Halo 2

Halo 2
Halo 2 for Windows Vista cover art
Developer(s)	Bungie Studios, Microsoft Game Studios (PC port)
Publisher(s)	Microsoft Game Studios
Series	Halo series
Engine	Proprietary "Halo" engine with Havok physics
Platform(s)	Xbox, Windows Vista, and Xbox 360 backward compatible (with HDD unit to store emulation files)
Release	Microsoft Xbox: NA: November 9 2004 AU: November 9 2004 EU: November 11 2004 JPN: November 11 2004 Windows Vista: AU: May 29 2007 NA: May 31 2007 EU: June 8 2007 JPN: June 21 2007
Genre(s)	First-person shooter
Mode(s)	Single-player, Multiplayer, Xbox Live, Co-op, and System-link

Halo 2 is a science fiction first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie Studios. Released for the Xbox game console on November 9, 2004, the game is the sequel to Halo: Combat Evolved. After its initial release, Halo 2 was the most popular video game on Xbox Live, holding that rank until the release of Gears of War for the Xbox 360 nearly two years later. By June 20, 2006, more than 500 million games of Halo 2 had been played and more than 710 million hours have been spent playing it on Xbox Live; by May 9, 2007, this number had risen to five billion, with more than five million unique players on Xbox Live. As of May 9, 2006, 8 million units of the game have been sold worldwide, with 6.3 million of those units being sold in the United States. As of September 25 2007, Halo 2 is the fifth best-selling video game in the US and is the best-selling first-generation Xbox game worldwide.

The game features a new game engine, the Havok physics engine; added weapons and vehicles; new multi-player maps; and a continuation of the storyline from Halo: Combat Evolved. In the game, humans, who have developed faster-than-light travel and colonized hundreds of worlds, have been engaged in a war against a collective of genocidal alien races, the Covenant. The player assumes the roles of Master Chief and the Arbiter, and fights enemies on foot or with a collection of alien and human vehicles.

A Windows Vista version of the game was released on June 1, 2007 in North America. It was developed by a team at Microsoft Game Studios who are referred to internally as "Hired Gun". Game developer Pi Studios will be producing editing tools for this version, which will allow users to create multiplayer maps.

Gameplay

In-game screenshot of Halo 2.

Halo 2 is a story-driven action-shooter game with a first-person perspective. The game features an expanded range of vehicles, as well as other gameplay changes compared to its predecessor. In the original Halo, health and shield bars are visible on-screen. In Halo 2, the health bar is no longer visible; instead, health regenerates quickly when the player is not taking damage.

Halo 2 features more than fourteen human and alien weapons, many new to the series. Certain weapons can be dual-wielded, which allows the player to compensate for reload times, while sacrificing accuracy and the ability to use grenades for raw firepower. The player can carry two weapons at a time (or three if dual-wielding; one weapon remains holstered), with each weapon having advantages and disadvantages in different combat situations. For example, most Covenant weapons eschew disposable ammo clips for a contained battery, which cannot be replaced if depleted. However, these weapons can overheat if fired too rapidly in a short time. On the other hand, human weapons are less effective at penetrating shields and require reloading, but cannot overheat due to prolonged fire. The player can also carry a total of eight grenades (up to four of each type: plasma and fragmentation); however, grenades can only be thrown when single-wielding.

Another new ability found in Halo 2 is the ability to board enemy vehicles that are near the player and traveling at low speeds. The player or AI latches onto the vehicle and forcibly ejects the other player or AI from their position.

Campaign

The game's "Campaign" mode offers options for both single-player and cooperative multiplayer participation. In campaign mode, the player must complete a series of levels that encompass Halo 2's storyline. These levels alternate between the Master Chief and a Covenant Elite called the Arbiter, who occupy diametrically opposed roles in the story's conflict. Aside from variations in storyline, the Arbiter differs from Master Chief only in that his armor lacks a flashlight; instead, it is equipped with a short duration rechargeable form of active camouflage that disappears when the player attacks or takes damage.

