Has 343i lost touch with the Halo Community?

Games Halo Infinite
1

*** Please refer to the references below, for data regarding feedback! ***

Due to recent circumstances and events I believe that 343i are beginning to lose touch with the Halo Community. Until recently they have done very well with their communication and exchange with feedback, applying it to games like Halo 5 and to date Halo MCC, however I feel that this could be taken for granted.

<:// Halo: 5 Guardians; why it wasn’t & why it was successful :\>

Halo 5 had a very successful release, until people felt stagnated by the lack of variety when it came to gameplay. Forge, Infection, Firefight & Split Screen were not available upon release, where 4v4 gametypes and the new gametype Warzone were the only options available. People loved the gameplay, but having only these options available did not cater to long term entertainment or sustainability.

What I noticed and observed throughout the period of Halo 5, is that when 343i decided to listen to the community and provide updates that they were receiving feedback upon; the game began to thrive with popularity once again. Many returned to the game however many did not. I personally believe that if they released Halo 5 as it is right now, they would have a bigger thriving population to date.

Having to adapt armour abilities being apart of the game - following Halo 4 - they did a great job balancing gameplay giving every player the same 7 armour abilities; although the gameplay became inherently very fast paced. This is something that can’t be helped, but they have taken this direction with Halo Infinite; removing 4 of the abilities and leaving: sprint, slide and grapple to be apart of the gameplay.

<:// Halo: Infinite recent announcements \:>
The reason announcements that 343 have made have been subtle and out of the blue. Following the change from the Halowaypoint Forums to Discourse and the recent announcement of how Forge and Coop Campaign will not be available upon release, the response made was not sincere and did not address the majority of feedback directly. A large majority of those who have voted on community polls have voted in favour of a delay, compared to those who don’t want the delay. 343i were considering a delay, although they didn’t consult this with their community before making the final decision.

I understand that there are other priorities and circumstances at play, but communication with the community is essential. If a large majority of the community is providing the same feedback, the game has been proven to thrive and improve; gathering feedback from many valid perspectives. I would love for the game to be delayed, although ideally now it would prove more damaging now that they have released a date along with the new exclusive Halo hardware.

From what I have read and what I have seen, there has been no sincere communication and proper acknowledgement of the community regarding this issue; especially from Community Manager Unyshek. To acknowledge the community, I would communicate why we decided to make the decision along with what we will do to compromise; looking at where we can substitute for entertainment or content in the meantime.

<:// Forge: Very Basic Sandbox available upon release or Season 2 - suggestion* \:>

To allow creators to provide and create Custom Games until the full release of Forge, I would recommend creating a very basic sandbox for them to play with. Even though the gamemode will contain bugs, it will allow for further content to be created as a substitution for the full thing. Players will have more variety of gameplay and something to look forward to. An example of this sandbox would be similar or smaller to Foundary from Halo 3.

<:// Conclusions & Final Notes \:>

I believe that relationships overall need nurturing and tending to, to create a more fulfilled experience for those that are involved. I have seen were 343i & Unyshek have displayed their capabilities and it is why I am calling them forward and addressing them directly. In the short term I believe Halo Infinite will be very successful, however the long term may not be as abundant as it could be. It is important to maintain momentum, as it is harder to create once it has been lost.

In conclusion I feel that the controversy regarding another delay needs to be properly addressed rather than being ignored. I understand that a majority at 343i will have other priorities to tend to, but this is the purpose and priority of a Community Manager. If the responsibility is too heavy among other responsibilities, this is where it is sublimated toward other people; other ambassadors of the community.

As I have found there is no rule against this, I will be tagging all Waypoint moderators & I thank you for work that you have done and continue to do for the community. I am really passionate about having this heard, as I care very deeply about Halo and its community. I feel you have a part to play in this by witnessing and sometimes interacting with these threads and conversations on the forums, hence why I’ve decided to tag you as well.

Thank you for taking the time to read what I have to say, I really do appreciate it.

