A Controversy

Games Halo Infinite
#1

I’m beginning to believe that the majority of Halo’s community suffers a lot of bias, particularly against 343i and all their efforts.

With Halo: Infinite’s reveal, I have never seen such a sudden and unmitigated backlash to Halo 4, Halo: The Master Chief Collection, and above all else: Halo 5: Guardians. Until now, most were presentably neutral towards those games with varying opinions both in favor and against in just about anywhere you look. Suddenly, everyone seems to hate them, and I mean abhorrantly.

People have already set it in stone that Halo: Infinite is going to bring about a resurgance of classical Halo solely because of the new artstyle. They’ve already jumped to the conclusions that it has classical gameplay, a compelling story, and a complete overhaul in the quality of life yet literally no one outside of 343i has even played an Alpha build or let alone knows any information. Simply because of the new artstyle? No, not just that.

There’s always been an incessant pre-disposed bias against 343i and everything they’ve accomplished thus far, only until now, it’s been the vocal minority. The moment the chance arose when simply because a new artstyle was teased, everything flipped and suddenly everyone is indoctrinated to hate the games they’ve already made. They’re forgetting that it’s still the same developer and some would say “They’re still going to blam it up, somehow”.

Mark my words.

If Halo: Infinite slips up in anyway and has so much as included sprint or Smart-Scope, the fandom will efficiently dismantle the game and everyone will go back to hating 343i and their efforts OVERNIGHT, even if the game is good. They just dislike 343i because they’re not Bungie, but to pose a question: What would Bungie have done if they continued to develop Halo? Imagine that instead of developing Destiny, they would implement all their looming and haunting innovations that they’ve saved only for Destiny, and trickled them into Halo. Imagine that they wanted to shape Halo into how they wanted to shape Destiny without starting a new IP. I’ll tell you what, I’m fairly certain that it would still have Sprint as well as many other gimmicks that both games use.

Only, how would the community respond to this? Would they retain today’s entitled attitude towards those innovations? Or would they be welcoming those innovations with the absense of bias towards 343i and simply because “It’s Bungie.”

Here’s a wake-up call: BUNGIE IS DEAD AND THE BUNGIE WE HAVE NOW IS LIVING IN IT’S OWN SHADOW. LOOK AT DESTINY 2 AND THE STATE OF THE DESTINY FRANCHISE. Does Bungie even seem competent anymore?

343i at least kept Halo alive when there wasn’t a reason to. If Halo is such a beloved franchise, then all the developers need from the community is support and encouragement, not demands to return to form, not reluctance to evolve and adapt, not unmitigated patronizing of their efforts. I mean, have you SEEN the amount of detailing in Halo 5 aside from its textures? The music, the environments, the attention to asinine details? Arguably one of the best developed games to hit the modern market regardless of its story. And people just HATE it for everything that it is.

343i have worked extremely hard developing their games.

Halo 4 was a storytelling masterpiece written by Chris Schlerf of all people which played very much like Halo: Reach and fit the new unfathomable universe-building undertones laid out by Schlerf. Could you imagine Chief intimidating Del Rio with his older armor? Not as well at least. Though Halo 4 is completely thrown away by most because its multiplayer was forgettable and Spartan Ops wasn’t engaging.

The Master Chief Collection was a mess, I’m in total agreement with this but in 343i’s defense; When else have FOUR CAMPAIGN ENGINES and FIVE MULTIPLAYER ENGINES EACH WITH THEIR OWN DEDICATED SERVERS running on ONE application that’s been done before and done CORRECTLY? Zero. The MCC was difficult to manage and they knew it themselves, but they did it anyway, because they believed we’d like it. We didn’t.

Halo 5: Guardians is the most controversial of all, and for good reason, too. Most are in agreemeant that the story for Halo 5’s campaign was incredibly subpar compared to the previous games, but here’s the thing: The story was still functional. Chief discovers Cortana is still alive following the events of Halo 4. Exposition. Chief searches for Cortana and is declared AWOL. Rising Action. Locke is tasked with hunting and arresting Chief. Conflict. Cortana turns out to be the main villain. Climax. Locke discovers the truth behind Chief’s absence and they join forces. Falling Action. Cliffhanger. Resolution. There’s your storyboard. What clearly went wrong during development is everything between those extremes, blame Brian Reed for that. Blame him a lot. On the topic of multiplayer, Halo 5 is perhaps one of the most, if not; the most engaging and rewarding competitive experienceto date. It’s a well-received and well-tuned arena style gameplay that surely makes anyone feel like they’re in control of a supersoldier while still retaining the fundamentals of inviting, casual capability and spontaneity. The Halo Championship is still going strong. Warzone is the most dynamic experience in a Halo game that’s already superceded gamemodes like Invasion, Spartan Ops, Firefight in terms of overall popularity and preference while paying respectable homage to previous games with accessory modes like Warzone Assault and Warzone Firefight. However, the most profound and groundbreaking innovation Halo 5 introduced to the franchise is of course the most dynamic Forge tool to date. Despite all of this, a (vocal) majority hate this game with all the passion they could muster.

