Halo 3: ODST is the best Halo game made so far.

Now, what that actually means and if that is a backhanded compliment is up to some debate. It also depends greatly on the level of your Halo fanboyism. If you are like me and find the overall plot to be kind of goofy and the multiplayer to be underwhelming in the face of so many other, better multiplayer experiences, you are obviously going to have a differing opinion from somebody who constantly wishes a PIN could be three numbers instead of four so theirs could be 117 or owns a Xbox 360 and hasn't purchased a game since Halo 3 dropped into their lap like Chris Rock in Dogma. The fact of the matter is, and I absolutely hate to parrot facts that every games journalist across the internet is already hammering into the ground, if you like Halo you will love ODST, if you don't like Halo you probably won't- the variable is that ODST is just different enough to make it appealing to the anti-Halo crowd.

Still, despite my many issues with the franchise I still find ODST to be the most appealing game out of all of them. In fact, if ODST was Halo 3 and Halo 3 was the overpriced expansion pack, and by that I mean ODST was made up of 20+ hours of gameplay and Halo 3 was only the 5 to 8 you get from this game, I would probably have a more favorable opinion of the series. Many of the issues I have with the Halo franchise are fixed, or at least downplayed- although new issues are introduced because of it. Consider it a double edged energy sword, but not quite as cheap.

Non-stop action

Speaking of cheap, I'm not even going to consider the second disc included with ODST in whether or not this game is worth a purchase.  ODST offers a very solid single player experience that would have surpassed anything else the franchise did if it wasn't only a handful of hours. This is the most focused and empathetic any Halo storyline has ever been. This is to be expected considering you aren't controlling the over the top superhuman Master Chief and are, instead, in control of a rookie Orbital Drop Shock Trooper separated and isolated from his team in an incredibly hostile environment. The ODS troopers may have an intimidating and fancy name, but they are really just regular soldiers. No health regen, no Incredible Hulk jumps or feats of strength.

This is an incredibly welcome change and forces you to greatly alter the simple strategy you were used to in the previous Halo games. You are no longer a tank who can go into a hot area with guns blazing, you have to actually use a slow approach and hope your gun play can get you out of sticky situations instead of your enhancements. While you don't technically have a shield to recharge, you do have “stamina” which sort of acts the same way except much less powerful. This is just one of a two headed monster that makes you want to stay out of harms way, the other head is entirely aesthetic: the visual and sound effects that alert you to taking damage are the most god awful things I have ever seen. If you take damage, any damage, your screen takes a red hue and an incessant heart rate monitor begins to go off. Imagine the low/no shields noise in Halo and breed it with the noise it makes when you scrape your fingernails against a chalkboard or a baby.

Halo 3:ODST

The gameplay is pretty easy to grasp as the Rookie- walk around New Mombassa, flip on your night vision, fight some bad guys, retrieve a beacon. This would get repetitive real quick if this were the only thing to the game, but each chapter gives you the opportunity to play a flashback of sorts as one of the other ODST members. These missions are quite different from the surviving as The Rookie and are more in the vein of traditional Halo chapters. As the Rookie in the eerie and quiet city, you can stick to the shadows and avoid confrontation to keep yourself alive. As your team members play more like the linear and loud Halo you have come to know and (maybe) love.

The pacing is brisk and it is very hard to get stuck somewhere even with the newly open world. It might take a bit of getting used to for Halo vets but it will won't ever get dull. Nothing that really happens during the storyline is entirely original, but it is all refreshing in regards to what you have come to expect from Halo. You can also play the story mode co-op but it honestly feels like you lose a bit of the appeal during The Rookie's scenes when you are causing havoc with three friends. The noir atmosphere just comes off better when you are playing with yourself. Not literally, of course, as that would make the game very difficult to concentrate on.The multiplayer elements also extend to the brand new Firefight mode, which actually shares more of a relation to Left 4 Dead's survival mode than any current Halo multiplayer mode.

Oh we've got a smart one do we?

In this, you and a team of humans face wave after wave after wave of Covenant AI and try to survive as long as you possibly can. It is simple and, like the best parts of ODST, a departure from the Halo formula. The longer you last, the more “skulls” get activated and the more difficult things get until you don't even have a shot in hell of surviving. Last a good amount of time, get a high score. Die early and don't. It is tense, and incredibly exciting.

ODST is a bit odd in that, while it is an expansion pack, it will actually keep your wallet from expanding by extorting 60 dollars from you. What you actually get for that money is the ODST single player, the brand new multiplayer mode “Firefight” and... Halo 3. Well, to be specific, you get a disc of the Halo 3 multiplayer that you most likely already play. This seems a bit of an odd move considering the vast majority of people purchasing this game already have all of the maps and play Halo 3 as if it were a religious commitment. The Halo 3 multiplayer disc comes with all of the DLC maps plus 3 new ones, but it just seems like it would have been easier to release each retail copy of ODST with codes to download all of the maps. This probably could have dropped at least ten bucks from the price and made a recommendation at least a little bit easier.

What seems to be the problem officer?

This is one of those moments that I am incredibly happy that Faceoffgames doesn't force us into some draconian rating system, because I honestly don't know what quantifiable score I would give ODST. I don't think it is worth the asking price of a full game since half of the content provided is probably already owned by you, but that isn't saying that it is a bad game. I enjoyed ODST more than I enjoyed any facet of the Halo franchise since the original, and I only liked the original when I could play it on the PC. Luckily my opinion doesn't really matter since 90% of the gaming public has already made their decision on whether or not ODST is worth their time before it even came out. I'm surprised you even read this review. Maybe while I have your attention I should use this opportunity to talk about the state of the American health care system and do some good.

Well, the problem is that the right wing is so idiotic and absolutely out of touch th-