There are four levels of difficulty in campaign mode: Easy, Normal, Heroic, and Legendary. An increase in difficulty will result in an increase in the number, rank, health, damage, and accuracy of enemies; a reduction of duration and an increase in recharge time for the Arbiter's active camouflage; a decrease in the player's health and shields; and occasional changes in dialogue.

The plot of the game takes the player from a futuristic version of Mombasa, Kenya, to a space station in orbit around Earth, to a massive floating city called High Charity, light-years from the solar system. Areas of the maps that players would normally never see due to design constrictions are still fully modeled and detailed, and experienced players can exploit gameplay flaws or glitches to explore new areas; notable examples are the mountains of Delta Halo and the skyscrapers of Metropolis.

There is a great amount of hidden content within the game, including easter eggs, messages, hidden objects, and weapons. The most well-known of the hidden content are the skulls hidden on every level. The skulls, which can be picked up like a weapon (or "ball" as in the '"Oddball" multiplayer gametype), are located in hard-to-reach places. Many are exclusive to the Legendary mode of difficulty. Once activated, each skull has a specific effect on gameplay. For example, the "Sputnik" skull found on the Quarantine Zone level alters the mass of objects in the game; thus resulting in explosions being able to launch these objects across larger distances. Skull effects can be combined to provide various new levels of difficulty and/or novelty.

Multiplayer

File:Halo 2 pregame lobby.jpg

Party members wait in the pregame lobby before the start of a match.

Unlike its predecessor, Halo 2 allows players to compete with each other via Xbox Live, in addition to the original game's support for split-screen and System Link multiplayer. Halo 2's Xbox Live mode offers changes from earlier online first-person shooters. Traditionally, one player sets his or her computer or console up as a game server or host, specifying the game type, map, and configuring other settings. The game software then uses a service such as GameSpy to advertise the game to the world at large; other players choose which game to join based upon criteria such as the map and game options each host is offering, as well as the ping times they are able to receive. In Halo 2, however, Xbox Live players do not choose to host public games, and they do not specify individual maps and options to search for. Instead, players select playlists that are geared to different styles of play. For example, the "Rumble Pit" playlist offers "every man for himself" game types, and "Team Skirmish" offers 4-on-4 team games, which are primarily objective-based games like Capture the Flag. Bungie occasionally deletes the unpopular game types and adds new ones.

File:Halo02.jpg

Production Screenshot of a Capture the Flag multiplayer game.

The Xbox Live servers create games automatically from the pool of players that have chosen each playlist, choosing a game type and map automatically and selecting one player to serve as the game's host. If the Xbox console hosting the game resigns, the Xbox Live service automatically selects a new host from among the remaining players so the game can continue. Players can create small parties with their friends and/or clan and enter games together as teammates in Team based games. Players may also set up games for their own party to their own specification, and invite others into that game from their Friends and Clan lists; however, these games are not made publicly available. For fairness and balance reasons, certain gameplay aspects from the Campaign mode are disabled or missing in Multiplayer: an example is the absence of the hand-held Fuel Rod Cannon and the removal of the Banshee's fuel rod cannon.

Technical lead designer, Chris Butcher, commented on the development of Halo 2's multiplayer in Edge, a British gaming magazine, in January 2007. Responding to a rash of subsequent news articles, Butcher clarified his position on Halo 2 multiplayer. He noted his original intent with the game, but he also reiterated disappointment. "For Halo 2 we had our sights set very high on networking," Butcher said. "We thought about the great LAN parties you can have with Halo 1 and decided to try [to] recreate that awesome experience of having all your buddies over to play, but using Xbox Live instead of having to lug consoles and televisions around. Going from having no Internet multiplayer to developing a completely new online model was a big challenge to tackle all at once, and as a result we had to leave a lot of things undone in order to meet the ship date commitment that we made to our fans."