I’m concerned for the early life-cycle of Halo: Infinite. Should 343i slip up, Halo will surely die this time, even if their mistakes are minor. They’ve lost faith in their own ambitious foresight because of a vocal majority. Those who enjoyed their games would naturally have no complaints, therefore they would naturally be the vocal minority. The baby birds who haven’t eaten, peep the loudest.

I feel as if 343i has catered to purists who only want Halo to be of the same form as the rest of the industry innovates. The new artstyle is all I need to see to feel implicated that 343i is now scared to explore and innovate. Their artstyle was fine as they envisioned it, they didn’t need to change it again. It was their own design philosophy, but changing it only admitted to me that they couldn’t make Halo they way they wanted. They had to cater as a last ditch effort to avoid being crucified once more, though they just might not escape that fate.

Thanks for reading.

#2

I would agree that 343 gets a lot of hate for things people turn a blind eye to in other games (i.e. having an expansion sold separately from a season pass in HW2. Rainbow Six Siege? Destiny? Xcom 2? They can get away with it, even be praised for it, but not Halo). I would also agree that people are a little overcritical. If 343 had kept the franchise basically the exact same as Halo 3 which is what everyone wants now, then it would get hated anyway (just look at Gears of War 4). I also find that a lot of the problems people have with 343 can be found in Bungie’s games as well but I guess nostalgia gets in the way there (needing to read lore outside of the games to understand certain plot elements, unlikable characters, major gameplay/graphics changes, etc.)

I would also say 343 is in no way above criticism I’m just saying I think people are a little too harsh on them. Criticism is how games get fixed to a decent state (EA’s Battlefront 2 for example). I would also agree that Infinite is basically -Yoinked- because there’s no way 343 can fix everything people already hate (even if they fix art style and gameplay people already hate the current story trend so they’re still in trouble). Given this, we may end up with a DCEU problem on our hands*.

*by this I mean I don’t want what happened to the DCEU to happen to Halo. In the DCEU, people hated Man of Steel, BvS, etc. for various reasons, one being “the movies are too dark.” So when DC changed things up and made Justice League a light-hearted Marvel movie, the old haters still hated it because it was DC (and all the problems that implies) and it also attracted new haters who were fans of the darker tone of BvS and didn’t like the sudden change of style. In the end, both sides hated the movie. I see the same thing potentially happening to Halo Infinite. The current haters may hate Infinite because it’s 343 (and all the problems that implies) and it may also attract new haters who were fans of 4/5 who don’t want to go back to old school Halo. In the end, both sides may hate the game which hurts not only the game or movie but also people like me who were fans of pre-change DCEU/Halo and fans of post-change DCEU/Halo.

#3

A lot of food for thought there.

I think we’re starting to see this same dynamic play out across the board in just about any franchise you care to name. Just this morning I was talking to a friend about what Disney has done to Star Wars and how the fans feel about it and how those fans are making their feelings known. Some see it (in either example, SW or Halo) as new stake holders ruining the vision of the original creators and hence ruining the appreciation of the fan base… but it’s probably a lot more complicated than that.

In any event, game developers living under the scrutiny of fans is nothing new. People predicting the demise of the franchise is nothing new. And people projecting their desires on to a blank slate (like the Infinite teaser) is also nothing new.

Like any organization, 343 has hit some home runs and they’ve also been struck out. For me the point isn’t so much whether or not their next up-to-bat produces a triple play or even a home run. For me the point is that they get up to bat at all. Keep moving forward and keep trying to build a better game even knowing that what is better for some will be worse for others. It just isn’t possible to please everyone. Heck, I’m one of those impossible to please people, but I’d still rather see them swing and miss than not swing at all.

Go 343.

