When Microsoft announced Halo: Spartan Assault way back in early 2013 as a dual-stick shooter set in the Halo universe that would be exclusive to the Windows platform, no one ever thought that the folks in Redmond would ever sign off on it eventually hitting Apple’s App Store (although we dreamed about it when we checked it out at E3 that year). Yet, here we are with Microsoft pulling a rabbit out of its hat and launching both Halo: Spartan Assault ($2.99) and Halo: Spartan Strike ($2.99) simultaneously on the App Store. As you’ll soon discover, both games play quite similarly to each other, but we’ll focus primarily on Spartan Assault and the gameplay basics in this review and will get into more specifics as well as the differences of Spartan Strike in Part II of our review.
In case you never caught wind of the title when it was released in 2013 for the Windows 8 Mobile platform (or when it was released on Steam a year ago), Halo: Spartan Assault is a top-down third-person shooter with dual stick controls set between the events of Halo 3 (which was released in 2007) and Halo 4 (which debuted in 2012). The story follows two Spartans, Commander Sarah Palmer and Spartan Davis, as they are stationed aboard a planet that is attacked by a group of rogue Covenant that have violated the cease-fire treaty that was signed after the events of Halo 3. Missions have you playing as one of the two Spartans as they work together to defend the USNC personnel stationed on the planet.
Control-wise, Halo: Spartan Assault employs a pretty traditional dual-stick control shooter mechanism. The left side of the screen controls movement while the right side controls your weapon. Shooting controls are nuanced and dependent on the current weapon you have (for example, you can slowly trace your finger on the right side to aim, while making a sharper direction actual fires the weapon. Tapping on your Spartan activates his personal power-up (more to come on that feature) while double tapping on the right side of the screen tosses a grenade. Tapping on the weapon and grenade indicators in the upper right portion of the screen swaps weapons and a dedicated melee button rounds out the controls.
I felt that the controls in Spartan Assault were a mixed bag to start, but got better the more that I played. Movement and aiming felt a bit sensitive, and grenade aiming takes some getting used to. However, once you get used to the nuances, I thought the controls ended up being quite serviceable. It’s a good thing too, because as you progress through the game’s campaign mode the game starts to throw a lot of enemies at you, forcing you to dodge and attack enemies simultaneously.
When you have a series that is known for its first-person shooter gameplay, making a transition to the top-down third-person genre can be a difficult journey. However, I think Spartan Assault does an excellent job with making that transition. All the traditional Halo enemies are there, as well as a plethora of weapons straight from the canon games. Backdrops are lively and there’s plenty of action on screen. The visuals also look great and are impressive for a two year old game. Some nuances like reloading weapons have been scrapped to keep the action flowing. The additional of personal power-ups such as an invisibility cloak, health shield, and speed boost add some minor customization to your spartan. The best thing I can say about Spartan Assault is it feels like an arcade version of a Halo game, which is as best as its going to do.
(Original announcement trailer for the game, just ignore all the stuff about it being Windows exclusive!)
It’s obvious that fans of the series should check out Halo: Spartan Assault right away, but I think it’s one of the better dual-stick shooters to launch recently on the App Store even if you’re not a Halo fan. We’ll talk a bit more about the general gameplay elements in Halo: Spartan Assault as well as the differences with its sequel in our Halo: Spartan Strike review.
Note: Both Spartan Assault and Spartan Strike are sold separately for $5.99 apiece, but a bundle is available that will get you both games for $9.99. Savings!
