Thoughts on the Halo Reach Title Update and Halo Anniversary September 27, 2011

At PAX’s HaloFest, 343 announced they were going to be doing a major title update to Halo Reach.  Their goal, was to bring Halo Reach as close to the feel of Halo: Combat Evolved as possible, and they believed their work on Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary (which is coming in November) was instrumental in helping them capture that feel.

From what I read, the title update is going to COMPLETELY revamp the whole game.  This means that there will be more than just bloom tweaking options (although that is coming), the gameplay is going to be altered.  Most of the stuff I’ve read involved tweaking to armor lock, but 343 did say that they were also making the pistol more in line with Halo 1’s (something that Halo developers have been saying they wanted to bring back since Halo 3: ODST).

I really don’t know how I feel about it.  I do think it’s a little unnecessary to do a title update THIS drastic to gameplay a little over a year after the game released (especially since the game has had no problem selling since it released).

Another cool announcement about Halo Anniversary is the game will feature firefight, and since the game is running it’s gameplay almost entirely on Halo 1 code, it will capture the Halo 1 feel exactly.  In my experience, having firefight in Halo 1 is a very smart move.  If there was one map that Halo 1 fans would want firefight on, it would be the entire Silent Cartographer level.  When Bungie did their hour-long documentary, hearing Bungie and press talk about the early test version of that level brought a lot of people to ask if it could become a firefight arena.

Me?  I’m just happy that developers answered my request to take some of my beloved games from the previous console generation and update them to run on modern widescreen HDTVs.

Also, there was something else to come out recently, and that is the first look at the new Warthog.  No longer the M12-LRV, this is a beast that has been upgraded with all new futuristic technology for the next generation of Halo.  I’m a huge fan of Top Gear, and for a car this awesome, the host of Top Gear just had to break it down.

It kinda looks like a puma.  The new Warthog is going to be first seen in the game Forza Motorsport 4.

Halo Reach is out now exclusive to the Xbox 360.  The title update is probably out by the time you read this.  Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary is coming in November, 2011, also exclusive to the Xbox 360.