Halo Wars - Demo

I must admit my days of RTS kinda died when my Windows Systems started to suck too much to run new games, I’ve played games like Warcraft, Starcraft and the early C&C games to death and thus lost interest. When EA released C&C3 on Xbox 360 I’ll admit my interest was peeked due to the fact it would run as I own a 360 (although with the CD sounds recently I’m not sure how long I’ll own one before it melts). I borrowed the game off someone and sat down with the tutorial only to find the progress slow, the controls unappealing, and the game just a total turn off, in truth it kinda marked console RTS for me, which is a shame because the early C&C’s on PS1 were amazing. Anyway, when I heard about Halo Wars being a 360 exclusive I wasn’t to fussed, didn’t appeal to me based on my experience with RTS so I looked past it and focused on other games, that was till today when I downloaded the demo.

The demo is 1.4 gigs so if your on a bad connection give up now, but for anyone else I’d recommend it! The game is visually and technically beautiful. The controls are smooth and easy, the GUI is basic, the base building, although key, isn’t a chore. The wars even with the 30 unit limit I was given still felt large and chaotic. The graphics felt like I was genuinely playing a Halo game from an RTS view too (which is something the promotions bragged about but I didn’t be leave). I tried this demo thinking I’d finally have something bad to say about Halo because you know, it’s cool to dislike popular stuff, but I fell in love with the game to the point where I’m toying with buying it when it comes out (buying new titles is a rare thing for me because of my tight fistedness when it comes to games).

The game isn’t without it’s problems though. A few things make no sense in the time line considering the game is set 20 years before Halo 1, the technology of the Humans is far better than in the games. Also Halo War’s AI is clothed, where as Cortana didn’t need clothes (I know it’s nit picking but why dose an AI computer need to dress up? It bugs me). I’m also unsure about some of the characters (a.k.a the dude you take control of in the demo felt like a bit of a dick…kinda like a dick version of what’s his face who you take control of at the start of Starcraft). All of this is forgiven though with some damn beautiful cut-scenes and of course Halo’s trade mark music.

With the last set-in-stone Halo release (with Bungie jumping ship) being an expansion pack for Halo 3, Halo Wars to me is the final chapter in the series unless something happens. If it is, I think it’s set to be a good one, and also a game Ensemble Studios can be proud of as their final title before being shut down.

If you have a 360 check it out.