By Aaron Matteson
Microsoft's bold foray into video gaming was a risk. The Xbox was competing in a cutthroat field, and it had its disadvantages. First off, the actual console looked like something that had fallen off the back of a faulty hummer, as opposed to the designs of its sleek-looking competitors like the Dreamcast and the PS2. The controllers seemed designed less for humans and more for silverback gorillas. And finally, with launch titles like the overenthustiastic Amped: Freestyle Snowboarding and the inane Fuzion Frenzy, it seemed like the Xbox was perhaps a doomed enterprise.
But then the Master Chief strolled in. Here's a few things we learned from the defining FPS of a generation.
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One of the most brilliant moves in the development of Halo was the idea to give the gigantic cyborg protagonist the option to not actually fire his weapons but instead hit his adversaries in the face with them. The developers realized that there is nothing more satisfying than taking a piece of intricate, advanced machinery and using it completely incorrectly in order to cause harm to another. In fact, in retrospect, we're surprised there were not more cases of kids under the influence of Halo hitting each other in the heads with their Xbox consoles.
2.) Everybody loves an everyman.
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| The face of John Q. Public in the 26th century. |
Okay, so maybe it's not exactly accurate to call a ripped mega-soldier from the future an "everyman," but in a way it's true. With his badass but pseudo-bland voice and his inscrutable helmeted face staring down every new challenge with whatever combination of stoicism and bravado that the player imagines, the Master Chief is ultimately a perfect canvas upon which to paint the fantasies of millions of adolescents everywhere.
3.) Fundamentalism is dangerous.
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Look at this little weirdo. He's disillusioned, depressed, lost. Probably unemployed with few marketable skills except for his ability to scream "THE DEMON" and run. He's a perfect recruit for cultists. If you've ever flirted with extremism, take to hear the lesson that Halo imparts on this subject: be mindful that your road to salvation won't destroy the universe in the process.
4.) Sometimes people just want to feel important.
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| Look at this epic shit. |
Halo was a smash-hit among veteran gamers and the uninitiated as well. People of all walks of life bought copies of the new "it" game, in part surely because it would include them in the newest fad.
But there's another explanation for the wild success of the game and its sequels that has nothing to do with Microsoft's marketing campaign. One of the defining characteristics of Halo is its epic scope. Everything in the game is outsized and grandiose: the player character himself, the swelling motifs of the music, the gorgeously rendered settings and, of course, the sweeping plotline.
One of the reasons we go to video games is to transport ourselves from the ordinary to, briefly, the extraordinary. To experience a shared dream that adventure is closer than it perhaps truly is in our daily lives. With Halo, school children, frat boys, middle-aged stoners and probably even a few thirty-something soccer moms all engaged in something that felt big, and that was maybe the best thing the game had going for it.
5.) Get your license.
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| Your learner's permit will not cut it. |
Kids, get your license. Driving makes things ten million times more fun, though your dad's Civic is probably not going to have quite as big a machine gun mounted in the back.
And if you crash, don't worry. Just flip your car back over real quick.