#4

I think there’s a perceived increase of negative opinions towards 343’s games because the classic style of the Infinite trailer has wrangled back some of the strays who left during the transitional phase, coupled by a renewed validity for people like myself who are more critical of recent titles than hateful towards them.
You’re right about the 343 vs Bungie argument. Its a moot point that doesn’t serve any purpose beyond ‘glory days’-ing and begging for the withered husk of a developer that is Bungie to come back to Halo is like begging a concert pianist to come back after losing half their fingers and having arthritis in the ones remaining.

Most classic fans I know would tell you that 343’s initial fault was actually not course correcting Bungie’s mistakes in Halo Reach, and I’d say that Halo 4 having the second highest sales in the franchise while also having the sharpest population drop is clear evidence of this. You’re also on the money when it comes to actually recognising positive contributions 343 has made to the franchise, most notably the Custom Games browser and Halo 5’s expanded Forge, but also their commitment to 60fps and cool additions like seat-switching, all of which i’d like to remain in future titles.

I just hope that there’s a distinction between classic fans who want [ insert favourite trilogy game here ] over and over again and classic fans who just want new titles to innovate through the sandbox rather than the player, like myself. I don’t want Halo to remain stagnant, but copying mechanics from other games verbatim isn’t the answer, or should at least be heavily scrutinised. Halo can and should innovate, but in a way that stays true to that sandbox arena core that made the games so unique and appealing in the first place. I hope Infinite is the first step in that direction.

#5

So people aren’t allowed opinions now? It’s completely normal for people to speculate and come to conclusions about things when they see a brief glimpse of a game. Oh, and I see it’s the everybody loves Bungie post again. Seriously? Bungie had plenty of hate even in the H2 days and especially during Reach, but I guess people seem to conveniently forget about that because it doesn’t suit their everybody only hates 343 narrative.

I don’t think a lot of people are saying 343 doesn’t work hard. It’s pretty obvious that they do, but the problem for many lies in their vision for Halo and their gameplay design decisions which not everyone is going to agree with. Your position of defending those decisions doesn’t make your opinions any more valid than someone who disagrees with them. No matter what they do with Infinite someone is going to hate it so the only thing 343 can do is to just stick with their vision. At the end of the day, everybody is gonna have opinions, but it’s the game sales that will decide if their vision is the right one.

#6

> 2727626560040591;5:
> So people aren’t allowed opinions now? It’s completely normal for people to speculate and come to conclusions about things when they see a brief glimpse of a game. Oh, and I see it’s the everybody loves Bungie post again. Seriously? Bungie had plenty of hate even in the H2 days and especially during Reach, but I guess people seem to conveniently forget about that because it doesn’t suit their everybody only hates 343 narrative.
>
> I don’t think a lot of people are saying 343 doesn’t work hard. It’s pretty obvious that they do, but the problem for many lies in their vision for Halo and their gameplay design decisions which not everyone is going to agree with. Your position of defending those decisions doesn’t make your opinions any more valid than someone who disagrees with them. No matter what they do with Infinite someone is going to hate it so the only thing 343 can do is to just stick with their vision. At the end of the day, everybody is gonna have opinions, but it’s the game sales that will decide if their vision is the right one.

I don’t care about how 343i designs their games. I was only pointing out how harsh people can get, and that’s a matter of fact, not opinions.

#7

> 2533274870445963;1:
> Mark my words.
>
> If Halo: Infinite slips up in anyway and has so much as included sprint or Smart-Scope, the fandom will efficiently dismantle the game and everyone will go back to hating 343i and their efforts OVERNIGHT, even if the game is good.

-Yoinking- THANK YOU. I have been saying this for God knows how long, and now that we’ve got a look at what’s to come, it’s more relevant than ever. Due to the increasing trend of fandoms suddenly becoming more “aware” of stuff that’s wrong in their franchise (and by “wrong” I mean stuff that was held to be fine for a while but all of a sudden it’s the most hated thing in existence; kinda like how people thought SW episode 7 was great for a bit then decided it was the beginning of the end for the series), it is my belief that this will include Halo Infinite upon its release, and nothing can stop it. Someone is going to find something wrong with the game, be it a voice change, bad level, or something among those lines, and the fanbase will cling to it like vultures to a carcass until support for the game eventually ceases. Thus, the series will be fully and irreversibly deceased, not because the developers are incompetent, but because the fans refuse to accept anything they are given like a baby eating veggies for the first time, simply because it isn’t made by one group of people.

Oh well, nothing we can do about it, I suppose.

