Does 343i Listen to the Community?

Community General Discussion
1

Now the title of this thread is probably gonna make people say, “Yes but they aren’t going to put in everything people ask for”, or "They listen but don’t actually take our ideas into consideration."

Now what I am getting at with this is ever since Halo 4 there was a lot of feedback on art styles, the way the game looks, armor, certain features being taking away or certain features being changed all together. But then Halo 5 came out with a lot of key features not being in the game at launch! Forge, infection, oddball and other fun game modes. (Also the lack of a, “Boot player from game” option in customs.) Now free updates came out, and people then praised 343 saying, “They listening!” No, they started finishing the game with updates.

Now, 343 has listened to a lot of player feedback since Halo 5. Giving it more of a classic gameplay while still keeping some features like Sliding, Clamber and Sprint. (Sprint also didn’t look like it was like a major boost in speed, only a slight boost.) But one thing that seemed to not make it into the game was FULL Customization to your character. (Notice how I said Character, not Spartan.) Yes, armor customization is back like it was in Reach which is amazing, but our colors. Our emblems??? 343 said, we’re listening but we also wanna make some money since multiplayer will be free to play.

Some color sets will be behind pay walls while also being able to be unlocked. Okay, why? “We want to give more ways for people to express them selves in game.” . . . Really? We’re just gonna say that and then do the opposite? “These “Shaders” will have their own textures and coatings to them.” Textures and coatings. . . THAT’S DOOM 2016?!?! But in that game you could choose what you wanted! You wanna have a Pink flashy shiny doom guy then, do it. You want a weathered armored one, do it. But no, it is locked behind a Shader. Going back to expressing yourselves, emblems. You can’t make your own, it’s stuck with the Halo 5 idea of it being fixed to a certain design.

343 seems to listen to one thing, but only fixes it after they realize the idea was awful. Free to play multiplayer is also a terrible idea. I say this because of this, if there is free to play multiplayer with crossplay and you have those cheaters join in to ruin the experience what are you going to do? Ban them?

Cheater: Oh I just got banned, time to make a new account for this free to play multiplayer.

I’m pretty other games have also had those problems. But what are you gonna do? You can’t stop them, it’s free to play. They will keep getting banned and make new accounts!

The idea of praising a company for fixing a mistake they caused at this point is just. . . sad. One of my favorite core features of Halo won’t be in Infinite, and if I mention it I will be redirected back to the Halo 5 forums so I’ll just end with this. 343 listens, but they don’t seem to think about every decision. They said they thought long and hard about the armor coatings! Okay, but that about everything else that’s in the game and not going to be in the game? I feel like every single thing that people have asked for over the past 9 years could be in Infinite, but I don’t think they went through every option to make every fan happy. I will buy the game, it looks like it’ll be good. But it will probably be no where near the best Halo game.

2

They do listen, but that doesn’t mean they’ll act on every single opinion they hear. Even if they do act on something the community wants/has requested, they have priorities. Playable Elites for example. That’s a highly requested feature, but in the grand scheme of things their priority is to make what is in their current scope as good as possible and Elites aren’t part of that. Could they be added in later? Sure. But they’re clearly low on the priority list.

It seems to take them very long when they do decide to change/add something the community has asked for. Tournament settings in H5 for example. That took WAY too long to get to a good place. This is going to need to change for Infinite if they want it to survive as long as they’re intending.

As far as coatings, I think what they’ve explained so far is a bunch of bull. I think they made that system to make money, they could’ve done it like DOOM did as you said.

I get your point on F2P cheaters, hopefully they have a toggle for us xbox players to turn off crossplay if cheating gets too bad.

3

343, and Bungie before them, were very attuned to the communities’ gripes and requests. As someone in the design field, I know that trying to implement some changes requested by the community can take a very long time and may not always be something that makes it into the final product.

