Final Cut: Hetalia: World Series (Season 3) (DVD)
Keep It or Delete It?: Paper Monsters (iPad)
Keep It Or Trade It?: Duke Nukem Forever (X360)
Final Cut: kimi ni todoke Vol. 1 Premium Edition (Blu-ray)
Read or Recycle?: Gate 7 Volume 1The Story
Halo 3:ODST follows a small band of Orbital Drop Shock Troopers as they attempt to complete a mission in the Ruins of New Mombasa. The Time Line for the game starts During Halo 2 when the Covenant Cruiser makes the Slip Stream Jump inside the City, destroying the city in its wake. During the drop the Slip Stream wake knocks you off course and you, (only refered to as the “Rookie”), wake up in your drop pod 6 hours later. None of your team is nearby. You then start a search for your missing team mates. During the search you will find debris from their battles. You then take control of one of your missing team mates as you play through the scenario that happened to them earlier in the evening.
The Gameplay
The controls will be familiar to those who have played Halo 3 already. The changes are no dual wielding of weapons, the HUD has a compass instead of a motion tracker, and the HUD can now outline enemies with Red, Friendlies with Green, and Weapons with Blue. This is handy as the game takes place mostly at night or in low light areas.
The ODST’s do not have shielding like the Spartans Instead they have a “stamina” recharge system that pretty much does the same job. ODST’s are much weaker than Spartans so physical attacks do less damage and you can’t jump as high. But the programers also lessened the damage of all the weapons and increased the shielding of the enemies. Grunts, the weakest enemy in the game, can take a full clip of the Spiker weapon before dying. You essentially need to always get head shots or you will quickly run low on ammo. Even the sniper rifle will take two head shots on a Brute with shields. Unless a firefight is forced on you it is best to try stealth tactics and avoid combat altogether.
Multiplayer
ODST comes with a second standalone multiplayer disk containing all the maps in the Halo series plus several new ones. When playing these maps you can only play as a Spartan and the regular style of Halo Games apply. I.E. Capture the Flag, Slayer, etc…
An ODST mode is available called Firefight. In Firefight you have to withstand several waves of enemy attack. Several locations from New Mombasa are available for play after you unlock them by playing Story mode. FireFight is limited to Invite playing only, i.e. your friends list only, no matchmaking. This is due to it being a MOD of Co-Op mode as opposed to a MOD of the regular Multi-player LIVE mode.
Other Goodies
There are no Elites at all in the game. Apparently the covenant only attacked with Brutes. As a replacement the Engineers make their first appearance in the FPS. They are harmless to you, but do pack automatic defences that are triggered if you attack them. They do extend their own shields around nearby covenant forces so they will be even tougher to take down.
And owning this game gives you access to the Reach multi-player Beta in 2010. But I don’t think that’s a good enough reason to get it.
My Gripes
- The story takes about three to four hours to complete. That means expansion to me, not a full game.
- The dropping of weapon damage.
- Overall the game is a good buy for $60 IF you want to play alot of multiplayer and have never bought a single Map Pack. It is not worth more than $30 if you only want to play single player or have bought a lot of map packs.
Overall I say Keep It but get it after a price drop if you can wait.
Overall:
