> MLG is annoying because of their negative influence on people that turns them into annoying idiots and how they make a lot of people demand that the entire game follows MLG “lead” and design the game around their niche playlist.
So competitive gamers prefer competitive game mechanics? Thats a shocker.
Many of the things the competitive community wants benefits all of Halo’s gameplay,
-Good strafe/movement mechanics so you can out-shoot enemies and have freedom of movement
-Not too much clutter or random factors in the gameplay which is how Halo was until Reach
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Fast killing high skilled weapons and a Balanced Sandbox to encourage mix and matching
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Intelligent 4v4 maps that flow well
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Longevity for the multiplayer through ranking systems and tournament exposure.
Those are the things the competitive community pushes for, a good core Halo game that can be tweaked to suit every playlist.
> and it is niche, they do limit the game to a specific playstyle and no variation. Similar to Grifball, it’s also a limited niche playstyle. But it becomes a problem when many people start to think that this niche should become the norm. Completely unaware that if it does then you’ll lose the majority of players in the game. Why can’t I have a gametype where I can win using the Plasma Pistol? Why is everybody trying to force me to only ever use the BR/DMR? Aren’t I allowed for my own playlist, even if it’s a niche itself?
So…the most hardcore playlist in a FPS is niche, wow that is a shocker. You dont seem to realize that the MLG playlist is designed around tournament settings that are played for big money and tailored to create the widest skill gap. Halo has like 5 main weapons used in competitive play, the norm for competitive shooters is to have only the essentials to remove redundancy and not have unfavorable weapons clutter up the Sandbox. There is 4 niche ranges in FPS short,medium,long, and utility and MLG settings covers all of them. The variety in which they are used, is widely dependent on Sandbox balance which has fluctuated with each Halo title but the essentials have always been there.
> I’m also kinda against “professional competitive gaming” in general for long various reasons, but I do respect some areas of it. I’ll respect many Street Fighter players for the way they play the game, or even Starcraft players. But I have very little respect for Halo MLG players. Usually because with those other players, if something makes everything else redundant then it’s either patched, or banned until it’s patched. Halo on the other hand limits the game to just that one weapon instead.
I dont know what your problem is, Halo has always featured a high skilled utility weapon in competitive play that will never change. It is essential to how 4v4 Halo plays in providing a weapon to defend yourself with off spawn and be a threat no matter where you are on the map. MLG settings have been very close to regular Halo Team slayer settings until Reach where there was more factors added that did not work out in adding to the game. The whole reason different playlists are made is to create different play-styles in the game, if you dont like MLG’s play-style then dont play it.
> Sure, when SF4 was released, it was just boring Ken versus Sagat fights, but they learned new strategies and after several patches we get many different matches from the variations of characters and playstyles. If I watch a Halo MLG match, can I sit down and see an interesting battle between a Plasma Repeater and a Plasa Rifle? Can I watch how someone uses the Spiker against a Plasma Pistol? Are there different attack styles and strategies that the “pros” can use that I can learn and use myself? No, all I see is BR/DMR sidestepping duels.
Of course that is all you’re going to see with your limited understanding of competitive play, the tactics and strategy in Halo games evolves as the game goes on there is no set weapon roles. Halo is more skill-based than role-based it never was a class-based game but more Arena-styled. There is definitely different strategies and tactics the pros use, but the fast-paced and adaptive nature of the game makes the game more about adapting your strategy on the fly rather than executing one.
> Several months ago I was near the end of my gym workout and Halo MLG was on the TV (for some reason I don’t know) and it kept switching between Halo 2, 3 and Reach. I had trouble realising which game or matches were being played because they all looked the same.
Close to the same settings were used, so that would be no surprise. The differences in mechanics however are quite huge if you know Halo.
> If you open up and allow variation, you open yourself up to players who can find new ways to play the game and completely change up the format. Look at Boxer of Starcraft fame. He became famous because he used Terran, during a time where they were considered underpowered or redundant compared to the Zerg and Protoss, mircomanaged them around all his foes and completely changed the way people played and viewed Starcraft. All because he took a chance and learned another way to use them.
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Again, comparing a RTS to an Arena-style FPS but ill try to find an example like that. In H2, with the rise in requirement for team-work/coordination due to the slowed kill times, Final Boss was the first team to successively implement “soft roles” into Halo making organized play a higher requirement then straight out slaying skill as we saw in H1 with the huge individual skill gap. Again, trying to fit Halo into the “mold” of other games is impossible, its a unique game with its own set of rules. That is probably why there is so many people ignorant of the game, they dont really understand it.
