Halo 4 Limited Edition -Xbox 360

I'm a bit older than the typical Halo demographic, and one of the major reasons I play it is to keep my brain tuned up. As such, I play campaign more than multi-player. For me, then, the value of a Halo game has a lot to do with how engaging the campaign missions are. The original Halo CE and Halo 2 both had very good campaigns that I was content to play many, many times. Halo 3, Halo ODST, and Halo Reach, by contrast, had campaigns that simply didn't hold my interest past two or three run-throughs. I slogged through them the first time more out of a determination to finish than because I liked them, and only repeated them a couple of times before going back to Halo 2. Now, at last, Halo has a campaign I have had fun playing the first time. Here are some of the things I liked about the campaign. - Nice variety of missions and environments - Engaging story line - New, interesting enemies to fight - No Flood to fight (I'm not much on zombie shooting) - Better availability of weapons and ammo. In Halo Reach's campaign, I felt like I was scrounging for ammo half the time. This one gets back to Halo CE/2 days, where they do a good job of leaving appropriate weapons and ammo at various points in a level. - Very nice rendered scenery - reminiscent of Halo Anniversary edition, but somewhat better - Good cutscenes, both visually and in terms of promoting the story. Finally, finally they got the faces right on the human characters. I'll be watching these all the way through the first several times through the campaign. - Hard to get lost in a level - good signaling about the correct way to go - Good use of extra capabilities in the campaign, especially the jet-pack - Smooth vehicle piloting. The Pelican was an absolute piece of cake to fly, for example. The Warthog felt pretty natural. - Good sounds. The vehicles and weapons have a richer, more natural sound, which makes the experience more immersive. There are a few less-than-perfect things to note. The variety of weapons can be bewildering, and I'll have to do some experimentation in future campaigns to figure them all out. One run-through isn't enough to master all the weapons, or even to become generally familiar with all of them. As usual, it's all too easy to fall off an edge when fighting - sometimes I wish the entire game had a "guard rail" option to turn on. I also noticed a bit of glitchiness on one weapon - the boltshot. It seemed to sometimes not fire on a click the way I expected. That might be because it has a "hold and fire" mode reminiscent of a plasma pistol overload, but at times it just felt a bit wrong. Those are minor issues, though. I'll be putting this campaign through its paces plenty more times, I think. I don't know if I will grow as attached as I did to Halo 2's campaign, but we'll see. *** Update 16 Nov 2012 *** I didn't really get into the Limited Edition goodies in the original review, so I'll add a bit about that. The main reason to get the Limited Edition, I think, is the downloadable content. The details on what you get are in the product description, but in terms of tangible, physical items, you basically get a poster and notebook from Spartan Gabriel Thorne. The notebook is interesting to read if you're into the Halo backstory, and includes a mildly useful UNSC weapon summary. I've uploaded a picture that shows the notebook both closed and open. For size reference, it's about the size of a DVD case. The downloadable stuff includes some specializations you get right away (instead of having to work for them), some spiffs for your armor, some map packs, and access to an extended edition of the Forward Unto Dawn series. If you expect to get the map packs anyway, you'll pay almost as much for them as the gap between this edition and the regular edition. So this isn't a bad deal, but it's not a must-have collectible either. After playing the campaign a couple more times, I still like it, but I have two more comments about it. First, but I noticed that the music is pretty dull compared to earlier versions. It sounds like generic, off-the-shelf video game music, instead of the powerful compositions by Martin O'Donnell in Halo 1 through 3. It's not even as good as the Halo Reach music, which I thought was a step down from earlier Halo games. Also, there is no detectable improvement for the AI that controls the Marines who accompany Master Chief. They will still walk right in front of the player, run him over with vehicles, and other silliness. This detracts at times from the immersive experience of the campaign; you'll be in the middle of kicking some alien butt, and then WHAM, you're run over by a Warthog driven by your allies. But the campaign doesn't have that much fighting with the Marines, and it's no worse than previous versions, so I'm not too upset about it. Ally AI is an area I'd like to see more investment in, though. *** Update 8 July 2013 *** When I wrote the review above, I had not yet had time to play Spartan Ops. I've played it a lot since then, and overall liked it a lot. For practice and replayability (is that a word?), Spartan Ops is as good as campaign, and perhaps slightly better. Spartan Ops does have a story line, but it's told mostly through cut-scenes, and the game play is only tangentially related to the story. It's a good story, involving Catherine Halsey and artifacts on the Requiem Forerunner planet. Note, though, that Spartan Ops is really optimized for co-op play. You can play it alone, but on the higher difficulty levels, it's rather frustrating. You'll get swarmed a lot by enemies with no real ability to deal with it, and then sometimes spawn right in the middle of another swarm. So on the higher levels (Heroic and especially Legendary), get used to dying a lot if you play solo. I've had a lot more fun playing Spartan Ops co-operatively. Spartan Ops does have one serious flaw, and it shares that flaw with the campaign. Dropped weapons disappear in seconds. Halo Reach had this problem too, but the times to disappearance seem shorter now. This is probably appropriate for multi-player, because ordnance drops mean there are lots of heavy weapons that become available. If they all stayed around, that would bias the play against skill with more routine weapons. However, it makes zero sense in campaign and Spartan Ops for weapons to disappear that fast. If you are holding a weapon, you can't drop it because you want to use a different one for a while and then come back to it. When you drop it and move away to fight, it disappears. You can't pick up an enemy weapon and then drop it so that it will hang around either. Halo CE, 2, 3, and ODST did not work this way. Disappearing weapons in Halo 4 has been the single most frustrating thing about campaign and Spartan Ops for me. Please, 343, do something about that for Halo 5. It really hurts the replay experiences to be locked in to certain weapon strategies. And I cannot believe that the game performance would be affected by leaving a couple of dozen weapons touched by the player hanging around indefinitely the way it worked in the earlier versions.

