Halo 2

About Halo 2
Halo 2 is the sequel to the blockbuster and critically-acclaimed Halo: Combat Evolved, and features a newly built game engine and the Havok physics engine, new weapons and vehicles, new multiplayer maps, and a storyline that continues the story begun in Halo: Combat Evolved. Halo 2, released for the Xbox game console on November 9, 2004, and its predecessor are both backwards-compatible for the Xbox 360, including its Xbox Live functionality.

Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios

Platform: Xbox

Release Date (North America): November 9, 2004

ESRB Rating: M (Mature)

History
Halo: Combat Evolved became a best-selling and well-lauded title upon its release in November 2001 but some complained that it lacked support for Xbox Live even though the broadband service would not be ready until a year later. The only cross-console multiplayer was either from System Link, Gamespy Tunnel, or XBConnect. Given the expected long development time of Halo 2, there were rumours of an updated "Halo 1.5" which would add Xbox Live support for the original and would be released in late 2002 or early 2003 but that never materialized. The PC version of Halo: Combat Evolved released in Fall 2003 however, and did have online support.

Since Bungie's 2002 announcement that they were working on an Xbox Live-enabled sequel to Halo, Halo 2 had became one of the most anticipated titles in development, only rivaled in hype by Doom 3 and later Half-Life 2. All three games were slated for a 2003 holiday season release but due to delays they were pushed back to 2004.

Of particular note regarding the release of Halo2 was an estimated one million dollar Alternate Reality Game project titled I Love Bees. The story line was entirely unique in the Halo universe, but was at the same time very engaging and tied in seamlessly with the game itself. For those who are not familiar with the "ARG" premise: a story is put forth on webpages and other media devices. Players are invited into a part of the story they might not otherwise see. ARGS have become increasingly popular in the early 21st century, and this popularity is owed in large part to I Love Bees.

On the morning of October 14, a leak of the French version of the game was posted on the Internet, and circulated widely. Microsoft, the parent company of Bungie Studios, tried to contain the spread, and pledged to bring legal action against anyone who spread the leaked version. Fortunately, the leak failed to have a significant effect on Halo 2 sales, due in part to a supportive Halo community which was determined to honor the original release date and which was instrumental in curbing the spread of the leaked version.

The first official release of Halo 2 was in New Zealand on November 9, 2004. Anticipation for game was high; three weeks before this release, a record 1.5 million copies had already been pre-ordered. This was followed by releases on November 10 in France and other European countries, and November 11 in the UK. The game sold 2.4 million copies and earned up to $125 million US in its first 24 hours on store shelves, thus out-grossing the film Spider-Man 2 as highest grossing release in entertainment history. As of 1 January 2005, the game had sold 6.3 million copies. According to a contemporary Wired Magazine issue, Halo 2 had a more profitable opening day than did the then-highest-grossing Hollywood film, Spider-Man. Some observers saw this as another milestone in the emerging dominance of the video game industry; a few years earlier, the video game industry had surpassed the movie industry in total revenues for the first time and had never relinquished its lead since then. It also won "Game of the Year 2004" at GPhoria, among other awards (Best Boss Battle, etc.), including different award shows.

Since Halo 2 was a successful killer app for the Xbox and its Live online service, Microsoft took advantage of Halo 2 to ban modded (modified) Xboxes from the network when they tried to log on for online gaming.

Campaign
The game is playable in campaign mode either single-player or cooperative. This mode follows the story to the Halo series and is the second of the three games (the third and final part of the series is still not published). When playing in this mode the player(s) must complete a series of episodes. Some of these episodes require the player to compete as a Covenant Elite called The Arbiter, while some, but not the majority are still played as the Master Chief. Aside from variations caused simply by switching sides in the conflict, most notably The Arbiter is different from Master Chief in that his armor lacks a flashlight and is equipped with a short duration rechargeable form of active camouflage that will drop if the player attacks or is shot. His shield is also weaker than the Master Chief's - probably a result of its age. Another possibility is that the Arbiter was designed to be less of a battering ram than the Master Chief, which subsequently requires different tactics. Additionally, the story line while playing as the Arbiter changes to one of fighting an internal faction within the Covenant, with the elites, hunters and grunts forming one team and the brutes, jackals, prophets and drones forming the other.

There are four levels of difficulty: Easy, Normal, Heroic and Legendary, the latter of which has been described as "suicide" by the game's developers. An increase in difficulty will result in an increase in the health of opponents, an increase in their accuracy, and a reduction of health in the player.

