(Mostly focusing on H5G as a reference here) People are always hating on REQ packs, but no one has stopped to examine just how fair they really are. If you’re actually a decent player, you won’t have much trouble unlocking everything in the game. I never spent a dime on REQs, other than the voice pack, and I had every single unlock within a couple of months. When I can easily grab 6,000+ RP in a game of Mythic Warzone Firefight by pulling out a basic scorpion, it seems stupid to assume that others cannot. As far as the random aspect goes, it’s really not that bad either. “But Police, people who suck at the game are running around in cool armor!” Yeah? Well guess what, I can go through Achilles gimps faster than a bad burrito. Armor doesn’t say anything about the skill of the player using it. Any idiot with two thumbs can play Reach long enough to get the best cosmetics. A prime example of this is MCC’s new Reach progression pass. You can absolutely smash through matches, but the game values time over skill. It’s designed to keep you playing, and won’t give you anything really cool until you’ve spent a great many hours on it. “Ha! Got you there Police, only dedicated players would get the armor because it can’t be bought. That means only good players will have the good customizables!” Wrong again. There’s always a way to cheese the system in one way or another. From launch, people were taping their controllers on MCC Reach Firefight. People boost, throw matches, and use ***** tactics to rank up. Just because someone has cool armor, doesn’t mean they are actually a skilled player. Now, why is this important? It’s simple really. Progression systems are almost always the alternative to loot boxes in modern games. Although Halo 5’s system isn’t perfect, the ability to earn your REQs at a reasonable rate needs to stay. Battle passes always require a ridiculous amount of effort for a small amount of progress. Is that Recon helmet really worth playing 6,000 matches and having to go through 200+ unlocks to get? And, if it is, how does it feel knowing that a 5 year old could play 6,024 matches and get the same customizable that you did? In an ideal world, we would see some sort of credit system like the original Reach had. Something that makes sure that the good players get the coolest armor quickly. It sucks, but if 343 removes the REQ system I guarantee that whatever replaces it will be worse. Infinite’s budget is rumored to be over $500 million, and they won’t be making much of a profit if they don’t have some form of micro-transactions. I’m not a huge fan of the gambling system, but I’d rather have a chance at unlocking MK VI after 60 tries than being unable to get it because I can’t play 15 hours every day. Progression systems are definitely more of an obstacle than REQs, and would likely still have a “buy your way out of the grind” option regardless. In short, I don’t want to see a Halo Infinite battle pass. Let that system die with Fortnite and Apex Legends. Just because the one on MCC is free doesn’t mean the next one will be. It’s a shady way of locking nostalgia behind a paywall while simultaneously inflating your required in-game time if you aren’t willing to cough up the cash.
> 2535448727280996;1:
> (Mostly focusing on H5G as a reference here) People are always hating on REQ packs, but no one has stopped to examine just how fair they really are. If you’re actually a decent player, you won’t have much trouble unlocking everything in the game. I never spent a dime on REQs, other than the voice pack, and I had every single unlock within a couple of months. When I can easily grab 6,000+ RP in a game of Mythic Warzone Firefight by pulling out a basic scorpion, it seems stupid to assume that others cannot. As far as the random aspect goes, it’s really not that bad either.
Good for you.
You do however realise that one of the issues with Loot Boxes, sorry, “REQ packs”, and their inclusion with Warzone, is that Warzone was included to support Loo… REQ Packs. Eating up a fair chunk of the resources allocated for Halo 5, I mean, have there been any developer made BTB maps made for Halo 5 yet? Because they weren’t included at launch, and neither was Forge.
Moving on with that. Sure, there were new maps, modes were “reimplemented”, because some popular ones didn’t make it into the launch version, new weapons and so forth. But quite a lot of the updates brought a huge amount of new armor variants, weapon skins and so forth only to pad the REQ pool. Money earned from REQ sales went into padding the REQ pool to get more money from REQ sales.
Doesn’t matter if you as a single person can unlock every single item within a couple of months of gameplay, when there are people who’ll buy two or three 100 REQ pack bundles, and then boast about it on these forums, and if these packs weren’t meant to be sold for real money, they wouldn’t be available for real money. As they’re available for real money, their grind is much longer to incentivice buying them, than if they wouldn’t be available for real money.
Furthermore, as you so happily pointed out, you can grab +6000 points in a single game of Mythic Warzone Firefight, that just shows that if you want something quick from the REQ pool, your best bet is to jump into a mode with the best point to time ratio. It’s not efficient playing Arena to get REQ points, even if that’s all you want to play, but you want those REQs fast.
> 2535448727280996;1:
> “But Police, people who suck at the game are running around in cool armor!” Yeah? Well guess what, I can go through Achilles gimps faster than a bad burrito.
I’m sure your mother must be very proud.
> 2535448727280996;1:
> Armor doesn’t say anything about the skill of the player using it. Any idiot with two thumbs can play Reach long enough to get the best cosmetics. A prime example of this is MCC’s new Reach progression pass. You can absolutely smash through matches, but the game values time over skill. It’s designed to keep you playing, and won’t give you anything really cool until you’ve spent a great many hours on it.
