Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Halo 3 Trial Download

By Nathan Jones

The completion of Halo 3 was wildly anticipated, as the game was the third in the original trilogy of the Halo videos. As a result, the Halo 3 free download was one of the most downloaded video game demos in the history of the Xbox 360. But what many people don't remember is that the Halo 3 trial download went on to make another game ie Crackdown.

What does the Halo 3 demo download have to do with any another video game? Well, it has a lot to do with the sale and marketing work for a game that was originally planned for release on the Xbox system. Microsoft had become worried that Crackdown wouldn't sell a lot.

So they used a marketing gimmick, the one of bundling Crackdown with an access code for the Halo 3 trial download. And it worked in that Crackdown sold 1.5 million copies within the first six months of its release. Those aren't Halo 3 numbers, which sold 8.1 million copies in just over a year, but for a lesser well-known game that's terrific.

Microsoft had turned to the Halo 3 trial download tactic because of poor opinions about the game from the play testers. They found the nonlinear nature of the game off-putting, often leaving them asking themselves what they were meant to be doing next.

As a result of this, the powers that be thought that something had to be done or the game would be a loser. It may appear shady practice at first to try to push sales of a game that's expected to be unpopular, but in hindsight people love the game and it was a good thing that they were able to get the chance to play it.

In Crackdown, and that includes the version bundled with the Halo 3 free download, individuals play the role of an agent who is assigned to beat the kingpins or leaders of various gangs. To do this they utilize various superhuman powers such as super strength and super fitness. In order to obtain these powers, players have to accumulate experience by defeating enemies who then release experience orbs. The clever part of the system was that the kind of orbs released was reliant on the manner in which the agent killed the enemy. For example, a firearms orb appears if the enemy was killed with a gun.

So, although at first sight this video bundled with the Halo 3 trail download seems to be no more than a veiled marketing trick, in reality, it exposed gamers to an exciting new gameplay world.

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