Multiplayer
There are varying modes, several of which have returned from the original Halo game. A typical classic free for all or team deathmatch game known as Slayer, a team based Capture The Flag game, a game which you plant a bomb in your enemies base to score called Assault, a more esoteric free-for-all (FFA) or team game of keep away called Oddball, a game extrapolated from a child's game of "tag" called Juggernaut, King of the Hill, where players race to control a specified area of the map, and finally, Territories, which bears some resemblance to King of the Hill, but with multiple hills. All of these modes can be twisted and changed in thousands of unpredictable ways, resulting in incredibly varied multiplayer gameplay. Of the preset variations present in the original game, only Race is missing.

Unlike its predecessor, Halo 2 allows players to compete with each other via the Xbox Live online service, in addition to the original's support for split-screen and System Link multiplayer. Halo 2 ' s Xbox Live mode offers a unique and, some would say, innovative approach to online gaming that is intended to alleviate some of the problems that have plagued online first-person shooters in the past. Traditionally, one player sets his or her computer or console up as a game server (or host), specifying the game type and map and configuring other settings. The game software then uses a service like GameSpy to advertise the game to the world at large; other players choose which game to join based upon criteria such as the map and game options each host is offering as well as the ping times they are able to receive.

In Halo 2, Xbox Live players do not choose to host public games, and they do not get to specify individual maps and options to search for. Instead, players select "playlists" that are geared to different styles of play. For example, the "Rumble Pit" playlist offers a variety of "every man for himself" game types, primarily Slayer or variations thereof; "Team Skirmish" offers a number of 4-on-4 team games, which are primarily objective-based games like Capture the Flag; "Big Team Battle" is similar to Team Skirmish but allows teams of up to 8 players. Other playlists allow head-to-head play and matches between different clans. The Xbox Live servers create games automatically from the pool of players that have chosen each playlist, choosing a game type and map automatically and selecting one player to serve as the game's host.

Players can create small "parties" with their friends and enter games together as teammates in Team based games. Parties can also play in "Rumble Training" games, which is an unranked version of "Rumble Pit" If the Xbox console hosting the game drops out, the Xbox Live service automatically selects a new host from among the remaining players so the game can continue. Players may still choose to set up games for their own party to their own specification, and invite others into that game from their Friends and Clan lists, however these games are not made publicly available.

Bungie.net records every single statistic that is displayed on-screen in the end-of-game "Postgame Carnage Report." Anyone can visit Bungie.net and look at any Xbox Live player's stats. If a player logs in with a Microsoft Passport, they can also access the "Gameviewer". This presents an image of the level that was played from the player's choice various angles, superimposed with a summary of the crucial game events. For example: for each kill, the attacker and target's locations and the attacker's weapon are displayed, and the paths taken by flags in Capture the Flag games are shown. Bungie keeps these stats for several hundred games per player at a time, then games begin to be purged to save space, and they are used as evidence when banning suspected cheating players (see "Xbox Live Updates", below).

Regular players have expressed concerns regarding the game balance of Halo 2. Many players feel that game strategies are too dependent upon controlling the "power weapons" in each map such as the Rocket Launcher, Sniper Rifle, Shotgun, or Energy Sword, which leads to the overshadowing of the other weapons in the game. Should a team acquire these weapons, it becomes more difficult for their opponents to score kills or attain objectives. Much game time may be consumed attempting to seize the weapons in question from the opposition to shift the balance of power; in some cases it may not even be possible to do so. This primarily affects team games and one-on-one games; in free for alls, a player with a "power weapon" will become a priority target for the other players, meaning that the weapon will change hands frequently. Another common criticism is the dominance of dual-wielding weapons over single-wielding combined with grenades, although attempts have been made to address these issues with the April 18th automatic update (see "Xbox Live updates").

Marathons
As with any popular game, Halo 2 is responsible for all-night LAN parties or simply a late night playing stand. Players will play online until morning hours, armed with caffeine beverages and the gamer's food of choice: pizza. Some game stores have all night Halo 2 tournaments, increasing the popularity of these marathons.

Multiplayer maps

 * See also: Halo 2 Multiplayer Map Pack.

Damage system
The damage system in Halo 2 is slightly different from that in Halo: Combat Evolved. The player has a regenerating shield, but now has regenerating health as well.