Well, basically the only difference between this new battlepass one and how Reach worked then, was that as you ranked up, you got access to more pieces to purchase, rather than unlocking things straight away.
> 2535448727280996;1:
> “Ha! Got you there Police, only dedicated players would get the armor because it can’t be bought. That means only good players will have the good customizables!” Wrong again. There’s always a way to cheese the system in one way or another. From launch, people were taping their controllers on MCC Reach Firefight. People boost, throw matches, and use ***** tactics to rank up. Just because someone has cool armor, doesn’t mean they are actually a skilled player. Now, why is this important? It’s simple really. Progression systems are almost always the alternative to loot boxes in modern games. Although Halo 5’s system isn’t perfect, the ability to earn your REQs at a reasonable rate needs to stay. Battle passes always require a ridiculous amount of effort for a small amount of progress. Is that Recon helmet really worth playing 6,000 matches and having to go through 200+ unlocks to get?
I genuinely see no difference between a battlepass and accumulating REQ points. If you want to do it slow, then you go ahead and do what you just say others do in MCC Reach.
Then your last question regarding the Recon helmet, it’s equally aplicable to the REQ system, as it’s random. The helmet you want could be any number of matches away, any number of unlocks away.
And, if it is, how does it feel knowing that a 5 year old could play 6,024 matches and get the same customizable that you did? In an ideal world, we would see some sort of credit system like the original Reach had. Something that makes sure that the good players get the coolest armor quickly. It sucks, but if 343 removes the REQ system I guarantee that whatever replaces it will be worse.
> 2535448727280996;1:
> Infinite’s budget is rumored to be over $500 million, and they won’t be making much of a profit if they don’t have some form of micro-transactions. I’m not a huge fan of the gambling system, but I’d rather have a chance at unlocking MK VI after 60 tries than being unable to get it because I can’t play 15 hours every day.
As far as I heard, the Reach battleplass of MCC isn’t going anywhere when the season ends and a new battleplass comes in.
You get a point in one battlepass, and should be able to spend it in another battlepass.
Pretty sure there’d be quite the backlash with Infinite if supposed Battlepasses were included, and timed, as well as their contents being gone forever to unlock.
> 2535448727280996;1:
> Progression systems are definitely more of an obstacle than REQs, and would likely still have a “buy your way out of the grind” option regardless. In short, I don’t want to see a Halo Infinite battle pass. Let that system die with Fortnite and Apex Legends. It’s a shady way of locking nostalgia behind a paywall.
A battlepass is Linear, you get everything along a line you follow.
Halo 3, 4 and Reach were “multi laned”, you could choose what to pursue.
Halo 5 is random, you get no saying in what you get.
I’d rather see a well designed Battlepass than any sort of randomized unlocks in Infinite.
Locking nostalgia behind a paywall?
What “nostalgia” are you talking about?
I don’t think battlepasses belong in a full priced game, I dislike loot boxes just as much though. I’m fine with direct mtx as long as you can unlock them in game as well.
To this day, I still don’t know what the hell REQ packs are for. Granted, with H5 being my least-played Halo game, I never took the time to look into what they are. Any form of loot boxes, gotchas, etc., I don’t bother with.
IMO all items sold should be allowed to be earned just by playing the game. As someone said already, Micro doesn’t belong in a full priced game especially if new content isn’t being created for the game. If I remember correctly, Activision/Blizzard made something like 7 hundred million off of micro last year. How much do you think 343 brought in with Rec packs for Halo 5 and no new content was added to the game?
Again, IMO If Rec packs are going to be a thing with the amount of money it brings in? Then there should be free content added to the game, not just taking request to rotate maps.
Battle passes that cost money like COD or Fortnite should stay in those games. The battle pass in MCC is okay, it just doesn’t feel very rewarding when I earn something. I would like something like a “store” to buy armors, like there was in Halo: Reach.
I’d much rather not have the Req system return. At least as far as getting armor goes. If they want to put armor skins (flames, lines, whatever) in Req packs, fine. But armor should be earn-able through challenges similarly to Halo 3, and in some respects, Halo 4. Reach was fine, so a combination of Reach and Halo 3’s unlock system would be great. So long as it isn’t Req cards and a bloody season pass, I’ll be at least a little happy.
> 2533274795123910;2:
> I genuinely see no difference between a battlepass and accumulating REQ points. If you want to do it slow, then you go ahead and do what you just say others do in MCC Reach.
As far as standard battlepasses go (a la Fortnite and Apex Legends), they are temporary, imparting a sense of necessity to complete it before the pass expires. Personally I find standard battlepasses to be very stressful because of this. Then, of course, there are the “free” and “premium” versions of battlepasses where the free version only unlocks a very small selection of items, whereas the premium version let’s you play to unlock everything while generally giving you a starting boost in your battlepass progress.
