Note: This text was originally created to be sent to 343, but I wanted to first share to the community to see if you agree with mine and some friends ideas. I realize there are lots of suggestions and ideas for Halo 5 throughout this forum, but this is a really complete one. And even is more than just an idea, is a compilation of things that went wrong in Halo 4 and should be fixed for the next game. I do not redacted these in form of list, because I explained and justified many of the ideas, so apologies.
These text is so extended, that I will post it in different topics. Please finish reading, I know it is long, but I believe it will worth it. (Please excuse my english, I am not American, but I also care about Halo Universe.) If anyone knows hot to contact 343 directly, I will be really grateful you tell me.
343 Industries:
The Halo series are by far, the best games for Xbox 360. This text was wrote with the intention of avoiding the mistakes of Halo 4, and help you, 343 industries to do the best Halo game on Halo 5. This text was written by a single person, but supported and agreed by other Halo series fans. We do not mean you are not capable of doing one of the greatest games ever, you actually are, but I wrote this to help you, and to see some new and old awesome features.
Halo 4 was not what I expected, we could say it is a good game, but it is also far from being the best Halo (which in my opinion is Halo 3). There were many mistakes, so I expect to help on their fixing by writing this list of things that would make better the next title.
First of all, I want to say that campaign was the best aspect of the game. But there were few details like the volume of the soundtrack or even parts with no soundtrack, this is really important to incite the correct feeling such as sadness, nostalgic, inspiration, warlike feelings, etc. About soundtrack, “Never Forget” from Halo 3 was really legendary and I will like to hear it again in Halo 5 campaign. Halo 3 campaign was incredible, I hope Halo 5 will be more similar to it. Also the original trilogy main soundtrack should be back, to remember this good times.
Other important topic I want to mention, is the year 2557 and human kind still uses vehicles and weapons similar to the ones on our time? Having forerunner and covenant technology, humanity can development advanced weapons and vehicles. A complete gamma of new ones would make a great change in the next game.
I really do not know what is going to be about the Halo 5 campaign, but I suggest an alliance between humans and elites to defeat prometheus and some covenant survivors. Making emphasis on epic battles, especially in attacks on Earth. And also finding hidden skulls and taking them throughout the level will make a better experience.
More easter eggs, and more interesting ones, will be well appreciated.
Now I want to talk about multiplayer. Multiplayer really needs several improvements. First of all maps, there are just 5 maps in regular/small-teams playlists, in Halo 5 must be at least 10 and other 5 for big team playlists. I believe every Halo fan would agree in have remakes of the bests halo 3 maps such as Guardian, Sand trap, Avalanche, and others. Playlists, it is really boring to play something like 10 different playlist while in Halo: Reach were more than 20.
Something important to mention, is the decision of making halo multiplayer look alike Call of Duty one, this was an awful decision. Maybe you had done this thinking on the sales, but for fans, we prefer to see a better and originally game, keeping the same feelings and game style from other Halos. If you work really hard on the game trust me, that you will have better sales, better critics, and less necessary letters like this one.
The classes were not necessary, but if they continue in Halo 5 you must add more weapons (use what I mention of new human technology based on forerunner´s), change perks for armor improvements just like make less noise, be faster, reduced fall damage, faster shield regeneration, and others. If there are going to be specializations, (I do not want to have these, but it is your choice) they must be more explicit and harder each time you start a new one. And unlocking special advantages with these specializations must have their one section, so if you want to equip one “perk” or armor improvements you can choose just one from other specializations perks, instead of sacrificing other “tactical” perks.
About gameplay, grenade pick up from bodies should be back, Dual-wield was incredible and it must be back. It was the must exciting feeling just shooting with 2 submachine guns. Armor abilities are great, but we need more variety and originality. Assassinations, gathering all assassinations from Halo Reach and Halo 4, and duplicate this number in new animations. Gameplay should be slower, as slow as it was in Halo 3. You should make 5 different loading screens and include several gameplay tips, curiosity data, and explanations in the form of short phrases. Also de main screen would be great with a blue tone and changing between campaign images and an awesome background music, similar to Halo 3 and Halo Wars.
Ranks should be more creative like in Reach, instead of SR130. You can inclusive add ranks like “Master Chief” or “Arbiter”. Jetpack would see better if it is already integrated on spartan armor, choosing the jetpack ability would allow its use, but everybody should have it. Kill cams must be improved, those are kind of lagged in Halo. Phantom (if there is going to be phantoms) explosions should be more like Halo 3, more impressive and realistic. Halo 5 should support more dead bodies and these should be more time in map, to make it more realistic. By the way, weapons disappear too fast from map and that is a problem. Another thing, is the implementation of dedicated servers, I know this can be expensive, but we would really appreciate it.
Halo 5 must have a better launch trailer, I know you hired experienced men in Hollywood, but the trailer must be more Halo 3 “Believe” alike.
Something really remarkable, is the game´s menu, the Halo 4 menu was original and creative, but I believe all Halo fans would prefer the classic one.
Talking about spartan ops, you should make some basic improvements to them, but generally, are a nice addition. Firefight should be back, maybe it was not too popular, but it was a great game mode. You should bring it back with great improvements such as the option of customize maps for firefight mode in forge mode.
Now that I mention forge, I think community will love additions to forge mode like editing firefight maps (I know I have already mentioned it), water and a toxic liquid physics, a special panel to write things like instructions. When sharing custom game modes and map variants it should be options for grading maps and game modes giving them a certain number of stars or something similar. Something incredibly important is the fact of the system to search content of the community (this system is not currently working in Halo 4). This system should be seriously improved and must be working when the game is released. A nice request many fans share, is the creation of just one big forge map, like “Forge World” of Halo Reach. But this map should be even bigger and maybe include different biome types, a snowy zone, a desert one and a forest.
Continue in part 2…