Joe Pring
❘ Published: 2024-11-10T14:32:51
Halo 2 has left its teenage years and entered early adulthood – ancient by video game statistics – but the second installment in the Master Chief saga is far from outdated.
Twenty years after its release, the middle child of Bungie’s original trilogy retains pole position as a landmark FPS, even more so than its predecessor. Halo 2 echoed its older sibling in every way possible, but it didn’t do so without help.
Microsoft’s then-newly launched online Xbox Live service paved the way for Halo 2’s legs to reach far beyond a one-off campaign and local LAN parties. It went global, opening the gates for millions of Spartans to test their mettle against each other in a friendly digital playground.
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An alien concept today, but in the fledgling world of online gaming from the early 1990s, Common courtesy still had to be dismissed. Custom games, not the usual array of shmup modes found in most shooters, became the lifeblood of Halo 2, born from a strong sense of community and the desire to participate in emergent gameplay.
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Bungie would eventually provide proper support for fan-made content with Halo 3s Forge modebut until then, the community had to rely on honor rules to make the massive list of custom rules work. Infected chief among them.
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Coagulation was a popular card for bumper cars.
Infected, a staple, officially supported mode in later entries, required one player (the zombie) to ‘infect’ normally Spartans only using the Energy Sword to kill their prey. Any Spartan caught by his undead opponents had to manually switch teams and adopt the rules of a zombie.
Halo 2 quickly became a party game in all but name from that point on, exploding with a creative, casual-friendly series of pointless (in the best possible way) custom games just by answering what-if scenarios.
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Halo Infinite’s Season 4 launch fails to revive interest in Microsoft’s floundering FPS
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What would it be like to eschew gunplay and have a lobby of 16 players jump into Warthogs and ruthlessly collide with each other? Bumper cars. Why not limit one team to Covenant Wraith tanks and have them chase the smaller, agile Warthogs on Coagulation? Cat and mouse.
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A personal favorite, Tower of Power transformed Halo 2’s Ascension map into a proto-base defense minigame. Both teams fought for control of the main tower, equipped with a minigun perfectly positioned to plow down any Spartan who tried to regain ownership. Terribly out of balance? You bet, but great fun for a teenager with nothing but time.
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Ascension hosted Tower of Power.
Others, such as President (or VIP; the name may vary from lobby to lobby) and SWATwere acquired by Bungie, as was Infected, and became wildly popular alternatives to Team Deathmatch and Big Team Battle for more competitive players.
Microsoft said goodbye to Halo 2’s online features when it ended online support for the original Xbox in 2010, returning four years later with 2014’s Master Chief Collection.
With better visuals and its own independent Forge mode, the OG’s multiplayer magic lives on as a time capsule for those in their thirties and forties who have followed John-117’s story from the very beginning. For anyone over 30, it’s a snapshot of Halo’s Golden Age; a playable history lesson that still holds up today as a leading FPS in the genre.
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