As far as Halo stories go that deal with the Master Chief, this is the best. It shows a more emotional component to the series in addition to the already decent sci-fi story. I should divulge now that I think the pinnacle of the Halo games story telling was reached with Halo: Reach so if my review of this game seems lackluster in regards to the story, you are forewarned. The game picks up right where part three left off, on the ship where Master Chief last went to sleep. A few years have passed since these events and things are not looking to good for the dynamic duo of Cortana and John. As usual, John is putting boot to ass to achieve the mission goals and this time, he has set his own priorities. His number one priority right now is to get Cortana back to her creator for repairs as it seems she is dying. Along the way he discovers those wacky Covenant forces doing more silly shit, this time uncovering the origins of an ancient civilization that is determined to rule the universe, and trying to utiliza the power for themselves. The visuals are a little more polished from the halo: Rech time and the game runs a lot more smoothly. The best thing about this game aside from the story is all the added things that come along with it. Right now there is a guaranteed 10 week online component to the side story of the Spartans that further continue the story. That is 5 extra missions per week that are not simply multiplayer but addition to the story. There is a movie or a five part web episoded series that shows the beginning relationship and explanation of Captain Lasky and the Master Chief. If you watch it in it's movie form I guarantee you that it stands up easily to any big budget hollywood sci-fi movie. There is of course the always spectacular multiplayer and ever present DLC. This game basically picks up and runs with the ground work laid with Hal: Reach and makes an already exemplary series even better. If you buy it, get the limited edition as it comes with some very cool extras and a beautiful game case.

The Limited Edition of Halo 4 is a product that is either worth it or not. This product, meant for extreme halo fans, carries with it special online multiplayer content, avatar props and clothes, the full series of "Halo 4: Forward unto Dawn", and a special UNSC Infinity briefing packet. Though this packet does contain a lot of extra content, much of it is a one-time use thing. If you are a dedicated Halo fan and have followed all the games this Limited Edition is for you. The online content is very unique as well as very noticeable. The content this box gives you is a special unique emblem and background emblem, a weapon skin for your assault rifle, and a uniquely designed recruit armor set. The emblem guarantees that's if you use it people will know that you bought the Halo 4 Limited Edition. The assault rifle skin is also a very noticeable feature during multiplayer. Whether it is you holding it or if you picked it up off the ground players will recognize that you have a special skin on your weapon. Finally the armor set has a unique design that is almost noticeable. The armor set allows for a new way to color your character but one placed in a matchmaking game all player become red or blue and this special decal becomes unnoticed. Overall, two out of three extra content is very noticeable for online and if you want your character to stand out I would recommend buying this special edition. If you do not care too much about how your player looks and just want to get right in and kill people then saving your money could be a good bet for you. The avatar props and skins are just another added bonus of buying this box set. Since I do not edit my avatar I have not uploaded this content to my hard-drive. The content includes an Avatar Cryotube prop and an Avatar male and female version of Spartan armor. If you do like to edit and change you avatar an these two add-ons will help you to stand out amongst your friends. The "Halo 4: Forward unto Dawn" is an action packed, live action, series of the events leading up to Halo 4. If you are a true Halo fan and have been craving a Halo movie than this is a must have. It is very exciting and includes information that relates back to Halo 4. (**Spoilers**) After watching this series there are multiple characters to show up in the Halo 4 campaign. These videos also add to the background story to the whole campaign as well as parts of the special Spartan Ops missions and storylines. They make you feel that you know more about the connection between characters than others who haven't seen this series. Over all this Limited Edition is a must have for Halo fans that want to be recognized on the halo network as dedicated players'. If you crave new exciting info for Halo than I definitely recommend this Limited Edition set, the extra $40 is very much worth it.