4

Honestly I just hope 343 continues to improve because Bungie sure isn’t anymore, even after severing most ties with Activision

5

> 2533274873349282;1:
> Now the title of this thread is probably gonna make people say, “Yes but they aren’t going to put in everything people ask for”, or “They listen but don’t actually take our ideas into consideration.” Now what I am getting at with this is ever since Halo 4 there was a lot of feedback on art styles, the way the game looks, armor, certain features being taking away or certain features being changed all together. But then Halo 5 came out with a lot of key features not being in the game at launch! Forge, infection, oddball and other fun game modes. (Also the lack of a, “Boot player from game” option in customs.) Now free updates came out, and people then praised 343 saying, “They listening!” No, they started finishing the game with updates.
>
> Now, 343 has listened to a lot of player feedback since Halo 5. Giving it more of a classic gameplay while still keeping some features like Sliding, Clamber and Sprint. (Sprint also didn’t look like it was like a major boost in speed, only a slight boost.) But one thing that seemed to not make it into the game was FULL Customization to your character. (Notice how I said Character, not Spartan.) Yes, armor customization is back like it was in Reach which is amazing, but our colors. Our emblems??? 343 said, we’re listening but we also wanna make some money since multiplayer will be free to play.
>
> Some color sets will be behind pay walls while also being able to be unlocked. Okay, why? “We want to give more ways for people to express them selves in game.” . . . Really? We’re just gonna say that and then do the opposite? “These “Shaders” will have their own textures and coatings to them.” Textures and coatings. . . THAT’S DOOM 2016?!?! But in that game you could choose what you wanted! You wanna have a Pink flashy shiny doom guy then, do it. You want a weathered armored one, do it. But no, it is locked behind a Shader. Going back to expressing yourselves, emblems. You can’t make your own, it’s stuck with the Halo 5 idea of it being fixed to a certain design.
>
> 343 seems to listen to one thing, but only fixes it after they realize the idea was awful. Free to play multiplayer is also a terrible idea. I say this because of this, if there is free to play multiplayer with crossplay and you have those cheaters join in to ruin the experience what are you going to do? Ban them?
>
> Cheater: *Oh I just got banned, time to make a new account for this free to play multiplayer.*I’m pretty other games have also had those problems. But what are you gonna do? You can’t stop them, it’s free to play. They will keep getting banned and make new accounts!
>
> The idea of praising a company for fixing a mistake they caused at this point is just. . . sad. One of my favorite core features of Halo won’t be in Infinite, and if I mention it I will be redirected back to the Halo 5 forums so I’ll just end with this. 343 listens, but they don’t seem to think about every decision. They said they thought long and hard about the armor coatings! Okay, but that about everything else that’s in the game and not going to be in the game? I feel like every single thing that people have asked for over the past 9 years could be in Infinite, but I don’t think they went through every option to make every fan happy. I will buy the game, it looks like it’ll be good. But it will probably be no where near the best Halo game.

Community managers with 343 might listen to the community, and the dev team might be interested in integrating feedback, but don’t ever forget that 343 makes Halo games for Microsoft to make money off of them, they do not make halo games for the community to love and enjoy. It is a very sad truth. This means that while yes, they might hear overwhelming fan feedback and fix a misstep they’ve made (like no couch co-op in Halo 5,) but they will never listen to feedback like “please no microstransactions,” or “this armor coating system is terrible,” because microsofts voice will always be louder there.

6

I have heard even Modern Warfare has a lot of cheaters. Probably because it’s so popular. Still has cheaters March 2021 after its release in late 2019. If Infinite has plenty of hackers then I may not be playing. They ruin the experience.

