343i has done DLC right

Games Halo 5: Guardians
1

This is going to sound crazy but the more I think about it, the way 343 is releasing content over time is working. Having a million things to do on Reach was good but I played the playlists that I really liked all the time and got burned out, after that I didn’t care to play any other playlists so I would just stop playing for months at a time. I will agree that the content was a little to lacking at release but what this spaced out idea they’re going with there’s a reason for me to come back. Not only that but it allows them to get feedback before they release something else. I would’ve been disappointed if they had delayed launch for months (possibly even a year) to cram in everything they plan to release only to find that there was a mountain of bugs that needed fixing, because by the time a fix for everything was released I’d be burnt out and they still wouldn’t have had enough feedback to add everything. There’s a misconception that 343 doesn’t listen but the reason we have even half the things that have been released recently is because they’re listening. Although it doesn’t seem like much they’re releasing in each update but it’s also free, this stuff would cost you at least $10 per update from other franchises (COD, Battlefield) seems to me like we got a good deal considering those games charge for DLC (that isn’t created from community feedback) also have microtransactions. Thoughts?

Edit: I use DLC loosely in reference to content released after launch that adds to the game, not the typical idea that it’s adding in a new story line to the campaign or a map pack, just additional content in general.

2

Mate, Call of Duty has the playlists and game modes that everybody expects at launch. So does Battlefield. In fact, Battlefield would never launch a new game without its signature game modes, such as Conquest, TDM, and Rush. Halo happens to have a lot more signature modes, things like Infection, Race, King of the Hill, Oddball, Assault, Slayer, etc. And out of those modes I’ve listed, Halo 5 had various Slayer permutations and CTF permutations and Strongholds. And then 343i is updating the game to include modes that we have had since 2007. They are not using the updates to give us actually new modes, they are giving us stuff we have already done before. I’m gonna say it, when 343i actually puts all of the modes that are supposed to be in a Halo shooter, like Infection and Race, and KotH, I’m going to ask them “So when does the free DLC start?” Because I was under the expectation that the “Free DLC” was supposed to be actually new stuff, not old stuff.

3

I have thought the very same thing a few times, and I too am happy the direction 343 took Halo. Everyone gets DLC, people who max out REQs and rank still have incentives to come back the next month for a new update. Halo is alive.

4

I wouldn’t say releasing a game with no content and then giving us what we expected at launch over the next half a year to keep player counts up a good way to do DLC. I understand that we can’t have everything, and its hard to please everyone, but I’m sure 343 could have done better then that.

5

I will say this. I have been playing video games for 20 years now and Halo has been my favorite for a long time. I have never played another Halo or any other game as much as I have played Halo 5. I always thought people were crazy when they kept playing the same game. As of right now I just can’t stop playing.

6

> 2533274915643658;2:
> Mate, Call of Duty has the playlists and game modes that everybody expects at launch. So does Battlefield. In fact, Battlefield would never launch a new game without its signature game modes, such as Conquest, TDM, and Rush. Halo happens to have a lot more signature modes, things like Infection, Race, King of the Hill, Oddball, Assault, Slayer, etc. And out of those modes I’ve listed, Halo 5 had various Slayer permutations and CTF permutations and Strongholds. And then 343i is updating the game to include modes that we have had since 2007. They are not using the updates to give us actually new modes, they are giving us stuff we have already done before. I’m gonna say it, when 343i actually puts all of the modes that are supposed to be in a Halo shooter, like Infection and Race, and KotH, I’m going to ask them “So when does the free DLC start?” Because I was under the expectation that the “Free DLC” was supposed to be actually new stuff, not old stuff.

I get that, and I agree to a point, the problem is that the changing to a 1080p 60fps game makes things more difficult, hence why the opening portion of my post was about how it would’ve significantly delayed the release date. I would like them to have had all of that but it would’ve meant us being stuck with MCC and Halo 4. Which would also mean them working on additional content for those rather than focusing on the H5 release. Yes cid and Battlefield always have their key gametypes, but that’s also all they have. 343 is trying to improve the game rather than just doing copy and paste.

7

I can some what agree. I am liking the monthly updates as they give you something to look forward too. But they really should have included a bit more at launch. Also we probably should have had a bit more in the playlist and game types by now.

8

> 2533274950162674;4:
> I wouldn’t say releasing a game with no content and then giving us what we expected at launch over the next half a year to keep player counts up a good way to do DLC. I understand that we can’t have everything, and its hard to please everyone, but I’m sure 343 could have done better then that.

