I have seen reach get a lot of hate from Halo fans and honestly I know why. I can name a million and one problems with it, the weapons are unbalanced, the rank system is a grindfest, sprint was integrated horribly but for everything it did wrong it did 10 things right. Reach is one of my favourite halos and I don’t think it deserves the hate it gets.
CAMPAIGN/STORY
Halo Reach had a brilliant story, hands down. Instead of one spartan (don’t worry I’m not one of those Master Chief haters) we had 6, each with there own personalty and role in the team and all of which you would interact with in different ways throughout the campaign. Other than that it had the perfect atmosphere of Patriotic “We are Humanity, Indivisible under John” that made you feel like fighting not just to progress but because you wanted to protect Reach. All throughout the campaign hints were being dropped towards some sort of conspiracy and in the last few missions it really came to light. It always gave you a sense of purpose like what you did was going to count.
As far as the campaigns gameplay it wasn’t lacking in this department either. For me at least, every mission was memorable: Nightfall had the whole sniper/recon feel, long night of solace had the space battles (they literally make every game better) and New Alexandria had the whole close air support thing. It also gave you a sense of freedom and usefulness, since instead of just giving you a blatantly easy path to follow, a lot of the time you were given directions and had to follow your compass. Halo reach had my second favourite campaign of any Halo right behind 2.
MULTIPLAYER
While Reach’s multiplayer was a rather big leap from that of previous halos I found it very enjoyable. In my opinion Reach had the best gametypes ever, of any game. It added new gametypes like invasion which is still my favourite while bringing back some oldies like race. You were never short of them either, Reach’s game customizability is comparable to Grand Theft Auto, so playing community made gametypes with friends or even just other random people online was always great. Anyone else remember playing cat and mouse, cops and robbers or avalanche? Not to mention all the great infection variants too.
Reach also had its fair share of maps, bringing back loved classics like ascension, sanctuary and ivory tower, as well as adding unique new ones like the vertical oriented swordbase and my personal favourite powerhouse. And if reach’s generous selection wasn’t enough Bungie also went out of their way to incorporate community made maps which were some of my favourites. This all came back to the great forge mechanic. If anyone remembers Halo 3 forge you will know how amazing Reach was and it’s because of this that not only do we have great community maps but also creations. I used to love logging on and downloading maps just to look at what people built like giant scarabs or the pillar of autumn. But what do you guys think, am I and idiot? Or do you like Reach too?