 * Shields: The shield in Halo 2 is much stronger, and recharges at a higher rate. It covers the player's entire body, and slowly decreases in power as it sustains damage.  After it takes damage, it starts to recharge 4 seconds after the last time damage was sustained.  The power is displayed above the motion tracker in the bottom-left of the screen. Like in the original Halo, once the shields become low an alarm informs the player that they are out.


 * Health: In Halo 2, once the shields run out, the player also has a buffer of health. Unlike the first Halo, health regenerates after the shield.  The amount of health left is not visible to the player, and is also much smaller than in the original game.

Powerups
There are two types of powerups available in Halo 2 Multiplayer.


 * Overshield: An enhanced, non-regenerating shield which is three times the strength of the normal one. The overshield functions on top of the regular shield – when it is active, the normal shield does not take damage. In addition, when a overshield is picked up, the player is invulnerable until it finishes charging, which takes a second or two. In multiplayer Halo 2, the overshield gradually depletes over time and can be completely taken out with a charged up plasma pistol shot. The overshield is no longer present in the campaign mode of Halo 2. However, the Black Eye Skull will enable the player to charge his/her shield into the overshield range. In certain Multiplayer gametypes, one or more players start with a regenerating overshield.


 * Active Camouflage: Drastically reduces the player's visibility for a period of time, making all but a faint outline of him invisible. This effect (which is almost identical to that of the alien armor in the Predator movies) is reduced if the player is hit by weapons fire, or if he fires a weapon. However, the Energy Sword remains clearly visible even if the player is using camouflage. This feature is included in the Arbiter's armor, though its effect only lasts a few seconds and is cancelled by firing a weapon or taking fire. The power-up is not available in Campaign (the Arbiter can activate it for a short time), and the built-in generator is not available in Multiplayer. The Envy skull gives Master Chief access to the built-in generator.

Gametype Settings: In some gametypes, the overshield and/or active camo are always active on one or all of the players, and if disabled, will recharge over time. One common mistake for new players is to mix the overshield and the active camo: this creates a faint halo around the player, caused by the overshield, even though they have active camo.

Secrets
The existence of many hidden skulls has been discovered. These small objects are hidden in every campaign level in Halo 2, some levels containing more than one. Their effects, while somewhat disputed, can do anything from making the player invisible to removing his HUD. One, called "I Would Have Been Your Daddy," is a maddening skull that, unlike the others, seems to have no reliable mechanism for triggering its appearance. After finding it and picking it up, some players are entered into a battle with more than twenty Elites using only a plasma pistol, with victory leading to new NPC comments. However, other users have acquired the skull with no apparent effect at all.

The current known skulls are Unamed (text does not appear when collecting this skull, but has a name see below), Thunder storm, Blind, I Would Have Been Your Daddy, Catch, Grunt Birthday Party, Famine, Envy, Assassins, Mythic, Sputnik, Angry, Ghost, Iron, and Black Eye. These skulls are only available on the Legendary mode except for the Blind skull, found on any difficulty in the level Outskirts. One skull shows no text when collected but examination of Halo 2 files shows this skull to be known internally as Whuppopotamous (fitting the acronym) and also Cowbell.

The Scarab's destructive main cannon is available as a handheld weapon. It is located in a hard-to-reach area in a level where the Scarab is present. To obtain the Scarab's powerful weapon you must first arrive at the end of a long bridge in the level Metropolis. After defeating all the enemies except one Banshee, the player must lure the Banshee into a tunnel and board it as it reaches the other side. After commandeering the Banshee, the player must fly to a certain grouping of buildings: the Scarab gun resides in the middle of a bridge connecting them. Although the Scarab gun uses the Plasma Rifle model, it shoots a huge green plasma beam many times larger than the Master Chief. This trick is most easily performed in Co-op mode, where you have another player to provide backup and assistance.

Glitches
Players have discovered many glitches in Halo 2. For example, the player can leave the ordinary map boundaries by performing a "sword jump," in which the player presses "Y", "R" twice, and then the "X" button on their gamepad, while having their rocket launcher out and their sword equipped, while facing another player. They will charge at the player but not slash them, allowing the sword user to fly over the other person and get over a boundary. Players could also use the "rocket glitch" to reach past the boundaries. However, this has been removed from the game by an update from Bungie. It works by having one player already in the position they wish to reach. While the player above is jumping, the player wanting to reach the position must have a rocket launcher, without ammunition, and a sword. While targeting the jumping man, from the bottom of the cross-hair, the player must switch between the rocket and sword to obtain access to the new area. The "rocket glitch" was disabled in the autoupdate, due to misuse in multiplayer battles. Two players can still use the "sword cancel" to gain access to new areas, or a technique called 'butterflying,' in which one player jumps upon another's head, jumps again, and then is sword-cancelled. The player doing the cancelling is propelled up to the first, who jumps again. This method of play can be used to attain incredible hights, as long as the first person maintains his position on top of the other's head. Invisible walls on most levels stop the players from travelling 'out of the map,' but it can still lead to unfair play in objective games on maps such as Relic.

