Firefight vs Horde Mode - A few key differences and why I think Firefight is better

Last night, with a few friends (including DBC's own Nick), I got to test out Firefight, the new co-op mode included with Halo 3: ODST. Essentially, Firefight is you, and 3 other ODSTs, facing off against wave after wave of Covenant aliens. 5 waves = 1 round, and after each round, the skulls being used against you change. So one round, the enemies might be using Blackeye (melee to regain your stamina) and then in the next you might have Tilt (enemy shields deflect bullets). The skulls are the biggest variant in the gameplay, since the turning on of a certain skull will probably force you to change up your strategies. After the fourth round, you have a quick one-minute bonus round, which is basically you firing on dozens upon dozens of grunts with all the skulls turned on, for extra lives.
Oh yeah, you and your team share a pool of lives. If you die, you can respawn (unless the Iron skull is turned on) but it costs you and your team a life. Luckily you get rewarded more lives for surviving a round, and doing well in the bonus round, but if you're not careful and go all gung-ho, you can run out of respawns pretty quickly.

Anyways, I thought I would outline a few key differences between Firefight, and Gears of War 2's Horde mode, and also show why I think Firefight is better in a couple of ways.
Skulls - In Horde mode, the only way the difficulty ramps up is that after the 10th round, the enemies become stronger and do more damage. In Firefight, one random skull can make you discard your entire strategy and try to adopt a new one. For example, Tilt might make a camper using the pistol and sniper rifle rethink his strategy and go for energy weapons instead. Blackeye means you have to get up close and personal in order to regain your stamina. This kind of quick adjustments and improvisation keeps the game interesting and fresh.

Variation - By your second playthrough of Horde mode, you can accurately predict what enemies you'll be facing off against in what wave. Because of that, the game becomes rote and mechanical. In Firefight, the enemies are very much randomized; you know that in the first wave, you'll see easy enemies like Grunts and Jackals, but after that, it's anybody's guess. We were fighting against Hunters in the second wave, and they kicked our collective asses.

Enemies - Horde mode had plenty of enemies, but I had always hoped they would make a few maps that would include some of the larger enemies of the game, including Reavers, Brumaks, and maybe even a Corpser. In Firefight, pretty much anything from the single player game is in the mix - Grunts, Jackals, all kinds of Brutes (including the incredibly hard to kill Chieftain), Hunters, Drones, and enemies in vehicles, which from the maps we saw, included Ghosts and Wraiths. Also, the enemies in the later waves become ridiculously overpowered (one of my few faults with Firefight), like the Grunts with fuel rod guns, or how they can throw three or four plasma grenades with incredible strength and accuracy in the span of a few seconds.
Vehicles - I mentioned vehicles earlier, and they are a huge draw in the Firefight mode. One of the maps we played, Lost Platoon, is a big open Savannah-type map, and Nick and I spent the first 10 minutes of Firefight just roaming in the Warthog, mowing down everything that moved. You do get half the points than you would if you made the kill on foot, but still, the experience is a whole lot of fun. Horde mode, because of the small maps, and well, crappy vehicle control in Gears 2, has no vehicles. However, I don't fault Horde mode for that.

Teamwork - Now teamwork is definitely a big idea in both games, but I feel like Firefight just does it slightly better. Because you are all working with a collective pool of limited respawns, it helps to prevent one of your players from going Rambo, because you can chastise that person for being so reckless. The enemies are much, much tougher than in Horde so teamwork is essential to bring down the bigger guys like Hunters and Brute Chieftains. There is no reviving of downed teammates, so there isn't any of that residual anger of "Why the fuck didn't you revive me dude", which, trust me, I felt a lot of in Horde mode. In Horde mode, after every wave, there is brief after action report that summarizes points and kills by each player. Because of this, Horde mode becomes a competitive game so that a person can see their gamertag at the top of that list, which is what leads to lone soldier, Rambo behavior. In Firefight, your individual points and team points are listed in the HUD, but the team points are much bigger and more easily visible than your points. Bungie is making a point here - it's the team that's important, not the individual. There is no after action report after each wave - you do get a breakdown of your points and kills, but only once your entire team has died.

Difficulty - Once you get used to what enemies are going to show up, and what the main camping points are in each map, Horde mode isn't all that difficult. Just three of us managed to make it to wave 50, on Hardcore mode. Last night there were three of us, playing on Halo's Normal difficulty, and we were having a tough time. Granted it was our first time playing, but even once we got in the groove of it, facing off against the big enemies or against a horde of Grunts bearing plasma grenades made us very wary. The combination of the toughness and number of enemies, the weakness of your own character (remember, you are playing as an ODST with a health bar, not an invincible Spartan), the randomness of the skulls and the variation of enemies, Firefight is freakin' hard! But that's what makes it fun. Keep the game varied, unpredictable, and just slightly too hard, and you'll have a perfect co-op experience.

Which is what Firefight might be. Perfect might be too strong of a word, but this certainly is the most fun I've had in a co-op experience all year (at least, until Modern Warfare 2 comes out). We'll post more updates as we play more maps, and I believe I'm about an hour away from finishing the single player campaign of ODST. Once I'm done that, and we play the three new Halo 3 maps that are included with ODST, I'll post a review on this site. Hopefully we get a chance to talk about it some more on the next podcast (though only Nick and I bought the game out of the 5 of us, I hope that changes soon).

- Baljot