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5stars
182ratings4stars
55ratings3stars
12ratings2stars
6ratings1star
10ratings
Good graphics93% agree
Compelling gameplay93% agree
Good value95% agree
244 reviews
Ensemble studios did a great job of building a RTS
Overall I give this game a solid 4 stars its no First person Shooter but to be able to play as the Covenant more than makes up for that. Its Not a pc RTS but on a console you don’t need all those bells and whistles to worry about. This game is very addictive with its in depth game features and prequel storyline that fills you in on a ton of halo history. Ensemble studios did a great job of building a RTS for a console. You have pre determined base locations and base slots that can be upgraded to allow for more building basically a cookie cutter base but on a console you don’t have the buttons to micro manage a huge base so this works out very well. The controls are a blast to work with simply press the Left trigger and you select All of your units you have. The right trigger will select only the units on your screen in front of you. Tap A for a single unit or hold for a paint brush effect to get as many men as you need. Or double tap A and select all units of that type. I loved that they included Skulls to find (each mission has a Skull hidden in it) along with Black boxes that unlock more story timeline segments and the Xbox Achievements means you will play this game again and again one achievement is to have played Halo wars for 24hrs with breaks of course (No need to burn the system up) so go out there at win one for the UNSC or Take over everything with the Covenant just watch out for the Flood.Read full review...
Just Right
This in my opinion was not the greatest game ever, but it is one of my favorite. Why is it my favorite you ask? Well, the controls are great, the simplicity of the gameplay is extremely entertaining and the online multiplayer is highly addiciting (although not as addiciting as COD of Halo 3). It is not the perfect game considering that there are some graphical issues, the covenant seem a wee bit overpowered and that the single player campaign could've been longer.
SINGLE PLAYER CAMPAIGN
You are... not the master chief. You a multitude of characters. a gruff sergeant, a sassy scientist, the ol veteran and A HELL LOAD OF OTHER UNITS. The game takes place before the first halo where you are at the planet Harvest. It takes you 5 years to retake it (as said in the narrative). Yup! So you go to fight the covenant, flood and sentinals in an all out war between good against evil. Dont mind my description because I don't want to spoil anything.
Short but Sweet is the proper term to call this campaign. The CGI cutscenes vividly show the events that happen between the missions. Now although you only get 15 missions with about 5-8 hours of playtime alltogether, there is a lot of variety between the missions. Plus, ONLINE AND SYSTEM LINK COOP. High replay value for the campaign.
MULTIPLAYER
Fret no more! Help is on the way! That's the thought that will be racing through your headset as your fight your 3v3 matches. The multiplayer is highly addictive and one of the strong points of the game. Lots of maps to choose from each being not entirely the same. Field environments change the course of the gameplay and chatting with your friends about strategy over xbox live gets you in the hype! Pooling resources and sending support units really get you into the game. AWESOME MULTIPLAYER!!!
SOUND
Great! DUH. This game's music is probably one of the best in the game biz. It really recapture the HALO feel.AWESOME.
GRAPHICS
A few graphical issues there and there. The units don't have much detail to them and they just look pretty plain. The CGI cutscenes on the other hand are amazing! Why don't they just make a CGI Halo movie? Graphics are still pretty damn good.
STATEMENT
Awesome game all and all. Not perfect, but its just right. Halo game within the rts or rts within the halo universe. My opinion is that its a Halo game within the rts because the controls and gameplay is simple just like the first halo and the feel is more HALOY. Definatly aimed toward a new audience for rts and halo fans. If your a hardcore rts fan, it might be too easy for you. but still give it a go. Youll probably like it!
score-8.5
graphics-8.0
sound-9.3
controls/gameplay-9.3
multiplayer-9.8
chicken?-1000000000000000Read full review...
Great game, lots of action, fun on online play!
I bought this game on ebay for one great deal, I do not play games all the time, so a gaming chance is rare for me. When I did have time I would play Halo Wars to the best of my ability, and let me tell you it is one great game. I would rather play Command and conquer because halo wars does limit your building space, so it gets frustrating, but not only will it limit your building space, it will limit your enemies space as well. I would claim it to be a fair game, but other wise the campaign will not get you much fun, it was easy to beat, and easy to beat on the hardest difficulty. I would say it is easy on the xbox 360 to control, not as difficult as I though if it were to be compared to PC, so I would recommend this to someone who is wanting some action!Read full review...
