I know that is a controversial thread title, but I don't know for the life of me why... I looked at two past poll threads and Halo 3 was either at the top or a very close second and Halo 2 was way down near the bottom. Halo 3 is clearly the favorite, but for me it falls behind 2 in so many ways that I can't quite wrap my mind around it. Now I am talking about original campaigns as well, but with the Anniversary edition of 2 I really find it baffling. Let me break it down this way...
Story: Halo 2 has a way more engaging story that is basically not one long battle sequence... Sure Halo 3 does have some plot, but most of it just doesn't really make that much sense. All the cool plot setups from 2 have ok wrap ups, but still overall disappointing. One example is that Gravemind is set up as a big bad that has some ancient knowledge in 2, but in 3 he is dumb enough to send his entire race to The Ark and nowhere else, to assuredley get him and his whole clan all blown up... I mean why not attack multiple places instead of sending your infested ship to one place. There's a lot of stuff I can bring up here, but overall, Halo 2 was a well told story, decent characters for the type of game Halo is, and solid writing. Of course anniversary cutscenes accentuate the story in a better way and it is presented better, but even on paper Halo 2 is vastly superior.
Locations: This may be personal, but I love me some space opera and Halo 2 was full of it with the mystery and the sci fi settings. Halo 2 upped the ante and you were traveling to alien worlds, and uncovering alien lore. It was just full epic space opera. Halo 3 has half the game on boring ass earth, and when it finally gets interesting half way through, you're almost done with the game. It felt very much like a militaristic COD version of Halo, and to me that's super boring.
Missions: This is similar to locations, and yes The Ark and The Covenant are some of the best Halo levels ever, but most of the game has mediocre missions. The earth missions are fine, but comparing Crow's Nest, inside a boring military base to any of Halo 2's exotic sci fi levels just doesn't excite me. That's not even mentioning Cortana and the other backtracking Flood mission, which are simply slogs.
Gamplay: It's a wash for me as both still have excellent Halo gunplay, which makes the other areas so glaring of me. The only portion of this is that I like Halo 2's enemies a lot more than 3... mainly Elites more than Brutes. Positves and negatives for both, but I find them pretty even.
Level Design: A wash for me... I do love the open ended levels and vehicles more in Halo 3, but it's not massively more and I find Halo 2, even in its linearity does some wonderful things.
Atmosphere: Love Halo 2 so much here, again much more sci fi atmosphere... a little darker, more desolate but much more immersive for me.
There's much more, but I'm in a hurry and I wanted to get the discussion going... I feel like I'm taking crazy pills! Just playing through MCC and finished Halo 3 and about to start Reach, which I have never played. I heard I'm in for a treat...
Story: Halo 2 has a way more engaging story that is basically not one long battle sequence... Sure Halo 3 does have some plot, but most of it just doesn't really make that much sense. All the cool plot setups from 2 have ok wrap ups, but still overall disappointing. One example is that Gravemind is set up as a big bad that has some ancient knowledge in 2, but in 3 he is dumb enough to send his entire race to The Ark and nowhere else, to assuredley get him and his whole clan all blown up... I mean why not attack multiple places instead of sending your infested ship to one place. There's a lot of stuff I can bring up here, but overall, Halo 2 was a well told story, decent characters for the type of game Halo is, and solid writing. Of course anniversary cutscenes accentuate the story in a better way and it is presented better, but even on paper Halo 2 is vastly superior.
Locations: This may be personal, but I love me some space opera and Halo 2 was full of it with the mystery and the sci fi settings. Halo 2 upped the ante and you were traveling to alien worlds, and uncovering alien lore. It was just full epic space opera. Halo 3 has half the game on boring ass earth, and when it finally gets interesting half way through, you're almost done with the game. It felt very much like a militaristic COD version of Halo, and to me that's super boring.
Missions: This is similar to locations, and yes The Ark and The Covenant are some of the best Halo levels ever, but most of the game has mediocre missions. The earth missions are fine, but comparing Crow's Nest, inside a boring military base to any of Halo 2's exotic sci fi levels just doesn't excite me. That's not even mentioning Cortana and the other backtracking Flood mission, which are simply slogs.
Gamplay: It's a wash for me as both still have excellent Halo gunplay, which makes the other areas so glaring of me. The only portion of this is that I like Halo 2's enemies a lot more than 3... mainly Elites more than Brutes. Positves and negatives for both, but I find them pretty even.
Level Design: A wash for me... I do love the open ended levels and vehicles more in Halo 3, but it's not massively more and I find Halo 2, even in its linearity does some wonderful things.
Atmosphere: Love Halo 2 so much here, again much more sci fi atmosphere... a little darker, more desolate but much more immersive for me.
There's much more, but I'm in a hurry and I wanted to get the discussion going... I feel like I'm taking crazy pills! Just playing through MCC and finished Halo 3 and about to start Reach, which I have never played. I heard I'm in for a treat...
