PixlBit

I finished Halo 3 in about 5.5 hours. That's the shortest of the series yet. I was surprised by that. Seems Halo 2 is the longest so far at 8 hours. 

Didn't have a lot of time today, but I managed to finish Halo 3: ODST. It took me about 6 hours over two days, the same as Halo C.E.. It was weird playing ODST this time because I knew the story well from the novel Halo: New Blood, which was about the same team leader Edward Buck and his squad Alpha-Nine. I really enjoyed Halo 3: ODST. It's like a dark film noir crime investigation. You switch control of different members of Alpha-Nine as you try and find your teammates who all crashed into the city of New Mombasa in their drop pods instead of landing on the covenant cruiser that jumped to slipspace at the last minute. New things I noticed were: molotov cocktail type grenades that set everything on fire; a flame thrower you find in one area late in the game; and lots more Huragoks (Engineers) and the explanation of how they are not an enemy to humanity. The look of those things is quite fleshy and repulsive. They seemed a little bit more elegant and techy in the novels, but in both cases they are tentacled floating brains.

Finished Halo 2 today. Boy does it seem to end abruptly before an actual climax. It's like Bungie did the story for Halo 2 and 3 together and then split it up. The true wrap up comes at the end of 3. I was surprised at the end of 2 and had to double check the story because I had in my mind the ending of 3. Anyway, it was a super fun campaign. 

This comprises 1986-1992. These were my college years. My arcade gaming was minimal but the few arcade machines I played made a lasting impression. 

Part II is the peak and decline of arcades, years 1982-1985. I was in high school those years. Weekends I'd get on my bike, and with a friend, head down to the mall to play arcade games. 1982 was the absolute peak with just a ton of new games. After that the decline began as home consoles began offering more elaborate experiences to challenge the two and half minutes per quarter the arcade machines were giving. Here are my favorites.

Mark and I played about 2/3rds of it today on XBO via Master Chief Collection. It is clearly longer than Halo C.E.. We had some connection issues with it here and there. Mark eventually quit in frustration. I kept going. I found some new terminals and got a few achievements for various gunplay. I'd say this game might be Bungie's biggest effort as far as story goes. It seems the most epic of the series with long elaborate cut scenes and very dramatic dialog. I think, talk of a movie started about this time and I can see why. 

I was a teenager when the video game arcades were big in the 80s. I rode my bike everywhere and arcades were all around me. I would go to a pizza shop, a hotel lobby, a department store or the mall and find them. It was fun to go to different places because they often had different machines. I got to play a lot of different games, so I'm breaking this blog up into three parts. This first one is the years 1978-1981.

I finished Halo Reach, number 2 on the chrono list, on Sunday in about 7 hours. First off, the opening minutes reminded me how much I love the O'Donnell/Salvatore music. It adds such majesty to the game. It has just the right amount of melodramatic emphasis. Music for Halo should be a little bit over-the-top. Then, I saw the environments in Reach and remembered how much I like the design of this game. It still looks amazing. Most of the game takes place in natural environments dotted with a few buildings. I just like the look of the game very much. There is a lot of variety of gameplay: you go to space, fight within a Covenant ship, fly a Falcon helicopter, and drive a tank. The story is a downer but it's still a heroic story. I love the way it dovetails into Halo: Combat Evolved. Your last task in Reach is to deliver Cortana to Captain Keyes' ship, The Pillar of Autumn. There is a spartan with green armor near the end, but I could have sworn the voice work for him wasn't Master Chief, but I could be wrong. Maybe that was him as you link up with the Pillar of Autumn's crew. It would make sense. Anyway, the next day Mark and I ran through Halo: C.E., co-op, via The Master Chief Collection. 

And it started with Halo Wars 1. I played it all today in about 8 hours. I got very excited during the first few cut scenes because the game begins on planet Harvest where first contact with the Covenant was made. It felt like the true beginning of the Halo story; the true beginning of the human/covenant war. So here it is. 

Armada, by Ernest Cline, is about Zack Lightman (that name's words are almost Luke Skywalker) who plays the MMO space shooter Armada. Zack's father dies suddenly so he becomes obsessed with his dad's interests in 70s and 80s gaming and pop culture. Eventually, as a teenager, he finds his dad's journal outlining a conspiracy and from there the plot thickens.