By Bryan Arivett
All good things must come to an end. That’s just as true for the citizens of Reach as it is for players around the world experiencing Bungie’s iconic run of the legendary Halo franchise. After releasing three incredible Master Chief centric stories and a side project in Halo 3: ODST it was time for the developers to say goodbye with a package that would encompass all the best elements of the series thus far. You know their motto, they deliver.
Halo: Reach takes place right before the events of 2001’s Combat Evolved and deals with humanity’s final struggle to save the planet from the overwhelming power of an alien race known as the Covenant. The beauty of this story is in the simple fact that you already know how it ends. Because of this, Bungie decides to place its focus on the tragic fall of the planet as its central character rather than the actual characters themselves. Speaking of characters, Reach opens by introducing you to Noble Team. A group of Spartan-III’s (produced cheaper than the Master Chief’s Spartan-II’s) tasked with investigating a recent disturbance and bringing their latest recruit, Noble 6 into the fold. You are Noble 6. Both literally as the player and in your choice of customization for the character, which will be reflected in all cutscenes from beginning to end across the entire experience. It's a relatively simple setup, but one that lays the groundwork for a fittingly somber and thematic end.
Campaign is just one element of a greater whole and by 2010 Bungie had well established the expectation of fitting more content into each release than the last. Included day one from the moment you pop the disc into the tray (fittingly nostalgic, I know) is campaign, competitive multiplayer with a full suite of maps, the level editor Forge, a wave-based horde mode called Firefight, theater for watching your gameplay and file share for making it available to players everywhere. This is on top of four player online co-op through the campaign as well as two player split screen and one of the most impressive catalogs of customization earned exclusively from playing the game this world has ever seen. If tragedy is Reach’s central theme, then value follows closely behind.
Halo: Reach isn’t perfect though, as often as it nearly convinces you that it is. A main component of Reach’s gameplay is armor abilities. These abilities have taken the place of Halo 3’s non-invasive, but quite entertaining equipment items and the results are something with far more thought, but much larger consequences. Several of these armor abilities result in cheapening the competitive experience by making you invincible right before your health runs out to avoid certain death or sending you high into the sky to flee from a fair fight, while others like Sprint merely give you an ability that gamers had come to accept as a default feature for several years already. This is on top of a myriad of other gameplay issues stemming from bloom on your reticle while aiming, down to the inconsistency of players using preset loadouts rather than even starts with well-designed placements of power weapons on the map.
A new method of developing missions for the campaign led to the implementation of multiplayer maps within the level design, assumedly to both save resources and create greater world building, but I think the results proved the experience would have been better without this decision. It breaks the immersion that was so painstakingly cultivated through the rest of the narrative. There’s also the elephant in the room that is how Reach’s narrative often clashes with that of the book “The Fall of Reach” which many had grown attached to over the years prior to the release of this game, but I’m hard pressed to hold that against this product, especially when it’s so thoroughly crafted with its own direction in mind.
While there are issues ranging from preexisting expectations of the narrative, multiplayer competitive drawbacks and potentially cut corners in level design it’s easy to excuse these shortcomings. Video games do not release this feature complete and without asking you for more money at this quality anymore. It’s a level few developers have been able to hit and one that’s rarely even strived for in modern times.
When you consider that all of this was pulled off after having already released an acclaimed trilogy while being in the midst of separating from Microsoft and shifting to the development of Destiny, it becomes even more impressive. It’s unlikely Reach doesn’t have something to offer you if you’re a fan of first person shooters at all. Everything holds up far better than you’d expect from a game that is closer to two decades old than one. Halo titles have been chasing the bar that was set by Reach for over 15 years with varying levels of success, making sure it will be hard for us to ever forget.
FINAL VERDICT
Whether it’s a tragic story that acts as a prequel to one of the industry’s greatest shooters, a multiplayer suite with limitless hours of enjoyment or a well spring of user generated content, Reach is a fitting end for a beloved developer's tenure with one of the most important franchises in gaming. Remember Reach.