Synopsis

Setting

Main article: Halo universe

Halo 2 takes place in the same science fiction universe as Halo. According to the story, humans have colonized numerous worlds due to the development of faster-than-light travel. Twenty-seven years before the beginning of Halo 2, the outer colony world of Harvest was destroyed by a collection of alien races, called the Covenant. Since then, the humans and Covenant have been locked in a bloody war, with the UNSC forces continually losing major engagements. The Cole Protocol was created in the hope of preventing the Covenant from discovering human population centers, particularly Earth itself. However, shortly before the events of Halo 2, the Master Chief heads to Earth after destroying a Covenant fleet to warn of an impending Covenant attack on humanity's home planet.

Characters

Main article: List of Halo series characters

The playable characters are the "Master Chief Spartan-117", one of the few surviving super-soldiers of the SPARTAN-II project; and the Arbiter, a disgraced Elite Commander turned into a holy warrior and serving under the Covenant's Prophets. Throughout much of the story, the Master Chief is assisted by a feminine artificial intelligence construct, Cortana, who resides in a neural implant and is connected to his MJOLNIR battle armor. The Master Chief is also assisted by the Marines of the UNSC ship In Amber Clad and its captain, Commander Miranda Keyes, who is the daughter of Captain Jacob Keyes (captain of the Pillar of Autumn during Halo: Combat Evolved). The Arbiter, meanwhile, is assisted by the varied races of the Covenant and the Special Operations Commander, Rtas 'Vadumee. The Covenant are the story's antagonists, although due to the action shifting between the Master Chief and his Covenant counterpart, the Arbiter, these enemies are sometimes allies. Playing an antagonistic role in the later stages of the game to both sides is the entity called Gravemind, a Flood intelligence of unknown motives.

Plot

The story of Halo 2 is told through in-game dialogue as well as cutscenes; the back-story to the game can be found in the game manual. Taking place shortly after the events of the novel Halo: First Strike, the game opens with the judgment and torture of a former Covenant Elite Commander, who is being punished by his fellow Covenant for failing to stop the destruction of the ringworld Halo during the events of Halo: Combat Evolved. This is juxtaposed with the recognition ceremony of the humans Master Chief and Sergeant Major A.J. Johnson receiving awards aboard Cairo Station, a MAC gun platform orbiting Earth, alongside Commander Miranda Keyes. It is revealed that the Covenant's interest in Halo lies in the belief that the activation of Halo would bring about the "Great Journey", which would allow them to follow the ancient Forerunners to the "divine beyond".

Soon after the commencement of Master Chief's ceremony, a Covenant fleet jumps out of slipspace near Earth. The Covenant proceeds to send boarding parties towards a battle cluster of MAC stations. These boarding parties are secretly carrying explosives designed to take out the MAC (Magnetic Accelerator Cannon) guns that protect Earth from attack. Master Chief finds and disarms a bomb located on Cairo Station with the help of Cortana, while the flagship of the Covenant fleet speeds past Earth's defenses and heads toward Earth itself. Master Chief and Cortana join the UNSC ship In Amber Clad, which is en route to New Mombasa to deal with the Covenant flagship.

Before reaching New Mombasa, Cortana decodes transmissions revealing that the flagship carries the High Prophet of Regret, an important Covenant figure. The UNSC successfully repels the Covenant invasion force with the help of Master Chief, and the Covenant ship begins preparations for a slipspace jump to an unknown destination. The ship makes the jump, and the city is destroyed in the shockwave. To avoid destruction, In Amber Clad follows and discovers a second Halo installation dubbed "Delta Halo". Despite the Covenant's own ideas about the rings, Master Chief and the crew of the Amber Clad know that the rings are actually weapons that if activated would wreak devastation on a galactic scale. Master Chief is sent to kill the High Prophet of Regret while Keyes attempts to secure the Index to prevent the activation of Delta Halo.