I think they could have done better, but they’re making the best of a bad situation. They really had a lot of problems with MCC, if they didn’t have those problems and could’ve just focused on H5 it could’ve been a good launch.

9

> 2533274816788253;7:
> I can some what agree. I am liking the monthly updates as they give you something to look forward too. But they really should have included a bit more at launch. Also we probably should have had a bit more in the playlist and game types by now.

The problem isn’t that we don’t have those playlists, it’s just that for whatever reason they only have certain playlists on weekends. I’m still confused as to why doubles isn’t permanent and even more so why it isn’t ranked.

10

> 2533274903043020;6:
> > 2533274915643658;2:
> > Mate, Call of Duty has the playlists and game modes that everybody expects at launch. So does Battlefield. In fact, Battlefield would never launch a new game without its signature game modes, such as Conquest, TDM, and Rush. Halo happens to have a lot more signature modes, things like Infection, Race, King of the Hill, Oddball, Assault, Slayer, etc. And out of those modes I’ve listed, Halo 5 had various Slayer permutations and CTF permutations and Strongholds. And then 343i is updating the game to include modes that we have had since 2007. They are not using the updates to give us actually new modes, they are giving us stuff we have already done before. I’m gonna say it, when 343i actually puts all of the modes that are supposed to be in a Halo shooter, like Infection and Race, and KotH, I’m going to ask them “So when does the free DLC start?” Because I was under the expectation that the “Free DLC” was supposed to be actually new stuff, not old stuff.
>
>
> I get that, and I agree to a point, the problem is that the changing to a 1080p 60fps game makes things more difficult, hence why the opening portion of my post was about how it would’ve significantly delayed the release date. I would like them to have had all of that but it would’ve meant us being stuck with MCC and Halo 4. Which would also mean them working on additional content for those rather than focusing on the H5 release. Yes cid and Battlefield always have their key gametypes, but that’s also all they have. 343 is trying to improve the game rather than just doing copy and paste.

Nope, do not use the 1080p 60fps angle on me. 343i had the same amount of time and a larger budget than Bungie had to make Halo 3, a Halo game on a new Xbox platform at the time, and Halo 3 had almost every game type that Halo 2 had at launch. Implying that they had to upgrade the engine and so forth is just excusing sloppy development work. Bungie did the same thing and made the most successful Halo game to date.

Also, from my knowledge, Call of Duty typically has, at launch, several deathmatch and team deathmatch variants, and several objective game modes like Domination, Search and Destroy, and CTF. And they have hardcore variations of the same game modes, so that already increases the variety of game modes. Battlefield 4 released with Conquest, Rush, TDM, Squad Deathmatch, Domination, Obliteration, and defuse. BF4 also had hardcore variants of those modes. Both of those game franchises had more variety at launch than Halo 5 did. And again, as I said before, I do not see putting old game types back in Halo 5 as something that should qualify as “free DLC”. That should count as an obvious update with no strings attached as that should have been in the game in the first place.

And in the words of Shigeru Miyamoto, “A delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad.” I feel that this saying is appropriate for the predicament regarding Halo 5.

11

It doesn’t seem free cause it feels like content removed from the game we paid for that we expected to get at launch

I hated dlc cause I barely got to play on the maps that had I paid extra for and now if I go back and play old halo games dlc maps aren’t available

