The year is 2531. In the year 2531, during the infancy of the Human-Covenant war, human scientists stumbled upon a new world. Named "Lumoria", the planet was laden with both flora and fauna as alien as anyone had ever seen before. Nestled amongst the planet's varying terrain lie architecture left behind by a once seemingly all-powerful race known as the Forerunners. But what began as a scientist's greatest dream of study and discovery quickly turned into destruction and terror when the Covenant found the planet as well. When the Covenant attacked the human research vessel, the scientists had no chance. Their final hopes lay in a beacon dropped in desperation. A beacon found by you. Arriving at the planet aboard the small, stealthy UNSC Frigate Endless Horizon, your mission is to defeat the Covenant, discover the mysteries behind this new world, and give humanity their hope back. Welcome to Lumoria.
This review may contain spoilers
First off, Project Lumoria has brilliant level design. While still a linear shooter, Lumoria does offer you several paths that you can take to flank the Covenant and it has some very epic battles. One of my favourite pieces of design is when you come out of the Forerunner tunnels and are confronted by Covenant in the high ground, with a couple of turrets trained on the door. The "Oh ****!" moment was just fantastic, and it added a certain tactical element to the game, with the Covenant positions actually looking like they've been planned by some sort of commander, rather than just placed randomly. Actually, all the Covenant positions seem to have been strategically placed, which often makes progress slow and difficult (at least for a noob like me :P).
The animation in Lumoria is also good for a mod. It's on about the same level as the original game, although most characters do seem to run a little stiffly, and the Pelican takes its sweet time getting away at the end of the level, but it's important to remember that the mod is just that, a mod. It's not some major blockbuster game, and it's made by hobbyists. So, despite not having the best animations of all time, Lumoria still does pretty well.
Unfortunately, my next point is the voice acting and, as anyone who has read the comments on the mod knows, the voice acting is bad. I have no problem with the accents (although I'm not a big fan of the sergeant's British accent), but there's just no emotion in them.
The story isn't too bad, but it feels hard to connect to the characters because of the voice acting and there is almost no character development. It would also help to actually be told about the situation before you get dropped in. I also have some issues with the characterisation of May (I don't see any SPARTAN acting the way she does), and the plot is fairly typical of the Halo canon (OMG Forerunner artefact that could destroy humanity).
Level Design: 10/10
Animation: 7/10
Voice Acting: 4/10
Story: 6/10