7

> 2533274873349282;1:
> Now the title of this thread is probably gonna make people say, “Yes but they aren’t going to put in everything people ask for”, or “They listen but don’t actually take our ideas into consideration.” Now what I am getting at with this is ever since Halo 4 there was a lot of feedback on art styles, the way the game looks, armor, certain features being taking away or certain features being changed all together. But then Halo 5 came out with a lot of key features not being in the game at launch! Forge, infection, oddball and other fun game modes. (Also the lack of a, “Boot player from game” option in customs.) Now free updates came out, and people then praised 343 saying, “They listening!” No, they started finishing the game with updates.
>
> Now, 343 has listened to a lot of player feedback since Halo 5. Giving it more of a classic gameplay while still keeping some features like Sliding, Clamber and Sprint. (Sprint also didn’t look like it was like a major boost in speed, only a slight boost.) But one thing that seemed to not make it into the game was FULL Customization to your character. (Notice how I said Character, not Spartan.) Yes, armor customization is back like it was in Reach which is amazing, but our colors. Our emblems??? 343 said, we’re listening but we also wanna make some money since multiplayer will be free to play.
>
> Some color sets will be behind pay walls while also being able to be unlocked. Okay, why? “We want to give more ways for people to express them selves in game.” . . . Really? We’re just gonna say that and then do the opposite? “These “Shaders” will have their own textures and coatings to them.” Textures and coatings. . . THAT’S DOOM 2016?!?! But in that game you could choose what you wanted! You wanna have a Pink flashy shiny doom guy then, do it. You want a weathered armored one, do it. But no, it is locked behind a Shader. Going back to expressing yourselves, emblems. You can’t make your own, it’s stuck with the Halo 5 idea of it being fixed to a certain design.
>
> 343 seems to listen to one thing, but only fixes it after they realize the idea was awful. Free to play multiplayer is also a terrible idea. I say this because of this, if there is free to play multiplayer with crossplay and you have those cheaters join in to ruin the experience what are you going to do? Ban them?
>
> Cheater: *Oh I just got banned, time to make a new account for this free to play multiplayer.*I’m pretty other games have also had those problems. But what are you gonna do? You can’t stop them, it’s free to play. They will keep getting banned and make new accounts!
>
> The idea of praising a company for fixing a mistake they caused at this point is just. . . sad. One of my favorite core features of Halo won’t be in Infinite, and if I mention it I will be redirected back to the Halo 5 forums so I’ll just end with this. 343 listens, but they don’t seem to think about every decision. They said they thought long and hard about the armor coatings! Okay, but that about everything else that’s in the game and not going to be in the game? I feel like every single thing that people have asked for over the past 9 years could be in Infinite, but I don’t think they went through every option to make every fan happy. I will buy the game, it looks like it’ll be good. But it will probably be no where near the best Halo game.

They sure don’t listen to the Insider guys lol.

Can’t tell you how many bugs people reported en masse during MCC PCs flights and they ALL would make it to the release and THEN they’d fix it, AFTER everyone left because the game was broken.

Remember the Halo 2 PC projectile bug? Where you could just shoot the ground and kill anyone on the map? Yeah people reported that and it wasn’t fixed.

There was one employee that mocked a guy that made a video about the Halo 3 hit detection, saying it wasn’t an issue. Only until the PC release revived the discussion about the hit detection, did they bandaid it.

This kinda stuff is why I tread lightly with hope for Halo anymore. They keep sabotaging themselves each release. Seriously? No forge or theater at release for Halo 5 AND Halo MCC PC? I mean was the feedback from Halo 5 not enough? They would literally release a list of known bugs with each game released on PC and instead of fixing it they’d just say “no big deal” and release it anyway. No game should release with a LIST of known bugs.

It really sucks because I want to see them do well and I know they can do great things but they keep shooting themselves in the foot in the simplest of ways.

