I don’t want to seem negative, but I’m a little worried about how Infinite’s campaign will be structured. On the map in last year’s gameplay demo, we see an objective to take out a high-profile Elite target. I feel like this hints at an Ubisoft-esque “kill the henchmen to progress the story towards the final boss” design. I just don’t feel like Halo could make that work from a narrative standpoint. The franchise is known for rich stories, and I just feel like target elimination objectives are extremely shallow. I guess terminals could help partially make up for a lack of depth, but world exploration alone doesn’t have the same ‘wow’ factor that narrative experience does. Anyone else get that vibe from the “destroy AA guns” and “kill [weird Elite name]” targets? Idk, maybe it’s just me reading too much into it.
What we saw of the campaign from last year was basically the Far Cry formula. I think what we may end up getting might be different after a significant delay as well as soem serious changing of leadership positions during that delay.
343 was all-in on the open world thing for awhile there, but recently theyve backtracked that statement hard. I wouldn’t be surprised if we see something more akin to the second level of CE, Halo, in several different formats. I do hope we get some linear stuff in there with awesome hand-crafted setpieces like the Scarab fights in Halo 3. Here’s to Hope lol
I’m ready for the changes, I like mission formats if the missions are short and I feel the Halo ones are a bit long for me despite being huge and epic in scale.
As a huge fan of Far Cry I’m quite excited for a more open world structure for Halo.
> 2535411993815954;1:
> I don’t want to seem negative, but I’m a little worried about how Infinite’s campaign will be structured. On the map in last year’s gameplay demo, we see an objective to take out a high-profile Elite target. I feel like this hints at an Ubisoft-esque “kill the henchmen to progress the story towards the final boss” design. I just don’t feel like Halo could make that work from a narrative standpoint. The franchise is known for rich stories, and I just feel like target elimination objectives are extremely shallow. I guess terminals could help partially make up for a lack of depth, but world exploration alone doesn’t have the same ‘wow’ factor that narrative experience does. Anyone else get that vibe from the “destroy AA guns” and “kill [weird Elite name]” targets? Idk, maybe it’s just me reading too much into it.
“but world exploration alone doesn’t have the same ‘wow’ factor that narrative experience does”
I have to strongly disagree with you there. Player driven world exploration is one of the most compelling means of story telling there is. It’s all about taking what makes video games unique as a medium i.e player agency, and allowing players to forge their own narrative. Halo rings have too much potential to only be explored via linear levels.
Not to mention, some of the most exciting levels on the series have been the more open ended ones. Halo and Silent Cartographer from CE are two notable examples of that, with the latter often regarded the best level in the series. I don’t understand how it isn’t exciting to you.
Not worried about the halo infinite campaign structure at all, happy to embrace the changes 343i are going to introduce.
A while ago there was mention of this in a blogpost I think. As I remember Joseph State found the campaign to have to many obligatory objectives and they went back to the drawing board to make a main storyline and side missions that can help and enriched your experience.
So not really worried about too much chores in the campaign, but lots of places to explore.
I think the levels just have more to do then the linear campaign not anything like ubisoft or bethesda does like making enimes stronger so you have to do sidequests to have a fighting chance.
Honestly, I hope the lean a lot more into the “Semi” in the “semi-open world” term they keep using. I do not want a fully open worlds halo game, not in the style that I typically think of when I hear open world. One of the best aspects of halo’s campaign and what has kept it relevant so many years later was it’s linear level design imo. The fact that you can go back and hop into a level you liked and play it over and over any time you want and get the same experience, or could replay the campaigns countless times without putting hundreds of hours into them, added to the replayability for me.
From when they first announced it a worry of mine was that the campaign could easily become bloated with collectibles and side objectives and Unsubstantial RPG-like grind. I don’t want to spend half the campaign doing side objectives just to level up chief or to unlock portions of the map. I’m hoping the campaign will still be full interesting linear spaces and that the main story requires little to no going off the main path in order to complete. And that we can still revisit old “levels” to replay them without having to start a new save.
> 2535411993815954;1:
> I don’t want to seem negative, but I’m a little worried about how Infinite’s campaign will be structured. On the map in last year’s gameplay demo, we see an objective to take out a high-profile Elite target. I feel like this hints at an Ubisoft-esque “kill the henchmen to progress the story towards the final boss” design. I just don’t feel like Halo could make that work from a narrative standpoint. The franchise is known for rich stories, and I just feel like target elimination objectives are extremely shallow. I guess terminals could help partially make up for a lack of depth, but world exploration alone doesn’t have the same ‘wow’ factor that narrative experience does. Anyone else get that vibe from the “destroy AA guns” and “kill [weird Elite name]” targets? Idk, maybe it’s just me reading too much into it.
As has been stated a few times, initially 343 was pretty heavy into this whole open world idea and do X objective to advance. I can’t remember where but I believe when they brought Joe in, he didn’t love the idea as it felt way too repetitive and unrewarding. When objectives become monotonous, it takes away.
