We’re all excited to see the return of a more classic art style, as it’s one of the things that made Halo Halo. However there is one thing about the more recent games that I haven’t actually seen anyone talking about: the sound design. When you think of a phantom flying overhead, you probably hear the distinct sound that was present in Reach and earlier. Think of an assault rife, you probably hear the one from H3 firing. Same with a needler or a plasma rifle.
Now, I’m not saying the new sounds are bad, they just don’t feel like Halo to me. I’ve recently seen a video that replaces weapon, music, and character voices in Halo 4 with sounds from Halo 3, and to me it just sounds so much better. Such a small change, the game plays the same, it looks the same, but it feels more like Halo.
Anyways, that’s just my opinion. We’ve all discussed art style, music, and gameplay, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone bring up sound design of weapons, etc. I’m curious to see what others think.
I absolutely despise the sound effects in Halo 5. Halo 4’s weren’t terrible, but I’d take them any day over 5’s. They just sound so unnecessarily childish and different, it’s likely another change to minor detail in order to market the game as T-rated instead of M.
Default/non-precision kill sounds too clicky, the ‘kill confirmed’ little ding is also distracting. - Headshot pop sound. Completely unnecessary. - Grenades sound insanely to bouncy and metallic.If 343 decides, for whatever reason, to keep these cartoony SFX, I at least hope there will be an option to change them in-game or at least mod them to sound differently on PC.
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> I absolutely despise the sound effects in Halo 5. Halo 4’s weren’t terrible, but I’d take them any day over 5’s. They just sound so unnecessarily childish and different, it’s likely another change to minor detail in order to market the game as T-rated instead of M.
> - Default/non-precision kill sounds too clicky, the ‘kill confirmed’ little ding is also distracting. - Headshot pop sound. Completely unnecessary. - Grenades sound insanely to bouncy and metallic.If 343 decides, for whatever reason, to keep these cartoony SFX, I at least hope there will be an option to change them in-game or at least mod them to sound differently on PC.
I completely agree, the added sound effects for kills and such are completely unnecessary and break immersion. It doesn’t sound like a sci-fi military shooter, it sounds sort of like an arcade game. All of the sounds are very plastic-y and fake, Sure, obviously the classic SFX weren’t realistic either, but they didn’t sound super cartoony and plastic-y like H5. H4 suffered the problem to a much lesser extent, but eh, I still don’t like them.
I saw a video (can’t remember who posted it) where the Halo 4’s campaign sounds were replaced with Halo 3’s sounds. It was crazy to see how much it changed my perception of the gameplay. The sounds were so recognizable and changed the whole feeling of the experience.
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> I saw a video (can’t remember who posted it) where the Halo 4’s campaign sounds were replaced with Halo 3’s sounds. It was crazy to see how much it changed my perception of the gameplay. The sounds were so recognizable and changed the whole feeling of the experience.
>
> Oh here it is: Halo 4 campaign with Halo 3 sounds!We should definitely have familiar sfx. It’s just one large part that made Halo what it was.
Yeah, I linked to that video in my original post. It’s incredible how much more I enjoy it, just from something as simple as the sounds the guns make.
And yeah, the art style can be what we all like and love, but without the SFX of the originals, it still won’t feel like the Halo we want. Now obviously I’m not saying revert back to Halo 3’s sounds exactly, but they should do what they’re doing with the art style: bring back the style we love, but mix in a little of the new and update the old.
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> > 2779900484279609;5:
> > I saw a video (can’t remember who posted it) where the Halo 4’s campaign sounds were replaced with Halo 3’s sounds. It was crazy to see how much it changed my perception of the gameplay. The sounds were so recognizable and changed the whole feeling of the experience.
> >
> > Oh here it is: Halo 4 campaign with Halo 3 sounds!We should definitely have familiar sfx. It’s just one large part that made Halo what it was.
>
> Yeah, I linked to that video in my original post. It’s incredible how much more I enjoy it, just from something as simple as the sounds the guns make.
> And yeah, the art style can be what we all like and love, but without the SFX of the originals, it still won’t feel like the Halo we want. Now obviously I’m not saying revert back to Halo 3’s sounds exactly, but they should do what they’re doing with the art style: bring back the style we love, but mix in a little of the new and update the old.
Ha sorry. Guess I didn’t really read your post thoroughly. Definitely agree they need to mix old with new. That way it would certainly feel familiar but also excitingly new.
A game is, at its core, a simulation. You turn on a console and pretend you’re an actual soldier, Spartan, alien, etc. In the back of you’re mind you know it’s fake, but an immersive experience allows you to let go and feel like you’re a part of the universe you are playing in.
The sound effects of the old games felt so much more real to me. They were industrial and practical. It immersed me in the experience, even though I knew in the back of my mind I was playing a game.
In contrast, the sound effects of Halo 5 gave me the feel of being in a simulation, which is the exact opposite point of a game. The constant crackles and pops when you reloaded a weapon or shot an enemy completely ruined the immersion for me.
I feel like H2A did a great job in the SFX department alongside it’s graphics. If they were to directly pull the SFX from H2A I wouldn’t even be mad. The gunfire and explosions have a real definite boom to them that just simply makes them extremely satisfying to listen to.
are we all just going to forget how horrible some of the Bungie Halo sound effects were? remember the popcorn soundin’ peashooter SMG in Halo 2? How about the assault rifle from Halo 3 that sounds nothing like any machine gun ever? Even when the needler fired it sounded like some foam disc launcher you’d find in a toy store.
I appreciate classic halo sounds like anyone else, but acting like they were all 100% amazing and flawless and saying that new Halo doesn’t compare is just fallacious.
