I am in awe of the multiplayer experience of Halo 2. It’s the first game to fully deliver on the two-year-old promises of Xbox Live. Where to start... First, the matchmade games are perfect when none of your friends are online. It’s so nice to have a guarantee that you will be only playing against people at the same skill level as you. It’s also awesome to see your level increase as you defeat higher level players. I even ignored a game invite from “K Smooth” Keith last night just so I could keep playing ranked games to bump my level up. I talked to him today and apparently he was sitting in a room all by himself waiting for me to accept... loser.
And when your friends ARE online? It’s such a slick online experience that really feels like you are all hanging out in the same room. Previous Live games required everyone to congregate before starting the game, which meant you had to prearrange a game time, or luck out by finding your friend idle while you were. Not with Halo 2; you can join a friend’s game at anytime. And once you and your friend(s) are joined in a party, there’s no separating you. It ends up making the online gaming feel just like gaming at a LAN party. Like two days ago, I messaged Micah (oh, the new voice messaging also is an awesome feature that streamlines pregame communication) and we got in a game together. We were talking in the lobby, when INfINItE ENdING (a guy I was playing against earlier) joined to me. We played a game with just us three, but then INfINItE ENdING had to leave. So Micah and I started a one-on-one game, but halfway through Brett showed up. And then 3/4 of the way into the game, Jeff showed up as well! When that game ended, we were all in the lobby and ready for another game.
And as if that wasn’t enough, Bungie has put up a sweet website that shows stats on every game played. Here is a list of my recent games, where you can look at who I was playing with, who won, and even detailed stats like hit percentages! There is even an RSS feed for each player’s games (which I am trying to get integrated into my site)!
So basically, this is the best online game ever made, ever. I don’t think there is even a point for companies to make new Xbox games, because I think all of our Xboxes just became Halo 2 boxes.
"And when your friends ARE online? It’s such a slick online experience that really feels like you are all hanging out in the same room."
Another alternative might be actually to all hang out in the same room. :)
Yeah, that'll be an option as soon as we all figure out how to make our big screen TVs portable. And don’t tell me you're actually suggesting that we hang out and not play Halo… that would just be silly.