A half-baked mediocrity that could have been good game
The biggest disappointment about this game is its length. 15 years ago Blizzard came up with Warcraft. There were 2 campaigns - Humans and Orcs. 10 years ago - Starcraft, 3 campaigns. 5 years ago - Warcraft 3 with 4 campaigns. This year 2009 Microsoft released Halo Wars with whooping 1 (one) campaign of about a dozen missions!
What's up with that?! You create unfinished, unpolished, tiny game, throw it at the wall and expect people to shell out $60 for it because it is related to legendary franchise?! I paid $25 at a company store, and still feel like I overpaid.
Now to gory details
Pros:
+ Awesome cinematics.
+ Great graphics. But come on, it is 2009, you expect great graphics of an RTS.
+ Good controls. Work pretty well for a console. I was kinda missing ability to select all units of a given type, but it's OK.
+ You don't need to hunt for resources that quickly deplete.
(do you see anything above that says $60?)
Cons:
- Lack of thought-through design you see in Blizzard games. Forget the BS about paper, rock, scissors, most of the units there remain unused. You only build a couple of most efficient unit types unless you want to drag the game forever.
- You are only able to build structures in the waffle, provided by the base. Seems like implementation-driven design, MS found it easier to do so. Forget about surrounding your base with custom ring of fortifications.
- There is no dynamics of the unit types you can build. You can build them all from early levels up, but, I reiterate, you simply don't care.
- super-short. Half length of the shortest RTS I've ever played.Read full review...
An excellent RTS that harkens back to games like AoE!!!
Let me begin by saying that Halo Wars is an excellent game. It appeals to many gamers for three reasons: it's an RTS, has controls that will work on the 360, and the Halo characters and universe. Another plus is the developer. Ensemble Studios, who developed excellent games such as Age of Empires/Mythology and other excellent RTS games know what they are doing with a game like this. While it is isn't perfect, its innovation and depth of gameplay forces me to give this a 5/5! So let's dive into the review!
Story
While Master Chief doesn't appear this time around, you needn't worry, the story is still deep without him. The story is set 20 years before the first Halo, as most of you already know, and follows the exploits of a ship called the Spirit of Fire. They discover that the Covenant have discovered a super device (which I can't name, i hate spoilers!) which could destroy all humankind. So as good old marines do they lock and load! While it is quite a good story line, some of the characters get annoying. The women analyst of the Covenant seems a little too persuasive and unbelievable, but other than that you got a rock-solid story here.
Gameplay
As far as gameplay goes, Bungie and Ensemble went to the basics of core gameplay design. Their is only one supply collection resource you must manage, reactors that allows you to upgrade buildings, and a counter allowing only a certain number of units on the battlefield. It does seem simplistic, but Bungie adds an interesting twist. You can't build a building anywhere like other RTS games, you must build your barracks, supply gathering buildings, research, etc. as a part of your main base. Its an interesting twist which forces a player to choose wisely to make certain buildings. While you can have more than one base, this management system is an excellent twist and adds a lot of depth to the gameplay. I do have a couple of minor gripes. The camera zoom is broken. I found the max zoom out was still not enough, and it made unit management difficult. Thankfully, the controls pull that out of the water, as I can auto-select all units with the press of a button. Another gripe is the difficulty. THIS GAME IS HARD! Period. It will take careful planning and resource management if you want to be successful in Skirmish or Online. Campaign is different: it doesn't focus as much on base building but more on objectives, but time limits and overwhelming forces will still provide plenty of challenge in the campaign.
Online
While I haven't played too much of Halo Wars online due to my limited schedule, it works quite well. The online co-op feature in the campaign is a definite plus, and it makes objectives a bit easier. A tip of advice: start on Easy or Normal if you're daring. Without a friend, heroic and Legendary are IMPOSSIBLE! And the online modes and party system is easy to use, but they are a bit time consuming.
