I just completed HALO 4 in the normal mode and it took me less than 4 hours to do so. I was fairly disappointed to have completed the campaign in that time, having spent nearly $60 on the game. I was, at the very least, expecting 10-20 hours of game play.
Hoping for more, I installed disc two, thinking I could find some single player missions on the Infinity. Unfortunately, unless I have an Xbox Live gold account I cannot access these missions. I know many many folks like to play on line, but I personally do not because I do not have the time to spend doing so. But because I don’t, I cannot access most of the content on the discs I bought.
The bottomline is I feel fairly cheated for having spent quite a bit of money for a game I won’t be able to access most of the content, nor was there any clear indication on the box/packaging that most of the content is on-line. I love the series, the characters, the plots, and I am loathe to compare HALO 1 to 2 or 3 to 4 or any of them to Reach, but the one thing I did appreciate about Reach, which is absent here, are the extra missions you can play outside the campaign. That is what I expected when I installed disc two of HALO 4. Sadly, that is not what I got.
Anyway, if 343 Industries continues to build its version of the HALO franchise on this model of short campaigns with mostly on-line content, I will not bother purchasing future games. I will not waste $60 on a game that provides only 4-5 hours of play time to then be told I have to spend an additional few bucks a month to access the rest of the game. There are plenty of other FPS, strategy, role playing, or action games I can play with tens of hours of play time without on-line play.
I was disappointed with the length as well, however, the campaign itself was phenomenal, I’d rather have a great campaign then one that is drawn out just to make it longer. Don’t forget we still have Spartan Ops which is still continuing the story. Online gaming is the future, it is unfortunate you can’t play Spartan Ops, but that’s the deal. Sixty dollars a year isn’t much when you get so much time and entertainment from various online games.
Solo legendary only added MAYBE an hour, at the most.
Length gained from sheer unfairness and difficulty doesn’t really count. The fact is , despite the great story, campaign was short. You can’t spin it any other way.
Well first off, correct me If I’m wrong but no Halo has had a 10-20 hour long campaign, ever. You want something like that go play Fallout or Skyrim. Second off you want to extend the life of your campaign? Play through on Heroic or Legendary with or without skulls, that’ll give you a run for your money. Lastly, you clearly said you have played through the other series so you really shouldn’t have been surprised to learn that multiplayer is going to obviously be online and also you could have learned that Spartan Ops is online only through a simple Google search.
Length? A little short. However, for me the existence of Spartan Ops makes up for that.
Ending? Was very surprised at the ending. Not the sequence of events or the story… just the manner in which it was executed. If I’m not mistaken, it was the same (or similar) sequence of button presses as the elevator shaft in chapter 1.
Edit: I also think the nature of the missions made it seem shorter than it was. I don’t remember so many instances of “Run here and push button” in the other games, but that may just be selective amnesia.
Well If you look at the older Halo games we had levels similar to the Library where it was long, repetitive and very draggy. In halo 4 we are exposed to unique levels packed with action in each one, that’s why it is so short.
Saying Campaign on NORMAL is too quick to complete - I have only 1 thing to say. Why on earth are you playing on normal if you want a long playthrough. I mean seriously, if this is why all the Halo games are “too short” than I want to slap all of you. Normal and easy are to be expected fast playthroughs and are meant for ppl who don;t really know what they are doing.
the online requirments, yes. 343 Is tarded. To not allow ppl offline the full games promised experience is a bunch of crap. I can only understand the reason for this is to stop hackers and/or they didn’t finish the game. I can forgive the latter but I mean really, it’s going to happen. Don’t cheat the good ppl just cause there are bad ppl.
Now as for the ‘not actually finishing the game’ theory I have about H4 - I get it’s probably Microsoft’s fault but STILL. I am dissapointed w/ S.Ops in general (no penalty for dieing, pre-rendered cutscenes that DON’T have my character or freinds involved whatsoever, and NO TEATHER for it…)
> Length gained from sheer unfairness and difficulty doesn’t really count. The fact is , despite the great story, campaign was short. You can’t spin it any other way.