#8

> 2533274870445963;1:
> I’m beginning to believe that the majority of Halo’s community suffers a lot of bias, particularly against 343i and all their efforts.
>
> With Halo: Infinite’s reveal, I have never seen such a sudden and unmitigated backlash to Halo 4, Halo: The Master Chief Collection, and above all else: Halo 5: Guardians. Until now, most were presentably neutral towards those games with varying opinions both in favor and against in just about anywhere you look. Suddenly, everyone seems to hate them, and I mean abhorrantly.
>
> People have already set it in stone that Halo: Infinite is going to bring about a resurgance of classical Halo solely because of the new artstyle. They’ve already jumped to the conclusions that it has classical gameplay, a compelling story, and a complete overhaul in the quality of life yet literally no one outside of 343i has even played an Alpha build or let alone knows any information. Simply because of the new artstyle? No, not just that.
>
> There’s always been an incessant pre-disposed bias against 343i and everything they’ve accomplished thus far, only until now, it’s been the vocal minority. The moment the chance arose when simply because a new artstyle was teased, everything flipped and suddenly everyone is indoctrinated to hate the games they’ve already made. They’re forgetting that it’s still the same developer and some would say “They’re still going to blam it up, somehow”.
>
> Mark my words.
>
> If Halo: Infinite slips up in anyway and has so much as included sprint or Smart-Scope, the fandom will efficiently dismantle the game and everyone will go back to hating 343i and their efforts OVERNIGHT, even if the game is good. They just dislike 343i because they’re not Bungie, but to pose a question: What would Bungie have done if they continued to develop Halo? Imagine that instead of developing Destiny, they would implement all their looming and haunting innovations that they’ve saved only for Destiny, and trickled them into Halo. Imagine that they wanted to shape Halo into how they wanted to shape Destiny without starting a new IP. I’ll tell you what, I’m fairly certain that it would still have Sprint as well as many other gimmicks that both games use.
>
> Only, how would the community respond to this? Would they retain today’s entitled attitude towards those innovations? Or would they be welcoming those innovations with the absense of bias towards 343i and simply because “It’s Bungie.”
>
> Here’s a wake-up call: BUNGIE IS DEAD AND THE BUNGIE WE HAVE NOW IS LIVING IN IT’S OWN SHADOW. LOOK AT DESTINY 2 AND THE STATE OF THE DESTINY FRANCHISE. Does Bungie even seem competent anymore?
>
> 343i at least kept Halo alive when there wasn’t a reason to. If Halo is such a beloved franchise, then all the developers need from the community is support and encouragement, not demands to return to form, not reluctance to evolve and adapt, not unmitigated patronizing of their efforts. I mean, have you SEEN the amount of detailing in Halo 5 aside from its textures? The music, the environments, the attention to asinine details? Arguably one of the best developed games to hit the modern market regardless of its story. And people just HATE it for everything that it is.
>
> 343i have worked extremely hard developing their games.
>
> Halo 4 was a storytelling masterpiece written by Chris Schlerf of all people which played very much like Halo: Reach and fit the new unfathomable universe-building undertones laid out by Schlerf. Could you imagine Chief intimidating Del Rio with his older armor? Not as well at least. Though Halo 4 is completely thrown away by most because its multiplayer was forgettable and Spartan Ops wasn’t engaging.
>
> The Master Chief Collection was a mess, I’m in total agreement with this but in 343i’s defense; When else have FOUR CAMPAIGN ENGINES and FIVE MULTIPLAYER ENGINES EACH WITH THEIR OWN DEDICATED SERVERS running on ONE application that’s been done before and done CORRECTLY? Zero. The MCC was difficult to manage and they knew it themselves, but they did it anyway, because they believed we’d like it. We didn’t.
>
> Halo 5: Guardians is the most controversial of all, and for good reason, too. Most are in agreemeant that the story for Halo 5’s campaign was incredibly subpar compared to the previous games, but here’s the thing: The story was still functional. Chief discovers Cortana is still alive following the events of Halo 4. Exposition. Chief searches for Cortana and is declared AWOL. Rising Action. Locke is tasked with hunting and arresting Chief. Conflict. Cortana turns out to be the main villain. Climax. Locke discovers the truth behind Chief’s absence and they join forces. Falling Action. Cliffhanger. Resolution. There’s your storyboard. What clearly went wrong during development is everything between those extremes, blame Brian Reed for that. Blame him a lot. On the topic of multiplayer, Halo 5 is perhaps one of the most, if not; the most engaging and rewarding competitive experienceto date. It’s a well-received and well-tuned arena style gameplay that surely makes anyone feel like they’re in control of a supersoldier while still retaining the fundamentals of inviting, casual capability and spontaneity. The Halo Championship is still going strong. Warzone is the most dynamic experience in a Halo game that’s already superceded gamemodes like Invasion, Spartan Ops, Firefight in terms of overall popularity and preference while paying respectable homage to previous games with accessory modes like Warzone Assault and Warzone Firefight. However, the most profound and groundbreaking innovation Halo 5 introduced to the franchise is of course the most dynamic Forge tool to date. Despite all of this, a (vocal) majority hate this game with all the passion they could muster.
>
> I’m concerned for the early life-cycle of Halo: Infinite. Should 343i slip up, Halo will surely die this time, even if their mistakes are minor. They’ve lost faith in their own ambitious foresight because of a vocal majority. Those who enjoyed their games would naturally have no complaints, therefore they would naturally be the vocal minority. The baby birds who haven’t eaten, peep the loudest.
>
> I feel as if 343i has catered to purists who only want Halo to be of the same form as the rest of the industry innovates. The new artstyle is all I need to see to feel implicated that 343i is now scared to explore and innovate. Their artstyle was fine as they envisioned it, they didn’t need to change it again. It was their own design philosophy, but changing it only admitted to me that they couldn’t make Halo they way they wanted. They had to cater as a last ditch effort to avoid being crucified once more, though they just might not escape that fate.
>
> Thanks for reading.