12

> 2533274915643658;10:
> > 2533274903043020;6:
> > > 2533274915643658;2:
> > > Mate, Call of Duty has the playlists and game modes that everybody expects at launch. So does Battlefield. In fact, Battlefield would never launch a new game without its signature game modes, such as Conquest, TDM, and Rush. Halo happens to have a lot more signature modes, things like Infection, Race, King of the Hill, Oddball, Assault, Slayer, etc. And out of those modes I’ve listed, Halo 5 had various Slayer permutations and CTF permutations and Strongholds. And then 343i is updating the game to include modes that we have had since 2007. They are not using the updates to give us actually new modes, they are giving us stuff we have already done before. I’m gonna say it, when 343i actually puts all of the modes that are supposed to be in a Halo shooter, like Infection and Race, and KotH, I’m going to ask them “So when does the free DLC start?” Because I was under the expectation that the “Free DLC” was supposed to be actually new stuff, not old stuff.
> >
> >
> > I get that, and I agree to a point, the problem is that the changing to a 1080p 60fps game makes things more difficult, hence why the opening portion of my post was about how it would’ve significantly delayed the release date. I would like them to have had all of that but it would’ve meant us being stuck with MCC and Halo 4. Which would also mean them working on additional content for those rather than focusing on the H5 release. Yes cid and Battlefield always have their key gametypes, but that’s also all they have. 343 is trying to improve the game rather than just doing copy and paste.
>
>
> Nope, do not use the 1080p 60fps angle on me. 343i had the same amount of time and a larger budget than Bungie had to make Halo 3, a Halo game on a new Xbox platform at the time, and Halo 3 had almost every game type that Halo 2 had at launch. Implying that they had to upgrade the engine and so forth is just excusing sloppy development work. Bungie did the same thing and made the most successful Halo game to date.
>
> Also, from my knowledge, Call of Duty typically has, at launch, several deathmatch and team deathmatch variants, and several objective game modes like Domination, Search and Destroy, and CTF. And they have hardcore variations of the same game modes, so that already increases the variety of game modes. Battlefield 4 released with Conquest, Rush, TDM, Squad Deathmatch, Domination, Obliteration, and defuse. BF4 also had hardcore variants of those modes. Both of those game franchises had more variety at launch than Halo 5 did. And again, as I said before, I do not see putting old game types back in Halo 5 as something that should qualify as “free DLC”. That should count as an obvious update with no strings attached as that should have been in the game in the first place.
>
> And in the words of Shigeru Miyamoto, “A delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad.” I feel that this saying is appropriate for the predicament regarding Halo 5.

So much this! It’s funny how everyone is using the 1080p 60fps and upgraded engine on new hardware angle to justify Halo 5’s piss poor launch state. Everything Halo 5 is doing on the Xbox one for Halo, Halo 3 did on the Xbox 360 for Halo almost 9 years ago, and better (pushing for better graphic quality, utilizing new hardware, pushing new ideas for the franchise, etc.).

13

Well, if I’m not mistaken we were told we’d get 15 maps throughout the first planned free update period. Now a while ago Bravo did an update stating that we had gotten 11 out of those maps. Someone did a calculation, and again if I’m not mistaken, those eleven maps we had gotten included the four BTB launch forge maps and Urban the Assault version of BoN.

I understand remixes of maps would be counted in because there’s some more effort gone tnto those than a simple forge map. However they’re still not on par with true original maps.

I agree with many here, the updates are catch ups.
There’s an issue though, i343 really did take water in over their heads with free updates. They do not have enoigg time to make a map in a month, not a properly made one. Another mistake they did with them in my opinion is releasing them at the end of the month. Even if it’s just a couple of days delayed, that can carry over to the next month and that sound worse in many ears than the same month but the next week. They should have delayed all updates a couple of days so we’d get the updates at the start of the month.

14

I wouldn’t say they’ve done DLC right. They’ve done UPDATES right though, by adding things based on community input. Only thing I wish was here at launch was a couple gamemodes.

I don’t really hasten to call these DLC, because they’re more like inherent parts of the game that come along with the disc rather than additional pieces.

15

> 2533274915643658;2:
> Mate, Call of Duty has the playlists and game modes that everybody expects at launch. So does Battlefield. In fact, Battlefield would never launch a new game without its signature game modes, such as Conquest, TDM, and Rush. Halo happens to have a lot more signature modes, things like Infection, Race, King of the Hill, Oddball, Assault, Slayer, etc. And out of those modes I’ve listed, Halo 5 had various Slayer permutations and CTF permutations and Strongholds. And then 343i is updating the game to include modes that we have had since 2007. They are not using the updates to give us actually new modes, they are giving us stuff we have already done before. I’m gonna say it, when 343i actually puts all of the modes that are supposed to be in a Halo shooter, like Infection and Race, and KotH, I’m going to ask them “So when does the free DLC start?” Because I was under the expectation that the “Free DLC” was supposed to be actually new stuff, not old stuff.

So far all of the updates have been free, well, for me atleast, not sure about you.

