It was inevitable for Halo 3, Bungie's "over hyped" title of the year, to be criticized for being nothing more than its predecessor in HD. Fans of the first-person shooter surely agree that even if Halo 3 was Halo 2 in HD, that's still not bad, as they just need good visuals for a great gameplay experience with it. However, with all the complaints about the game's visuals, surfacing on the Internet, Bungie felt compelled to do some clarifying.

And so they did in an interview with Pro-G at the time Halo 3 made its way in London's Waterloo IMAX cinema for the big launch event. Bungie's Lee Wilson, cinematic designer at Bungie Studios, confidently answered the accusations regarding Halo 3's graphics, by stating that the team was quite pleased with what they've accomplished visually in Halo 3:

"Stuff like the water, stuff like our HDR (high dynamic range or next-gen lighting) model, I think that stuff is so beautiful and so subtle and over time I hope people will appreciate that stuff as much as we do right now," he told the website. "Something like the HDR is really beautiful but it creeps up on you over time while you're playing the game, the way the light behaves. Like I said we're really happy."

He continued commenting on the same issue, creating a pertinent scenario proving that the gameplay experience is all that matters in the end: "We think it's a beautiful game at Bungie. Folks who have complained about the graphics in the large part have said 'I don't like the way it looks' then they pick it up and they play it for half-an-hour and then four hours later they're still playing and that's the last time you hear them saying anything about the game."

While some will still disagree with Lee Wilson's statement, everyone can admit that Halo 3 isn't a bad looking game at all and again, fans of the series won't mind if it really just is Halo 2 in HD. What, is HD bad or something? In fact, this is exactly what fans wanted - the same game they'd fallen in love with, with improvements here and there, a great storyline of course and good ol' multiplayer online. Bungie realized that, developed the game accordingly, and delivered the goods. End of story.