MCC is an outlier among battlepasses in that it doesn’t have a premium version and it doesn’t have a time limit. In that respect, it’s certainly preferable to a lootbox monetization system (or any monetization system, really). However, I would probably take Halo 5’s REQ pack system over a premium battlepass system. While the REQ system was randomized in how it awarded you, it was largely optional with respect to the choice to spend real money. A premium battlepass system is anything but optional; if you want the best stuff in the pass, you gotta buy it (in addition to whatever playtime would be necessary to unlock the items). Assuming that Infinite had a “battlepass” similar to MCC, in that it’s not tied to monetization and never expires, then I’d be for that showing up in Infinite with some improvements. But a premium battlepass? No thanks.
> 2533274817408735;8:
> As far as standard battlepasses go (a la Fortnite and Apex Legends), they are temporary, imparting a sense of necessity to complete it before the pass expires. Personally I find standard battlepasses to be very stressful because of this. Then, of course, there are the “free” and “premium” versions of battlepasses where the free version only unlocks a very small selection of items, whereas the premium version let’s you play to unlock everything while generally giving you a starting boost in your battlepass progress.
In terms of how you accumulate points, and in that people can cheese the system.
> 2533274817408735;8:
> MCC is an outlier among battlepasses in that it doesn’t have a premium version and it doesn’t have a time limit. In that respect, it’s certainly preferable to a lootbox monetization system (or any monetization system, really). However, I would probably take Halo 5’s REQ pack system over a premium battlepass system. While the REQ system was randomized in how it awarded you, it was largely optional with respect to the choice to spend real money. A premium battlepass system is anything but optional; if you want the best stuff in the pass, you gotta buy it (in addition to whatever playtime would be necessary to unlock the items). Assuming that Infinite had a “battlepass” similar to MCC, in that it’s not tied to monetization and never expires, then I’d be for that showing up in Infinite with some improvements. But a premium battlepass? No thanks.
As far as I recall, paid loot boxes aren’t going to be a thing.
Regulations cropping up and backlash on games from various angles.
New hot thing is paid Battlepasses, so chances are high it’s going to be paid battlepasses, unfortunately.
If, the MCC is anything to go by, it could be paid, and not expire in time, with the best case scenario, where you could buy old battlepasses and not miss out on anything.
Buy them as you see fit, perhaps gain free stuff on new battlepasses and spend it on the premiums you’ve actually bought.
That’s perhaps the best case scenario if Halo Infinite is going to be a game of service, or whatever it was called, that I can think of, with paid battlepasses.
> 2533274795123910;9:
> That’s perhaps the best case scenario if Halo Infinite is going to be a game of service, or whatever it was called, that I can think of, with paid battlepasses.
I hope not. To me, locking stuff behind a paid battlepass that requires both money and time in order to unlock stuff removes the convenience aspect of monetization schemes, which are their only positive factor as far as the consumer is concerned (monetization is good for devs, obviously, but rarely do gamers think from the perspective of the devs). While multiple 343 devs stated years ago that Infinite would not feature paid lootboxes (which includes premium currency to purchase in-game lootboxes), that leaves other monetization systems on the table, and we do know Infinite will be monetized. Personally, I’m hoping for something like a direct buy store that will sell premium customization content directly for fair mtx prices. This of course would be in addition to a hopefully large variety of play-to-earn customization options within the base game. Ideally, items in the direct buy store would be timed exclusives and eventually added to the general pool after a decent amount of time passed (let’s say a year, that gives payers plenty of time to feel special but still makes everything available for everyone eventually). A direct buy store for additional, premium customization items (and only customization) would be largely ignorable if one so chooses, but still allow the willing to drop extra cash if they wanted. Unlike a premium battelpass, which would constantly loom over you as the primary way to unlock customization items.
An alternative to the Fortnite model would be the Gears 5 model, which doesn’t charge for the “Tour of Duty”, but the timed nature of the Tour turned me off from Gears 5 before the first tour ended, as I got burned out from trying to reach max rank within the allotted time. So even that really isn’t particularly preferable to me. I suppose if I had to choose the lesser evil between a timed battelpass and a charged battlepass, it’d be the charged, but hopefully we won’t have to deal with either.
Honestly, I think Blizzard did this fairly well with Overwatch’s cosmetic system. You can unlock 99% of cosmetics; voicelines/skins/emotes/etc at some point, about 80% of them are available all year round as they are core cosmetics. 19% of the cosmetics are event items only available during that event or during the Anniversary (where everything from events is available). The 1% is real life limited edition (Blizzcon skins, Overwatch League skins/emotes, and charity things) stuff that is paid for through some means (Blizzcon tickets, charity donations, OWL tokens/packages).
You can earn lootboxes by leveling up, inside the lootboxes is a chance of cosmetics, icons, and coins. If you don’t get the item you want, you can simply buy it with accumulated coins from opening boxes and getting coins or getting coins from receiving duplicates.
It’s not a new concept for sure and it’s not a unique concept either, but I’d be ok with a system like that. This way those who don’t care and want to open chance reward packs can do so, while others who want to buy specific items with in game currency that you don’t need to pay for if you don’t want to can also do so.