Players have also discovered "super jumps", or bounces. Super jumps can be found on every map and are executed by crouching under something, releasing crouch so that you are 'stuck' in crouched mode under the object (this is key...it is not known exactly what this does, but it does increase the probability of the jump working enormously), and jumping on one of the lines that make up the map's geometry, at which time the player will be propelled very high. Some theories as to why exist, but the most appreciated states that you actually begin to fall out of the map, and the physics engine forces you back up; hence the effect of being thrown up into the air. Players have discovered many of these jumps and there are possibly many more, especially in the newer maps.

One of these "super jumps", or bounces, can be found in the map Zanzibar. This can be achieved by first going inside of the base. Where you find the battle rifle you would be able to see two windows with glass. Break these windows by either throwing a grenade or hitting them until no glass is left. If you look at the window to your nearest right, there would appear to be a glass shard in the wall. By walking left to the edge of the window and crouching, you should be able to get stuck into the wall. By jumping onto or near the line on the floor directly under the wall, you can be propelled to the top of the base. According to several non-US players, the superbounce can only be used on both Australian and American systems. However, it is much easier to perform on American systems. Also there is another superbounce that allows the player to get on top of the wheel in the middle of the map. You first crouch and walk into the corner of the wheel nearest the buliding which the flag is located. You then turn around and jump on the handrail near the ramp where 'Camp Froman' (where the defender's sniper rifle respawns) is located. When done correctly, you are propelled into the air, allowing you to get onto the top of the windmill.

These glitches have become a major problem in Halo 2's multiplayer over Xbox Live. For example, players can use the aformentioned "super jump" on the level Zanzibar to jump to the top of the level out of reach of most players. Since the release of the downloadable maps, Halo 2 hackers, users who edit the game with formerly illegally modified consoles (modifying Xbox consoles is now legal in the United States), began to mod the maps on the hard drives of their Xbox's to receive advantages, such as weapons that do more damage, flying ground vehicles, etc. This has become such a widespread problem in the "Matchmaking" system that Bungie was forced to resolve the problem by releasing autoupdates which ban hackers from the system and terminate their accounts. They have currently banned thousands of players and are working on cleaning up the rest, earning the process the moniker 'Banhammer.' Several sites offer a list of cheaters and hackers.

Legal (accepted) Weapon Glitches
Numerous Weapon Glitches have been discovered in Halo 2, most of them dealing with the MLG starting weapon, the Battle Rifle. Note: all of the following commands assume the default controller settings.

Quick Reload: X,Y,Y or X,B,X After a certain time in a reload animation, the weapon is reloaded, pressing Y,Y, enables you to fire again. This also works to cancel out the swords 'reload time' since there is a period of waiting after a swordlunge. If you don't have a secondary weapon (Y,Y is switch back and forth), then press X and after the weapon is reloaded press B to melee and X to cancel it again.

Cancel Reload: Y,Y During reload you might decide to want to open fire again, press Y,Y before the weapon has reloaded and you can continue fire with the ammo left.

Quick Switch: Y,B,Y,Y If you want to be the faster combo-whore after releasing a plasma bolt, just switch, melee and switch, switch and you'll be able to fire a splitsecond before you combo-opposition can.

Double Melee: B,X,B As soon as your melee has hit your opponent and the damage is done, you can cancel the rest of the animation with X and melee again. Note- with the battle rifle, you can double melee without the X cancel when the first melee is horizontal.

Switch Melee: B,Y,B As soon as your melee has hit your opponent and the damage is done, you can switch to your other weapon with Y and melee with that weapon again.

MeleeFire: B,X,R As soon as your melee has hit your opponent and the damage is done, you can cancel the rest of the animation with X and open fire again. If done optimal it will seem like a melee and shot at the same time. To be done with a full clip- otherwise, X will cause you to reload.

MeleeSnipe: B,X,R This trick is meant to use your melee lunge as an auto-aim for your sniper in order to succesfully no-scope. Works the same way as MeleeFire, but try to press X before hitting your opponent, because then you still have the full use of the lunge.