Kind regards, GG Panda GG :slight_smile:

Replies, References & Tags
Reply #1**
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OP CHADS MAG : DELAY INFINITE TO RELEASE W/ FORGE AND CO-OP: POLL

OP SLASHcmd : [YAY OR NAY, SHOULD THEY DELAY?

](https://www.halowaypoint.com/en-us/forums/29568daf8cd14083bd1b70a810bf3581/topics/yay-or-nay-should-they-delay/c9e9b32c-bdda-42fd-ab34-c64e6e1d87e8/posts)BreezyStarfish1Chimera30Comedic HermitDavidJCobbKa FiveLord HookochosarcasmbullystckrboytsassiViper SkillsEvaWulf XLR8

<strong>This is a summary of why I feel that Halo 4 was not as successful as the other Halo games, responding to those who have stated their opinions about ‘343 & Halo 4’ in the thread*</strong>
<:// Halo 4 & why it was not as successful as the other Halo games \:>

Following the release of Reach, Halo had something introduced that it didn’t have before, sprint & armour abilities. As they have already introduced them into the game, it would be very hard to then take them out. They created Halo 4 inheriting sprint as main function of movement - taking adaptation from other modern games - and adding new armour abilities for the player to choose from.

As this was their first game as a company, there was a lot of experimentation to make the game newer; integrating features from other games. Unfortunately, following the release of Halo Reach, the competitive circuit surely dried up due to the slower paced gameplay from adding bloom; by the time they added a no-bloom gametype it was too late. Halo 4 also started off with a very small competitive circuit, as Halo lost it’s partnership with MLG.

Just liked Halo Reach’s Forge, the selection of blocks were very bland and didn’t have great variety when it came to how they look aesthetically; other than maps used. Referring to Halo 4, this made for Custom Games not to be as enjoyable as it’s past successors; although they were still enjoyable.

Again, thank you for taking the time to read! :slight_smile:

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My honest opinion?
They lost touch with the halo community right around the time H4 came out

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This is what is commonly referred to as an evergreen question, mostly because it’s appropriate at any time during their existence. I mean you could be asking this in 2014, 2015, 2021; it doesn’t matter. The question is still relevant.

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Thank you for your response xthemorningstar, I appreciate you adding your own opinion :slight_smile:

I understand it could be considered that Big T Mac10, however I made points of where I am referring to specifically; acknowledging when they have and when they have not been in touch with the community. Thank you for your input :slight_smile:

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> 2533274793006817;3:
> This is what is commonly referred to as an evergreen question, mostly because it’s appropriate at any time during their existence. I mean you could be asking this in 2014, 2015, 2021; it doesn’t matter. The question is still relevant.

I don’t think the Halo community knows what it wants either to be fair.

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I take issue with the fact that the decision to move forward with the launch came almost immediately after the announcement that, to do so, Halo Infinite would have to launch without two of its most cherished features, Forge and Co-op Campaign, as if there was no discussion to be had and that it didn’t matter what we think of this decision. It seems as if this decision was done more to look out for Microsoft’s interests than the interests of the fans. As you know, I did collect those polls from various sources, and what I saw was shocking. It seems as if, had there been some discussion had between 343 and the community, there would have been a decision made to delay the game so that it may be completed upon release. I find it very disheartening that there seems to have been no desire for the community to express their opinion about whether or not they would rather see the game released in full at a later date rather than releasing incomplete just to make it for the Holiday season. I would like to see a relationship between 343 and the community that acknowledges the opinions of the fans on important issues such as these and does not rely on the whim of Microsoft’s corporate interests to dictate what is best for our favorite game.

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> 2533274866720209;5:
> > 2533274793006817;3:
> > This is what is commonly referred to as an evergreen question, mostly because it’s appropriate at any time during their existence. I mean you could be asking this in 2014, 2015, 2021; it doesn’t matter. The question is still relevant.
>
> I don’t think the Halo community knows what it wants either to be fair.