The criticism for all those games has been there since the beginning,you must have overlooked it.People didn’t really like reach and that was a bungie game.Whoever develops the game is not an issue as long as the game is good.Numbers do the talking and Halo has been declining for awhile now

#9

> 2533274870445963;6:
> I don’t care about how 343i designs their games. I was only pointing out how harsh people can get, and that’s a matter of fact, not opinions.

Part of your last paragraph would say otherwise, but I never said you cared about how they designed their games. I was merely pointing out that your opinions defending the majority of 343’s game decisions that you listed doesn’t invalidate someone else’s opinion that is less favorable of 343. For your other part, what else is new? There has always been harsh amped up criticism when a new game is coming out and this is no different. No matter if the developer is Bungie or 343, there will always be a group of people that will be disappointed and lash out since they can’t please everyone.

#10

> 2727626560040591;9:
> > 2533274870445963;6:
> > I don’t care about how 343i designs their games. I was only pointing out how harsh people can get, and that’s a matter of fact, not opinions.
>
> Part of your last paragraph would say otherwise, but I never said you cared about how they designed their games. I was merely pointing out that your opinions defending the majority of 343’s game decisions that you listed doesn’t invalidate someone else’s opinion that is less favorable of 343. For your other part, what else is new? There has always been harsh amped up criticism when a new game is coming out and this is no different. No matter if the developer is Bungie or 343, there will always be a group of people that will be disappointed and lash out since they can’t please everyone.

Bingo. What I said.

#11

H4/5 have always suffered a lot of hate from the “veteran” community, maybe it’s just emphasized even more now. Reach wasn’t the most loved game either as it introduced part of the “problem” of 343’s games, even though it was made by Bungie. If Bungie were the ones making 4 and 5 exactly as 343 did I do think they would get less hate, they would still get hate for sure though. For a lot of people I think they view 343 as a studio that took over their favourite childhood franchise and utterly ruined it, whereas if Bungie kept making them maybe they’d be in a “better” state. As for if I think the current Bungie could make a better Halo than 343 I really don’t know. That would depend on if they wanted to keep going with the abilities or stay more of a familiar Halo, which we have no way of knowing. Would they have implemented all this Destiny stuff into Halo? Maybe, maybe not. They could have thought they needed to innovate along those lines, or they could have thought “no that’s not what Halo is”. It’s kind of a pointless question to me because we just have no way of knowing without actually hearing it from them, until then it’s all just speculation.

#12

If you really havent seen hate posts towards Halo games before you must have been living under a rock.
There have been (and still are) people that are Halo: Combat Evolved purists having points such as SPARTANs wouldnt use energy swords like you can use in Halo 2.
Otherwise Halo 3: ODST had its share too, one common point being it being short.
And Halo: Reach had its share for such things as the armor abilities (especially armor lock to the point it became infamous) and so on.

So 343i has not been the only one to receive criticism and bungie hasnt been held as the perfect company either.