MeleeStick: B,X,L When you lunge towards an opponent for the melee you can cancel the full animation in order to use the lunge towards your enemy to get a plasma grenade attached. Works best when the melee has not yet hit, since then you are still moving towards him.

Overheat nade: Charge,R,Y,L When you release a plasma bolt after the pistol is charged and released you can hit Y and L quickly after each other. What will happen is that the grenade will fly without its throwing animation. Helps if you missed the plasma shot because your opponent goes behind a wall. After the grenade is thrown, there is a small time you can not shoot, but doing a cancel reload (Y,Y) fixes that.

Double Nade: Charge,release,pause,L,L When you release a plasma bolt after the pistol is charged or when another plasma weapon has overheated (Beam Rifle, Plasma Rifle) wait one second and press L,L in order to through two grenades rapidly after each other. With the right timing you can throw them almost at the same time. You can also set traps with this, deliberately missing a plasma shot, then surprising your opponents with a rain of grenades. You can switch back to your battle rifle, but only after the first nade is thrown.

Dual Nade: L,Y,B,L (On-host) Not to be confused, but can be combined with the Double Nade. The Dual nade is an entirely different trick that uses the picking up and dropping of dual wieldable weapons to cancel the time intersection between two grenade throws. Basically you stand on a dual wieldable weapon, holding a dual wieldable weapon, then press L to throw your first grenade, hold Y to pick up the dual wieldable weapon, B to melee and throw the weapon away and L to grenade again. With boxer settings the sequel would be L,Y,L. Note - This trick can also be used in combination with the Double Nade, using the plasma pistol as the first dual wieldable weapon for a deathtrap of three grenades.

Double Fire: R,R,X The hardest one of all; quickly press R, then as soon as you have your R released, quickly squeeze it again and this time hold; quickly after the controller has registered the start of the holding, press X in order to have the two shots burst out at the same time or rapidly following each other. Timing is crucial, there is about 1/10th of a second to do so and within that second, pace of the shots is also determined. You will know it's succesfull when you see no reloading animation, but have a full clip again with 6 bullets less. You can also cancel the actual reloading by the Cancel Reload, but more useful is to Doublefire and then instantly throw a grenade to cancel the reloading, this also seems to be the quickest way to get damage across a map.

Nade Reload: L,X (Off-host) If you have shot a few rounds out of your clip already and you want to reload and shoot at the same time, then press L, then quickly press X while doing the reload animation and then just keep shooting the rounds you have left in your clip while the gun reloads at the same time. Note - Works only when you are not host, due to communication error towards the host.

Suicide shot: R,R,Y (secondary weapon) This is a technique that can help you get out of a bad spawn without losing a point. When you press R,R,Y (all quickly after each other, the results of the button pressing comes later) and move forward the following happens: you will fire one shot, then switch to your other weapon and then fire another shot. If you have moved forward during the button sequence, the second burst will hit you, because it will still come from the place where you pressed the second R.

Extended second burst: R,R,Y (no secondary weapon) A very usefull trick if you want to land two precision shots without having the pulling of the trigger as an interruption so you can use the autoaim optimal. The shots will come out at normal speed, but the second burst will come automatically.

Instant death: R,R,Y,B The hardest to pull off, but also the quickest way to make someone die with a battle rifle. Stand in front of them and aim at his/her head, then by pressing R,R,Y,B quickly you will first fire one shot, then switch, melee and fire the second shot. The melee is to be pressed when you see the secondary weapon model. You could use the B,X,R, but with this trick you will always do damage, because of the first shot and on top of that you can do it with a not-full clip. Note - You do not want to run forward while getting in range for the melee, because then you will have the second shot hitting you in the back of your head.

Keep in mind that these glitches can also be used to expand each other, basically until it turns into Tekken Tag combat!

Plot synopsis
Halo 2 opens with an awards ceremony on the Cairo weapons platform orbiting Earth. This ceremony is cut short when a Covenant flagship jumps out of slipspace and sends boarding parties towards the weapons platforms. These boarding parties are carrying heavy explosives designed to take out the MAC (Magnetic Accelerator Cannon) guns capable of destroying the Covenant flagships. Master Chief finds and disarms the bomb with the help of Cortana, then sends it to one of the Covenant ships and detonates it. They then head to Earth where the Covenant attack the city of New Mombasa, repelled with the assistance of the Master Chief. It continues across another ring world, dubbed "Delta Halo", as the crew of the UNSC vessel In Amber Clad attempt to discover the reason for the Covenant's incursion. There, the Master Chief kills one of the Covenant's three High Prophet leaders, which ultimately triggers a civil war inside the Covenant. Meanwhile, the fleet commander who led the Covenant forces in Halo is stripped of his rank, only to assume the role of the Arbiter, the greatest of the Covenant warriors. His first mission, to silence a heretic who doubts the Prophets' teachings, starts him on a path which will make him question his beliefs.