8

> 2533274797939950;7:
> > 2533274873349282;1:
> > Now the title of this thread is probably gonna make people say, “Yes but they aren’t going to put in everything people ask for”, or “They listen but don’t actually take our ideas into consideration.” Now what I am getting at with this is ever since Halo 4 there was a lot of feedback on art styles, the way the game looks, armor, certain features being taking away or certain features being changed all together. But then Halo 5 came out with a lot of key features not being in the game at launch! Forge, infection, oddball and other fun game modes. (Also the lack of a, “Boot player from game” option in customs.) Now free updates came out, and people then praised 343 saying, “They listening!” No, they started finishing the game with updates.
> >
> > Now, 343 has listened to a lot of player feedback since Halo 5. Giving it more of a classic gameplay while still keeping some features like Sliding, Clamber and Sprint. (Sprint also didn’t look like it was like a major boost in speed, only a slight boost.) But one thing that seemed to not make it into the game was FULL Customization to your character. (Notice how I said Character, not Spartan.) Yes, armor customization is back like it was in Reach which is amazing, but our colors. Our emblems??? 343 said, we’re listening but we also wanna make some money since multiplayer will be free to play.
> >
> > Some color sets will be behind pay walls while also being able to be unlocked. Okay, why? “We want to give more ways for people to express them selves in game.” . . . Really? We’re just gonna say that and then do the opposite? “These “Shaders” will have their own textures and coatings to them.” Textures and coatings. . . THAT’S DOOM 2016?!?! But in that game you could choose what you wanted! You wanna have a Pink flashy shiny doom guy then, do it. You want a weathered armored one, do it. But no, it is locked behind a Shader. Going back to expressing yourselves, emblems. You can’t make your own, it’s stuck with the Halo 5 idea of it being fixed to a certain design.
> >
> > 343 seems to listen to one thing, but only fixes it after they realize the idea was awful. Free to play multiplayer is also a terrible idea. I say this because of this, if there is free to play multiplayer with crossplay and you have those cheaters join in to ruin the experience what are you going to do? Ban them?
> >
> > Cheater: *Oh I just got banned, time to make a new account for this free to play multiplayer.*I’m pretty other games have also had those problems. But what are you gonna do? You can’t stop them, it’s free to play. They will keep getting banned and make new accounts!
> >
> > The idea of praising a company for fixing a mistake they caused at this point is just. . . sad. One of my favorite core features of Halo won’t be in Infinite, and if I mention it I will be redirected back to the Halo 5 forums so I’ll just end with this. 343 listens, but they don’t seem to think about every decision. They said they thought long and hard about the armor coatings! Okay, but that about everything else that’s in the game and not going to be in the game? I feel like every single thing that people have asked for over the past 9 years could be in Infinite, but I don’t think they went through every option to make every fan happy. I will buy the game, it looks like it’ll be good. But it will probably be no where near the best Halo game.
>
> They sure don’t listen to the Insider guys lol.
>
> Can’t tell you how many bugs people reported en masse during MCC PCs releases and they ALL would make it to the release and THEN they’d fix it, AFTER everyone left because the game was broken.
>
> Remember the Halo 2 PC projectile bug? Where you could just shoot the ground and kill anyone on the map? Yeah people reported that and it wasn’t fixed.
>
> There was one employee that mocked a guy that made a video about the Halo 3 hit detection, saying it wasn’t an issue. Only until the PC release revived the discussion about the hit detection, did they bandaid it.
>
> This kinda stuff is why I tread lightly with hope for Halo anymore. They keep sabotaging themselves each release. Seriously? No forge or theater at release for Halo 5 AND Halo MCC PC? I mean was the feedback from Halo 5 not enough? They would literally release a list of known bugs with each game released on PC and instead of fixing it they’d just say “no big deal” and release it anyway. No game should release with a LIST of known bugs.
>
> It really sucks because I want to see them do well and I know they can do great things but they keep shooting themselves in the foot in the simplest of ways.

I do believe Infinite will have things that’ll be good. But there are so many features that should be there that Isn’t that could make it better or even the best Halo out there. A lot of the times it seems they take one step forward and two steps back.

Like these armor coatings, if they did what Doom 2016 did it’d be the perfect armor color system with textures to them. But making them like Shaders, no. I wear Silver and Gold on every Halo game. For me, what if that’s not there? And if it’s coming out then when?

I’m hoping we’ll see a lot more at E3 this year, instead of more campaign.

9

> 2535413107551836;6:
> I have heard even Modern Warfare has a lot of cheaters. Probably because it’s so popular. Still has cheaters March 2021 after its release in late 2019. If Infinite has plenty of hackers then I may not be playing. They ruin the experience.

I’ve never ran into them on MW. Destiny 2 on the other hand, yes. Peek a corner and a guy fires a sniper like an auto rifle with 20 shots fire with each burst. He could get banned, most likely did. But Destiny 2 is free to play, so he’ll just be back with a new account.

If a game is free to play, it should be something else besides multiplayer.

10

> 2603643534586909;3:
> 343, and Bungie before them, were very attuned to the communities’ gripes and requests. As someone in the design field, I know that trying to implement some changes requested by the community can take a very long time and may not always be something that makes it into the final product.

I agree, I think they and bungie are both examples of devs that do listen to and engage with their community, more so than many other games. At least from my observations over the years.

11

A person can listen and take something into consideration subconsciously if it was a good idea. So if they hear my words, then i did my part. The next part is if they do something good with it and thats their part. I understand what we asked for cant be done but if its something like “hey we want elites” and they know we want them but don’t do it. Then I’ll have to take it as I will but they must have a reason. Now If that reason is a good reason then okay, but if its a reason like “dlc or a way unlock behind a price tag” then frankly opinion and feedback are constructed. So, this is how a consumer publisher relationship works. So yes they do listen but the reality of things is there will be things they do listen to and act on negatively or positively. This is something ran by humans so they have different ideas that work or dont work. As long as we voice our selves (civilized and not threaten like how some a holes do) things may work out for the best. When things so for the worst then as consumers we just don’t buy anymore or support the product. Thus they see that what we want matters and choices are made.

12

I Personally have received many many responses from A REAL PERSON when addressing 343 Ind. and would have to say they listen to ALL and take great pride in the halo community when putting all suggestions into motion (Within reason)