And I dont know about others but I tried to be open about 343i, the ensemble didnt do bad with Halo Wars so I just tried to see what they were up to.

HCEA became a bit less than what i expected with its Halo: Reach style graphics which made it mostly seem worse than the original. I thought it was something like a training for a new company so nothing much to it.

When H4 was announced I thought aesthetically it looked really off but I was curious about seeing continuation to rather open legendary ending of Halo 3 after quite some years. It turned out disappointment as Halo having parts with Star Wars vibes and such. Im not going too depth here.

The point being that personally i tried to be open about new developers but for whatever reasons they couldnt make a game that feels like a Halo.

But i still try to thinknof the games as individuals, which includes infinite too. I dont expect much but you never know. 343i made their fame/infamy themselves though who knows if they could have dond much better with their own creation of a brand and own vision but their version of Halo, not too impressive.

Otherwise, the post seems to be stating the obvious, people are always going to be criticising some aspects and people are always going to speculate things. Nothing new.

And if Bungie made a bad Halo game, I wouldnt believe for a second it could be above criticism. Destiny was utter feces and it was criticised for it much like 343i was criticised for its games.
There will be criticism, no matter the game or developer. No developer is above that. Old studio wont be above it for its past fame nor new developer get a free pass for being new and inexperienced. There are no excuses, its just business with its quality/ profitability ratio.

Which brings to 343i keeping Halo alive, I think its more about microsoft and its want of milking every last pennies from the Halo brand. Not implying there wouldnt be hard working and enthustiathic workers.

But whether some games are good is purely about opinions of various people, hence making most of what is included here rather pointless.

And please, if you are writing about minorities/majorities at least post some links with research notes and numbers. Otherwise its just empty words.

Also, I hope that with ypur rant about community being biased you see the irony of you seemingly being biased towards the community. Or its just misunderstanding of your text in which case you can just forget that.

Also, what exactly you mean by “purists”? The Halo: Combat Evolved purists? Original trilogy purists? Bungie purists? Before Halo: Reach purists? That needs more specification. There are more than 1 group of Halo purists.

Also, what even is that rant about people getting speculative and then in the end stating that 343i is catering to “purists” (whatever you mean by that). Its just illogical.

#13

> 2533274890014309;12:
> But whether some games are good is purely about opinions of various people, hence making most of what is included here rather pointless.
>
> And please, if you are writing about minorities/majorities at least post some links with research notes and numbers. Otherwise its just empty words.
>
> Also, I hope that with ypur rant about community being biased you see the irony of you seemingly being biased towards the community. Or its just misunderstanding of your text in which case you can just forget that.
>
> Also, what exactly you mean by “purists”? The Halo: Combat Evolved purists? Original trilogy purists? Bungie purists? Before Halo: Reach purists? That needs more specification. There are more than 1 group of Halo purists.
>
> Also, what even is that rant about people getting speculative and then in the end stating that 343i is catering to “purists” (whatever you mean by that). Its just illogical.

Just check out the Halo subreddit, the lot is almost unanimously biased against 343i and you’d expect them to be the most mature about it, they’re not.

You ought to not just dismiss everything I say just because you disagree with it.

#14

First off Microsoft kept Halo alive for the very reason of money, it’s their biggest IP. 343 was specifically made exactly for Halo as a division of Microsoft. Microsoft didn’t buy the rights to Halo for nothing :+1:

Second: the dislike for current halos direction has been a thing since Reach, you know why there are threads complaining of abilities, Sprint, the change in asthetics, soundtrack etc etc? All stem from Reach which WAS a bungie game so I think that nullifies the point that if bungie made H4/H5 that people would’ve accepted it just by name alone. People actually wanted 343 to revert what bungie started, and being new on the block with H4, people were lenient knowing it was their first game. After that you then have the #s. Halos sales and player counts have been doing nothing but regressing game after game since Reach (again, a bungie game) so is that decline just an overnight thing? You have to do something wrong to provoke such action, especially when it’s by the millions.

Third: adapting has never been an issue, people already know how to play the newer games, knowing how to play doesn’t mean you should like it :+1: you then say people shouldn’t be so reluctant to change, well if it’s something they don’t like of course they will, there’s change for the sake of it and then there’s change for the better of a franchise. I already brought up declining numbers so is it really change for the better? For what is this supposed “flagship franchise” it can’t even stand in the top 10 most played list on it’s own console, it’s letting non exclusives outdo it. I myself also fail to recognize Halo as Halo anymore because damn near everything that can be changed HAS been changed. The asthetics? The soundtrack? The gameplay? Half the game modes themselves play different to their original versions. If it wasn’t still in the halo universe, I wouldn’t be calling it Halo.

