A troubled development and time constraints forced cuts to the scope of the game, including the wholesale removal of a more ambitious multiplayer mode, and necessitated a cliffhanger ending to the game's campaign mode. Bungie found inspiration in plot points and gameplay elements that had been left out of their first game, including online multiplayer. In Halo 2 's story mode, the player assumes the roles of the human Master Chief and the alien Arbiter in a 26th-century conflict between the United Nations Space Command, the genocidal Covenant, and the parasitic Flood.Īfter the success of Halo: Combat Evolved, a sequel was expected and highly anticipated.
The game features new weapons, enemies, and vehicles, and shipped with online multiplayer via Microsoft's Xbox Live service. Halo 2 is the second installment in the Halo franchise and the sequel to 2001's critically acclaimed Halo: Combat Evolved.
Halo 2 is a 2004 first-person shooter game developed by Bungie and published by Microsoft Game Studios for the Xbox console.