Been a fan of Halo since Halo 2, and have thoroughly enjoyed each subsequent game. I thought Halo 2 had campaign in my opinion and favorite overall, Halo 3 had the best multiplayer. Reach made changes, good and bad, but was still a worthwhile game. My biggest problem was the credit system instead of rank, resulting in no division of skill. I found myself scrambling to complete random challenges rather than worrying about my how I played (this remains the case in Halo 4 at times). Halo 4 also makes a number of changes, however they seem to actually have improved the experience (online that is - campaign is pretty decent but not the reason I'm still playing a month and a half after release. The addition of ordinances initially annoyed me as it seemed too much like COD, which I am not a fan of. However, after playing for awhile I have warmed up to them and can change the pace of the game. Another change is the game now goes by points, with a victory requiring typically 600 points, rather than a set number of kills. For example, a kill is worth 10 points, revenge 5, and so on. So, it's harder for me to tell just what it will take to get the last few points. This is probably a matter of opinion, but I'm not the biggest fan. There are three other notable changes: you can instantly spawn instead of waiting (unless you betray or commit suicide). This and the fact that you can now sprint for a period of time make for quicker paced games. The last thing is that there are now customizable loadouts. This allows you to change your primary and secondary weapons as well as grenades and abilities. While there are pros and cons, I like it and think it was a good change. All in all, this is a perfect installment in the Halo franchise, and it has been worth every penny. As for the Limited Edition, it looks gorgeous and you get quite a lot of content with it. I was disappointed that it came with the digital streaming of Forward Unto Dawn, but I can live without that. Overall I am pleased with the purchase, and for the maps alone this is a worthwhile splurge.

I have to say, first of all, that the story is, in my opinion, far better presented than what Halo: Reach gave; I won't give spoilers here (although it's been quite a while), but I will say that I did not find the campaign, as a narrative piece, to be disappointing. I will warn that people unfamiliar with the expanded Halo universe will have some seriously confusing moments, which is a point against it. But given that I was prepared for that (the game was effectively made by fans), I can accept its eccentricities and flaws. What I can't accept is how buggy and sometimes broken the multiplayer is: it has virtually nothing to do with the weapons and loadout system, as it's close enough to Bungie's system for Reach to avoid being broken, but the stuff that goes on "under the hood": matchmaking, NAT issues, random lag spikes, occasional gear resets until you relog into Live; I've genuinely had more issues with Halo 4's multiplayer in the last few months than I've ever had from Halo 3 to Reach. You can tell this wasn't made by an objective, fully professional company, at least not yet: there's a lot of love-letters to fans, a few too many and a little too heavy-handed. There's design choices that make no sense (again, mostly under the hood; why couldn't they use Reach's netcode instead of their own?; on top of that, levels become rapidly meaningless as you max out your armory, unless you want to farm for achievements/commendation-specific equipment) and just overall the game feels somewhat incomplete at times. But for me, the most important aspect was the campaign, and that, at least, is extremely solid. Not perfect, but excellently done. I can forgive the bugs and glitches prevalent throughout the game as "first attempt" issues. As long as they're resolved by Halo 5 (or even in a title update), I can forgive it. I really do consider this to be a very promising beta for Halo 5, honestly, rather than it's own standalone game. Perhaps if they'd had a beta, things would've been different, but alas... At any rate, the game is well worth buying for any fans of Halo, but I'm sorry to say, not quite a good entry point for newcomers, unless you're only interested in multiplayer.

