So the new information that dropped about how the Halo 5 campaign will center around fireteam mechanics is interesting. Personally I am ok with it to some degree. Who hasn’t had an instance in previous Halo stories where they wanted to command friendly AI characters? That said, I’m worried that the whole game will focus around this mechanic. In previous Halo campaigns, I always relished the levels that had the Master Chief fighting on his own without any help. And the progression of being with friendly AI, being cut off from them, and returning to them made for a more dynamic story. The solo missions were especially immersive, often being the ones where you got to take in the visual splendors of the universe, such as the opening area of Halo on CE, and Requiem in Halo 4.
While I look forward to the new concept in Halo 5, I do hope that there will periodically be levels where, as Locke or Master Chief, you are separated from other allies and have to fight on your own. Does anyone else share this concern?
I do share that concern, OP, but I have no doubt that there will be solo levels.
My main concern is this: If you can control them, there needs to be some form of risk/reward for using them properly/improperly. Basically, if you send Fred alone into a room with 10 elites and 2 hunters on legendary, he needs to die. If he dies, he could no longer be used in the story. So I’m afraid the rest of Blue team will be controllable, but invincible thus kind of breaking the dynamic. Maybe they will fall incapacitated and you have to pull them up, like Left 4 Dead and other games.
I look forward to seeing how 343i tackles this predicament.
I really like that idea. I could see a standard mode where he’s incapacitated for the remainder of the mission, and a hardcore mode where once he’s dead, he’s gone forever. Skulls could even be used to adjust these settings. One to make your AI invincible, etc (for the noobs :p). Just a thought to add to that. But yea, that sounds like it would be a cool way to up the ante.
I think that from what we have seen so far before E3, I believe that they know what they are doing now and have a plan on how to handle it. It would be a little late in the year since it is being released in october to NOT have a plan ;). I just hope it all works out for the better. I miss Cortana
AI was never Halo’s strong point. Unless they’re making serious improvements to it, then missions with friendly AI will probably be like missions in Gears of War 1. In that game, giving commands does absolutely nothing and you could go through the entire game without giving any commands.
The fact that they mention them in relation to Cortana kinda suggests that they’ll have dialogue during gameplay to help move the level forward, rather than you actually commanding other players.
To me the best part of Halo 4 and frankly, all the previous games, was when you led a group of friendlies into a massive battle. Think the scene in Halo 4 where Chief grabs a Scorpion and leads the charge with a bunch of Spartan-IVs in Warthogs around him. Or the final battle versus the two Scarabs in Halo 3.
I’m thrilled with this change and apparently the Republic Commando guy really knows what he’s doing when it comes to squad commands. I think this is a great innovation for the campaign and I can’t wait to see it in-action.
Regarding squad members, I expect a simple revive mechanic. The characters can’t die because they’re essential to the story and essential to co-op.
I guarantee you there’s gonna be skulls involved that remove the revive mechanic for co-op and any death results in mission failure.
I don’t see how solo levels would work in this particular game. With each teams’ importance to the story of the main characters, and the fact that we now know there will be a squad mechanic and unique co-op play, I cant see them separating for any amount of time. Which is good in my opinion - because every character is going to need as much time as possible for development.
I would hope they use something closer to Halo 3 Arbiter rather than Noble Team. At least the Arbiter could at least be temporarily downed and didn’t fire nerf rounds. Naturally the AI should be an improved over Halo 3, but I would rather have down-able squadmates over immortal window dressing that was Noble team.
As far as the squad vs solo gameplay is concerned I imagine the levels will be tweaked accordingly and with as much ‘solo’ gameplay levels we have gotten in the past it would not bother me to much to have a team focused Halo campaign. I also don’t think having a squad will necessarily preclude having solo missions, I wonder if it would be possible for 4 player co-op versions of those level(s) where player are actually separated in different areas. Think NMPD from ODST except one group actually gets to play as Mickey and Dutch while the other players play as Romeo and Buck through the normal level.
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> I do share that concern, OP, but I have no doubt that there will be solo levels.
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> My main concern is this: If you can control them, there needs to be some form of risk/reward for using them properly/improperly. Basically, if you send Fred alone into a room with 10 elites and 2 hunters on legendary, he needs to die. If he dies, he could no longer be used in the story. So I’m afraid the rest of Blue team will be controllable, but invincible thus kind of breaking the dynamic. Maybe they will fall incapacitated and you have to pull them up, like Left 4 Dead and other games.
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> I look forward to seeing how 343i tackles this predicament.
Mass Effect does it pretty well. I’d like to see a similar incorporation.
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> Mass Effect does it pretty well. I’d like to see a similar incorporation.
