INNOVATION IN HALO / NEW GAMEPLAY IDEAS FOR H5

Games Halo 5: Guardians
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HALO HAS INVENTED. HALO INNOVATES FOR EACH NEW GAME. HALO DOES CHANGE. WHAT DIRECTION DO YOU THINK IT SHOULD GO IN NEXT? ARE MY IDEAS ANY GOOD? [My ideas are detailed in the 2nd, 9th, 13th & 14th posts [page 1] & 3, 5 & 7 on page 2–I needed a lot of room]

There’s been a lot of discussion about the Halo 5 Beta, and whether or not change is good for Halo. Here’s a short history of Halo’s innovations.

2001: The release of Halo: Combat Evolved.
Reaction: What is this? A console game? It’ll never catch on…
Innovations: The Golden Triangle of Halo [weapon, melee, grenades]–now an industry standard. Restricting the amount of weapons a player can carry to 2–now an industry standard [for comparison, take at how many weapons Gordon Freeman carries at once]. Wide-open, non-linear environments–now an industry standard. Sandbox gameplay, with a variety of ground and air vehicles which the player can use outside of rail shooting or other scripted events–not an industry standard. Smart enemy AI–not an industry standard. Most video games at this time used a health-only system. Regenerating shields were uncommon. Also, the god pistol. And the epic music.

2004: The release of Halo 2
Reaction: What is this? Online matchmaking? It’ll never catch on…
Innovations: Bungie invented online matchmaking. Online matchmaking, parties, and playlists were invented by Halo 2’s multiplayer team, for Halo 2. Look it up. Parties and playlists are now, of course, the industry standard. As to the gameplay itself? No health packs, new weapons and vehicles [the battle rifle and carbine, for example], destructible warthogs, lack of fall damage, rubbish pistols, dual-wielding, hijacking vehicles, not getting splattered after a gentle tap from said vehicles, the addition of gameplay-altering skulls to the campaign, the fact that enemy and friendly AI could adequately drive vehicles without an exact, scripted path…need I go on?

2007: The release of Halo 3
Reaction: Hype! Hype! Hype! Wait…they changed things from Halo 2! The campaign is too easy! Halo 3=overhyped.
Innovations: Forge mode. The ability the modify your own maps, even slightly, and create your own custom games on a console game? Obviously the community can’t possibly make much use of this. Say hello to Grifball! More weapons, more vehicles, more gameplay tweaks, more rubbish pistols. Some things, like the Spectre, are simply replaced. The addition of Equipment. The bubble and deflector shields, tripmines, gravity lifts, invincibility, regen field, power drain–all of them were quite hard to use properly, and quite fun–more on the lines of single-use power-ups. Theater mode, for the campaign and multiplayer–the ability for a party to replay your gameplay and view it from any angle, allowing you to notice things in the campaign that you’d never noticed before [like terminals and skulls, and a whopping great big planet-devouring Ark in the sky during the Warthog run–how the heck did I miss that!?], and a boon for machinima.

2009: The release of Halo 3 ODST and Halo Wars
Reaction: Two Halo games in one year? One an RTS? This isn’t Halo! The other is just an overpriced expansion pack! Talk about milking the franchise…
Innovations in Halo Wars: The most successful console RTS game. Awesome cinematics by Blur Studio, and sure, the gameplay may be dumbed down, but the campaign and multiplayer is still seriously fun and the control system is very fluid. Ensemble Studios also did a fantastic job of meticulously preserving the feel of Halo.
Innovations in Halo 3 ODST: Every other Halo game is essentially linear. This was a city to explore, with a secondary story [Sadie’s] to find The enemy AI was improved significantly. Visible shields were out, and health packs were back in. VISR mode for the night-time, and the VISR interface in general. Walking around that city was a very different experience to the rest of the franchise–definitely not bombastic, and more of a film noir. Having the mostly non-verbal interaction with the city AI through supply caches, ringing phones and honking cars was a very nice touch. Also, Firefight. Did I mention Firefight? No? It was awesome in ODST. Just. Plain. Awesome. I also had a ton of fun with The Squad.

