It’s pretty hard to get away from shooters on the Xbox 360. I quit them for awhile because of the oversaturation I faced. There were so many to choose from and so little time. Having to pick from several at any given moment, I felt spread too thin with ample amounts of repetition along the way. Long before the shooter flood on the Xbox, I was a big fan of the original Halo, had an awkward relationship with Halo 2 and had a stinted love affair with Halo 3. Having spent a long break from the series, I decided to give Halo 3: ODST a try. I was looking for a chance at an enjoyable experience for old time’s sake ... and ended up getting even more.

I barely preview games; I find the surprise much more enjoyable. This sometimes leads to me getting burned, but I usually have a very good gut instinct. The very basic information I heard about ODST was more or less a return to old glory. The game’s storyline is a bridge between Halo 2 and Halo 3, giving you some explicit story in an epic six hours. The full version of the entire story is quite robust in the way of personality and character — in no small part due to some very charming voice acting — as you investigate via open world what exactly went down.

You follow a squad of orbital drop shock troopers as they descend and navigate through a hell storm of almost insurmountable fury. The rookie will be your main squeeze as you discover what has become of the other members of your team hours before you got separated. The story has a much darker feel than previous Halo incarnations, and the experience had an enriched sense of personal gain in its independence. You will encounter several personalities with a lot of flair that will keep you grounded and interested throughout. I felt the dialogue also was smooth and did a lot to keep me interested in the sound way past the impressive attention to weapon detail. This ties together with a new grittier graphic style and an ambient moody soundtrack that goes beyond award-winning and keeps you absorbed to the last plasma sticky.

The basic gameplay is classic Halo; vehicles let loose on gigantic battlefields with rambunctious firefights at close and long range, and even dogfights are staged far above the ground in alien ships, such as Banshees. One of the twists lies in you assuming the role of several regular human ODST at different intervals, while Master Chief makes halfway across the galaxy. You will hit the ground falling as you are violently reminded throughout the game that you are not a super soldier, and playing Rambo is usually an unforgivable choice. In this way, the game walks a sharp edge by mixing new gameplay strategy, while updating the familiar throwback of how the original Halo use to play. The inclusion of the M6 pistol variant is a call to previous arms, and a glorious call it is. As a vet — and a skeptic — I was not fully convinced this handgun recreation would do it justice. Luckily, the M6 in ODST is not a joke like the sidearm was in Halo 2 and Halo 3, and it will be a go-to weapon in a lot of impressive exchanges.

Even after all is said and done with campaign, the new firefight mode is a welcome co-operative edition. An overrun mode in essence, you and a team fight your way through infinite hordes of Covenant, for guts and glory (points are good, too). This game variation ends up being more lasting and even crazier due to its nature than even most intense single-player battles. Not a completely new concept to Bungie (Marathon possessed a firefight mode of sorts), the inclusion is sure to moisten any Halo fan’s mouth. My friend and I ended up playing for more than six hours on one of our first games ... and we only stopped because I had to go to work. The fighting is continuous, and the possibilities for entertainment with late-night play sessions feel quite endless with firefight, as it accomplishes its goal toward being an awesome alternative to campaign mode.

There’s a lot to like in ODST: co-op firefight, open-world hub, great character interactions. I have heard one complaint that I will mention, though I had no personal qualms to the issue. The length of the campaign mode bothers some, though me and a friend got a good 12 hours out of it on our first play through — on legendary no less. The lack of matchmaking to find random people online for any of the actual modes in ODST truly hurts the game in an online sense, which is usually Halo’s strongest suit. Even with all of these questionable flaws the game has stashed away, the fact that the ODST package comes with Halo 3 multiplayer and all released updates and downloadable content is quite nice for anyone who didn’t have the money and missed out. Going back and forth between the slower more tactical feeling and very balanced gameplay of ODST to the swamps of Halo 3 and its incessant and sometimes downright infected player base is a harsh task to be sure. Both are fun, though, and both exist for your enjoyably tolerating taking.

One of the last points I’d like to underline about Halo 3: ODST is the variety it effortlessly caters to. Whether your cup of tea is shooting, driving, exploring or plowing through the opposition, ODST has you covered. The difficulty settings help even the greenest rookie or the most rock-hard fan decimate the Covenant at their own enjoyable pace. The entertainment will flow through any of the many game modes available, and you will be hard-pressed to tear yourself away.

I’d say this game possesses a sturdy confidence about its distinction from Halo 3 and rightfully so. There are a lot of weird missteps through the experience — some people might feel cheapened at the shorter campaign, some chance of frame-rate issues in heavy firefights and weird co-op glitches — but everything to me felt really polished. The almost sci-fi noir subtlety in the campaign execution mixed old and new and made sure to remind you of what Halo is and use to be. I think the bittersweet truth of the matter is the ODST campaign rebalancing will not affect multiplayer in Halo 3, and that’s a damn shame. Seeing something with such keen craftsmanship being stranded on its own virtual island is a travesty, but the splitscreen content does wonders for replayability. A warm historical celebration of all things good awaits Halo rookies and vets alike with Halo 3: ODST.