If I were to tell you that one of the most successful first person shooter franchises in history, the game that made Xbox become a household name and established Xbox Live as a service, actually started out as a real time strategy game for the Mac then you may be inclined to think I’m lying. But that is exactly where the game that became Halo: Combat Evolved started out development. It is somewhat well documented by now so this may not be new information to you, but it’s still something I find quite interesting as Halo would eventually perform a complete U-turn and in 2009 Microsoft released Halo Wars, an RTS game set in the Halo universe, developed by Ensemble Studios, the critically acclaimed developers behind the monumental Age of Empires series.
Sadly, due to Microsoft believing the developer to be no longer financially viable for them to remain in operation, Ensemble was dissolved following Halo Wars launch, despite the strong sales Halo Wars received. Thanks to an extremely dedicated and vocal fanbase though, Halo Wars would resurface in 2017 with a sequel developed by Creative Assembly (of Total War fame) alongside a remaster of the original game for the Xbox One. So how does Halo Wars hold up against the mainline series?
Set twenty years before Combat Evolved, Halo Wars puts you in command of the UNSC Spirit of Fire and its troops. You’re sent to the planet Harvest, having recently been ravaged in the First Contact War with the Covenant, you’re informed the Covenant are searching for something and you need to find out what. What the covenant discover is Forerunner in origin and takes them (along with some kidnapped Spirit of Fire crew members) to an undiscovered planet in another solar system; when you follow them you find that the planet is infested with parasitic creatures (The Flood) and beneath its surface is an inverse planet and a sun at its core. You must rescue your kidnapped crew from the Covenant, destroy the planet, and escape by any means necessary.
Sadly, due to Microsoft believing the developer to be no longer financially viable for them to remain in operation, Ensemble was dissolved following Halo Wars launch, despite the strong sales Halo Wars received. Thanks to an extremely dedicated and vocal fanbase though, Halo Wars would resurface in 2017 with a sequel developed by Creative Assembly (of Total War fame) alongside a remaster of the original game for the Xbox One. So how does Halo Wars hold up against the mainline series?
Set twenty years before Combat Evolved, Halo Wars puts you in command of the UNSC Spirit of Fire and its troops. You’re sent to the planet Harvest, having recently been ravaged in the First Contact War with the Covenant, you’re informed the Covenant are searching for something and you need to find out what. What the covenant discover is Forerunner in origin and takes them (along with some kidnapped Spirit of Fire crew members) to an undiscovered planet in another solar system; when you follow them you find that the planet is infested with parasitic creatures (The Flood) and beneath its surface is an inverse planet and a sun at its core. You must rescue your kidnapped crew from the Covenant, destroy the planet, and escape by any means necessary.
It is a story that serves its purpose but does little to really expand on fans pre-existing knowledge of Halo, provided they have read the copious amounts of comics and books. Whilst the story of the Spirit of Fire is new to Halo Wars, the story of Harvest and what happened there is not, and the events of Halo Wars are so self-contained that it doesn’t impact any other Halo lore that existed prior to its release.
The main characters are good, but they lack the same depth and development that fans expect from a Halo game. Whilst Professor Anders is perhaps the standout character in Halo Wars, the others either lack screen time or personality to really be meaningful. Captain Cutter has the most screen time of the four main characters, but he lacks personality as he is usually just dolling out orders or analysing battle strategies. His A.I Serena does give some comic relief to his straight edge militarism, but in comparison to Cortana from the mainline games she is significantly less interesting. Finally, Sergeant Forge has a lot of personality, but he doesn’t get an awful lot of screen time, and much of his time on screen is often just responding to Cutter’s commands. They are perfectly ok characters but when you compare them to Halo characters past they are a little undercooked.