2010: The release of Halo Reach
Reacton: Armour Lock, Bloom and Loadouts? Nope, that’s it Bungie, you should just leave—hey wait, you’re actually leaving Halo!? NOOOOO! COME BACK!!!
I probably don’t need to go into the problems people had with Reach before 343 industries took over. Armour Lock, Jetpacks, Loadouts. Reusable, map breaking Armour Abilities. The story and canonicity of the campaign. The characters, The maps. The lack of a skill-based ranking system. A lot changed in Reach, and people found problems with it. I also don’t need to remind anyone of what happened when 343 industries actually implemented some of the changes that some people in the community wanted…
Innovations: Aside from the above innovations, Forge mode was vastly improved with Forge World…although it was a bit grey, and Firefight was also improved. Theater mode became a solo venture, but with a rewind button, and your Spartan character became fully customizable.

2011: The release of Halo CEA
Reaction: This is awesome. Where’s my multiplayer, though?
Innovations: Well…having the Anniversary maps be Reach DLC without the original MP maps included was a bit of a naff decision, but in regards to the campaign…every other company was content with slapping a HD sticker on the game and calling it a day. Instead, we got a graphical and sound overhaul, with a neat option to switch back and forth between old and new graphics. Now that’s a HD upgrade.

2012: The release of Halo 4
Reaction: I WANT MY BUNGIE BACK! Oh, actually this is quite fun. Cool story. Wait…nononononononono! BRING BACK CORTANA! I WANT BUNGIE BACK!
Innovations: Tweaks, tweaks, and more tweaks. New weapons, vehicles, and a completely new faction of enemies [The Prometheans], with perversely overpowered AI. Support Upgrades and Loadouts and Tactical packages and Weapon Drops and a whole lot of MacGuffins for multiplayer. Spartan Ops–an experimental, weekly co-op firefight/campaign crossover–pity there wasn’t a friendly AI squadmate or two like Halo 3’s Arbiter. It’s Crimson Team, not Crimson Lone Wolf Spartan whose respawn point sucks. I should also mention that prior to Halo 4, all the cutscenes for the FPS Halo games were done using scripted game engine sequences–as in, the game engine renders the scene in real time. This was replaced by prerendering for Halo 4’s Prologue and Epilogue and the Spartan Ops cutscenes–by Blur Studio! Hello again! However, believe it or not, some of Halo 4’s cutscenes are still real time game renders. Most games don’t do real time cutscenes.

2013: The release of Spartan Assault
Reaction and Innovation: Well, making a Halo tablet game is new. Playing a few minutes of this at a time is extremely fun, but overall it’s such as grind. Spartan Ops repeat. I’m pretty sure there is a circle of hell reserved exclusively for microtransactions, too.

2014: The release of the Master Chief Collection.
Reaction and Innovation: There have been collections. There have been hd upgrades. There have been graphical remakes. There have been worse video game launches [Half-Life 2 and World of Warcraft, I’m looking at YOU]. There may have even been collections which combined the MP of five different game engines online–although I doubt it. The MCC Collection has it all.

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I must say: the reaction of the community to each new Halo game, the Halo 5 Beta and even each new hint of change is…entertaining, to say the least.

Staying on-topic, and keeping in mind I haven’t seen too much of the Beta footage, here are some things I’d like to see in Halo 5 and future games.

–Multiplayer and Firefight Vehicular Combat modes. Come on, I know that blasting away enemies as a footsoldier is fun, but Halo is also known for its wide range of vehicles–ground, air and space. Hornets, Falcons, Banshees, Seraphs, Broadswords, Longswords, Capital ships, Warthogs, Tanks, Ghosts, Wraiths, Prowlers, Choppers, Spectres, Revenants, Mammoths, Scarabs, Vultures. It’s all there. Outside of the campaigns, Halo Wars had the most effective use of vehicular combat in multiplayer. Heck, I’d like to see at least a dozen vehicles in space, air or on the ground blasting away at eachother as modes in multiplayer and Firefight. Spartan Ops was only fun with vehicles.

–Ocean combat–above and below. It’s Halo. It’s the future. Where are the underwater and floating cities? Where are the battleships and submarines? 71% of the Earth’s surface is water. A good chunk of each Halo Ring’s surface is water. At least have a campaign mission or two with water combat…that view under the water in Halo 2 was beautiful. Space and the Ocean have always been regarded as being similar, so let’s have more of both in Halo. I’d also like to point out that the Ghost and Wraiths are hovercraft, so why do they sink?

–Forge Games in Matchmaking–Being able to set the locations of enemy and friendly AI spawns on Firefight maps, and integrating those maps into the Forge experience. Then have a gametype with enemy AI and friendly AI armies battling it out, with players as Monitors providing support using Forge mode from overhead, and hey! We have a makeshift RTS in an FPS game!

