Game Over: Halo 3: ODST

Dane finished a Halo game.

- Dane Townsend

My parents were actually really restrictive when it came to getting videogames with mature content for me when I was much younger. Call of Duty was completely off the table, as were most games with “16 and over” age ratings. Of the games I was denied, Halo was the one I sought after the most. It’s odd, looking back because Halo’s violence and content in general was honestly not much more concerning than anything else I was consuming at the time. I’d long since discovered Thing Thing and all of the horrifically gory flash games popular on Newgrounds and Stickpage, so, really, Halo was like a soupedup Saturday morning cartoon in comparison.

I did, however, eventually manage to get my grubby hands on an Xbox 360 controller at my friend’s house to play my first ever Halo game: Halo 3: ODST. Up until that point, I hadn’t even looked up footage or screenshots for the game, I’d psyched myself up entirely on what another mutual friend was able to describe to me. And so, when the melancholy and beautiful menu screen faded in, I was instantly drooling.

It took me nine years this year to actually purchase a copy of Halo 3: ODST. I waited specifically for the Master Chief Collection to release it, as I didn’t want to have to go back to my Xbox 360 to play through it all. I had a new perspective when I started the campaign, as I was now very well informed on most of the Halo lore and had beaten every game up until ODST besides Halo 3 (which I’m still playing through with my friend at the time of writing).

So, this many years later, what did I think when I finished it?