The gameplay is what Halo Wars is really worth playing for. It’s a well-known fact that controllers simply aren’t good to play RTS games on. There aren’t anywhere near as many button inputs, and a thumb stick is infinitely less accurate than a mouse. But Ensemble spent the best part of five years developing Halo Wars and much of that time was spent making sure the game felt right to play on an Xbox controller. Whilst it certainly can’t compare to a keyboard and mouse, it’s a mighty fine control scheme that is comfortable, intuitive, and most importantly effective. The left stick controls camera movement whilst the right stick rotates or zooms it. The A button selects a unit, and the X button gives the unit a waypoint to move to, if you do that on an enemy unit then it will attack. Some units are capable of special attacks which can be performed by pressing the Y button over an enemy unit. The B button clears all selected units. Holding down the A button allows you to cast a selection radius to highlight multiple units. The Left Bumper selects all your units whilst the Right Bumper selects whatever units are on screen. The Up button gives you Spirit of Fire commands such as powerful attacks, healing abilities, and moving your units rally point. The Left and Right allow you to quickly flick between points of interest on the map such as your bases, objectives, or enemy unit encounters.
Reading it in a paragraph may not make it sound particularly intuitive but after just a few minutes of playing Halo Wars you’ll be performing some pretty complex manoeuvres without even thinking about it. Whilst it certainly lacks the depth of games like Age of Empires or Total War, it allows you to do everything you need. The UI is also extremely easy to navigate, presenting menus as wheels that simply require you to push the left thumb stick towards your desired option and press A to select it. This makes base building and unit management extremely easy. Whilst purists may be put off by not having the ability to customise button layouts and have commands mapped to every key imaginable, Halo Wars eschews the need for that with simple to navigate UI and a control scheme that just works straight out of the box.
The main characters are good, but they lack the same depth and development that fans expect from a Halo game. Whilst Professor Anders is perhaps the standout character in Halo Wars, the others either lack screen time or personality to really be meaningful. Captain Cutter has the most screen time of the four main characters, but he lacks personality as he is usually just dolling out orders or analysing battle strategies. His A.I Serena does give some comic relief to his straight edge militarism, but in comparison to Cortana from the mainline games she is significantly less interesting. Finally, Sergeant Forge has a lot of personality, but he doesn’t get an awful lot of screen time, and much of his time on screen is often just responding to Cutter’s commands. They are perfectly ok characters but when you compare them to Halo characters past they are a little undercooked.
The gameplay is what Halo Wars is really worth playing for. It’s a well-known fact that controllers simply aren’t good to play RTS games on. There aren’t anywhere near as many button inputs, and a thumb stick is infinitely less accurate than a mouse. But Ensemble spent the best part of five years developing Halo Wars and much of that time was spent making sure the game felt right to play on an Xbox controller. Whilst it certainly can’t compare to a keyboard and mouse, it’s a mighty fine control scheme that is comfortable, intuitive, and most importantly effective. The left stick controls camera movement whilst the right stick rotates or zooms it. The A button selects a unit, and the X button gives the unit a waypoint to move to, if you do that on an enemy unit then it will attack. Some units are capable of special attacks which can be performed by pressing the Y button over an enemy unit. The B button clears all selected units. Holding down the A button allows you to cast a selection radius to highlight multiple units. The Left Bumper selects all your units whilst the Right Bumper selects whatever units are on screen. The Up button gives you Spirit of Fire commands such as powerful attacks, healing abilities, and moving your units rally point. The Left and Right allow you to quickly flick between points of interest on the map such as your bases, objectives, or enemy unit encounters.
Reading it in a paragraph may not make it sound particularly intuitive but after just a few minutes of playing Halo Wars you’ll be performing some pretty complex manoeuvres without even thinking about it. Whilst it certainly lacks the depth of games like Age of Empires or Total War, it allows you to do everything you need. The UI is also extremely easy to navigate, presenting menus as wheels that simply require you to push the left thumb stick towards your desired option and press A to select it. This makes base building and unit management extremely easy. Whilst purists may be put off by not having the ability to customise button layouts and have commands mapped to every key imaginable, Halo Wars eschews the need for that with simple to navigate UI and a control scheme that just works straight out of the box.
