No you need the hard drive and xbox live to play xbox 1 games
Yes, you can play Halo 2 online on the Xbox 360 using Xbox Live.
No, you do not need Xbox LIVE to play any original Xbox games. Not all original Xbox games can be played, but Halo and Halo 2 do not need LIVE to be played on the Xbox 360. I just now tried it with my LIVE unplugged and signed in to an offline account and it let me play both of them. The previous answer was a lie, obviously.
Yes, specifically, you need a Xbox Live Gold Account to play most xbox 360 games online, including Halo 3.
No. You can play Halo Reach on the old Xbox 360 consols.
Yes it can. I personally have an Xbox 360 arcade and halo 3. There are som things on Xbox Live that you cannot do, because it doesnt come with a harddrive, but you can play the game.
Halo 1: Xbox, Xbox 360, & PC Halo 2: Xbox 360, & Windows Vista Halo 3: Xbox 360
Yes you can. I do it all the time with Halo 2.
If you are referring to an "older xbox" as the regular xbox, then the answer is no. but if you are referring it as the first models of the xbox 360, then you can play halo 3 or any new xbox 360 games on your Xbox 360.
You can play halo 3 on any xbox 360.
Yes, If you have the Halo Ce disk for xbox (It's 360 compatible) and the halo 2 disk (also compatible)..don't expect halo 2 to have online play via xbox live anymore though. They shut down all original xbox game severs down a while back.
As far as I know, you can't play Halo 2 on a Xbox 360 Arcade. The Xbox 360 Arcade can NOT play regular Xbox games. To play Halo 2 on your 360, you'll either need to: A): Get a Xbox 360 Pro or Elite Hard Drive somehow, or B): Buy a new Xbox 360 Pro or Xbox 360 Elite