16

> 2533274795123910;13:
> Well, if I’m not mistaken we were told we’d get 15 maps throughout the first planned free update period. Now a while ago Bravo did an update stating that we had gotten 11 out of those maps. Someone did a calculation, and again if I’m not mistaken, those eleven maps we had gotten included the four BTB launch forge maps and Urban the Assault version of BoN.
>
> I understand remixes of maps would be counted in because there’s some more effort gone tnto those than a simple forge map. However they’re still not on par with true original maps.
>
> I agree with many here, the updates are catch ups.
> There’s an issue though, i343 really did take water in over their heads with free updates. They do not have enoigg time to make a map in a month, not a properly made one. Another mistake they did with them in my opinion is releasing them at the end of the month. Even if it’s just a couple of days delayed, that can carry over to the next month and that sound worse in many ears than the same month but the next week. They should have delayed all updates a couple of days so we’d get the updates at the start of the month.

We have been given 11 new maps so far, none of which are forge creations.

Here is a list in no particular order

  1. Regret
  2. Overgrowth
  3. Riptide
  4. Torque
  5. Tyrant
  6. Alpine
  7. Glacier
  8. Parallax
  9. Urban
  10. Battle of Noctus
  11. Skirmish at Darkstar

That’s 11 and before you complain about Urban being the same as Battle of Noctus take a look at the two maps, similar in some ways yes but Battle of Noctus doesn’t even have an armory on the whole map. So yes you are mistaken. Also, remixes play completely differently compared to their originals, so there’s no reason to complain about remakes.

17

One of the problems with the drip feeding of content is that players at launch leave after a month or so and find new games.
Once they leave it hard to get them back because they have invested time into other games.
I tried to get my brother to play Halo 5. He bought it and played it a for a few weeks. Then he got fed up with waiting so long for a Slayer match to connect (in AUS.) The wait time I believe is because the population fell after release because there was not enough content.
Whether players return after June when the game is “complete” is yet to be seen but I don’t think they will.

18

> 2533274826434697;15:
> > 2533274915643658;2:
> > Mate, Call of Duty has the playlists and game modes that everybody expects at launch. So does Battlefield. In fact, Battlefield would never launch a new game without its signature game modes, such as Conquest, TDM, and Rush. Halo happens to have a lot more signature modes, things like Infection, Race, King of the Hill, Oddball, Assault, Slayer, etc. And out of those modes I’ve listed, Halo 5 had various Slayer permutations and CTF permutations and Strongholds. And then 343i is updating the game to include modes that we have had since 2007. They are not using the updates to give us actually new modes, they are giving us stuff we have already done before. I’m gonna say it, when 343i actually puts all of the modes that are supposed to be in a Halo shooter, like Infection and Race, and KotH, I’m going to ask them “So when does the free DLC start?” Because I was under the expectation that the “Free DLC” was supposed to be actually new stuff, not old stuff.
>
>
> So far all of the updates have been free, well, for me atleast, not sure about you.

Never implied or said that the updates were not free for me. Although that statement right there, “Free for me”, implies that someone had to pay for the updates. Which is somewhat true, since a good portion of the REQ purchases went to the development of the updates.

19

We will see just as soon as they release some DLC.

In all honesty, I would prefer paid DLC as it would force them to put in the effort at making some worthwhile content.

20

You could be right, but I don’t work for 343. It seems like a reasonable explanation. 343 is a business and like many large gaming companies they need money and can’t risk a huge flop, they won’t intentionally mess up a game or just half -Yoink- it because they’re greedy or lazy, they had their reasons for how they did things. Nowadays one really bad game is enough to shutdown companies. I’m trying to find the article that I’m basing my opinion on but it provides good insight into how with the slow decline of console gaming and the rapid rise of mobile freemium games that one bad title is enough to ruin a company and why they can’t just intentionally half -Yoink- a game. I’m an open minded individual and if you have reasoning as to why you think 343 went about things the way they did I’m all ears but all I’ve heard is that you don’t like the game and that they were lazy.

Just some side notes: I use the term DLC loosely just meaning content released post launch that adds more to the original game. I’m aware this is all stuff that was standard in previous games. Halo5 by itself, with all the stuff that still hasn’t been incorporated is almost 100gbs that’s a lot for a console that comes standard with 320 (usable) gbs. If I was a hardcore FPS player I would definitely have my reservatioit about a game that’s going to take up 1/3 or more of my consoles data right off the bat without knowing how I like it. I’m not thrilled about the small amount of content that was included at launch but I think I understand why there wasn’t everything right off the bat. Yes a rushed game is bad, but they aren’t rushing it, can you imagine how many problems there would’ve been if they tried to release as much content as reach had?