Top 50 Video Game Moments: Number 40

Accidentally posted an unfinished version of this earlier. Oops! That (probably) won't happen again.

Today's entry (number 40 already! One fifth the way there!) comes to us from Halo 3. Pretty sizable spoilers abound, so unless you're all into that sort of thing (or unless you're one of the 9 trillion people who have played Halo 3 to its completion), stay away..... stay far away.

Whereas I try to keep myself from delving too deeply into nostalgia on the other list, this list is packed with it. This one might be the prime example of that. The actual portion of the game is simply a redux of the first game's harrowing warthog ride finale. As usual, context is everything in these matters.

I beat Halo 3 for the first time at my friend Ben's house. We started playing around 4 in the afternoon, we started drinking gin shortly thereafter. As the sobriety and hand/eye coordination decreased, the hilarity increased an a striking inversely proportional way.

"On second thought, if you're planning on having that next drink, maybe I should drive."

At the end of the game, you essentially use the prime Halo site as a massive bomb to wipe out the super-dangerous bad guys (the plot by this point is a little... hazy. That could be because of copious quantities of gin.) Right around then, the game makers essentially give you a Warthog, lay out a path before you, and blow up the world right underneath your wheels. It might not have been as frantic as I am remembering it. YouTube videos seem to show that driving at a decent pace without freaking out or flooring it seems to be the best way to do it. We screamed our heads off as we drove headlong into bottomless pits time and time again, laughing all the way. More than once, we were within sight of the ending, only to have the massive plate we were driving on fall away from underneath us. By the time we beat the game, it was 3 in the morning, and there was nothing left to do... but crank up the last last level and drive into the abyss ten or fifteen more times.

Oops... shit... Fine. You can drive.