^ Exactly. Now if the OP had complained about how easy the game was, then I would pull the Legendary card. Sure it increases the length, but only out of instant deaths and bullet sponge enemies. It should be lengthy even on Normal.
With all things considered, I guess the short length could be due to the fact that 343 crafts such huge environments that they encourage players to explore.
I agree that the campaign was too short, although I was expecting it based on the other Halo campaigns.
More than the lenght though, the story just felt rushed. They introduced too many new characters (Lasky, Del Rio, Didact, Librarian, Palmer) and didn’t give them enough time to use them in the story that well. They also brushed over pretty much everything concerning the Forerunners/Prometheans and the Storm Covenant, expecting the player to read the books to make sense of it all. While I read most of the relevant outside material (only read the wikipedia plot summaries for the Forerunner Saga books), and knew what was going on, it still didn’t get rid of that sense of disorientation that comes with trying to cram too many narrative plot points into too short a time. If they included a couple more missions to flesh out the Infinity and it’s main crew, as well as given some information on the Storm covenant (Lasky and Del Rio would know something about it) as well as a bit more backstory on the Forerunners, it not only would’ve resulted in a longer campaign, but also would have given the story a much nicer flow and made it seem less…claustrophobic.
And for those saying “play it on Legendary”, extending the game length by having to reload the same checkpoint dozens of times doesn’t really count.
It’s not that it’s short. It’s that it has less to offer. With the same skulls returning, 90% of them are purely for difficulty. Oh and Catch seems to be malfunctioning on Easy because the Covies rarely throw grenades.
Out of map exploration has been crippled. You’re now limited to finding soft walls and using jetpack on Reclaimer.
AI collections are non-existent, as well as interesting and/or massive scale battles. The Prometheans generally come in great numbers but they’re not the same. Spartan Ops sends a lot of AI at you but you often have to kill some of them for more to spawn and there’s rarely any interesting combat. Only about 2-3 levels feature Covies and Prometheans fighting alongside each other. Only 1 level features the Covies fighting the Prometheans. And the lack of marines is another disappointment.
There’s not much to do with given assets (besides Hog launching on Requiem, Scorpion launching on Reclaimer, box launching on Midnight, and a few other things). Often they’ll put you in danger. And on Reclaimer, you’ll be forced out of vehicles at some points. On Requiem, you can only bring a Banshee to the last area on Co-op if one of you exit the map with it. I remember a time where the Ghost had plenty of traction to climb up walls and when the Hog wasn’t a flipping piece of -Yoink- and the Scorpion could have no trouble going up surfaces (like on AotCR. You can actually get it to the previous area).
Oh and of course, there’s no way to utilize out of map glitching for skipping levels. Reclaimer is probably the only level that really allows that.
And the lack of a boss battle really hits hard. I recall them tweeting something about a boss fight on Requiem (and it’s even implied by the cutscene tease). And the Didact was really shaping up to be a boss (the Knight variety you encounter, the weapons that were made available to you, the gravity hammer making it’s only appearance) but it was just a QTE.
Halo 4 doesn’t provide anything new other than a few forced sections (Ghost on Forerunner, Mantis on Infinity, Broadsword) and lame ones (Scorpion on Infinity, Mammoth on Reclaimer, Pelican on Shutdown). From a tricking and combat perspective, it’s just disappointing (though the Promethans are a worthwhile addition nonetheless).
Solo legendary was pretty fun. I was hoping the campaign was a little longer than it was but it was a good story nonetheless. I was also hoping that you would actually be able to fight the didact in the end.
I agree that the Spartan Ops should be available to those on Xbox Live Silver. Other DLC is, and without Firefight there’s substantially less to do offline. They can make the episode streaming Gold only and have it so Silver members have to watch it on Youtube/computer version of Waypoint but the levels should be available to everyone with an internet connection.