Whether it speaks to their inner soldier or their sense of classic myth, the release today of the futuristic "Halo 3" is expected to give millions of fans a hugely successful conclusion to Microsoft's video game trilogy.

The video game world has eagerly awaited the final installment of a story that gamers have followed since 2001.

The "Halo" franchise, which recorded one-day sales of $125 million when the first sequel was released in 2004, follows the exploits of Master Chief, a genetically altered super soldier battling an army of invading aliens called the Covenant.

Johnerson Lin, a 17-year-old college student from Manoa, likes the game because of what he and his friends call the "burl factor." That's their shorthand for burly.

"The fact that you are a lone soldier, Master Chief, is appealing to most players," Lin said. "Rarely in games do you see a balanced character that is at the same time all-powerful and also has many weaknesses."

As a player, that means you do what it takes, said Lin, a business student at Kapi'olani Community College.

"You have to resort to somewhat underhanded tactics," he said. "In this game you have to resort to instinctual behavior to see the game through."

And see it through they do. Lin and his friends have gathered as many as 12 people all playing in one place at the same time. They make it a party, and they'll play for up to five hours.

"It's a pretty addicting game," Lin said.

SMOOTH ACTION

The first two versions of the game inspired fans because the action was smooth, said Victor Dadiz Jr., an avid "Halo" player who also manages a video game store in Kunia called GameStop.

Unlike a lot of other weapons-oriented video games, the weapons in the "Halo" series and the way characters use them seem very realistic, he said.

"Sometimes, when you play shooter games, what happens when you are firing your weapon is it looks fake," he said. "When you play 'Halo,' when it comes to you throwing a grenade or switching a weapon, it flows. It's pretty much how a shooter (game) should be."

The action — and reaction — is more popular than the plot with this Hawai'i fan. "There are not too many people who talk about the story line," Dadiz said.

A 30-year-old Kunia resident, Dadiz has been playing "Halo 2' every day for several weeks to ensure that his reflexes are sharp for the new release.

When he gets his fingers on "Halo 3," Dadiz will be hoping the game's creators will provide an answer to a question he's had for years: What does Master Chief look like?

In the game, the character's face is never revealed.

"I would want to know," Dadiz said. "I've always wondered if Master Chief is a girl. I don't want it to be a girl, but it has been a thought. If it is a girl soldier, it will pump up the whole genre. Now you see lots of girls playing 'Halo.' You meet them online. They are kicking my butt."

How does it end?

Many players are eager for a conclusion. Miguel Chavez, 39, of Whitestone, N.Y., an administrator for fan site www.halo.bungie.org, wants to know "how this whole darn thing ends."

Another fan, Roger Travis, 38, of Stoors, Conn., admits that he, too, "can't wait to see the ending of the story."

But Travis, an associate professor of classics at the University of Connecticut, also wants to see how "Halo" stacks up against the great mythologies of our time. Already, he says, "I certainly don't have any problem putting ('Halo') on the shelf next to classics such as 'Beowulf.' "

For those who scoff at the notion that a video game could rival modern-day epics such as "The Lord of the Rings" and "Star Wars" — let alone classics — consider some recent accolades given to "Halo."

"A cultural touchstone, a 'Star Wars' for the thumbstick generation," Wired labels "Halo" in its current issue with the game's hero, Master Chief, on its cover.

The video game's story "is rich and complicated in ways that we're not used to in video games," Lev Grossman declared recently in Time. The level of lore rivals that of Jane Austen novels, he wrote, and its quality is Wagnerian. " 'Halo' takes itself seriously as, if not art, certainly a spectacle. But art seems more apt."

"Halo" does "what a truly good book or film or TV show does," says Peter Molyneux, a pioneering game developer ("Populous," "Black & White") and founder of Lionhead Studios, which like Bungie was acquired by Microsoft. " 'Halo' delivers it in a way that more than ever before is emotionally engaging. In our industry, 'Halo' represents pretty much the top of the game of what we are able to do with our dramatic content."

A SPACE OPERA

Released in November 2001 by Microsoft for the new Xbox, "Halo: Combat Evolved" was a space opera with a spin on the saga of the Spartans at Thermopylae (as seen in the recent film "300").

The main difference between "Halo" and past epics: You are the Master Chief.

"Halo" has a hero you could really get behind. You could identify with him because he had a mask on," says Morgan Webb of video game network G4TV's X-Play series. "You were him."

The faceless super soldier has led dwindling forces against an enemy alien collective called The Covenant and the parasitic Flood, an all-consuming race of organisms aimed at galactic domination. At the end of "Halo 2" the Master Chief headed back to Earth, vowing to fend off the Covenant's attack and finish the fight.

"Halo 3" is the last game in this trilogy, but there are two new "Halo" games in development — one from filmmaker Peter Jackson, whose "Halo" film is on hold.

While Bungie acknowledges its forerunners in the epic tradition, the game developers do not want to needlessly saddle players just out for fun. "The story is incredibly layered, and you can take from it what you like," says "Halo 3" co-writer Frank O'Connor.