While Halo Wars isn't perfect, the innovation it bring to the console is a great thing to see! Starcraft for 360 FTW! 5/5Read full review...
Halo Wars - The game that insults IQ's
I have never had my intelligence so insulted by a game before. Now, I never played the campaign so I can't comment on that, but the skirmish was bad enough to not matter.
I started with the tutorial to learn the controls. It turns out they didn't need a tutorial because the controls are so babyish. Now, don't get me wrong, simple controls are good, but not when they make the game too simple! In an attempt to make the game better for consoles, they made an RTS with a little less S.
Now, if you're new to the genre, this is fine, but why couldn't they have a beginner mode! Let the people who are very familiar with the genre play the game how EVERY other RTS is; with tons of freedom. The game gives you 4 defensive turrets and I think 7 buildings (give or take one). Fine, that's good for people who are fans of Halo, but haven't played RTS's. It gets them slowly into them and maybe they'll move on to other RTS games. But, they could easily put in an advanced setting where it has a lot more freedom.
Everything else about the game seems fine. The units are cool, the hero units have cool abilities, but the simple play ruined it for me. If you're a fan of Halo, you'll get into it. If you're new to the genre, it's a good starting point. If you are a veteran of RTS's, this is one I'd suggest ignoring.Read full review...
Halo Wars review
Halo Wars is not the next epic,incredible,mind blowing Halo game.Rather a decent side game adding something new to the Halo universe.Overall if your a hardcore PC RTS fan you won't like it a whole lot.If it's your first RTS than you'll like it and on some parts love it.The Campain is short but has some replay value to get specific challenging achievements.I personally played through the game in about 8 hours by myself and finished it again on legendary with a co-op buddy which took about 9 or 10 hours.I highly recommend co-op and on a hard difficulty when playing through the game because it adds tons more strategy and intensity.The multiplayer is the real focus which is rather genaric but fun for Halo fans using familiar units.I personally like it because the gameplay focuses on combat way more than anything.The controls are great but not perfect.It's not worth it's 60$ and if you haven't gotten around to the tons of other epic games than I recommend you rent it.If though you have gotten around to a lot of other fantastic games and you are really interested in Halo Wars buy it off ebay or something for around 40$.No hardcore or semi-hardcore Halo fan should miss it.Read full review...
Halo Wars - A New Era of RPG
A very excellent game in its category, Halo Wars will keep you wanting to play again and again. Its graphics and gameplay are well put together, and provide hundreds of hours of fun. It may not be what a hardcore Halo fan's expectation, but that doesn't mean it's not fun. The game is overall easy, especially on Easy mode [duh] but it can get tricky EVEN on Easy mode sometimes, which means the harder modes might actually be able to defeat you. Even if you defeat Halo Wars Story Mode multiple times, it's still fun with the innovative Scrimmage mode, with numerous gameplay options and possibilities, including being able to control the Covenant Forces! The controls of the game are user-friendly and easy to get used to, no complicated, un-needed buttons to press. I wouldn't pay $50 for it, but for any price under 30 bucks, totally worth it. Graphics are gorgeous, beautiful explosions and effects, great sound effects. Looks cool on your Plasma television!Read full review...
Halo Wars
If you like RTS - Real Time Strategy - like me, this is the game for xbox. I'm a great fan of starcraft and always looked for a new game to play. At first I was out of spectations, since a console without mouse and keyboard can never give the same control and experience as a computer. But after I've played the demo I saw the great user interface microsoft developed to halo wars. It's not perfect, but it can give you a great range to control your units, especially when you master it.
Again, if you like RTS games and have an Xbox 360, this game is a must have.Read full review...
Good game
I bought this game because I wanted to play a strategy based onlne game for my 360. Plus, I knew my friends were going to get it too. I love the simplicity to the game. With that however, there are many complicated strategies and counters you can come up with. That's what I love most about halo wars. My only minor complaint about the game is thr fact that there are only six leaders to choose from. I think ensemble studios could easly develop a dlc to include at least one more human leader and one more covenant leader. Campaign was pretty fun too but you would want this game for multiplayer because that's where the fun and replay value is at.Read full review...