Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary

Well for those that don’t know, the E3 gaming event is an annual convention for the announcements of new gaming technologies, this year it’s held on the 7th of June right through til the 9th, and already what’s been released/announced has been pretty exciting.

343 Industries, the company that is now responsible for the Halo franchise after Microsoft put an end to Bungie Studios, has announced the release of Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary on the 15th November 2011. This ‘new’ Halo title is a complete remake of the first ever Halo game released, just with revamped graphics, high def-audio and it also looks as though there will also be the assassination abilities from the most recent Halo title Halo Reach. In my opinion though . . . it doesn’t actually look that better.

Here’s my first complaint for 343 Industries . . . WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO MASTER CHIEF? As you can see above, the original Master Chief kicks the remake’s ass. The new armour looks ridiculous, his helmet just doesn’t look the part, now that 343 Industries has taken control are we playing Halo anymore? Or some try hard echo of what Halo use to be?

Anyways, the campaign has been completely reworked, as you can see I’ve laid out the original, followed by the remake for reference. You can definitely see the Halo Reach engine coming into play, especially with the one below, which has gone from a block-like . . . block . . . to the sleek-shiny metal that we’ve seen in Halo 3 and Halo Reach.

My major problem with what they’re doing, is the fact that they’re remaking  a historic landmark, not that it’s a bad thing, but when you try and do a remake of a legacy there’s a huge expectation. Yeah doing up all the graphics is good, but the legacy is what it is, because of . . . what it is. At the end of the day, people will still go back and play the original Halo Combat Evolved because it was the first Halo game, the sole reason, is because it’s the first Halo game, they want to go back and play it old-school and see where the franchise all started. It’s like all us gaming-geeks that still have the Duke Nukem and Legend Of Zelda games, we play them because they’re classics.

Screenshots (Click to enlarge)

A familiar level? Is it not?

This is the all new look of the level “The Silent Cartographer.”

The maps appear to have been revamped pretty well, the campaign has been completely regenerated, along with all of the multiplayer maps.