I spoke about this the other day with a friend, saying that with all the money 343i have received from just requisition packs alone, they should be able to provide some awesome stuff in the updates, including new maps (and I mean from scratch, not just one per month either or copy pasted).
But we don’t really see much changes of improvements being added, maybe the colour system and a few awesome weapons… But does it really take 3 months post launch to invent the Gravity Hammer and install it into the gameplay? Free yeah but sheesh.
Maybe all the money they’ve received so far will be directed in to the development of Halo 6 or at least Halo Wars 2.
One improvement I felt was really needed is the hostile AIs. Usually in previous Halo’s, enemies were challenging and fun to fight, including Halo 4’s Prometheans.
In Halo 5’s Warzone, the AIs are pretty much just punching bags. Shoot until they drop. It’s boring and the only reason I even attack them is to gain a higher score than the enemy team.
Most of the time these enemies, weather Covenent or Prometheans, often stand around doing nothing interesting. When you engage in battle, they often just stand around. They don’t take cover or do anything smart to kill you. It’s a big problem. They shoot you and that’s all there is to it. If you’re in a vehicle, they cause more damage than the opposite team players do, including killing you faster. Power weapons cause very little damage and it’s only occasionally you’ll find something than can beat them…
True they may be on legendary difficulty, but why do these hostiles have to be so dumb yet so powerful? Even the weak but powerful marines are dumb as hell. Dumb in the way nothing outsmarts you in any engagement. It’s only out of pure strength they beat you and all they do is stand around, and shoot.
(Sorry for the long rant. I got bored so I thought I may as well talk about this, which I feel is an issue, especially in Halo 5’s campaign.)
The main problem I have with the campaign, other than a bit of a confusing story, is that there is a huge lack of variety of enemies to fight (especially referring to Promethean soldiers)…
Knights, are actually more stupid than the Promethean soldiers. They used to be way cooler and actually do bad -Yoink- stuff in Halo 4. Crawlers in Halo 4 used to actually crawl on the cealings just to find a way to shoot you if you’re taking cover. Watchers would often throw grenades, shield the Knights etc. The Covenent in Halo 4 actually used to kill you by being smart. (Here’s a good example: In Halo 4, wraiths would often be challenging, you could find a way to kill them using different strategies. In Halo 5 there is no strategy. Shoot to kill, no skills needed. No figuring out a way to kill tank master Rocke. If you die just keep shooting him when you get back to him, then he kills you because you don’t have the firepower or capability to kill him on your own in a challenging way)
Not saying Halo 5 is a bad game if any of you reading this are thinking that. I do believe there are first person shooters out there than have similar agendas to Halo 5. But the thing is Halo 5 doesn’t need this agenda, it needs challenging enemies to fight, a variety of them with different approaches of how they try to kill you. Halo 5 needs challenging and fun enemies to fight. We already have games where all the enemies are stagnant.
Lets not forget Warden Eternal, how fun it is to just stand around shooting him, while he occasionally hits someone with his sword.
In my opinion, the improvements needed for the AIs are simple:
1: Make Prometheans behave the exact same way they did in Halo 4, including knights teleporting (yes, so they actually do something other than stand in the exact same spot wielding a scattershot). This increases the challenge and variety of skills and strategies needed to beat them.
2: Make the Covenent behave more similar to previous Halo games. Or at least Halo 4
3: Decrease all current AI health and “normalise” they’re battle tactics. I don’t want to fly a banshee only to be killed in just 5 seconds from a few marines.
4: Warden Eternal should be more challengingly fight, even him holding a spartan in the air using his gravity powers would be interesting, while the team must save the dying Spartan within a short few seconds.
Warden should have different tactics than can be beaten especially by specific weapons. For example maybe he shoots out some EMPs while locked to the ground, but you could destabilise him for a short moment by knocking his knee with a plasma grenade, sniper or rocket. Or by shooting his knee for five seconds with an assault rifle. That kind of stuff… Maybe then people wouldn’t be so annoyed hearing Palmer say “It’s Warden Eternal, beat him to win”. We don’t have a lot of skills needed to fight him and if he actually did some cool, bad -Yoink- attacks, fighting him with our best skills… maybe then we could be a bit more excited and say “Let’s go get him, come on!!!”
Imagine the stories you could tell your mates if the AIs did cool stuff, attacked you in ways you wouldn’t expect, or you could fight them in ways that you were flat out giving it all you got. (Because you see 343, shooting a bullet bag from above or below that doesn’t do anything but stand around isn’t fun to fight. Nor is standing around shooting them or using your power weapons to realise that power weapons do very little damage. Please make Halo 6’a AIs awesome. And while you’re at it, please make a sensible, breathtaking story for Halo 6 and Halo Wars 2 that only other games could dream of).
So there you have it, my lovely rant and criticism. If you think the AIs need improving please comment below.
(And just a bonus, I think the campaign could do with a few new missions that take place in between already installed missions, that fit well and make sense. Agree?)