I was one of those Halo fans who was playing the game at midnight and had the campaign beat by 6am. The campaign was good. Felt a little short and ended anticlimactically though. And they focused too much on Osiris. But overall decent.
It didn’t take long after jumping into the multiplayer to become seriously annoyed with just about everything. As a seasoned Halo fan of more than a decade, annoyances just kept popping out of everywhere. Below is a list of all my immediate multiplayer criticisms that I hope to god they somehow fix.
-The radar. OMG the radar. Seasoned Halo players have learned to rely on the radar for strategic and methodical target dispatch. The radar is nerfed to the point where it is basically useless. The detection radius is so small, that players are already ontop of you by the time you see them coming. Good players will still be able to get the odd double kill, but triple and overkills are essentially a thing of the past. The radar is especially frustrating when operating slow moving vehicles as they get hijacked every which way. I know some of you will say that the new radar just calls for greater visual awareness, and I agree to an extent, but the original radar allowed for so much more stealth and trickery. It also gave veterans a real-time tool to plan ahead for more than just immediate engagement. The original radar allowed for more map awareness overall, and gave players the chance to regroup after winning firefights.
-The rank and armor display system. You can’t see anyone’s rank before the match starts. What the hell is that? The whole point of ranking up and unlocking kick -Yoink- armor is to size players up and show it off respectively. Don’t tell me “you can see it after the match ends”. Nobody is sizing players up after the fact. You look at your own stats. The current system basically renders ranking up and unlocking armor useless.
-All the match rewards are pretty much geared toward Warzone.
-Warzone REQ level system does not allow players to use their best loadout weapons. Even though time, energy, and even money might have been spent in unlocking better loadout weapons, a player cannot even use them until higher REQ level is reach in game. The higher levels are only available in the last minutes of the match when other high end REQ cards are available for use. This renders the best loadout weapons also useless, because nobody is going to waste precious time switching their loadout with a minute to go in the match.
-The loadout and REQ menu is very convoluted.
-Almost every vehicle’s health has been nerfed. Tanks can be destroyed by BR fire in no time.
-Original heavy weapons such as rocket launchers and plasma cannons have been nerfed. They are useless in player v player engagements. Half of the weapons in the game are overshadowed by something more easily acquired. It used to be that every weapon was situational. Not so anymore. There are weapons that will never have a place (the new and nerfed boltshot)
-The new Spartans seem underpowered. Deaths come far quicker in H5 multiplayer than any other Halo.
-Shields do not regenerate during sprint. That might be good for a lot of people who have trouble finishing that last headshot. For veterans, it’s annoying. Shields are integral to Halo strategy and overall feel of the Spartan power. Spartans feel underpowered.
-It’s obvious that many of the new mechanics decisions were made with the goal of making Halo more like COD, which is the worst thing they could’ve done. Power is what makes the Spartans unique. The Halo feel is lacking hard in this game.
These are all just little things that come together to make almost every death feel stupid and annoying. I really, really want to like this game, but after 3-4 days of hammering through, trying to give it every chance, I had to stop. Coming from someone who has played every Halo game with a passion, this has to mean something. It can’t be just me. Halo multiplayer has been built masterfully over the years, and it just got hit in the gut with a shotgun. Let’s see what 343 does.