What possibly could be hailed the mother of all betas, with millions of gamers waiting in anticipation for its public release on May 3rd - the ‘Halo Reach Multiplayer Beta’ is so polished enough that the quality “surpasses a lot of finished games.”

Bungie Community Manager, Brian Jarrard and ‘Halo: Reach’ Sandbox Specialist, Sage Merrill told GameInformer:

“The multiplayer beta will include revamped versions of Halo classics - the Warthog, Scorpion, Wraith, Ghost and Banshee. They look better than ever but functionally they haven’t been changed.”

“I think people will be surprised at just how much of the sandbox is being packed into the Beta, how many features are included and how fun and polished the experience is.”

“It’s definitely still a beta and some rough edges are to be expected, but after playing internally here I’m pretty blown away by how much work the team has put into making this a solid, fun experience that surpasses a lot of finished games.”

“Reach still plays like Halo, but armor abilities change the game so much. People will be surprised how much they miss them when the beta ends and they go back to Halo 3 and you can’t Sprint or jetpack or Armor Lock.”

The games creative director has confirmed that ‘Halo: Reach’ will push the Xbox 360 to the limits of its current processing capabilities, taking every advantage of everything on the CPU and GPU, and every bit of memory in order to produce the look of Reach beyond anything of Halo 3.

The multiplayer Beta will available to everyone through the ODST Campaign disc, and via a redeem code for compensated Halo 2 players on May 3rd.

Source: GameInformer