I can get a new company trying to establish their own mark and identity, but you don’t do so by touching everything you can else you just alienate people. The coalition did a much better job keeping gears of war as gears of war than 343 did with Halo and they were in the very same shoes as 343 once epic left the gears franchise as they’re also a division of Microsoft specifically made to make gears of war games.

“Catering to purists” how so? Even then I think we’ve already seen their current attempts at modernizing or “evolving” Halo fail being how the #s have shown nothing but regression. It probably makes sense to attempt an old school approach to see what happens and if it fails 🤷 they can go right back to what they were doing before. It’s not like Halo hasn’t changed it’s core before.

Lastly I can’t believe anything on an engine demo. Anything is subject to change till launch so infinite can very well be old school asthetics or it goes right back to power ranger spartans. I also see 343s stubbornness and I’m sure they’ll stick to their statement that the next mainline game will be built off Halo 5 like was said years ago. So anything said of old school implementation will be a " i’ll believe it when I see it" cause I won’t partake in assumptions that 343 will do this or that as they’ve established a history of changing things on the fly.

#15

> 2533274870445963;13:
> > 2533274890014309;12:
> > But whether some games are good is purely about opinions of various people, hence making most of what is included here rather pointless.
> >
> > And please, if you are writing about minorities/majorities at least post some links with research notes and numbers. Otherwise its just empty words.
> >
> > Also, I hope that with ypur rant about community being biased you see the irony of you seemingly being biased towards the community. Or its just misunderstanding of your text in which case you can just forget that.
> >
> > Also, what exactly you mean by “purists”? The Halo: Combat Evolved purists? Original trilogy purists? Bungie purists? Before Halo: Reach purists? That needs more specification. There are more than 1 group of Halo purists.
> >
> > Also, what even is that rant about people getting speculative and then in the end stating that 343i is catering to “purists” (whatever you mean by that). Its just illogical.
>
> Just check out the Halo subreddit, the lot is almost unanimously biased against 343i and you’d expect them to be the most mature about it, they’re not.
>
> You ought to not just dismiss everything I say just because you disagree with it.

There really is criticism about 343i games but at this point its likely about peoples experiences of the products 343i made. And as to why there is less criticism about bungies Halo games its because those things were discussed to death when those games were new. No game is above criticism.
Cant say for everyone but it would be rather weird if people just decided even before the first game 343i made that they dont just like 343i. And I dont get as to why would anyone think like that nor I dont get as to why would anyone just let bad designs slip just because of the brand Halo or keeping it alive.
Personally I think 343i could have done better than bungie outside of Halo given how Destiny turned out but that either remains to be seen or we will never see it. But this topic is mostly about opinions so there really is no point for a really deep discussion given opinion about what games are good is included and personal experiences influence that.

And it would be naive to think that all internet discussions would be mature when there are immature people around physically but more importantly, mentally. Though maturity is in the eyes of a viewer.

Though why would anyone just blindly hate something without prior experience about the subject matter? Its just illogical.
And i really just wouldnt try to invalidate criticism about 343i:s design choices by using a simple word “biased”. Its just as empty as calling a game “generic” and its just taking space from real points.
Nor would it change if 343i parts would have been changed to bungie.

And people have their reasons as to why they think as they do. I simply disagreed with points such as people being biased against 343ivand think its rather just the usual criticism based on prior experiences with said companys products while also stating that i hope people try to see new releases as individual products rather than wallow in the past.

That goes for both hating previous design choices and holding a brand on high pedestal. Both are part of ridiculous and blind behaviour.

And i dont see that as dismissing points that others make but rather weighing them and when personally found them lacking, disagree with said point unless later on with additional related points on the subject matter change my mind if i see the point now outweighing the point i related more to before.
Observe, adapt, overcome.

Though i still havent seen much more than repeat of that empty word “biased” and dismissing part of the community with said simple word. I would hope you would do as many others and try to think from multiple perspectives as to why people think as they do. At least i personally do that.
It doesnt mean that your opinions would have to change or mine either but it could give some perspective to things and more solid base to discussions about subject matter.

Also, in your last sentence, i see the same irony as before.

“This one is machine and nerve, and has its mind concluded. This one is but flesh and faith, and is the more deluded.”