> 2535470395434446;5:
> I don’t understand how it isn’t exciting to you.
For me, an open world is only as exciting as the story lets it be. I do find different environments interesting, but exploration only goes so far in creating that “wow” factor. The exceptions to this are hidden caves and secret entrances. Now those are extremely exciting.
Halo’s writing is what makes it so fascinating to me. Is there a level of interest created by Forerunner architecture? Absolutely. But I just don’t think staring at walls is as interesting as having Cortana (or, in Infinite’s case, the Weapon) talking about the structures’ significance.
> 2535411993815954;11:
> > 2535470395434446;5:
> > I don’t understand how it isn’t exciting to you.
>
> For me, an open world is only as exciting as the story lets it be. I do find different environments interesting, but exploration only goes so far in creating that “wow” factor. The exceptions to this are hidden caves and secret entrances. Now those are extremely exciting.
>
> Halo’s writing is what makes it so fascinating to me. Is there a level of interest created by Forerunner architecture? Absolutely. But I just don’t think staring at walls is as interesting as having Cortana (or, in Infinite’s case, the Weapon) talking about the structures’ significance.
“The exceptions to this are hidden caves and secret entrances. Now those are extremely exciting.”
Exactly, and there will be plenty of interesting places to explore on the ring, that’s a given.
> 2535411993815954;11:
> Is there a level of interest created by Forerunner architecture? Absolutely. But I just don’t think staring at walls is as interesting as having Cortana (or, in Infinite’s case, the Weapon) talking about the structures’ significance.
Well who’s to say we’ll be left staring at walls? 343 wouldn’t go the semi open world route without fleshing out the ring and its forerunner facilities, it’s too good an opportunity. In fact, I’d wager the semi open world approach will actually make for better world building than Bungie’s games.
I am a little worried, the old Halo Formula only worked well (IMO) for Linear games
I feel the campaign is going to need a loadout menu or something, for it to really be a sandbox
and to really give players the option to tackle objectives in whatever way they want.
I also feel like the arsenal is a little small… only 8 UNSC weapons in total so far
things like the DMR, SMG and LMG no where to be seen… but 55 days, the could still add them
I am also a little worried on how well itll flow, if itll be like destiny, or flop
I am also concerned that paying 60$ for a Story was a little steep
and that PvE modes like Firefight or Spartan Ops or whatever they decide to add later
should be locked to Story Purchase, and that they should give us some in-game stuff for paying.
I am not super worried about the game in general, but little things like
- if they added more weapons post-launch, how will they work them in the Story? Loadouts seemed like the easiest solution, cause they could just add them to the loadout menus. I made a forum post about loadouts not too long ago. I expect lots of hate for it.
- Flow, Story, How well it will mesh together…
- Music, I don’t want a lot of EDM and Pop like CoD tends to have, I want Orchestral Pieces with Ominous vocalizing, like the old Halo
HECK, I would take Doom’s Soundtrack over CoDs, that metal is great for killing too.
Plenty more story things I worry about. I mean, personally I do not want MC dying, but it seems like article writers do, but our own spartan story could track him, then he could do a Halo 3 and drift into space “Wake me when you need me” and become a legend. That way he isnt totally dying off. But that is just my thought.
Mostly I am just thinking of little things, I know there are probably bigger concerns, but I am more concerned with the Armory currently, the optimization on a RTX 3060 TI A(that I have) not getting stable frames in PvP maps… and hoping that the story and world are fun and not… like Far Cry 6… or like Halo 5…
I am also really hoping that they do DLC, BUT not PvP Focused, give us more ways to use our spartan, give us FireFight, add more maps to it, let us take our own spartan for a spin in the story after we beat it, or make a whole new story, in similar locations and perhaps some new ones for our own Spartan, like we are tracking the MC, but not like Locke, also let us Kill Locke… PLEASE… or have the arbiter just woosh in and energy sword him, that would be so good.
ANYWAY, I just am more of a PvE/Co-Op person so I constantly think about content they could add, and hoping that they don’t pull a CoD and make PvP focused additions instead of adding more PvE (though Outbreak had some good additions and Zombies in general had some) but I mean, Firefight, our own Spartan Story… it would all be really cool to see that. Especially they will need to consider that if they are still going for that idea of: “TEN YEARS OF HALO INFINITE”. I could see it lasting 6 maybe 7, 10 is a stretch. it would need stuff like what I am saying, and more community input
> 2535470395434446;12:
> 343 wouldn’t go the semi open world route without fleshing out the ring and its forerunner facilities, it’s too good an opportunity.
This is why I’m worried, because we don’t know if that’s the case. I really like your enthusiasm, but I’m just not confident from what we’ve seen so far. We just know so little about the campaign.
I’m not as worried as much as I just want to know what kind of game we’ll be playing. Show some mechanics already.