I haven’t played Mass Effect but for 5 minutes of the first one’s demo. Could you briefly explain how ME handles the situation for me and others that have not played?
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> > 2533274803493024;2:
> > I do share that concern, OP, but I have no doubt that there will be solo levels.
> >
> > My main concern is this: If you can control them, there needs to be some form of risk/reward for using them properly/improperly. Basically, if you send Fred alone into a room with 10 elites and 2 hunters on legendary, he needs to die. If he dies, he could no longer be used in the story. So I’m afraid the rest of Blue team will be controllable, but invincible thus kind of breaking the dynamic. Maybe they will fall incapacitated and you have to pull them up, like Left 4 Dead and other games.
> >
> > I look forward to seeing how 343i tackles this predicament.
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> Mass Effect does it pretty well. I’d like to see a similar incorporation.
This revive mechanic could be ok. I feel somehow that this narrative part of the 4 player co op precludes us from having solo missions
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> I do share that concern, OP, but I have no doubt that there will be solo levels.
>
> My main concern is this: If you can control them, there needs to be some form of risk/reward for using them properly/improperly. Basically, if you send Fred alone into a room with 10 elites and 2 hunters on legendary, he needs to die. If he dies, he could no longer be used in the story. So I’m afraid the rest of Blue team will be controllable, but invincible thus kind of breaking the dynamic. Maybe they will fall incapacitated and you have to pull them up, like Left 4 Dead and other games.
>
> I look forward to seeing how 343i tackles this predicament.
The article made mention of your AI companions ability to resurrect each other. So there you go.
I think that 343i would have Chief get his own mission, but I think that Blue Team would still be there in coop. I’d assume Chief would have one or two missions after he goes AWOL, and maybe Locke’ll get a mission or two near the end of the campaign, if he begins to close in on Chief. I’d just keep my hopes up for a solo mission or two in Halo 5.
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> The article made mention of your AI companions ability to resurrect each other. So there you go.
I’m ok with that, but it seems really weird to me that they can resurrect you. I’m not complaining, just skeptical of this added feature.
I don’t really think that they will focus too much on the squad commands, I think it’s just a new feature that they’re trying out. Also, think about how much of a pain in the -Yoink- it would be if your team was doing exactly what you didn’t want all the time. Commands would get rid of that issue: for example if your team is attacking the less dangerous enemies when they should be focusing on the more dangerous ones, you could command them to attack the more dangerous ones. If your team is in your way, you can tell them to piss off. It’s quite useful if you think about it.
I share these concerns as well OP, I really hope co-op doesn’t take too much away from the solo experience. I just want to be able to play the campaign as fulfilling and immersive as I always could like every title to date. If it’s like ODST where playing solo is exactly the same just a tad tougher, I’m good with it myself.
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> So the new information that dropped about how the Halo 5 campaign will center around fireteam mechanics is interesting. Personally I am ok with it to some degree. Who hasn’t had an instance in previous Halo stories where they wanted to command friendly AI characters? That said, I’m worried that the whole game will focus around this mechanic. In previous Halo campaigns, I always relished the levels that had the Master Chief fighting on his own without any help. And the progression of being with friendly AI, being cut off from them, and returning to them made for a more dynamic story. The solo missions were especially immersive, often being the ones where you got to take in the visual splendors of the universe, such as the opening area of Halo on CE, and Requiem in Halo 4.
>
> While I look forward to the new concept in Halo 5, I do hope that there will periodically be levels where, as Locke or Master Chief, you are separated from other allies and have to fight on your own. Does anyone else share this concern?
I was thinking the same thing earlier today when I was playing “Two Betrayals” … I thought, what would this be like with three others Spartans and no Cortana? I’ve said time & again on here that those are my favorite Halo missions; alone and surrounded by enemies on a mysterious aliens world with no one but an AI in your head, just exploring and kicking butt.
But I think we’ve had plenty of Halo game like that, so why not have one be properly squad based? We can always go back and play CE & H4 as much as we like. Also, Halo 4’s campaign borrow heavily from CE, so if it’s to the point that we’re recycling story arcs (I know it was an homage, and it’s an amazing campaign, I’m not knocking it) then I think we need to try something new. And who knows what’s in store for Halo 6?
… wait … there’s now a dilemma … in order for Chief to go back to lone-wolfing it, something needs to happen to Blue Team. And since Cortana is never coming back, he’d probably be alone. And that’d just be sad.
Aside from Buck, Osiris doesn’t catch my attention all that much, but… as a long-time fan of the tertiary Halo fiction, I’m going to be so nerdily happy surrounded by Kelly, Linda and Fred, and all the banter back and forth.
