Halo was (is) special because of its ability to create and foster a community. It was easy to pick-up, hard to master, and had a million little details that pushed community front and center. Halo 2 had clans, Halo 3 had the file browser and forge. Halo Reach expanded on those. Small things like wacky double XP weekends, or Vidmaster achievements that forced people to work together, or Bungie’s pick of the week that showcased people creations IN GAME all went a long way in building connections, and brought people together. Hell, map veto and a pre-game lobby, even in 2022, would allow some level of interaction. Even if voice chat was turned off for other opposing teams.
Sure, Halo 5 eventually got a custom games browser, and Infinite is lining up to have the best Forge so far, but both of these games also have an extremally high barrier to entry gameplay wise, and brought these features months, or years after release, only rewarding the small amount of people who have stuck around.
343i focusing on competitive play over community building contradicts itself, because without a community, real competitive play is impossible.
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Yea, it’s not wrong to work on competitive e-sports portion of Halo.
But, doing so at the cost of social features, and then justifying that without any data to back it up is unfair.
Enabling voice chat is going to introduce toxicity? what stats do you have to prove that? Tell me the metrics!
Give us our dang lobbies, and some voice chat with enemy team. Trust in humanity. Don’t scoff at us.
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Halo has always been a party game first and foremost, players just had the tools to make it competitive if they wanted to. 343 needs to understand that you need to focus more on fun first and competitive second. You cant take social game and turn it competitive but you cant take a competitive game and turn it into a party game. 343 has ignored/negelcted the social aspects of what made Halo fun in the first place.
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I agree but we have variations of this thread alreasy and i dont think we need another place to reiterate.
If what weve been saying has not been acknowledged by now i dont see yet another 343i dont get it thread being of any value aside from maybe venting frustration. But the other threads can be used to do as also so ya.
Its a bummer.
It shows no signs of changing.
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The irony is that Halo competitive scene is dwindling because of how niche the title has become. Instead of jumping directly into esports, they should be building the community and public interest in the franchise.
With a failed TV series and poor Social/Casual scene, the Esport scene also dies due to lack of interested parties.