The Master Chief and the Arbiter meet upon the release of the Flood and the discovery of the Prophets' true objective: driven by their ancient religion, they seek to activate Delta Halo, which would cause the death of every sentient being in the galaxy. A mysterious Flood creature called the Gravemind sends the Arbiter and Master Chief in separate directions to prevent The High Prophets from activating Delta Halo.

The Master Chief finds himself upon the nearby Covenant Holy City, High Charity, a gargantuan space station, and pursues the remaining Prophets. After capturing the In Amber Clad, the Flood, led by the Gravemind, arrive on the city and begin to try and capture it. The only remaining High Prophet, Truth, escapes on a Forerunner vessel. The Master Chief stows away on board, but Cortana stays behind in order to detonate the In Amber Clad's engine reactors as a last resort. This will destroy Delta Halo and High Charity, stopping Tartarus from activating it, while preventing the Flood's escape across the galaxy. However, at the end, Cortana not only fails to destroy High Charity, but she also chooses to answer the questions of Gravemind.

Uniting the separatist faction of the Covenant on Delta Halo, and with the help of Sergeant Johnson, the Arbiter succeeds in preventing Tartarus from activating the installation. However, the Halo and its counterparts across the galaxy are left on standby alert, awaiting a trigger signal from "The Ark", whose location is yet unknown, but is believed to be on Earth. Meanwhile, the Forerunner vessel arrives near Earth, with the Master Chief on board. The game ends with a cliffhanger, with the last cutscene showing the Master Chief about to enter the battle to save Earth while Cortana meets Gravemind on High Charity for unknown reasons. The stage is set for the final battles of the Human-Covenant and Covenant civil wars in Halo 3 or Bungie's next project (has yet to be announced). There, without a doubt, will definitely be a Halo 3.

Main characters

 * Master Chief
 * Cortana
 * Sergeant Johnson
 * Miranda Keyes
 * Arbiter
 * High Prophets of Truth, Mercy and Regret
 * Tartarus
 * 2401 Penitent Tangent
 * 343 Guilty Spark
 * Spec-Ops Command Leader Half-Jaw

Music
The Halo 2 soundtrack was mostly composed by Martin O'Donnell, who had also composed the music of Halo. Steve Vai provided guitar backing for many tracks. Additional tracks were also provided by various outside musicians, such as Joe Satriani (for the remixed theme song, which includes new guitar solos).

The Last Spartan, is the signature theme tune for Halo 2.

The bands Incubus, Breaking Benjamin, and Hoobastank also feature on the official soundtrack and to a certain extent, in the game. The song Blow Me Away is considered the most popular of these contributions, however Incubus's contributions create the mood of the game the best.

Xbox Live Updates
A common complaint regarding Halo 2's online play has been the widespread cheating which occurred almost immediately upon the game's release. Users exploited bugs in the game and vulnerabilities of the network to win ranked games and thus increase their matchmaking rank. In response to these complaints, Bungie released an automatic update for Halo 2 (a mandatory patch) on Monday, April 18th, 2005, which fixed many of the various bugs and cheats in the game (though some inevitably persist), slimmed down split-screen HUD information, and rebalanced various weapons to promote use of single-wield weapons, grenades, and melee attacks. For example, the melee attacks and grenades are now far more powerful. The battle rifle is now more accurate. A full list of changes can be seen here. This brings Halo 2 up to Version 1.1.

Halo 2 also supports downloadable content, with Bungie making various new multiplayer maps available. Four maps were made available to download on Monday, April 25th, 2005. Two of these were immediately free to download (the "Bonus Pack"), while the other two (the "Killtacular Pack") had a charge attached (US$5.99, £2.99) until July the 5th (in actuality, late June), when they too became free to download. On the 5th, 5 new maps were made available in a pack for $11.99, and were similarly made free to download on August 30th. The Map Pack disk (below) was also released on that date. For further information on the map packs and their contents, see the list of downloadable maps.

