Note: This isn’t a rant against Reach.
Reach:
There was at time when I would have said “absolutely nothing” but I’m slowly turning pro-Reach because of how bad my experiences were with H2 and H3. I would spend hours on AI and every single -Yoinking!- time, -Yoink- happened and I was forced to start over. It took me 2 hours to get an army of more than 25 Hornets only for me to end up being sent into the water by collision with a Hornet and having to revert, took me 6 hours to get the half Flood setup perfected, took me 6 hours to get all the 20 Brutes for my Covenant AI collection (but I reverted because 1 of them lost his power shield and because of other reasons. Often, the AI drove off to their deaths, whether or not I showed myself). It took me 2-3 hours to get the freaking third tower friendly AI to the snow area because they kept getting past the blockade or getting in the tank. It took me up to 3 hours to get the H2 LASO strategy I devised working (up to 3 hours for each strategy, excluding my QZ test). It took me at least 7 hours to get my 61 Councilors army (reduced to 3-4 because I didn’t have to be at the computer all the time during the setup) and those setups failed miserably because the game glitched and deleted Tartarus or I ended up dying by making all the Elites dive or because the game took control of my movement and I ended up running off the platform. I had an army and I only got to see them fight me or Tartarus for 2-3 minutes… And it took me 3-4 hours to get the Heretic AI on The Arbiter because there wasn’t much cover so I was taking a lot of gun fire and they kept deleting or getting past my supply case blockades.
To sum it all up, <mark>H2 and H3 are a major disappointment to me</mark>. The problem is that these things are indeed possible, but are they worth it? Absolutely not. Not many people give a -Yoink- about that kind of thing and those who do just favorite and move on. I couldn’t take the AI anymore from those games. So freaking hard to manipulate. I’m willing to give Reach a chance and I plan on playing primarily CE.
But the most annoying thing about H2 and H3 (and perhaps Reach): THE FREAKING CHECKPOINT SYSTEM!! That is the problem with Halo. It’s now too linear. I never get cps when I need them. I get them when I don’t need them. Cp revert revert by 5 times death is a stupid idea. And the famine of infinite cp giving spots compared to CE is ridiculous (in H3, there are only 2 areas that give off infinite cps afaik: on The Storm, at the area before the Hunters spawn. On The Covenant, at the big glass screen at the Hunter battle). I liked Halo PC a lot because I could access more than 1 checkpoint. I also liked how convenient it was to transfer game saves and such, because often, in H2 and H3, I have to make multiple backups because of how the cp system can be such a screw over (and it’s really annoying how I have to exit Halo 3 and go to System Settings just to change the game save). Setups (AI collection, tricking, strategies) would be hell lot convenient if the cp system wasn’t such a pain in the -Yoink- to deal with.
Finally, boss battles. Those need far less scripting. All my attempts to bypass 343 guilty spark on the last level of Halo 3 were thwarted:
-getting past him before he moves to do his second laser attempt
-getting to him after he’s shot by Johnson
-even trying to sword him didn’t work
Then there’s the Phantoms on Sierra 117. Buggy pos vehicles: their destruction lags the game, their destruction is scripted.
Then there’s the last level where all the assembled Flood eventually get killed off right before a loading point. And let’s not get started with kill stealing Pelicans, Arbiter, and Noble Team…
Anyways, here’s what should be included from Reach.
AI numbers - Reach did this right but setup the encounters all wrong, so one could avoid practically all of them.
A decent pistol - Reach did this right but also hindered it’s effectiveness with Bloom and no shield bleedthrough. As it already suffers from a small clip size… yep, it’s pretty useless in campaign.
A decent plasma pistol and plasma rifle - Reach did this right (the plasma pistol restored and the plasma rifle could be shot longer due to less faster overheat) but also severely nerfed the other plasma pistol option (overcharge) and made the plasma rifle so pitifully, unrealistically weak against flesh.
Fast enemies - Reach did this right but damn it, it made the freaking Elites damage sponges at the same time. How the heck does a melee from a Spartan III that can fend off an Elite Zealot not send an unshielded Elite major recoiling?! Also, the Elites had fast recharge rates, about the same as in H2. Although this is nice and all, why the heck do Elite minors have it?!
Combat - Reach did this right but damn it, the enemy damage is still severe.
Scripting - As long as it doesn’t have a big impact on gameplay, I’d much rather prefer Reach’s.
Halo 3:
-Equipment that stays on the map when dropped, unlike Armor abilities, which disappear if dropped after being picked up.
-faster friendly AI. Of course, ODST had better pathfinding for friendly AI.
-realism. I saw both friendly and enemy AI suffering from reloading and overheating. Of course, H3 animation velocity was absurd and unrealistic. Also, how the further you go, the AI disappears from view, although I believe this was also in CE.
-set way of exiting a vehicle. In Reach, it seems to be random. In H3, you always got out either the left or the right. Not sometimes left, sometimes right.
-safety first. I’ve heard that in Reach, often during a scripted sequence where the player is unable to do anything other than shoot or view, one can get shot down (a la the Falcon rides). I’d prefer not having to encounter that.
-art style. The one thing that was done right about H3 with little to none flaws.
To summarize, the fails of new Halo gameplay experience:
-cp system
-scripting
-AI
-weapon sandbox
-combat
-encounters
These badly need fixing!
Sincerely,
a now CE purist, former H2 and H3 enthusiast, former Reach hater
<3
Maybe make a LOT of the armour achievement-based to earn?