I disagree, I think with each major divergence a portion of the Halo community want a specific thing, leaving each base with different expectations. Aside from individual game diehards I would say the 2 main camps are those who want the base game (classic fans) and those that want 343s additions (modern fans).
I happy to be corrected but i’d argue in my 15ish years of being on the Halo forums that it comes down to the power and fun being on the map not with the player that is the biggest point of contention between classic vs modern. Hence the generally positive outlook on the multiplayer gameplay of Infinite.

To OP, While 343 have been very communicative, the key issue is their design philosophy is at best divisive and at worst mostly negative with what the broad community wants. Leaving them to overhaul their new game, put in much more work than they need to, meet a negative reception on release and the first 6 months when the game is at its most active and then spend 3+ years coming up with ways to learn from their mistakes. Infinite is the 4th game, 5 did not have a successful release like OP states, it was dragged through the mud by the larger gaming sphere because of its campaign, lack of core features like BTB, heavy aim and over half of multiplayer development going to the new microtransaction delivery system (warzone).

343 could put in less than half of the effort that they put it if their design philosophy was more concordant with standards set between CE - Reach. The basics that is, not ‘Halo 3.0’. The key features like forge, co-op, customisation etc, the primary aesthetic, basic functionality for user interface, Halo style physics, sandbox, map roster.

Some may disagree with it being the broad community saying it’s fringe critics. Where are loadouts, ordnance, perk upgrades, flinch from 4? May be too early but I doubt warzone and breakout are returning, or most promethean weapons, or advanced mobility. It’s a failure on 2 fronts, the new additions are not well received and the established features are sub-par to prior games. Until that changes there will always be a disconnect.

The hype for Halo is there, the initial trailer and the tech preview, despite some rough edges, show that a game that looks and plays like Halo garners widespread attention, 343 just need to not subvert or underdeliver on the core features people expect.

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To be honest, as much as I love halo and want it to succeed, it feels like they’re not paying much attention at all, every piece of news we get is either an issue with game development or a poor decision by them. Like who’s idea was it to not have any form of progression outside of battle passes? If I’m playing loads of matches I expect to get something from it, I don’t want to HAVE to grind certain challenges to unlock extra things, and I’m worried the lack of any basic Spartan rank or leveling system will kill the longevity of the game. People just won’t have any reason to grind other than challenges and that will kill peoples moods quickly.

They don’t communicate with us as well as they should either, over the last week people have been complaining about not know what to expect (like at gamescom) or what’s going on and the only real replies we are getting is from random game developers.

All of this on top of the fact they haven’t had a good release since claiming the IP makes my heart ache for a game I’ve play since CE. I just hope they manage to salvage infinite before its too late

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> 2533274836395701;7:
> > 2533274866720209;5:
> > > 2533274793006817;3:
> > > This is what is commonly referred to as an evergreen question, mostly because it’s appropriate at any time during their existence. I mean you could be asking this in 2014, 2015, 2021; it doesn’t matter. The question is still relevant.
> >
> > I don’t think the Halo community knows what it wants either to be fair.
>
> I disagree, I think with each major divergence a portion of the Halo community want a specific thing, leaving each base with different expectations. Aside from individual game diehards I would say the 2 main camps are those who want the base game (classic fans) and those that want 343s additions (modern fans).
> I happy to be corrected but i’d argue in my 15ish years of being on the Halo forums that it comes down to the power and fun being on the map not with the player that is the biggest point of contention between classic vs modern. Hence the generally positive outlook on the multiplayer gameplay of Infinite.
>
> To OP, While 343 have been very communicative, the key issue is their design philosophy is at best divisive and at worst mostly negative with what the broad community wants. Leaving them to overhaul their new game, put in much more work than they need to, meet a negative reception on release and the first 6 months when the game is at its most active and then spend 3+ years coming up with ways to learn from their mistakes. Infinite is the 4th game, 5 did not have a successful release like OP states, it was dragged through the mud by the larger gaming sphere because of its campaign, lack of core features like BTB, heavy aim and over half of multiplayer development going to the new microtransaction delivery system (warzone).
>
> 343 could put in less than half of the effort that they put it if their design philosophy was more concordant with standards set between CE - Reach. The basics that is, not ‘Halo 3.0’. The key features like forge, co-op, customisation etc, the primary aesthetic, basic functionality for user interface, Halo style physics, sandbox, map roster.
>
> Some may disagree with it being the broad community saying it’s fringe critics. Where are loadouts, ordnance, perk upgrades, flinch from 4? May be too early but I doubt warzone and breakout are returning, or most promethean weapons, or advanced mobility. It’s a failure on 2 fronts, the new additions are not well received and the established features are sub-par to prior games. Until that changes there will always be a disconnect.
>
> The hype for Halo is there, the initial trailer and the tech preview, despite some rough edges, show that a game that looks and plays like Halo garners widespread attention, 343 just need to not subvert or underdeliver on the core features people expect.

