Halo

This is a story on how Halo impacted my life, and how it's greatness helped me through times of need.

I remember the first time I played Halo.  Probably the only reason I played it was because it was liked by my brothers and that it was rated M.  After I was able to get better at halo and finish the original campaign, I was amazed by the story. I wanted to show other people this game and get people to play it as well.

The first time I played Halo was somewhere in sixth grade.  I lived in California and was trying to get used to middle school, but it was a rough experience.  I didn't have many friends, only the ones I already had in elementary.  Most of my early middle school experience was very boring and isolated.  It started becoming a little more about classes than anything because schoolwork was the only thing I was good at.

Then came the day where I beat the campaign.  I recall it being slightly after the first semester.  I was so thrilled, and so amazed.  I started to make more friends when I asked people to come over to play this game.

This was 2011, ten years after Halo: Combat Evolved (the first one) came out.  Most kids were playing Halo: Reach, and didn't bother with the older campaigns because they had worse graphics and they wanted to live in the new generation.  I then heard about Halo: Anniversary, a remake of the original game in better graphics.  This was exactly what I needed.

I saved up enough money for it by lawn mowing.  I got 20 dollars a week, so I was able to get it in no time.  I had to get my mom to buy it because it was M, but it was worth it.

I played it with many people.  I wasn't an outcast anymore, because I finally was able to leave that life behind.  I was able to play halo for less than a year, though before my mom gave me news that shocked me.

My dad was and is retired from the Marine Corps.  He needed to find another job, so he first started working for Fast Enterprises, a computer programming company.  It was a good job that made lots of money, and they even allowed us to go to Hawaii for their Annual General Meeting.  This job was in Detroit, however and we did not want to go there.

Then my dad started looking for a job in Amazon, the online shopping company.  We were originally going to Kentucky, but then after working for a while, he got promoted and we were moving to Indiana.

I was completely saddened.  For so long, I'd been lucky enough for my dad to not be relocated when he was in the military.  I thought that there'd even be a better chance we wouldn't have to move if he wasn't in such an unstable job.

It was my last day of school, and I was saying goodbye to everyone, getting my final grades in to be transferred to the new school, and just trying to not cry.  On a side note, probably the part of the school day that really got me mad was that my English teacher didn't grade my final assignment and sent me away with a B.  All our stuff was packed up, so I had to walk home instead of bike.  That probably made it worse, because it gave me more of a chance to look back.

It wasn't my last day of living in California, though.  I still had a football game the next day, and that game would be the last I would see of California.  We didn't win, and I really wish I knew what my team did when I left, but I had to return pads and get in the car.

We had to drive across America to get to Indiana, stopping off to see family members and to stay at hotels.  Probably one of the worst parts was not playing the video game.  My mom and I made a deal to have the Xbox 360 in the car to play Halo while driving across America, but she broke that deal and it broke my heart.  We drove through Texas, went up to Kentucky to see my dad in Chattanooga, went to Boston to see my brother in college, and then went back to Indiana.

First day of school in Indiana was weird.  The first thing I noticed was that they had lockers.  Back in California, it was an open campus, so you just took your backpack with everything in it with you.  Also in the middle of first period, they announced that I had a schedule change, making my day a little bit more crazy.  

The house wasn't ours yet, so we couldn't move our stuff in.  We just lived in a Residence Inn for a while.  There was no Xbox and no Halo.  Having no Halo had been really stressful on me.  I was going crazy, so I started to just watch Halo videos on the internet.

It took a while for Halo to come back, but when the day came, I was very happy.  I didn't have Xbox Live, but I didn't care. I could play the campaigns all I wanted and that was all I needed.  I even got people to come over to my house to play Halo again.

Without Halo, I probably would've still been an outcast.  When I play Halo, I am reminded of how great it is, how much it affected my life, and how much I am happy I found it.  Halo is my life.  Many people say that video games are bad for you, and that they rot your brain.  Those people have not seen my story.

Author's Note

This is the first story I wrote on writer's cafe, and the first story I wrote that's sort of a mini-autobiography. If there's anything I can improve on, please say so and I will try to do better next time.