Meanwhile, the disgraced Covenant commander has been given a chance to redeem himself as the "Blade of the Prophets", the Arbiter. His first mission is to silence a heretic who doubts the Prophets' teachings, in turn starting the Arbiter along a path which ultimately results in him doubting his own beliefs about Halo. Seeds of discord are further sown within the Covenant when the Prophets decide to grant the Brutes the job of protecting the Prophets instead of the traditionally favored Elites. During his missions, The Arbiter finally realizes the danger that the rings represent.

File:Halo2cutscene masterchief a.jpg

The Arbiter (left) and Master Chief, the game's protagonists, in the tentacles of Gravemind.

The Master Chief and the Arbiter meet upon the release of the Flood, a race of parasitic creatures, from Delta Halo. A mysterious Flood creature called the Gravemind sends the Arbiter and Master Chief in separate directions to prevent The High Prophets from activating Delta Halo. Master Chief finds himself aboard the Covenant Holy City High Charity, a gargantuan space station, and pursues the remaining Prophets. During his mission, he finds himself in the middle of an erupting Covenant civil war between the Brutes and the Elites. After capturing In Amber Clad, the Flood, led by Gravemind, arrive at the city and begin to consume and infect the populace. The only remaining High Prophet, Truth, escapes on a Forerunner vessel hidden in the core of High Charity. The Master Chief stows away on board while Cortana stays behind in order to detonate the In Amber Clad's engine reactors to destroy Delta Halo and High Charity if the Brute Tartarus activates the ring. The Arbiter, with the help of fellow Elites, Avery Johnson, and Keyes, manage to stop the firing. However, the unexpected shutdown causes the ring to send a signal out to the other remaining Halos, sending them all into a "standby" mode so they can be remotely activated from the Ark. Meanwhile, the Forerunner ship that Master Chief has stowed away on approaches Earth. One of Earth's remaining orbital forces contacts him and asks what he is doing aboard the Forerunner ship. He replies, "Sir, finishing this fight," ending the game with an abrupt cliffhanger and setting the tone for Halo 3.

Soundtrack

Main articles: Halo 2 Original Soundtrack: Volume One and Halo 2 Original Soundtrack: Volume Two

The Halo 2 soundtrack was composed primarily by Martin O'Donnell and his musical partner Michael Salvatori, the team that had previously composed the critically-acclaimed music of Halo. O'Donnell noted in composing the music for Halo 2 that "Making a sequel is never a simple proposition. You want to make everything that was cool even better, and leave out all the stuff that was weak." O'Donnell made sure that no part of the game would be completely silent, noting "Ambient sound is one of the main ways to immerse people psychologically. A dark room is spooky, but add a creaking floorboard and rats skittering in the walls and it becomes really creepy. " Halo 2, unlike its predecessor, was mixed to take full advantage of Dolby 5.1 Digital Surround Sound.

In the summer of 2004, Producer Nile Rodgers and O’Donnell decided to release the music from Halo 2 on two separate CDs; the first (Volume One) would contain all the themes present in the game as well as music “inspired" by the game; the second would contain the rest of the music from the game, much of which was incomplete, as the first CD was shipped before the game was released. The first CD was released on November 9, 2004, and featured guitar backing by Steve Vai. Additional tracks included various outside musicians, including Joe Satriani, Incubus, Breaking Benjamin, and Hoobastank. The Halo 2 Original Soundtrack: Volume Two CD, containing the game music organized in suite form, was released on April 25 2006.

Development and release

Halo 2 was officially announced in September 2002 with a cinematic trailer. The trailer was subsequently packaged with later Halo: Combat Evolved DVDs. A real-time gameplay video was shown at E3 2003, which was the first actual gameplay seen by the public; it showcased new features such as dual-wielding and improved graphics. Bungie informed the public on development with weekly Halo 2 development updates which started on January 16, 2004 and ended June 25, 2004; the weekly updates became standard on the Bungie website even after the release of Halo 2.