First off. If your buying this Limited Edition for the digital content like the "Forward Unto Dawn" movie and you only have a DSL connection.... DO NOT BUY! Buy the Standard version and Save some bucks. The 90 Minute movie will be released on DVD/BD next month anyways! The "Product Description" states that it is "Digital Content" but does NOT tell you how you are ONLY able to view it. Tt is STREAMED only through HALO WAYPOINT.. and if you have a slower DLS connection you wont be able to see the movie in HD without constant breaks in the movie while it loads like every 5-10 seconds. I would be happier with this purchase if it was actual "Download Content" where I cold view it from the XBOXX HDD... So lack of details about it being Streamed on WEaypoint ONLY,, is right there, FAULT 1. Fault 2. They dont give you a Manual to tell you how to install it. As like all new games they say they dont want to use that much paper resources. but get this.. here is the ironic part of that.. they throw in this sealed envelope (not the red ziplocked envelope with the redeem codes init but the silver one you have to litterally rip open). and all you find in there is a peice of folded paper with some fiction "Top Secret" Mission information that is basically useless. how does that actually benefit us?! I thought it was going to some high end CODE to redeem since it was in a literally sealed envelope. it says and i quote " Please READ and DISCARD".. yeah like I spent 100$ for this piece of paper you think i am actually going to discard it? LOL! It's basically useless and just a waste of paper! They should have put a manual in there inetead. Third Fault. You get 6 "Early Access" Specializations. But ALAS, the "Product Description" doesnt tell you that They are NOT THAT early as you may think.. You have to work to get your character up to level 50 to get them.. Does it say that?!! NO it does NOT! But thats not that big of a deal. Just alerting you guys to be NOT excpecting something thats not going to be there when you think. For 100$ they could have at least give us something more substantial like REACH did with the monument statue or with Gears of War 3 did with that Fenix Statue!.. This Halo4 package is as LAME as it gets! Missleading Product Desciption is the major fault of it. Like i said if i only known about the Forward Unto Dawn being streamed media ONLY i would have NEVER bought this so called Limited Edition package deal. OK now lets talk about the game. To me it ISNT HALO.. I wont spoil for people but i will say that since BUNGIE left it in the hands of 343 it isnt the same Halo that we devoted fans came to love.. The audio basically is the worst. Grunts dont even sound like the usual fun grunt sounds they sound more like insects buzzing around. and thats just only part of the audio discrepancies.. BAD BAD BAD! Granted the graphics are ok.. and the game is smooth framerate but that didnt help it to make it feel like a halo game more like DOOM or RAGE definetaly NOT a HALO game at all! The story line of the Spartan ops mode are almost identical to the Mass Effect 3 story addons.. almost like the copied it... 343 cant come up with thier OWN original ideas without stealing them from other MORE popular games?! Another BAD fault for this game. As far as this game is I rate this the worst HALO game to date and the Limited Edtion makes it even worse. A complete WASTE of money! We need Bunngie taking HALO back under thier wing and Release HALO 4 as it SHOULD have been.. If 343 continues with it, you lost one devote halo fan you may end up loosing more! NOT WORTH it!

When I first Pre-ordered for this year I did so with an optimistic attitude but didn't want to set expectations to high, however after my first round of "Infinity Slayer" I knew this is the best Halo so far! The reason for this is because 343i has made the game WAY faster paced and added so many new variables that make Halo 4's multiplayer the most exciting experience you have ever had on Xbox. Multiplayer: Many people are complaining that Halo 4's multiplayer, aka "War Games" is to chaotic and ruins the classic Halo experience. These people are just having trouble breaking habits made from the Reach online experience. Players can no longer annoy the Heck out of you by "camping" or taking control of one key vantage point where as long as they are patient, they will get the kill. In Halo 4 you are constantly on the move. Thanks to having sprint by default you can run around while still enjoying the large variety of Armor Abilities. And now you can call in Ordinance drops which are your reward for supporting your team. The new loadout system allows you to personalize how you play, and my favorite part is that as of now I do not see any "Best" combination. different loadout combinations benefit different playing styles, and I have had fun experimenting which ones work best for me. Campaign: Definitely the most epic campaign I have played other than possibly Assassins Creed. This campaign has actually got my heart pumping from the intense missions. What I find so significant about the Halo 4 storyline is that this time Master chief is almost completely alone, it is up to him to defeat the Ancient Evil.(I won't say anything more because I don't want to spoil anything!) I also have found myself watching the cut-scenes because the story is actually emotionally unique from other Halos. Spartan Ops: The first mission was fun, I can't say much else because I haven't been able to play other episodes yet. I could see Spartan Ops becoming super successful as long as the missions don't get boring or repetitive. Limited Edition Bonuses: I would highly recommend the Limited Edition mainly because you will get all of the future DLC for free. The Limited Edition is $100. Take 100-25(For the free DLC)-10(Ten dollars of Amazon Instant Video!)-60(For the Halo 4 game itself)=$5. So honestly you aren't paying $40 extra but only $5. And that $5 gets you the entire FUD extended edition series, as well as some cool virtual stuff and awesome little physical collectors items. Conclusion: The Greatest Game to buy if you want a fun, fast paced game that will never get old!