Im not implying anything with that quote just to be clear, i just like quotes and it seems to fit the theme when writing about human psyche.

#16

I don’t see anything wrong with Sprint. My only problem is that it shouldn’t be unlimited
It should be like Reach’s

#17

where have you been? I’ve seen a crap ton of bungie bias and 343 hate all through out halo 5’s “prime”.

#18

> 2727626560040591;5:
> So people aren’t allowed opinions now? It’s completely normal for people to speculate and come to conclusions about things when they see a brief glimpse of a game. Oh, and I see it’s the everybody loves Bungie post again. Seriously? Bungie had plenty of hate even in the H2 days and especially during Reach, but I guess people seem to conveniently forget about that because it doesn’t suit their everybody only hates 343 narrative.
>
> I don’t think a lot of people are saying 343 doesn’t work hard. It’s pretty obvious that they do, but the problem for many lies in their vision for Halo and their gameplay design decisions which not everyone is going to agree with. Your position of defending those decisions doesn’t make your opinions any more valid than someone who disagrees with them. No matter what they do with Infinite someone is going to hate it so the only thing 343 can do is to just stick with their vision. At the end of the day, everybody is gonna have opinions, but it’s the game sales that will decide if their vision is the right one.

LUKEPOWA IS 100% correct. Everyone is entitled to an opinion. Opinion are like rear-ends. Everyone has one and they all stink.

The reality is that you can’t please everyone. No matter what, there will be people who will hate Halo Infinite. 343i isn’t going to get stuck up on all the hate. They’re going to do what they think is best while listening to the feedback of their community. The video game industry is highly competitive in this day and age. Going back to 2004/2005, Bungie had is really good because they didn’t have competition. Halo 2 was the only reason people were buying Xboxes and everyone was playing. If you look at today, 343i’s Halo 5: Guardians and The Master Chief Collection has to compete, for players time, against:
-Overwatch
-Gears of War 5
-Fortnite (Battle Royale)
-PUBG
-Destiny
-Battlefield
-Battlefront

And those are just a few of the Xbox titles. Don’t even get me started with the even bigger competitors outside the Xbox platform. The point is, things aren’t what they used to be and everyone is going to have an opinion about something. Its fine to have an opinion but don’t ram it down someone else’s throat or talk down to them because they don’t agree with you.

#19

> 2546678360738636;18:
> > 2727626560040591;5:
> > So people aren’t allowed opinions now? It’s completely normal for people to speculate and come to conclusions about things when they see a brief glimpse of a game. Oh, and I see it’s the everybody loves Bungie post again. Seriously? Bungie had plenty of hate even in the H2 days and especially during Reach, but I guess people seem to conveniently forget about that because it doesn’t suit their everybody only hates 343 narrative.
> >
> > I don’t think a lot of people are saying 343 doesn’t work hard. It’s pretty obvious that they do, but the problem for many lies in their vision for Halo and their gameplay design decisions which not everyone is going to agree with. Your position of defending those decisions doesn’t make your opinions any more valid than someone who disagrees with them. No matter what they do with Infinite someone is going to hate it so the only thing 343 can do is to just stick with their vision. At the end of the day, everybody is gonna have opinions, but it’s the game sales that will decide if their vision is the right one.
>
> LUKEPOWA IS 100% correct. Everyone is entitled to an opinion. Opinion are like rear-ends. Everyone has one and they all stink.
>
> The reality is that you can’t please everyone. No matter what, there will be people who will hate Halo Infinite. 343i isn’t going to get stuck up on all the hate. They’re going to do what they think is best while listening to the feedback of their community. The video game industry is highly competitive in this day and age. Going back to 2004/2005, Bungie had is really good because they didn’t have competition. Halo 2 was the only reason people were buying Xboxes and everyone was playing. If you look at today, 343i’s Halo 5: Guardians and The Master Chief Collection has to compete, for players time, against:
> -Overwatch
> -Gears of War 5
> -Fortnite (Battle Royale)
> -PUBG
> -Destiny
> -Battlefield
> -Battlefront
>
> And those are just a few of the Xbox titles. Don’t even get me started with the even bigger competitors outside the Xbox platform. The point is, things aren’t what they used to be and everyone is going to have an opinion about something. Its fine to have an opinion but don’t ram it down someone else’s throat or talk down to them because they don’t agree with you.

Even at release only a few of those games warrant

#20

Good read, I’m in complete agreement.