They have been very communicative, and I would also like to point out that they’ve listened very well to what the fans want so far. I am delighted that we are getting equipment back, an older art style more true to the original, and that they have dialed back “advanced movement” to where the game’s playstyle is also more true to form (I heard there was a big debate over whether to include sprint at all.) All of these things say to me that they listen to the community and care, and I will firmly put my foot down and say they have done a fantastic job in this regard (and a fantastic job in general, in regards to mcc). HOWEVER, this was a big setback for gaming imo. Not only have they not given us the time of day when it comes to considering what we would like to do with this launch, but they’ve also reinforced the precedent of releasing games unfinished that is present in the industry, under the guise of its being a live service game, which was never meant to serve the function of releasing core features of the game that would have been there anyway. They are for extra content, such as cosmetics, maps, etc. This leads me to believe, considering how much I believe that they do mean well and do listen to us, that they didn’t have any choice at all in the matter, and that my main issue lies with MICROSOFT. I like 343, and I don’t want my favorite game franchise or 343 to be pushed around. There is an unhealthy precedent in the games industry right now that money takes precedence over what the fans want. And what they don’t understand is that if you give the fans what they want, they will give you money! And here I stand.

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Even me, a 343 critic say, that 343 shared many informations in general but the current situation is a big problem, like the missing content of forge and the promised co-op campaign together with the missing information of key things like Roadmap, general marketing etc.
Give the people informations like how ranked works, will we have real life military ranks that increased with spended time in game [not ranked Playlist], how many maps will be there, etc just small informations like those I named and some others would calm the fear of many people. Also the ingame store which is coming is ironic when you look at the lack of content like forge

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To be fair, they probably are all hands on deck. I am sure in the coming weeks as marketing kicks off, you will start to see increased communications from 343.

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> 2535436125704294;8:
> Like who’s idea was it to not have any form of progression outside of battle passes?

Probably the same person who suggested multiplayer be ‘free’.

343 wants you paying money, ‘completely free’ players are unwanted.

13

At this point we are nit picking and that’s fine. We must remember these systems will most likely change if we are vocal as a community about them. At the same time these tiny things (outside of co-op and forge) matter however we probably are blowing them out of proportion. We want the perfect game and that is not reality. They have to make business decisions at the end of the day and we can only hope they align close enough with our views than not.