The release of Halo 2 was preceded with numerous promotions, product tie-ins, and movie trailer-like commercials. There was a Halo 2 Celebrity Pre-Release Party at E3 2004, in which a private home was transformed to replicate the world of Halo, complete with camouflaged marines and roaming Cortanas.

In addition to more traditional forms of promotion, Halo 2 was also part of an elaborate Alternate Reality Game project titled "I Love Bees" which cost an estimated one million dollars. This 'game' centered around a hacked website, supposedly a site about beekeeping, where an AI from the future was residing. The project garnered significant attention from sites including Slashdot and Wired News; Wired noted that the game was drawing attention away from the 2004 Presidential Election. The game won an award for creativity at the 5th annual Game Developers Choice Awards and was nominated for a Webby award.

On the morning of October 14, 2004, a leak of the French version of the game was posted on the Internet, and circulated widely.

Additional content

Halo 2 Limited Collector's Edition

Contents of the Limited Collector's Edition

The Limited Collector's Edition features the regular edition, but includes several promotional offers, a special cover and a special DVD of the making of Halo 2. The instructional booklet is also written from the Covenant point of view rather than from the UNSC point of view used in the regular edition. Also enclosed is the "Conversations from the Universe" booklet that contains additional information from both the human and the Covenant side of the Halo storyline; transcripts are available online. The game is enclosed in an aluminum case with the Halo 2 logo.

Xbox Live updates

A common complaint regarding Halo 2's online play has been the widespread cheating, which began occurring almost immediately after the game's release. Users exploited bugs in the game and vulnerabilities of the network to win ranked games and thus increase their matchmaking rank.

Some players used "standbying" to cheat, in which the player hosting the game intentionally presses the standby button on his or her modem; this results in all players except the cheaters freezing in place. This way, the cheater would be given time to accomplish an objective in the game. "Dummying" involves using an Elite character and a vehicle, exploiting a glitch which would cause a doppelganger of the player to appear. Cheating also includes softmodding, in which a player uses devices such as Action Replay and computer programs to gain unfair advantages, and bridging, which uses computer programs to give a player 'host' status, and therefore the ability to disconnect other players from the game session.

Many players became frustrated and demanded that Bungie create solutions to the widespread cheating. In response to these complaints, Bungie released an automatic, mandatory update for Halo 2 on Monday, April 18, 2005, which eliminated many of the bugs and cheats. In addition, the update reduced the split-screen HUD information, and rebalanced certain weapons to promote use of single-wield weapons, grenades, and melee attacks over dual-wielding. For example, the melee attacks and grenades were made more powerful than they previously were, and the battle rifle now shoots more accurately. Bungie maintains a full list of updates.

A game exploitation called "superbouncing" or "superjumping" is labeled cheating by many in the Xbox Live community, and Bungie employees have described it as cheating when used in Matchmaking. Another group of glitches, which involve the use of certain button combinations, has similarly been described as cheating by both fans and Bungie employees. Despite the condemnations by Bungie employees, players still dispute whether or not superjumping and the use of button combinations is cheating.

Halo 2 supports downloadable content, which allows for new multiplayer maps to be retrieved offline. Four maps were made available to download for a fee on April 25, 2005; in subsequent weeks, five new maps were also made available for free on Xbox live. The Multiplayer Map Pack was also released on that date, as an alternative for those who did not have Xbox Live.

Another update was released in July 2005 (a week after the release of the map pack). The update added a detection tool that would automatically detect and ban modders using modified XBoxes. Modified versions of the downloadable maps allow people to use cheats such as auto aim and automatic reload during matches on Xbox Live. Any players who are detected using modified content are automatically banned from matchmaking on Xbox Live within six hours. Anyone who knowingly and willingly plays with modders is banned from matchmaking. Online matchmaking was updated again in June 2006. This update removed several game playlists, and made other changes within existing playlists.

