Lukewarm "Halo Wars" reviews trickle in

I've been obsessively playing "Halo Wars"—the first real-time strategy version of the hugely popular Halo series—since my review copy arrived over a week ago. That said, I'm a novice when it comes to strategy gaming, and it appears that RTS veterans are somewhat less impressed.

The embargo for "Halo Wars" reviews lifted a few days ago, and while the word isn't disastrous—the game (set for release March 3) earned a combined rating of 82 on Metacritic, which translates into "generally favorable reviews"—the ranking pales compared to the 94 for "Halo 3" back in September 2007 (and remember, Halo 3 was viewed by many reviewers as something of a disappointment).

Indeed, of the 30-odd reviews listed on Metacritic, none of them gave "Halo Wars" a full "100" rating, while GameSpot weighed in with the lowest score: just 6.5 out of 10.

For its part, GameSpot damns "Halo Wars" (which was developed by Ensemble Studios, the now-shuttered developer behind "Age of Empires," and not Bungie, the original studio behind the "Halo" series) with faint praise, calling it a "fun strategy outing for fans for the universe" that "feels simplistic and short alongside other games in the genre."

1UP.com gives "Halo Wars" a B, noting that the game is a "solid, if somewhat uninspired and simplistic, all-around RTS package," albeit with "few faults."

On the more positive side, Wired writes that "Halo Wars illustrates that an RTS can work on a console … Halo junkies who are new to the genre will find an exciting campaign bolstered by a polished and unique multiplayer game," although "simplistic game mechanics and sluggish controls mean that [the] Xbox 360 still isn't an adequate replacement for the PC."

Probably true, though I'd argue that the "simplistic," "dumbed-down" nature of "Halo Wars"'s style of real-time strategy (which, as I wrote in my initial hands-on impressions story, involves much more planning and army-building than fast-action shooting) is probably a key reason that an RTS newbie like me got such a kick out of it.

As most of the "Halo Wars" reviews note, strategy games are usually at their best—and most complicated—on a PC, where you have a mouse and a keyboard at your disposal. "Halo Wars," on the other hand, has been made expressly for the Xbox 360, and let's face it—the triggers, buttons, and thumbsticks on the Xbox controller are no match for the mouse/keyboard combo.

So yes—Ensemble clearly had to dumb down the controls considerably to make an RTS version of Halo work well on a console, which meant losing some complexity in the process. That's a sure way to lose hard-core strategy gamers.

That said (and as I've blogged before), "Halo Wars" is probably the perfect game for RTS beginners like me—personally, I got the hang of the controls within about an hour or so, and I was surprised by how quickly I got sucked into building up supplies, training troops, building Warthogs, Scorpions, and Wraiths, and sending my armies into coordinated battle.

My suggestion for strategy beginners who take the Halo Wars challenge: Start with the 15-mission campaign, which does a great job of easing you into the RTS controls and the subtleties of strategy. Then, try the multiplayer skirmishes, which are playable on Live or versus A.I. opponents.

So, who out there is looking forward to "Halo Wars"? What do you think of the demo? Sound off below.