Halo Wars: The Times review

Halo Wars: first-timer takes on the Covenant

The eagerly anticipated video game Halo Wars was released this week, the first in a series of blockbuster game sequels that will dominate the year in games.

Thousands of gamers will bolt their doors shut this weekend as they devise strategies for epic battles against evil aliens. But critics fear that the video game industry’s increasing reliance on trundling out the latest version of an established game is merely apeing Hollywood’s worst trait.

Killzone 2, The Sims 3, Street Fighter 4, Resident Evil 5 are, all among the big titles, all sequels, that will have players glued to their Xboxes and PlayStations in the coming months.

“We all go and see The Dark Knight, and go and see the latest James Bond movie. It's not because of its innovation, but because of familiarity and nostalgia. It's about bigger, better, more.” said Kareem Ettouney, a co-founder of Media Molecule, the makers of the game Little Big Planet.

Some now argue that this approach in video games is stifling creativity and putting guaranteed success above risk taking. They see video game makers falling back on old favourites because they know they will sell.

Halo fans thought they had played the last game in the saga two years ago, after the release of Halo 3, billed as the last episode in a trilogy. But after it became the most successful game yet produced, pushing total sales for the franchise to 25 million copies, worth more than $1 billion, it became clear that such a money-making machine would be resurrected somehow.

Just like the Star Wars films, the answer was to make a “prequel”. Halo Wars is set in 2531, 20 years before the first Halo game with the battle between the humans and alien armies still raging.

“I sense that people are getting a bit bored,” said Mr Ettouney, whose game Little Big Planet was a made by a small team based above a bathroom shop in Guildford. It was a critical and commerical hit - the Slumdog Millionaire of games.

“Don’t you feel that sometimes when you see an epic movie in the cinema? There’s a growing hunger for something new.”

Some argue that video game makers are getting increasingly risk-averse because they are now big business. A report last year from Verdict Research showed that the video games market surpassed the music and video market for the first time. Industry figures showed that last year’s most popular game, Mario Kart Wii sold 8.94 million copies worldwide. The only DVD to sell more was The Dark Knight, the latest Batman sequel.