Multiplayer Map Pack

The Multiplayer Map Pack is an expansion pack intended to make Xbox Live content and updates available to offline players. The disk contains the game's automatic update, all nine new multiplayer maps, a documentary about the making of the maps, and a bonus cinematic called "Another Day on the Beach", amongst other features. It was released on July 5, 2005. At release, it cost £15 in the UK and $19.99 in the U.S., available at par in Canada. The new multiplayer content can be used on Xbox Live, System Link and Split-Screen modes. Five of the new maps (Elongation, Terminal, Backwash, Gemini, Relic) were released online through Xbox Live's downloadable content service on July 5, the same day as the map pack. The other four maps (Turf, Sanctuary, Warlock, Containment) were released earlier that year. All of the multiplayer maps are now available as free downloads on Xbox Live.

Blastacular Map Pack

On March 30, 2007, Bungie announced that two new maps would be available on April 17, 2007 for US$4. Bungie's own Frank O'Connor confirmed that both Xbox and Xbox 360 users would have access to the content. The two new maps, "Tombstone" and "Desolation," are remakes of "Hang 'Em High" and "Derelict" respectively, two maps from the original Halo: Combat Evolved video game. On April 6, Bungie commented that a new update to the servers will be implemented, due to the new maps and playlists. The update was scheduled to be released on April 24, which would have made the new maps a mandatory download to continue playing most of the playlists in matchmaking. However, on April 25, 2007, Frankie announced that due to issues with distribution of the maps to both original Xbox and Xbox 360 owners (the most common problems being unable to turn on 'Premium Content' or the maps failing to install properly), the update was released on May 9, 2007. Bungie also reset all ranks for Halo 2 at the same time. On July 7, also known as "Bungie Day", Bungie released the Blastacular pack for free.

Reception

Reception

Aggregate scores

Aggregator	Score
GameRankings	95% (112 reviews)
Metacritic	95% (91 reviews)

Review scores

Publication	Score
Electronic Gaming Monthly	10/10/10 Platinum Award
Game Informer	10/10
GameSpot	9.4/10 Editor's Choice
GameSpy	5/5
IGN	9.8/10 Best Xbox game of all time

Awards

Publication	Award
	2004 Game Critics Awards: Best Console Game
	2005 Game Developers Choice Awards: Excellence in Audio
	2005 Interactive Achievement Awards: Console Game of the Year, Sound Design

The first official release of Halo 2 was in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United States on November 9, 2004. Anticipation for the game was high; three weeks before this release, a record 1.5 million copies had already been pre-ordered. Massive lines formed at midnight releases of the game; the event garnered significant media attention. This was followed by releases on November 10 2004 in France and other European countries, and November 11 in the UK. The game sold 2.4 million copies and earned up to US$125 million in its first 24 hours on store shelves, thus out-grossing the film Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest as the highest grossing release in entertainment history. Official Xbox Magazine reported that the Halo 2 launch was the biggest event in entertainment history, grossing $125 million on the launch date alone. The game sold 260,000 units in the United Kingdom in its first week, making it the third fastest-selling title of all time in the UK. On June 20, 2006, Xbox.com reported that more than a half-billion games of Halo 2 have been played on Xbox Live since its debut. As of May 9, 2006, 8 million units of the game have been sold worldwide, with 6.3 million of those units being sold in the United States. As of September 25 2007, Halo 2 is the fifth best-selling video game in the US and is the best-selling first-generation Xbox game worldwide. From the day of its initial release and up until mid-November 2006, Halo 2 was the most popular video game on Xbox Live, even after the release of the Xbox 360; its position was eventually surpassed in 2006 by the 360-exclusive Gears of War. Halo and Halo 2 are still some of the most played games for the Xbox console.

