Please note, this is a hands on experience review and not our final review of this product. Code of games played at the X01 event may not be final.

Halo Halo Halo, the wait to get my hands on this was extended because there was a queue was basically enormous but I persevered, as this was a title I had to get my hands on. Initially this looked to have exceeded my expectations and after 20 minutes I walked away knowing it had exceeded all my expectations.

Driving my Warthog (Marine Jeep) along the beach I was in awe at the amazing details of everything from the blades of grass, the trees but the stunning water effects from the see as the waves rippled onto the beach was as if I was standing there which is truly amazing.

Although initially odd when in control of vehicles as you control the camera rather than the vehicle but after an initial period this becomes easier, once in the vehicles you collect you marines and manoeuvre your vehicle into a position which enables them to attack the enemy. This is just an initial impression but this too me is truly amazing, after all this is not Project Gotham this is not a racing game this is Halo and manoeuvring your vehicle in this manor fits the bill spot on.

Halo has more than enough in the way of story, adventure, combat and exploration to make Lara Croft cry, this is an astounding First Person Shooter but not in the normal sense of the genre by any means.

The attention to detail from Bungie is astounding throughout, when your driving you Warthog check out the Marine rattling off hundreds of rounds from the rail gun mounted on the vehicle a truly impressive detail, At no point in the short time playing Halo did I find the controls odd or difficult other than the initial issue when controlling the vehicles for the first time, they were just the norm really as we are now coming to expect from First Person Shooter titles on consoles (especially a console that is not a PC and without a Keyboard Mouse combo) the triggers fire your various weapons, X reloads and the analogue sticks control movement and aiming etc all as is becoming very familiar.

Moving on lastly, the graphics? Well a lot has been said about the 30 frames per second but this was all a distant blur from my mind and totally un-noticable. At no time was this evident and in a conversation with a programmer found out the only time slow down is seen in the game is in 4 player split screen and if you through a grenade at the same time or something of that nature, as this is not a truly a multi player game in the sense that there is no internet support for multi-player I personally didn’t worry about this shall we say ‘slight defect’ as I personally will only ever be playing this full screen in single player mode!!! I was also assured that there was no slow down in single player mode.

The animation of all the characters in the game is truly stunning and fluid, if you kill someone and they fall onto a rock or a tree it is almost lifelike, as was just about everything that I saw within the game. Halo has promised so much in terms of gameplay and visuals and I can honestly say Bungie have delivered in every way.