Another update was added in July, 2005 (a week or so after the release of the map pack). The update added a detection tool that would automatically detect and ban 'modders' using modified content on their Xboxes. Modified versions of the downloadable maps would allow people to use cheats such as 'super jump' and 'automatic reload' during matches on Xbox Live. Any players who are detected using modified content would be automatically banned from Matchmaking on Xbox Live. The update also fixes a teleporter glitch on the map, Relic.

Criticism
While Halo 2 has won many awards and raked in colossal profits, debate has risen over the merits of such success, especially when faced with comparisons to the immense impact on the console market that the first Halo had. Many gamers even credit Halo CE with singlehandedly propping up the Microsoft Xbox's image and sales through its first generation of games.

Criticisms of Halo 2
Some players dispute whether Halo 2 is a good game at all. A large chunk of this group consists of disgruntled Halo fans who feel that certain changes have made the game unbalanced, mainly in multiplayer gameplay. Several argumentative complaints have been registered by members of this movement:
 * The lack of mid-to-long range weapons in the game.
 * The Sub-machine gun starting weapon which some claimed was imbalanced and underpowered, leaving the outcome of the game determined by a combination of luck and who can get to more dominating weapons first.
 * Increased "autoaim," "stickyaim," and "magnetism," which some claim levelled the playing field between the professional and the casual players. Magnetism guides the aiming reticle towards an enemy character, while the autoaim allows hits to be registered over a wider area around the target.
 * Toned down pistol. In Halo, the M6D pistol was an extremely powerful sidearm that, if aimed precisely, killed any shielded enemy with three shots to the head. This made it one of, if not the best multiplayer weapon and the main weapon used by many experienced Halo players. In Halo 2, however, the pistol lost a considerable amount of power, making it a support weapon of dubious functionality.
 * Addition of the plasma sword, a one-hit-kill mêlée weapon with a lock-on feature, considered by many players to be overpowered.
 * A narrower field of view of 70 degrees.
 * Minor gameplay differences when compared with Halo CE which deleted or changed more subtle aspects of skill that originally steepened the learning curve (deletion of fall damage, inclusion of vehicle lock-on feature for rocket launchers, shorter fuse times for grenades, decreased blast radius, massive plasma grenade damage, underpowered melee attacks, reworked network code which leads to massive host advantage, change of weapon respawn system so that the more powerful weapons won't respawn if someone has them, etc.)
 * A cliffhanger ending.

It should be noted that many of these gripes all concern intricate game balances regarding competitive gaming, and almost exclusively focus on the interests of competitive gamers.

Matchmaking
A number of players take issue with Xbox Live Matchmaking. One frequent complaint involves the default weapon settings used in multiplayer gametypes, situations where the player starts off with the relatively underpowered and inaccurate SubMachine Gun. These players feel that a starting weapon such as the Battle Rifle would make much more sense in the competitive environment of matchmaking, allowing for a greater emphasis on aim and strafing techniques. Others feel that the Battle Rifle is an annoying weapon and isn't nearly as much as "fun" as the traditional SMG. Bungie has since responded to these demands by including the Battle Rifle as a default weapon in several playlist scenarios.

Many members of the Major League Gaming league share similar gripes. Fans of the strict policies and gametypes endorsed by MLG routinely posted on the Bungie.net forums arguing for these to be included in matchmaking, often proposing the compromise of an MLG-style playlist. These complaints escalated until Bungie.net moderators eventually banned all talk of MLG related proposals. Now Bungie has added Team Hardcore playlist to enact several of the key MLG ideas into matchmaking.

There are many issues with lag as well. Due to the fact that there are no regional hosts, lag can get very excessive if someone of another country plays in the same game with someone from a different country. Regional hosts are when a host if from a specific country visibly seen in normal online games. This reduces lag times because the players are closer together, less distance for data to travel.

Technical
Conflicts also arose because of Bungie's Halo 2 game engine. This engine uses an "on the fly" rendering technique in an attempt to create a game without load times. The downside is that the full resolution version of most textures are loaded as needed on-screen, which means that often times when loading new levels or characters, there are a couple of frames with lower resolution textures. Although this side-effect is not common during the single player campaign or the multiplayer scenarios, it is very common in the cutscenes used to separate levels and level segments. A few wish that such implementation was optional and would rather sit through loadscreens in exchange for a more consistant cinematic presentation.

