- SGT Johnson's finest quote.

Halo 2 is, without a shadow of any doubt in my mind, one of the greatest games ever. Sure, it has flaws; The pistol sucks, the Sacred Icon is a bad level, it is unbalanced as HELL on Legendary, with the Jackal Snipers making the game nearly impossible.

But... Everything else is Halo 1 but even better. The music is amazing, most of the levels are wonderful, the story is EXCELLENT, and the new playable character, the Arbiter, is without question, one of my favorite characters to exist in any game ever. Period. Even including Zero from Mega Man, Arbiter is my favorite.


I had grown up most of my whole life adjacent to Halo and FPS games at the time. I never played them (my parents were concerned about gaming violence, yes they liked Joe Liberman), but I heard my friends talking about Halo, COD, CS, etc... I knew of Master Chief, I knew what he looked like, I knew his deal; eh shots the Alines and doesn't afraid of anything. Yes, I knew it all too well.

I didn't even KNOW of the Elites, much less the Arbiter until I played the series about a year ago... Which is a blessing in disguise, because I remember watching his story play out. Playing his levels completely blind, even if some were duds (The Aformentioned Sacred Icon), was one of the best experiences i've ever had in a game.

The Elites were some of our main enemies in Halo 1; Cunning, accurate, agile, strong, and plentiful. They were expertly designed, looked unique, awesome, and threatening, and yet... They were also sentient species, like us. I never even thought about it until I played as the Arbiter, but looking back, I cannot help but feel bad for the Sangheli (Elite Species name, btw). They had their hands forced by the Higherarchs, a fate that might've befallen humanity if we didn't have the Spartans. All it did was make me, more than ever, want to help the Elites continue to exist as a species, to spite the vile Higherarchs.

As well, consider that humanity has it BETTER than them, even with most of the Spartans gone. I mean, at least we still have Master Chief, Linda 058, Noble 3 (I think that was the one who survived reach), that one character who was in Dead or Alive (yeah this actually was a thing lol), and MAYBE a few others.

The Sangheili was better off physically, but they lacked the Spartans. In a way, they had less of a chance of survival... And yet, the Arbiter did, in fact, live to fight through several suicide missions. He, in many ways, is just as impressive as Master Cheif ever was.

Also, maybe it was because I felt like an outcast as a child, but I really connected with the Arbiter on a deep, emotional level, being seen as a villain from both sides for much of the story... And that made it all the better when we saw Johnson heroically team up with them at the end of the game, which was easily a highlight to me!

The Prophets used, abused, and then threw the Sangheli away the second they were deemed unnecessary. They were, essentially, pawns in their grand game of chess, for the entirety of the galaxy. On the other hand, Humanity was more than willing to fight alongside them to bring down the Covenant during earth's darkest hour, which is a plot point continued in Halo 3... And nowhere else.

I hate to bring it up here, but I think it's so dumb that they re-appear as enemies in Halo 4. I would have prefered them being Allies and/or an allied faction in 4...

As for 5, I haven't even played that one because Microsoft is dumb and won't sell it on PC. In Infinite... I dunno. I don't really care to try it.

So yes, the story is 10/10, many of the levels are near perfection, the gunplay is satisfying and thrilling, the vehicles are fun and varied, the challenge is supreme keeping you coming back for more, the soundtrack is amazing, the graphics are still pretty good (albiet, I prefer Halo 1's graphics), it's mostly perfection through and through.

And did I mention you can Guns Akimbo? Because you can!