Halo 3: 10 Years Later

Halo 3, my favorite all time game and one that has aged rather gracefully ten years later as Bungie's defining end to their trilogy continues to amaze. I recall grabbing Halo 3 at midnight back ten years ago as it was my first midnight release and I was rather young. It's sort of a big deal to me being my favorite game and one that entertained me for a very long time while it was in its prime. I continue to enjoy the game through its Master Chief Collection release as the perfect combat only shines better with a smoother 60fps and that increased resolution.

This small touch helps keep it fresh and while I thought this might be the perfect Halo title to kick off 4k on Xbox One X, it apparently looks too good already to get that. It's disappointing, but I see the point there as the game has aged really gracefully. That is, unless you go through Xbox Backwards Compatibility to play it as it's very jagged around those edges and the slower frame rate really changes the pacing. The music shines on either version with a soundtrack that continues to be a smooth listen whether you're enjoying it timed in the game or outside of it. I just honestly can't believe the game is so old now having been a defining game in my life and one that I'm always happy to play whenever I can.

To celebrate the anniversary I grabbed a group of friends and went through the campaign, it may not have as many surprises at this point though it all holds up beautifully. The cutscenes are still gorgeous and the story is just easy to playthrough. No one complained about any aspects becoming boring because the gameplay is just quality. We raced through it grabbing the odd skull on the way and blasting any Covenant or Flood that got in the way. It was a charming time and it's still just a pleasure to go through.

The levels are too memorable and it's just epic in scale as you take on massive Scarabs or give Truth a final chat. The multiplayer is still stellar not only in design, but its perfect balance. The Battle Rifle is a beautiful thing and it's great whether you like smaller matches of Big Team Battle which is what I usually play. I don't know how many hours I've spent playing in Forge, fighting others online or just enjoying custom games. It had incredible hoppers practically starting fun weekends in games and this was so well supported for so long. I feel that Halo 3 holds up perfectly well and I still always suggest playing this game at any point since it just has the sort of quality gameplay that will keep it addicting.

Other games may fall aside, but this one will always hold up well with only some of the faces looking a tad rough at this point during cinematics. This is an important game to me marking large moments in my life and I can't believe it's already been this long. I'll leave a final mention to check out the original marketing trailers for this game as they're still very exciting from the diorama of Believe to the Starry Night and those stories about the Chief.

Read about Bioshock: 10 Years later
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