So Halo 5 has been out now for almost 3 days and it is clear that the gameplay is very well designed but there is still plenty of room for improvements outside of the gameplay. I would like to share my feedback and ideas on how 343 can make Halo 5 an even better game and how it will help to improve the experience.
First of all, Halo 5 is currently missing the ability to view earned medals after a match and to view the total amount of earned medals in-game. We can view our total amount of medals on Halo Waypoint and the Halo Channel app but medals are a key part of the Halo multiplayer experience, especially in Arena, but there is no way to show them off or view them after a match to see how many you earned. In Halo 3 it was great to view your medals and see a lot of them because you knew you did well that match and since 343 fixed the medal spam issue in Halo 5, it would be great to have this back to get those accomplishment feelings back after a match.
Secondly, there is currently no way to view how far you are progressing or declining in your CSR rank. I remember having this in the beta but it is no longer in the full game. I would like to see this return with an update to make it easier and clearer to understand how my CSR is progressing.
Another feature missing is the ability to view other player’s Spartan, CSR-rank and stances in a matchmaking lobby. In previous Halo games we had a lobby list on the left showing all the players in the lobby (this is still the case in Custom Games) and we could browse through them and view their CSR rank, Spartan, Spartan Stance and Service Record. I’m really missing this UI design in Halo 5 and I hope 343 can change this because right now there is no point in having Spartan stances if nobody can even see them in a matchmaking lobby.
Something that kinda bothered/worried me before the launch of Halo 5 was the amount of available gametypes in both matchmaking and custom games and sadly my concerns were justified since we only get to play Slayer variants (TS, FFA, Breakout, SWAT), CTF, Strongholds and Warzone. I know there will be a weekend playlist with gamemodes voted by the community but it still bothers me that none of the classic gamemodes that are missing from matchmaking are available in custom games. 343 is really underestimating the importance of the Custom Games community. We need gamemodes back like King of the Hill, Oddball, Grifball, Infection, Extraction, Assault and Regicide.
The playlists need more variety as well. The slayer playlist is currently lacking map variety. We can’t even play it on all the maps! One of the best Slayer maps in Halo 5, Empire, is currently not available in the Team Slayer playlist, only in the Team Arena playlist for Team Slayer. Besides the maps, there is serious lack of diverse gamemodes in matchmaking that 343 needs to adress rather soon than later.
My last suggestion for 343 is to be more creative with their map designs for the free DLC maps because I see a lot of missed opportunities in the current maps in terms of aesthetic creativity. They could have done so much more with the Fathom map in terms of aesthetics. It has the exact same UNSC blocks as The Rig which makes it feel kinda generic. Eden is also way too similar to Empire. Maps need to be more diverse in future DLC maps and we need some outdoor spaces for Arena instead of having tons of industrial spaces.
Some bugs I noticed:
- Theater is inaccurate in terms of shooting
- Zooming doesn’t work in Theater
- Theater is showing wrong gamertags in Warzone
- Leaving a lobby after a match brings you back to the main menu instead of the playlist selection
- Lowering your weapon only works for first person, not third person
It may seem like I have a lot of points for 343 to make Halo 5 better but I truely love the gameplay of the game and I enjoy it a lot but I just hope 343 continues to listen to the community to improve the quality of the game. It’s supposed to be 3 year game! I really want Halo 5 to be the next big Halo game people will remember for years like Reach and Halo 3 and the quality of the gameplay is there, but the game needs more surroundings around the gameplay.
EDIT:
Something I forgot to mention is instant-respawning in SWAT. It just doesn’t work and makes the gameplay too fast for such lethal damage gametype. A respawn timer is needed to improve the quality of the SWAT experience in Halo 5.