Offline Multiplayer
Another area that is criticised is the lack of computer controlled enemies (also known as bots) in multiplayer. While Halo 2's main attraction was its online multiplayer component, it's failure to improve over the original Halo in regards to players who do not have Xbox Live is sometimes pointed out as being negligent. The omission of bots is also strange in that the AI in the singleplayer section of the game is fairly intelligent and dynamic, and could possibly have been transferred to multiplayer with a reasonable amount of ease. However, early rumours in Halo 2's development as to the inclusion of bots were firmly rebutted by Bungie.

Many online players of Halo 2 suggest that bots would be a waste of development time for the game, although for the offline community it is another example of them being overlooked in favour of online multiplayer. Halo 2 certainly shines in this area, but for a game aiming to push the limits of the console FPS, the absence of bots is fairly odd, given that they are present in earlier console games such as Timesplitters 2, XIII, Perfect Dark, and even The World Is Not Enough.

Story
Other disputes concern the creative liberties taken with the story. Several fans felt that the game's plot was too different from what the previews suggested. They felt that the struggle to defend Earth should have been the centerpiece of the story rather than a preface to the reiteration of the first game's storyline. This was most likely due to Bungie's policy against the divulsion of spoilers prior to the game's release, a move reflected in Halo's advertising.

More controversy was generated by the game's abrupt cliffhanger ending. Many players (and some reviewers ) were dissatisfied with the apparent lack of climax and some claimed that Microsoft forced Bungie to cut the last level. However, according to the Collector's Edition supplemental DVD, Bungie's decision to resort to a cliffhanger ending was necessitated by "time constraints". After being given almost three years to finish the project, with numerous and competent staff, this was seen as a rather dubious excuse, and the outcome was less than satisfactory for many.

Players also lamented the demystification of the Covenant enemies. In Halo 2 Bungie decided to further humanize the alien enemies; aliens suddenly spoke English, due to the Master Chief's "Covenant translator" built into his new armor (the Covenant actually spoke backwards English in the original Halo). Also included were cutscenes that shed light on their socialization, inevitably compromising the Covenant's menacing appearance. Further, the decision to include a playable Covenant character (The Arbiter) proved a risky move that was not universally supported. Jokingly referred to as an example of the Metal Gear Solid 2 syndrome, it shifted focus away from the franchise's main character (Master Chief).

Awards

 * 2005 Spacey Awards
 * Favourite Video Game
 * 2005 GameFly Q Awards
 * Favorite Game of the Year
 * Favorite Xbox Game
 * Favorite Shooter Game
 * 2005 Game Developers Choice Awards
 * Excellence in Audio
 * Game Innovation Spotlights (I Love Bees)
 * Game Revolution 2004
 * Best Console Game of E3 2004
 * E3 2004 Game Critics Awards
 * Best Console Game
 * Best Action Game
 * Best Online Multiplayer Game
 * 1UP, 2004
 * Best Visuals of E3 2004
 * Best Xbox Game of E3 2004
 * Best Shooter of E3 2004
 * Best Game of E3 2004 Nominee
 * Best Multiplayer/Online Game of 2004
 * Best Shooter of 2004
 * Game of the Year 2004
 * Gphoria, 2005
 * Best Shooter
 * Best Multiplayer Game
 * Best Sound Design
 * Best Original Soundtrack
 * Best Male Performance (David Cross)
 * Best Boss (Scarab Battle)
 * Game of the Year
 * Webby for best "Games Related Website" (I Love Bees)

Links and Resources

 * Bungie's Official Halo 2 site
 * Xbox.com's Official Halo 2 site
 * H2Press – Creators of the Halo 2 Community Toolbar
 * Halo 2 Game Ratio (GR%) – Average Review Score for Halo 2
 * Collection of Reviews of Halo 2
 * Halo.Bungie.Org – Halo news & errata
 * halo2.junk.ws – Halo 2 Xbox Live statistics collection site
 * High Impact Halo – Site devoted to Halo stunts
 * Halo Fans.com
 * HaloWired.com Halo/Halo 2 Community
 * Gamespot.com and Gamespot's Halo 2 game page
 * Howstuffworks articles on a variety of Halo 2 topics.
 * H2Wiki – A Halo 2 Multiplayer Knowledge Repository
 * Halo 2 Speedruns
 * HaloTV
 * This Spartan Life – A "virtual talk show" recorded live within Halo 2's online multiplayer setting
 * The Halopedia – a Wiki devoted to everything Halo
 * Halo planet
 * Halo 2 at MobyGames
 * Halo Insider – Tips, strategies, and secrets for Halo 2.
 * Podtacular: The Unofficial Halo 2 Podcast – Tips, map of the week and custom games and call-ins

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