Aside from the controls Halo Wars features standard RTS gameplay. You command troops in an attempt to decimate any forces that oppose you and occasionally complete other objectives that are thrown your way. The story missions escalate in difficulty as the game goes on and often have multiple side objectives you can complete for extra rewards. Other modes include Skirmish and Multiplayer. Skirmish allows you to go head to head against the computer to see who will be the victor. Multiplayer swaps out A.I opponents and teammates for real people with a maximum of 3 vs 3 in a game. Each player chooses an avatar which acts as their squad leader and grants the use of particular command powers. For example Captain Cutter can use a powerful orbital gun called a MAC cannon to deal massive damage upon a single target (best used against bases). Forge can call in an airstrike to deal high damage across an area. Whilst Anders can call in a Cryo Bomb to freeze enemy targets in place for a number of seconds. In these modes you can also play as Covenant leaders, Prophet of Regret (whose Cleansing Beam works similarly to the Mac Cannon but can be moved around as it fires); Brute Chieftain (whose power grants a tornado like area damage), and The Arbiter (whose power grants the player control of The Arbiter to deal strong attacks with for a limited time). The Chieftain is the only character not to appear in the story and I guess its because The Arbiter is the main villain and he gets his orders from Regret.
The fact that there’s only two playable factions may also rub some RTS purists the wrong way as they may be used to multiple factions each with their own unique playstyle. But I would argue the limitations set by Halo Wars allows for far more intense matches as you can specialise in particular factions and leaders allowing for far more intense matches.
Graphically Halo Wars is great. Environments and units are richly detailed and the frame rate is for the most part pretty smooth. It only ever seems to dip below 30 when a scripted sequence happens, which are usually larger in scale than what usually happens in the game. I have had the occasional slowdown when full armies of 30 units each clash outside a base, but it happens rarely enough to not be a big problem. The CG cinematics are excellent. Designed by Blur, these cinematics were incredible back in 2008, and whilst they certainly show their age in comparison to 2014's Halo 2: Anniversary (which was also handled by Blur), they're still pretty great sequences with smooth realistic animation and highly detailed assets.
The score is always one of the best parts of a Halo game and Wars is no different. Whilst it certainly doesn't have quite as many memorable tracks as some of the mainline entries, almost all of them are still incredible.
Overall Halo Wars is a great console RTS. Whilst it certainly lacks many of the trimmings we have come to expect from PC RTS games, in comparison to its console contemporaries like Command & Conquer on console it far exceeds what they have achieved. It’s also a fun extension to the Halo lore that whilst not having a direct impact on the stories of any other part of the established canon is enjoyable nonetheless. The audio/visual standard is extremely high and I would say it's a must play for any Halo fan, as for RTS fans...I guess it just depends on how desperate you are for a console RTS experience.
The fact that there’s only two playable factions may also rub some RTS purists the wrong way as they may be used to multiple factions each with their own unique playstyle. But I would argue the limitations set by Halo Wars allows for far more intense matches as you can specialise in particular factions and leaders allowing for far more intense matches.
Graphically Halo Wars is great. Environments and units are richly detailed and the frame rate is for the most part pretty smooth. It only ever seems to dip below 30 when a scripted sequence happens, which are usually larger in scale than what usually happens in the game. I have had the occasional slowdown when full armies of 30 units each clash outside a base, but it happens rarely enough to not be a big problem. The CG cinematics are excellent. Designed by Blur, these cinematics were incredible back in 2008, and whilst they certainly show their age in comparison to 2014's Halo 2: Anniversary (which was also handled by Blur), they're still pretty great sequences with smooth realistic animation and highly detailed assets.
The score is always one of the best parts of a Halo game and Wars is no different. Whilst it certainly doesn't have quite as many memorable tracks as some of the mainline entries, almost all of them are still incredible.
Overall Halo Wars is a great console RTS. Whilst it certainly lacks many of the trimmings we have come to expect from PC RTS games, in comparison to its console contemporaries like Command & Conquer on console it far exceeds what they have achieved. It’s also a fun extension to the Halo lore that whilst not having a direct impact on the stories of any other part of the established canon is enjoyable nonetheless. The audio/visual standard is extremely high and I would say it's a must play for any Halo fan, as for RTS fans...I guess it just depends on how desperate you are for a console RTS experience.
STORY: 7/10
GAMEPLAY: 8/10
PRESENTATION: 8/10
LIFESPAN: 7/10
SCORE: 8/10
Whilst lacking in comparison to its PC contemporaries, you'll be hard pressed to find an RTS so well suited to a console.