I have been waiting in gitty anticipation for this game for a long time. I bought the origonal Halo when it first came out and have been a diehard fan of the franchise ever since. This was not what I was expecting. Let me say that graphicaly this game is realy nice and parts of it are fantastic. I realy love getting to delve deeper into the character's of Cortana and Master Chiefe. But these things were not enough to save the game's shorcomings in my eyes. SPOILER ALERT------------------------------------------------------------ From the getgo when you start the game something feels wrong. the new soundtrack does not jive with the old Halo spirit. It instead is somber with exotic wailing voices. It doesnt speak "here comes the invincible hero to save us all" it screams "lets all cry". getting into the game things look up. MC has a new look I dont realy like all that much but it isnt enough to spoil how beautiful the game looks. Immediatly I was impressed with the new cortana. You can realy feel her emotions and humanity just pours from her. Almost immediatly you are thrust into a fight with a splinter of the covenant that didnt get the memo. This just all feels wrong, the voices of the various creatures are messed up and while their tactics are similar I just couldnt shake the feeling that the flow of combat was completely off. Grunts have wierd buzzy voices that sound like some sort of swarming insect and the elietes barely make sounds other than growling. What happened to "wort wort wort" and "die devil!". Most noticable as well grenades seem powered down, almost useless against anything but grunts. Continuing on eventualy hou have to fight the prometeans. At first I was exited but then you quickly figure out that fighting the prometheans realy doesnt differ much at all from fighting the covenant. The big guys behave almost identicaly to elietes other than they can telleport and the little ones are like fast moving grunts that crawl on the walls. Further promethean weapons just act like human weapons with new visuals. Fortunatly with incredible writing was enough to keep driving me through the game. The story unfortunatly takes a turn for the worse. While we get to find out loads more about the MC and Cortana (like that they were both planned creations by an ancient forerunner called the librarian), and while we learn all sorts of interesting things about the forerunners and ancient human ancestors all this is spoiled in my eyes when they decided to write the death of the most beloved character from the Halo franchise. As many would know one of the major plot points of the game is that Cortana is going rampant "basicaly breaking down" and MC is trying to get her some help. Hope is always on the horizon in this game, hell they even find an artifact that can turn information into physical reality. But the end of the games sees Cortana sacrifice herself so MC can get home (So the librarian put a seed in humanity that would lead to the cration of MC and an AI who would who would be driven torturously insane and have to become a scfifical lamb, kinda screwed up and n my eyes the reason she couldnt go with MC was a copout). Cortana has always been MC's human side and I think 343 is trying to kill her off so they can humanise MC. Whatever the reason I was left feeling sour and kinda pissed. But still I held on hope thinking "maybe they will show us she is still alive after the credits" because halo always has a legendary ending. So I waited till the credits rolled and I was greeted with a scene of MC taking off his armor and seeing a glimpse of his face.... thats it... I dont care about his stinking face I want Cortana! Without Cortana there is no Halo franchise. End Spoilers---------------------------------------------------------------------- Anyway, great graphics, mostly awsome visuals, great writing with a terrible ending, strange new voices for the covenant and a horrible soundtrack.

Wow 343, If u hav xbox nd u dnt hav Halo thn u will nvr knw the power of xbox, best fps for xbox, legendry difficulty is amazing, Best delivery amazon. Must hav

Awesome game its graphic is amazing you gets extra content like avatar props and spartan 4 armor decal but for multiplayer only and you get most of the content by downloading box only contain codes if u dont go online or play multiplayer then u better get the standard edition

The best game ever please buy this game this is so awsome

Highly recommended if your a Halo Fan

It's a nice game with a lot material provided alongside the discs to please a halo fan. Wanted to play multiplayer using my laptop which doesn't seem to be possible.