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> 2533274861263132;10:
> Even me, a 343 critic say, that 343 shared many informations in general but the current situation is a big problem, like the missing content of forge and the promised co-op campaign together with the missing information of key things like Roadmap, general marketing etc.
> Give the people informations like how ranked works, will we have real life military ranks that increased with spended time in game [not ranked Playlist], how many maps will be there, etc just small informations like those I named and some others would calm the fear of many people. Also the ingame store which is coming is ironic when you look at the lack of content like forge

Yet more evidence that Covid and the Slipspace Engine have pushed the time schedule back too far and they need more time than they’re being given

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Yeah, I would say that 343 is out of touch with or doesn’t understand the community. And it has been this way since Halo 4. With the first few Halo games up to about Reach it always felt like the developers just knew what people wanted, what things people wanted in a Halo game (and did not), and how to evolve the game. With each game (for the most part) I didn’t have to say things like this belongs in Halo yet it isn’t here or this REALLY doesn’t belong in Halo, yet here it is. I always felt like each new game was a vast improvement over the previous in terms of content and features. I always felt the developers could read me and understand what I wanted without me ever having to say a word.

Ever since 343 has taken over, I feel they’ve been wrong with pretty much everything almost their entire time. They’ve been really off base with and don’t understand what the community wants and expects out of a Halo game. For instance, with Halo 4 I wanted to see Forge World 2.0 and an advancement on Reach’s Firefight. Still to this day we really haven’t seen either of those. There used to be unspoken expectations of the amount of features and the functionality of those features that ship with a Halo game, yet they’ve really blown that with MCC and Halo 5.

I would say that for a long time 343 has been forcing their version of Halo/ what they want at the cost of what the community wants and expects in Halo (and has been very vocal about in the last 9 years).

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Honestly, even though most of the people seem to be caring more about coop rather than forge, I think it would have been much better if forge was there first (wish it could be both) rather than the coop. Missing of coop won’t impact the game’s popularity as much as forge would. Forge is like a collection of multiple dlcs that other companies releases for their multiplayer. I don’t even have to mention the things that are possible with the forge. Forge will play an important role in the game’s population and since it won’t be at launch, infinite might see a population dip much sooner than expected

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> 2533274832130936;2:
> My honest opinion?
> They lost touch with the halo community right around the time H4 came out

Completely agree with this. Seems since H4 things have just become more and more frustrating.

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> 2535473783523584;16:
> Honestly, even though most of the people seem to be caring more about coop rather than forge, I think it would have been much better if forge was there first (wish it could be both) rather than the coop. Missing of coop won’t impact the game’s popularity as much as forge would. Forge is like a collection of multiple dlcs that other companies releases for their multiplayer. I don’t even have to mention the things that are possible with the forge. Forge will play an important role in the game’s population and since it won’t be at launch, infinite might see a population dip much sooner than expected

Absolutely. It is a unique mode, and games today need uniqueness to stand out from the herd

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> 2535473783523584;16:
> Honestly, even though most of the people seem to be caring more about coop rather than forge, I think it would have been much better if forge was there first (wish it could be both) rather than the coop. Missing of coop won’t impact the game’s popularity as much as forge would. Forge is like a collection of multiple dlcs that other companies releases for their multiplayer. I don’t even have to mention the things that are possible with the forge. Forge will play an important role in the game’s population and since it won’t be at launch, infinite might see a population dip much sooner than expected

I won’t argue which is more important but I will say both are important because there are people who only play co-op, and there are people who only do forge as well.

Infinites looking to be another halo missing so many things sadly, forge gave a ton of variety to custom games, and hell halo 5 was the first halo to have a custom game browser matchmaking setup of sorts and that won’t be in for I hear 6 months. By then most of the player pools will be down, and for some it’ll be to late because not everyone is going to just wait for a developer to bring missing features down the road when they shoulda been there from the start. People can say no delay but I hope they enjoy the continued decline of the franchise since that’s what they contribute to.

I was pessimistic from the start of infinite, then the tech demo had me actually a little excited, then -Yoink- hit the fan with the missing features and terrible communication from 343i since, and I’m not interested in infinite once again🤷‍♀️ I used to love halo but these newer games just aren’t fun to me.

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Time will tell just don’t think it’s good jumping to conclusions without knowing if it’s 343 ore Microsoft that made those decision for Halo Infinite launch I don’t want to blam them for somthing that’s isn’t there fault. But that just the way I see it.