Generally, the game was positively received; many reviewers praised the audio for being especially vivid. Multiplayer especially was noted in being the best on Xbox Live at the time. Game Informer, along with numerous other publications, rated it higher than Halo: Combat Evolved, citing enhanced multiplayer and less repetitive gameplay. Halo 2 received multiple awards, including Best Console game and Best Sound Design from the Interactive Achievement Awards. Most critics noted that Halo 2 stuck with the formula that made its predecessor successful, and was alternatively praised and faulted for this decision. Edge noted in its review, “It's fitting that we're able to steal a line from the script to sum everything up. No spoilers here, just an epitaph, from the moment Cortana turns to Master Chief and says this: ‘It’s not a new plan. But we know it’ll work.' " According to Xbox.com, the game has received more than 38 individual awards.

The game's campaign mode has received some criticism for being too short, in addition to some dissatisfaction with the abrupt, cliffhanger ending that sets up the sequel, Halo 3. GameSpot noted that the story switching between the Covenant and Human factions made the plot more intricate- but distracted the player from Earth's survival and the main point of the game. There is also some criticism of the game's on-the-fly streaming and level of detail adjustment, which can sometimes result in textures loading erroneously and "popping in" when the camera changes in cutscenes. Bungie has stated that this issue has been fixed for Halo 3 and the Windows Vista port.

In an interview with Edge magazine in January 2007, Jamie Greisemer, one of Halo's design leads, said that the main reason for Halo 2's shortcomings was a lack of "polish" period near the end of the development cycle. Staff member Frank O’Connor admitted the cliffhanger ending was abrupt, noting “we drove off Thelma & Louise style". Nonetheless, in the interview Greisemer promised that they would make Halo 3 a more than worthy successor.

Windows version

See also: List of Games for Windows titles

File:Halo2 widescreen.jpg

In-game screenshot of the PC version, demonstrating a fixed widescreen HUD.

On February 9, 2006, Nick Baron announced that a version of Halo 2 would be released on PC, but exclusively for the Windows Vista operating system. The game was ported by a small team at Microsoft Game Studios (codenamed Hired Gun) who worked closely with Bungie Studios. On December 7, 2006, Microsoft visited IGN and revealed plans, as part of their Games for Windows brand campaign, to have Halo 2 be playable from disc via streaming during its own PC installation. Microsoft calls this streaming technology Tray and Play and claims that players will be able to start the game within two minutes of placing it into their DVD drives. This behavior attempts to mirror the experience of console gaming (where no installation is required) and is unique in the PC market to date.

Since it does not make use of DirectX 10, there is no technical reason why the game requires the Windows Vista operating system rather than Windows XP. In fact an unofficial patch is now available on several sites, which allows the game to work without issue on Windows XP.

Halo 2 for Windows Vista was originally scheduled for release on May 8, 2007, but the release was pushed back to May 29. This delay was apparently due to the insertion of nudity into the game via a "content error". Microsoft will be offering patches to remove the nude content and is revising the boxes to reflect this. Many retailers were not given the notification in time and have sold copies to consumers since as early as May 20 in a few United States Circuit City stores. The nudity was a photograph of a male mooning (presumably of a Microsoft or Bungie employee) which appeared as a ".ass" error when using the map editor in Halo 2 for Windows Vista.

Halo 2 for Windows Vista will link with the Games for Windows - Live network and have some interoperability with the Xbox Live network, as stated in the new FAQ section of Windows Vista flavor of the popular game on Bungie's official website. Bungie has stated that it will also have networking features of its own, resembling Halo PC's inclusion of free internet capabilities. This did not happen. Halo 2 released with LAN support, but Live is required for any Internet gaming.

Halo 2 is the first Games for Windows game to feature Achievements. It also includes some widescreen support, one of the standard features for Games for Windows titles. (While the Xbox version already had this, the PC version fixes stretching of the in-game menus and HUD.)

External links

• Bungie's Official Halo 2 site
• Xbox.com's Official Halo 2 site
• Halopedia at Wikia
• halowiki.net Multiplayer Wiki
• Halo 2 reviews at Metacritic
• Halo 2 at MobyGames