5 Things I think about the Halo 3 Beta after my initial play session

1. Halo 3 is going to be a damn good game- I think the graphics are a huge improvement over Halo 2 and Yes, it doesn't look like Gears of War, but it's only a Beta and there is a lot more going on in a bigger area.

2. That using RB to pick up weapons and reload is going to take quite awhile to get used to. I have had a couple stumbles by pressing X....most of this revolved around dropping the powerdrain equipment onto myself.

3. Equipment is a genius idea that makes combat all the more dynamic. This morning I stormed into a battle against 3 enemies who were ganging up on one of my own mates. My teammate severely damaged 2 and I was able to finish 1 off quickly before the other 2 turned on me. Luckily, I had a bubble shield, killed 1 of the 2 and then dropped it...thus saving my life. The final opponent chucked all his grenades at me to no avail and just as he entered my shield, I left him a brute grenade and backed away- BANG a 3-1 team slayer point exchange. Equipment is great! I only hope there's more.

4. If the plasma sword does not return, I will be severely disappointed. Shotguns are good and all, but I loved the dynamic of having a shotgun and fighting a sword. The pistol is also missing, but I am pretty sure that will be in the game, so I only hope that the sword will make it as well.

5. Matchmaking is still the best damn way to play an online game and it's only better in this game. It makes searching for ranked matches in other multiplayer games all the more annoying and will make it extremely hard to revert back to come June 10th (oh yeah did I mention they extended the beta timeframe as a result of the Crackdown delay...thank you Bungie!).