Halo Reach’s grenade launcher had almost no sound effect at all, yet in Halo 5 they added the pop noise you hear when you fire a real grenade launcher. The only Bungie rocket I actually liked was Halo 1’s because it actually sounded powerful, in Halo 2 and 3 it just sounds like a gust of wind and then a slightly modified grenade explosion. Everyone hates on Halo 5’s rocket, but it’s an actual representation of a real rocket launcher and the shooomp sound it makes when you fire it makes you feel like you’re actually firing a missile.
The only thing I specifically want to hear in Halo Infinite is a turret that actually sounds like its firing .50 caliber bullets. If you ever get the chance to fire a M2 machine gun, you’ll realize how ridiculously wimpy Halo turrets sound in comparison to the real thing. Even M249’s and M240’s sound beefier than the turrets. The one that came closest to reality was Halo 4’s, yet everyone complains about it just because it’s not “classic”. I guess most people don’t know what real machine gun fire sounds like. oh well.
PS: before people start saying “well I heard an M2 in a video and it doesn’t sound that great.” You gotta hear it in person. It’s two very different things.
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> I feel like H2A did a great job in the SFX department alongside it’s graphics. If they were to directly pull the SFX from H2A I wouldn’t even be mad. The gunfire and explosions have a real definite boom to them that just simply makes them extremely satisfying to listen to.
Oh yeah, H2A did a great job with SFX. While I do prefer the sounds of certain things in the originals (such as the phantom’s hovering, shooting, etc. sounds), overall I quite enjoy H2A’s sounds. If they were to just dump them straight into infinite I’d be much much happier than with the current SFX.
If they were to just transplant the entire art style of H2A too I’d be in love.
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> are we all just going to forget how horrible some of the Bungie Halo sound effects were? remember the popcorn soundin’ peashooter SMG in Halo 2? How about the assault rifle from Halo 3 that sounds nothing like any machine gun ever? Even when the needler fired it sounded like some foam disc launcher you’d find in a toy store.
>
> I appreciate classic halo sounds like anyone else, but acting like they were all 100% amazing and flawless and saying that new Halo doesn’t compare is just fallacious.
>
> Halo Reach’s grenade launcher had almost no sound effect at all, yet in Halo 5 they added the pop noise you hear when you fire a real grenade launcher. The only Bungie rocket I actually liked was Halo 1’s because it actually sounded powerful, in Halo 2 and 3 it just sounds like a gust of wind and then a slightly modified grenade explosion. Everyone hates on Halo 5’s rocket, but it’s an actual representation of a real rocket launcher and the shooomp sound it makes when you fire it makes you feel like you’re actually firing a missile.
>
> The only thing I specifically want to hear in Halo Infinite is a turret that actually sounds like its firing .50 caliber bullets. If you ever get the chance to fire a M2 machine gun, you’ll realize how ridiculously wimpy Halo turrets sound in comparison to the real thing. Even M249’s and M240’s sound beefier than the turrets. The one that came closest to reality was Halo 4’s, yet everyone complains about it just because it’s not “classic”. I guess most people don’t know what real machine gun fire sounds like. oh well.
>
> PS: before people start saying “well I heard an M2 in a video and it doesn’t sound that great.” You gotta hear it in person. It’s two very different things.
The sounds don’t need to sound perfectly realistic and true to how they’d sound in real life, and I’m not saying the SFX of the classic games were flawless. However, like in art style and music, there’s a specific feeling each of the original sound effects had that aren’t captured in the new ones. You can update them, make them sound beefier and more realistic, but at the end of the day it still needs to sound like Halo. As I’ve seen it compared to before if you’re making potato stew, you can mix up the recipe a little, try a couple new small ingredients and spices, but at the end of the day you’re still making potato stew.
Now, while I do like the sounds of the UNSC weapons of the newer games, I despise the sound and feeling of the Covenant weaponry. It sounds too metallic and less energy weapon-y. In H5 it also adds a rather plastic feeling to those sounds, and adds other sound effects that make me feel more like I’m playing an arcade game with the various bits and bops when I kill something. I’m not calling for the sounds to be ripped straight out of Halo 3 and plopped into Infinite, but the SFX should be very heavily inspired by those, with a mix of the new in certain areas, much like the new art style they’re going with.
The plasma weapons don’t sound classic at all. They sound like wet suppressors and a lot of people haven’t been a fan of them since Halo 4 myself included.
> 2533274909712896;1:
> We’re all excited to see the return of a more classic art style, as it’s one of the things that made Halo Halo. However there is one thing about the more recent games that I haven’t actually seen anyone talking about: the sound design. When you think of a phantom flying overhead, you probably hear the distinct sound that was present in Reach and earlier. Think of an assault rife, you probably hear the one from H3 firing. Same with a needler or a plasma rifle.
> Now, I’m not saying the new sounds are bad, they just don’t feel like Halo to me. I’ve recently seen a video that replaces weapon, music, and character voices in Halo 4 with sounds from Halo 3, and to me it just sounds so much better. Such a small change, the game plays the same, it looks the same, but it feels more like Halo.
>
> Anyways, that’s just my opinion. We’ve all discussed art style, music, and gameplay, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone bring up sound design of weapons, etc. I’m curious to see what others think.
I feel this. The sounds are impressive on a technical level. They’re rich and deep with a lot of depth and sound like REAL firearms. But that’s the problem. They don’t have that unique sci-fi edge to them. The UNSC weapons especially feel ripped from COD. Whereas the BR in H3 had a really unique and nice sci-fi sound to it.