Memories of Halo: Combat Evolved

Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary Edition has inspired a lot of nostalgia among the GameZone staff, and rightfully so. Many of us practically grew up playing the game, its brilliant co-op mode, and frantic multiplayer, cementing the game's status as one of the greatest console first-person-shooters of all time.

And so, looking back on the glory days of the game, the GameZone crew brings you their favorite Halo-related stories and tales. Ah, the memories…

Andrew Clouther

My favorite original Halo moments were playing with four friends on a single console while screen looking to dodge sniper shots.  Screen looking has always been taboo, but if you said you didn’t do it you ARE A LIAR.  I had a certain friend who would ALWAYS rush the sniper rifle on Blood Gulch, crash a Warthog into the highest mountain range, then rain down hell.  If I didn’t screen look, he would never die.  Also, the pistol was probably the most overpowered multiplayer weapon of all time.  I mained it.  Come to think of it, I was a bastard when it came to the original Halo.

Lance Liebl

I had a few good Halo memories for the big, bulky, black Xbox, but they all consisted of Multiplayer.  There were many nights of intense, sweaty, and passionate multiplayer deathmatch sessions between me and my friends.  These were FPS deathmatches at their finest since 007: Goldeneye on the Nintendo 64.  With a sniper rifle and the best pistol to ever grace video games, I would love playing on Sidewinder, the lowercase n-shaped snow map.  With mountain ranges, water, and fortifications, it was a large map with tons of potential for death.  My other favorite map to play on with friends was Chiron TL-34.  There were so many teleporters/warpers in that map that you never knew where an enemy was going to pop up.  Strategy?  Get the rocket launcher and unleash hell.  White light at the end of the tunnel?  F*ck that.  Give me a green portal at the end of a red hallway.

Mike Splechta

I was never a huge Halo fan. In fact, I was one of the few who resisted buying an Xbox when it first came out and stuck with the PlayStation 2. Nevertheless, all my friends had it, and anytime we would hang out, we would immediately jump on the multiplayer. I usually ended up sucking, but that didn't matter. Halo's multiplayer, which at the time I preferred to be playing split screen, brought out a certain social aspect that people don't really get to experience nowadays when playing online. Back when console online gaming was still at its infancy, split-screen gaming was where it's at. There was something about gaming in the late hours of the night, with the lights off, energy drinks out, and staring at that glowing screen of exploding Plasma grenades. Those were my best Halo Memories.

Mike Meredith

My favorite Halo moment happened in Halo 3 (sorry original Halo fans, I just hold Halo 3 very close to my heart) on the multiplayer map Snowbound. My friends and myself have been up for hours upon hours and became entirely too slap-happy, that was borderline insanity. One of my friends proceeded to drive around in a banshee, but absolutely refusing to shoot anyone, but instead attempting to crush their skulls by ramming into them. The other team was so focused on trying to get him off the banshee, everyone completely ignored the deathmatch aspect of the game and became more of a "protect the guy on the banshee" game. Awesome? Yeah I think so.

Vito Gesualdi

Me and my buddies used to have these massive Halo parties just about every other weekend, which because Xbox Live hasn't been invented yet, involved lugging my heavy ass television over to my buddy Kyle's place and linking the boxes together with a mess of Ethernet cord. We would then proceed to lock ourselves away in the basement and play Halo until dawn, fueled only by a party-sized chicken & bacon pizza and several two liter bottles of Mountain Dew code red.

God, I even remember all our player names. Kyle was 'DJCustom', Richie was 'Topscreen' because he always fought to play as player one if only two people were on a box (he claimed he couldn't play on the bottom part of the screen). And I was 'Bukkake,' becuase I was like thirteen and playing as an all-white Master Chief with that name made me giggle like an idiot.

Anyhow, we eventually got to the point where capture-the-flag matches lasted hours on end, simply because we were all too good to ever let somebody get away with the flag. One night, after hours of a grueling back and forth slog, the game was tied with each team needing one more capture to win. Getting exhausted I said "aw screw it," hopped in a Warthog, and set off across Blood Gulch by myself, my teammates groaning as I sped towards a certain doom. And yet, the other team kept missing me with their shots, rockets flying past. As I approached the base I realized they were all standing next to each other.

"Spread out you idiots!" DJCustom yelled to his team, but it was too late, as I cut the wheel hard, the back of the Warthog spinning around and murdering all four of my foes in one swift motion.

"Holy crap!" Topscreen exclaimed, the rest of my team hooting and hollaring as I ran in and grabbed the flag, hopped back in my vehicle and sped over the hills just as the enemy team respawned, laughing all the way to victory.

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