They intentionally made design decisions based on what they thought would be appealing to esports players. This is opposed to making design decisions based on what makes a great game. Being a good esports title is supposed to largely be a byproduct of being a great game in general. The OG trilogy were great games first and good esports titles as a result of that.
On Reach, I’m not really sure what Bungie was going for there tbh. I’ve never been a big reach fan anyway.
Halo 4 tried to be an esports title in that they basically cloned cod and slapped a master chief helmet on it. It failed miserably.
Halo 5 was all in on the esports thing and failed miserably.
343 is letting too much esports influence in Infinite by not giving enough variety in ranked and social playlists. Hardcore mlg settings are the only ranked option and AR starts are the only social option. There aren’t even BRs to pickup on social variants of maps. You actually only get to see a BR in 4v4 if you play hardcore ranked in Halo Infinite. Like what? That’s stupid.
Edit: added a few words in last paragraph for clarification.
How exactly did they copy COD? Why is this the hot take everyone makes?
In what way did they copy COD? In what way are lower players “being left behind” in comparison to older titles? Onyx and up is like the top 10% or something in this game, which is similar to like level 40 or higher in games like Halo 3. How is it any different?
In what significant ways is the gameplay different from something like Halo 3 or Halo 2? Aside from sprint and slide, there isn’t really a massive difference in the way the game is played imo.
I dont wanna be that guy, but are you just not liking that you get pooped on or something? Not trolling, genuinely curious.
And Halo 4 was probably the furthest from an actual Halo styled eSports that they made. They didn’t do it cater to eSports, they did it to attract the casual COD fanboy that can’t wrap their head around things like map control.
I wish they’d start actually banning people like this dude, the bile that you so kindly posted does nothing but hurt Halo. Pointless conversations/debates with bad information and taken in bad faith. I’m not going to waste my time with you any longer, but I just wish this forum had more interesting and educational topics than “Esports killed Halo”
btw just checked this guys stats, dude literally played 2 matches… yes, TWO matches and not only is so arrogant as to come on here and act as though they know Halo Infinite better than everyone else, they also go around insulting people.
FYI I’ve played hundreds of hours of halo but lost the account I did it on. I worked my way up to diamond 5 in halo 5’s ffa so I’m no slouch. This account is an old one that I had stopped using for several years.
Cod was an esports title in the early 2010s. Black ops 1 was one of my favorite games back then. Can’t tell you how many dorks I saw with “FaZe” as their clan tag who could barely play the game. (Maybe you were one of them and don’t want to admit it lol.) Trying to tell me it wasn’t an esports title makes you sound stupid. So maybe you should stop being a pansy and accept being called out on your stupidity.
When halo 4 copied cod they did it to be relevant in the esports scene like cod was. This isn’t a hot take. This isn’t novel. This is what happened.
And dear moderators, “stupid” is one of the more polite terms to describe what this person is spewing off right now.
The idea that Halo 4 ended up as it did for the sake of esports is just complete nonsense. Halo 4 was changed because CoD was popular in general not to emulate CoD esports.
CoD has an esports scene, but its many copycats did not ape its gameplay formula in order get in on their esports scene, it was in order to chase its overall sales.
Halo also has an esports scene that predates CoD, that doesn’t make Halo an “esports” title.
If you can blame Halo 4’s trend chasing shift into a loadout shooter on “esports” then the term “esports” is totally meaningless. It just becomes nebulous “bad thing” that there is no way to to enact any meaningful change. What are you even supposed to do to erase the influence of “esports” in a Halo game targeting the widest and most casual audience possible.
Banning the entire concept of “esports” from the entire studio would have resulted in a content rich Halo Infinite, it wouldn’t have saved its garbage sandbox or prevented it from having a predatory business model.
“Esports” are not to blame for 343 and Microsoft farting out the minimum viable product while relying on exploiting human psychology to drive engagement instead of simply creating a quality product in the first place.
i am sorry but that is nonsense. You can’t compare doom when the entire game is faster overall and has Dashes ahahahaha.
you guys have to friggin stop man.
you are off your rockers man.
let us move you
why does letting us run bother you people so much>
let it go man
let it go
Again you’re missing the point. It’s not about if a game is good for esports or not. I’m talking about the motivation of the developers when making the game. Cod was a big esports title back then. I was in college, I remember it well. Debating me on this is not smart. But when I say esports, I don’t just mean tournaments at big events. Im also talking about the entire content push that revolves around esports. I’m talking about all the YouTube content and sponsorships and advertising and (more recently) streamers. Esports isn’t just about the tournaments, it’s about the entire marketing apparatus that surrounds esports.
I thought I was making that clear by making fun of “here’s my gfuel promo code dorks.”
Esports itself does not ruin games, however, when you make it the number 1 target audience for your product it tends to show, and not always in a good way.
Yeah I mean, it’s pretty self-evident when you look at games. Now of course there are the games that were designed for eSports since day one that are massive and people enjoy, but if you look at say COD, it was never designed with eSports in mind and it only blew up in the eSports space because of fan engagement, whereas now it’s like a Number 1 development goal for the franchise, which may sound good on paper because opinions get heard, things get taken into consideration, but really it sucks all the fun out because now it’s like a business, whereas back in the day it was just something for fun.
The motivation of developers is exactly what I’m questioning. Which is why I pointed out that the idea that Halo 4 ended up the way it did because of “esports” is absurd.
It only makes sense if your definition of “esports” is so broad as to be worthless. Youtube content, sponserships, advertising, streamers, battlepasses =/ “esports”. Some of these streamers, youtubers, what have you, may participate in esports like say snipedown, but the fact that some crossover exist doesn’t mean Halo Infinite ended up like it did because of “esports.”
“Esports” didn’t cause the game to end up with no content, nor did “esports” cause the game to be filled with battlepass garbage.
Its the sheer avarice of the gaming industry relying on addictive tendencies and pavlovion bell ringing rather than creating quality products with actual content.
Calling Halo Infinite a victim of “esports” makes about as much sense as claiming Assassins’ Creed(or any given Ubisoft game really, but I digress) was ruined by “esports.”
These games are being ruined by the same focus on predatory “live services” that exists whether a given game even has competitive multiplayer.
Looking at Infinite and the industry as a whole and blaming “esports” is peak nonsense that only serves to distract from the real underlying issues.
I don’t actually disagree with the substance of a lot of your complaints, but blaming everything on “esports” is honestly so ridiculous that it borders on non sequitur.
