Halo 5 obviously shows that heavy focus was placed on the multiplayer, but there are some huge things that just cannot be ignored. I love the game so far, and I think that this game has the potential to be extremely successful, but the way the game has been designed creates some big problems that I have. Let me just start out by saying that this is my opinion, but I have heard these same thoughts by my friends and people that I play with.
- UI
- Personally, I feel the UI is disappointing. The way it is set up just does not appeal to the user and the divisions just do not look good where they have been placed. I would have liked to see the UI from Halo Reach, where you can scroll over the person’s name and their Spartan appears. Who doesn’t like seeing how everybody else’s Spartan looks just scrolling down, instead of inspecting each player individually. Even Halo 4’s UI was better than this, and that is saying something. This isn’t a major issue and probably won’t be changed, but I would like to see it changed a little.
- Customization
- This is the biggest part of the game that frustrates me. They mislead us by telling us how many different ways we could customize our Spartan. We are limited to the helmet, armor, and visor. Why would you take out the Halo Reach and Halo 4 armor customization, we enjoyed mixing and matching armor pieces, and to take that out is just ridiculous. Most of the visor variants are almost identical, and the colors we were given just look bad. I don’t know what 343i is doing to get such washed out colors, but they need to be changed. Us being required to have a 4 letter/number long service tag also is a bother. Emblems in this game suck too. Besides the fact that the classic Halo emblems have been removed, mixing and matching emblems were a huge thing in Halo. Taking that out was a huge mistake, and the way we color the emblems currently doesn’t make sense. Let us choose the colors, not from a preset color scheme. This is all just for personal preference, but I really feel we were limited in 343i’s decision to use this type of customization.
- Gameplay Problems
- I would like to say that the majority of Halo 5’s multiplayer is designed well, but these suggestions would improve the game greatly. There obviously needs to be a nerf with the automatic weapons, they are just too powerful. Unbalanced weapons is to be expected with new game releases, but I would like to see them fixed sooner rather than later. Also, the spawn system in this game is awful. There is almost no spawn regularity, and blocking spawns in game is almost non-existent. If you die in one place, you should not spawn 3 times in a row in the same place, dying to the same person each time. The hitbox of the sniper rifle, the beam rifle, and the light rifle is just ridiculous too. There is an extreme amount of auto aim, and most of the time you can miss the person completely and still be credited for the shot landing or killing them. The fact that this is applied to certain weapons and not others, is stupid. The aim assist with primary weapons (BR, Pistol, AR) is little to none, and that creates the much needed skill gap in the game. Please go through and change the absurd amount of aim assist with those weapons, they should require skill to use and currently that is not the case.
- File Browser System
- I do not know whether this is going to be implemented along with forge, but this is a must have in a Halo title. Not to mention that countless people use it for various reasons, from showing off gameplay, to making amazing screenshots, to sharing popular maps with friends, this needs to be in the game. Another thing that I will throw in with this is the current theater system. Yes it is cool to analyze where everyone else is on the map in relation to you with the player outlines, but when you play back the film, your shots look like they are not even hitting the person you are shooting at. Why is this a thing in the game? The playback of your gameplay does not show you what actually happened, and this is a huge annoyance. Please fix this, this is on par with the Halo 4 killcam accuracy of playback.
- Playlists
- We have already seen that 343i is looking to implement playlists that were not shipped with the game, so that is promising. However, the fact that all playlists (besides warzone of course) are ranked, discourages people from playing Arena. Social playlists need to be put in, because the majority of people who will play this game are not competitive. Also, solo queue playlists would be nice, if you would like to play Arena by yourself, and not constantly match up against a team of 4 and get demolished. This is a secondary suggestion, but having social playlists is a must.
Overall I really enjoy the game and I want to see it thrive. These are some suggestions that I feel would benefit the game, as I plan on playing it for a long time. I hope there are others that feel this way, and maybe we can see some of these issues resolved in the future. If you guys have anything that you would like to see fixed, please let me know. Thanks.