Halo: Combat Evolved

So unfortunately my XBOX is still broken, but I managed to find an old copy of the original Halo for PC. I don't think I need to do much explaining of this game, it is pretty engrained into our pop culture now. But let's break down the story elements. I'll talk about the dramatic arc and not the hero's journey because the hero's journey may be my least favorite topic to discuss because its elements are often stretched to fit certain stories so I find the whole thing useless.

Exposition: The story begins onboard The Pillar of Autumn, a human Naval space battleship. It is under attack by the Covenant, a conglomerate of aliens that like to kill stuff. Okay I'll admit it, I never really understood why the Covenant does anything, I just always figure basic good vs. evil story and move on. The hero of the story is a super-soldier known as Master Chief who escapes the ship with an AI unit named Cortana. His escape pod/ship lands on an artificial world with a strange ring above it.

Rising Action: The master chief fights on the world and ends up taking a gravity lift up to the ring. The master chief learns more about the strange ring and while on it fights a horde of parasites called the Flood, which infest living creatures. And my understanding is that the Covenant accidentally released the Flood on the ring. I guess I can just call it the Halo because obviously the big ring in the sky is the Halo of the title. Oh the ring would also cause the death of all sentient life in the Universe if it is fired.

Climax: The master chief fights his way through the Flood and the Covenant to restore the Halo's defense system.

Falling Action: Cortana figures out that activating the defense system would kill them as well. So they rig the crashed Pillar of Autumn to explode.

Denouement: The master chief escapes the ship before it explodes and heads to what we learn in the next game to be Earth.

Sometimes it becomes difficult to follow all of the story because it is too easy to get wrapped up in killing things that focusing on every detail of the cutscenes becomes difficult. Also some of the story is told while in combat, and like I can concentrate on story while being shot at.

I usually don't like games with laser guns and magic forcefields, but Halo is a fairly enjoyable game. That is, except for the Flood. It is just not a fun enemy to fight. It is rather intense and unnerving and not satisfying. This is really the only major drawback of the game for me.