Few games have been as polarizing as the first-person Halo series. For better or worse, a good deal of what Halo popularized has become convention: Regenerating health and shields, forced weapon choices, and the control scheme, just to name a few. It was not necessarily the first game to do these things, but now we’re stuck with them. Halo Wars seems like an attempt to do the same standardization for the real-time strategy genre on consoles. EA had tried a few control variations on a couple of PC-centric RTSes (Battle for Middle Earth II, Command & Conquer 3), but it felt like an approximation of PC-style controls on a controller unsuited to the task. Halo Wars was built from the ground up to be a 360-exclusive, with controls and design decisions that promised to streamline the whole experience, all backed by a developer with considerable RTS knowledge.
Unfortunately, the original developer, Ensemble Studios, is no more, which is a shame, because that whole situation overshadowed what is a really decent game. It looks great, plays really well, and is the first RTS I’ve played that really feels at home on a console. Sure, it made some sacrifices to make it all work, and the value of the whole package can be really questionable at times, especially for a gamer who is only interested in part of the package. But it manages to fulfill what I see as its two primary goals: bring out an RTS that a Halo player might play, and present the Halo universe in a way a non-FPS gamer might care about.
As a bit of a disclaimer, I fall into the former category. I’m certainly no Halo superstar, but I have played all three. I’m also a modest RTS fan. I’ve enjoyed the assorted Warcrafts and Command & Conquers by muddling through them in my own way.
The game wears its Halo crown very well. The main menu opens with a remix of a familiar theme, with all the expected blue highlights and doodads. I was especially impressed with the inclusion of a Halo Timeline. It’s a group of about fifty key events (about a third of them initially locked) that take place during the Covenant Wars, leading right up to the events that started the original Halo game. I’ve always enjoyed Bungie’s backstory, a lot of which didn’t fit in too well with the run-and-gun action, so it’s nice to be able to read up and know what’s going on.
The core of the single player experience is the campaign mode. A number of bells and whistles are packed into it, but it does come across as underwhelming. It’s 15 stages, and UNSC only. Although the Covenant units are playable in the Skirmish and Multiplayer modes, there’s no matching campaign. It’s a little disappointing, especially given how much I was impressed by the campaign that is there. The game has absolutely amazing pre-rendered cutscenes. They’re very well done, very exciting, and fit the theme of Halo very well, much like the initial teaser released back during E3 a few years ago. They set up the missions and join them together.
Once in the mission, there’s a so-so cutscene done in the engine. Except that it has all been captured and compressed to the point where it looks rather blocky. The actual game looks quite good, so it’s really a minor squabble. There were no noticeable framerate issues, as I was too involved in the action to notice. The UI is simple – just a little minimap in the upper-right, next to unit numbers, reactor level, and number of remaining resources. Along the bottom will be icons when units are selected.
The sound fits the pace of the action very well. Halo-ish music at the right times, rising when things get exciting, growing muted when there’s a calm moment. All the familiar shouts and explosions, panicked Grunts and plasma blasts. The voice acting during cutscenes was perfectly fine, which is always a nice surprise.
The game’s tutorial explains most of the controls, and there’s really not a lot to explain. Analog sticks move and rotate the screen, A select units, and B cancels selection. X is move/attack, and Y uses the single special ability of any selected item. LT speeds up movement, RT cycles through selected units, LB selects all units, and RB selects all units on the screen. The d-pad is used for bringing up commander abilities and cycling between various locations (bases, alerts, armies).
That’s really it. Ensemble streamlined all the complicated controls a PC RTS would have to just those. No more than one ability per unit, no real way to create squads or groups of units, and so on. A very simple interface. It really does work, though. It’s easy to roll into battle with a huge group of dudes, tap RT to cycle to tanks, get them aiming at a Scarab, tap RT again, get the Spartans trying to hijack a Wraith, and that sort of thing. There’s no pinpoint precision, but there doesn’t need to be. There’s enough control given to let the game shine.
The simplicity of the control extends to other parts of the game. Halo Wars is built around the idea of a base. Certain locations on every map can support a base. Run a guy up there, choose Build Base, and you’re building that base! It pops up with a Command Center and three empty pads. Choose one of the empty pads and six options appear (some greyed out, depending on tech level). Supply Pads constantly produce resources. Gotta have a couple of those. Reactors raise the tech level of the base. They’re expensive, but necessary. A Field Armoury allows for upgrades, but makes no units itself. And then there are the Barracks, Vehicle Depot and Air Pad to produce the game’s various units. It’s possible to upgrade the Command Center so the base has five or seven pads, as well as four locations for turrets.
And again, that’s really it. The Covenant buildings have different names, and there are some slight differences, but the two factions are essentially the same. The game’s tech tree (PDF) is very straightforward. Each building can make two or three units, with a certain super unit getting unlocked should the tech be advanced enough, depending on the commander choice. And it’s all wrapped up in a Rock-Paper-Scissors system: infantry beats aircraft, which beats vehicles, which beat infantry, with a couple of exceptions. There’s an anti-infantry infantry unit (Flamethrower) and an anti-vehicle vehicle (Cobra), and the game does a good job of making all of this clear with on-screen prompts.
The major difference between the two factions is the way leaders are used. For the UNSC, the leader is on the Spirit of Fire, in orbit. They will have their one special ability, plus the ability to disrupt Covenant powers, send down healing / repairs, and order transports. For the Covenant, the leader is on the battlefield. His ability requires him to be in the area, putting him at risk. Because of this, all Covenant bases have the ability to teleport units directly to the leader at any time, with no cost. Kind of scary when you see the Arbiter running towards your base and suddenly he’s surrounded by a dozen squads of Suicide Grunts.
I really don’t feel the simplicity of the game is that bad a thing. Yes, there are really not all that many traditional strategic options, as far as development goes. But just because there are not billions of units, and the ability to drop buildings everywhere, doesn’t mean it’s not a strategic game. Resources are technically unlimited, but only come in so fast. What should be focused on at one time? Make them come in faster, focus on getting more bases for cheap Reactors, try to go for a Warthog rush, or rain down Regret death? Every pad is precious. By limiting building in such a way, every structure is valuable, even if resources would allow for many more to be made. The metagame that works in a good RTS is still intact.
Brad Petch has been playing games longer than most gamers have been alive. This does not mean he's good at them, or has good taste in them. Online interactions are not rated. 