Halo Reach: A T@RD Review pt.3

Vehicles:

This is the part of Reach that I have the biggest issue with. While Halo has always done vehicles better than most FPS games that try to include them, I’ve always had some issues with their driving mechanics. I recognize that they are probably trying to establish these vehicles as being precursors to what we have come to recognize in the Halo games, but I’m not sure that they needed to do anything more than make them look like older models (with one exception which I will note later). While I have issues with each vehicle, the driving mechanic is the one problem I have that is common to all the vehicles. As to what about the driving mechanic I don’t care for, and the other problems I have with the vehicles, I will address those in each vehicle review.

M808 Main Battle Tank (Scorpion/Shiela): Ah the Scorpion. Definitely my favorite Halo vehicle. There are few things more satisfying to do in a vehicle (in a Halo game) then dropping shells on your enemies and watching the medals keep popping up on the bottom of your screen. While this can still be done in Reach, I really didn’t like how the Scorpion drove in the beta. It seemed inconsistent. There were times when I had to double check and make sure that I wasn’t playing with inverted controls. I never really got the hang of driving one. Some of that I can attribute to only having a couple weeks to try it out, but not all of it. When I move the joystick on my controller a specific direction, I expect the to go that direction. Didn’t always happen with the tank. The only other problem I had with the tank was the ease with which it could be destroyed. Although, that may be more about the weapons than the vehicle, still, there were times when the tank seemed to go down a little too easy. Still my favorite Halo vehicle, but, with a little tweaking it could be much better.

Type-26 Assault Gun Carriage (Wraith): I’ve never been good with the wraith. Has to do with the arching shot it sends out. I usually spend half my time (and shots) just trying to figure out where my shots are going. When you’re in the middle of a fight this is definitely not a good thing, but that’s more about my skill than it is the vehicle. The only problem I have with the Wraith is the boost. I’ve never liked the boost. It’s always seemed both a little underpowered and little too short to me. I don’t want it to be able to perpetually boost (like the other Covenant vehicles), I just think increasing it by half again as long or maybe even doubling it would be about right. Doing this would probably address both of my issues at once. I do think this was the easiest vehicle to drive in the beta. It seemed to deviate the least from it’s other incarnations.

M12 Force Application Vehicle (Warthog): My second favorite vehicle in Halo and the one I had the most problems with when it came to driving. It drove sloppy. It bounced a lot, which made it hard to control. At times it felt like it was stuck in a puddle of oatmeal and then you’d hit a bump and you’d have to fight to keep it from flipping over. The only other problem I had with the Warthog was the inconsistency of its destructibility. Sometimes you hit it with one grenade and boom. Other times I’d hit it with a full salvo from a Plasma Grenade Launcher (4 plasmas) and nothing. I really didn’t like the Reach version of the Warthog… with one exception. I like the mounted gun. I know there are others who didn’t care for it but I thought it was great. At first I wasn’t sure about the fact that it could overheat (at which point it would simply shutoff) and that it seemed to take so long to spool up. I like that you can’t just hold down the trigger and go. Now being the Hog gunner requires a little more tactical thinking on the part of both driver and gunner. Now if they could just do something about how it drives…

Type-32 Rapid Attack Vehicle (Ghost): The Halo ghost and I have a love/hate relationship. The beta managed to make this even more apparent. While driving the ghost isn’t significantly worse here than elsewhere, I found the drift after boosting to be a little much. There were several times when I’d boost to splatter someone and wind up drifting into a wall, a teammate, or off a cliff. There’s only one other problem I have with the ghost. Avoiding the splatter. I’d see a ghost boosting towards me and I’d go to jump (even as an Elite) and wind up getting splattered. Then I’d go into theatre later and look at the film only to see that the ghost could have easily slipped underneath me but no. The other problem was that even if you got clipped by one of the front wings you’d often get splattered. It was ridiculous. That’s something they definitely need to fix. The boost I can adjust to. Though, it would be nice if they adjusted that to. All in all, the ghost wasn’t bad to drive just a little overpowered.

Type-26 Ground Support Aircraft (Banshee): This was the one vehicle in the beta that I actually liked. Now that doesn’t mean that I didn’t have an issue with it, it just means that I actually enjoyed flying this despite my issue with it. The Banshee was easy to fly. The only problem I had with it was trying to figure out how to do the acrobatic moves and how to fire the fuel rod cannons. Not that either was really necessary but knowing what to do would have been nice (and helpful at certain times). I will say that it did feel a little slow to respond to my directional inputs at times but it wasn’t too bad. Like I said, I liked the Banshee. Its problems were minor and mostly just due to a lack of time spent experimenting with it.

Summation: I understand the direction Bungie is trying to take with these vehicles but I think they may have done a disservice to some of them in the process. Hopefully these things are fixed but if not then I’ll just do my best to adjust to them (although, the Ghost splattering thing really needs to be changed). Still, as I stated before, Bungie does a much better job than most companies when it comes to including vehicles in an FPS. The beta is no exception to that. The vehicles did have their issues but they weren’t un-drivable which is ultimately the most important thing.