure if the Halo games can quite compare to the Marathon games in terms of the story, but just based on what Bungie did with Marathon, I feel as though there's a pretty good chance that I will enjoy what they did (assuming at least some of the creative minds behind Marathon had at least some influence in creating the Halo universe). Of course, all the responses here were a lot of help, but it is certainly reassuring to know that I can enjoy the type of story that Bungie uses (or seems use) in their games.

 

Finally managed to get a hold of the original Halo. I got it last night and beat it just an hour ago or so.

Geez, you guys weren't kidding about the repetitive levels. But that was probably my only major complaint about the game. I would have preferred it if some things were better (character development, story, some minor gameplay things though they may be PC-only issues, etc.), but I definitely enjoyed the SP campaign. As I expected, the music was awesome, especially in how it was used in the game. For a 7 year old game (or I guess 5 year old if you count the PC version that I played), the graphics were pretty nice (the art direction in particular). I wasn't expecting great things, but some of the levels are pretty impressive given the age of that game.

Halo 2 is still ridiculously overpriced for the PC, so I probably won't be getting it anytime soon. It sounds like it might be more to my liking, although the ending might not be something I'll enjoy apparently. So far, I wouldn't say Halo is the greatest game or FPS (wouldn't even say it is the best FPS made by Bungie), but it definitely a really nice game IMO (not a crappy SP campaign, or anything like that).

 

Eh, I don't really disagree too much with that statement, at least based on what I played in Halo 1 (might change once I play H2 and H3). I'd probably prefer H1 at this point over COD4, but not by too much (especially in the gameplay department, COD4 was crazy at times).

The reason I put so much emphasis on the narrative is I think it helps a game stand out through time. Maybe I'll be wrong, but I think COD4 will not be all that special in 5-8 years (although maybe COD6 and/or COD8 will be?). The gameplay will probably seem somewhat archaic (especially if we're all playing with Wii-motes ), the graphics will be outdated, the scripted events (and possibly the linear gameplay?) will probably stand out even more, the topic will probably be done to death (like WW2 games), etc. I think if you can make a strong narrative and combine it with great gameplay (along with all that other good stuff), it will make a game much more likely to become a "classic."

Do they ever give you a map or something? I never really noticed talk about it, although it might have been a small addition that I missed. I didn't necessarily mind TOO much that they were reusing levels over and over in H1, but the way they were laid out, it was difficult not to get lost at times, especially during the more intense firefights in closed corridors (I'm assuming this is the issue people have with the repeated levels?). It was sort of like this in Marathon as well IIRC, but the map made it much easier to navigate the levels.

I wonder why they didn't include a map in H1 (and possibly H2/H3?).

Hope I didn't just miss the tutorial pointing out how to use the map in H1.