–Promethean vehicles and Weapons. The majority of Covenant technology, weapons and vehicles are based on Forerunner technology. So where are the Forerunner vehicles? How about the Forerunner version of the Needler? Halo 4 and Spartan Ops suffered from repetitive combat, especially against the Prometheans who cannot use vehicles. More vehicles and weapons is never a bad thing.

–Mammoth vs Scarab battles. Vultures vs Liches? Elephants vs Shadows? Specifically focusing on the Mammoth and the Scarab, every time I see these vehicles I think of pirate ship battles. These vehicles are massive troop and vehicle carriers, can take a huge amount of punishment, and should be able to dish out an insane amount of damage. They’re mobile fortresses–castles to defend, enemy ships to board. I think a multiplayer/firefight mode or two featuring these would be incredibly fun.

–Unify the entire Halo Sandbox in Forge–the Master Chief Collection is a step in the right direction here. Take a look at the vast array of vehicles, weapons, equipment, grenade types, armour abilities, power-ups, aircraft, stationary turrets and miscellaneous toys and structures there are in the Halo franchise. How great would it be if ALL of them were available on a map?

–Altering the Gravity–These goes hand in hand with underwater and space based combat. Players have long been able to create zones in maps, power-ups or gametypes which alter the player’s speed and jump height. This seems like an area Forerunners would be experts in. Zero-g, altering the direction of gravity, restriction of movement in water, moving against the flow of conveyer belts/air/water, man-cannons–all are things which Halo hints at in gameplay but rarely utilises properly. Heck, you’d think that the gravity would have been different between various planets, ships, and Halo Installations, at least.

–Wide open, non-linear maps–Halo 4 [the campaign, Spartan Ops, and even the multiplayer maps] failed to deliver this, especially. Even the big maps feel tightly enclosed. Now, I know everyone is excited about the return of small, arena-based maps, and yes, I agree that is the best gameplay decision they could have made for infantry combat in multiplayer. However, this isn’t just about multiplayer. Halo 1, 2, 3, ODST, and Reach had huge, wide open areas for vehicle combat in the campaign --and that extended into the multiplayer with maps like Blood Gulch, Sidewinder, Avalanche, Sandtrap and Sandbox. Those maps were fun. Reach vehicle MP only becomes fun in the Heavies map variants, for some reason, and I seem to remember Exile as being the only good vehicle map in Halo 4. Even the Forerunner structures–the playable areas–in Halo 4 seem scaled down compared to prior Halos. “This cave is not a natural formation”–was our first introduction to Forerunner structures, and a Pelican or a Phatom could have easily fit through there. Even the Mammoth was really restricted in movement compared to the Scarab and air battles we used to have. Those expansive maps from prior Halos need to return.

**EMP–**Halo Reach mucked around with Armour Lock, Grenade Launchers, and other UNSC EMP weapons–and the Power Drain and Promethean Grenade were also interesting. However, the most effective weapon in the Halo universe since Halo 3 for disabling vehicles, and disabling shields full stop is the Plasma Pistol. Why are there no equivalent weapons to this? The Boltshot seems to be the closest, but has no EMP function. Time and time again in the Halo 4 and Spartan Ops campaigns–and in any Halo game, when I need a noob combo, I reach for the Plasma Pistol–which is a bit difficult when there are no handy mobile Plasma Pistol storage devices [Grunts] around.

Enemy Types: Human, Covenant, Flood, Forerunner, Prometheans–once again, fighting against the Covenant and Prometheans in Halo 4 was a bit dull. The Covenant, because we’d fought against them so much before, and there were no Buggers or Brutes or Skirmishers to mix things up [add that to the fact that the weapons and vehicle sandbox was significantly reduced from Reach and Halo 3]. Prometheans were also not integrated into the campaign experience very effectively. From memory, there was only one mission where Prometheans were fighting against the Covenant, and one mission where Prometheans were fighting with the Covenant, as opposed to spawning in after the Covenant were all dead. Having Prometheans directing groups of Elites, or Watchers spawning shields for Jackals and Grunts, would have made an interesting combat experience. I should also note that the Prometheans were too OP with their abilities, and they could have had more distinguishable types based on ability use.
The Flood in Halo 3 had many enemy types, but forgot how to drive from Halo 2. Return in H5? I’d also like to see the Juggernaut.
The Spartans were originally created to fight Insurrectionist humans. That hasn’t ever been explored in gameplay.

–As to the Halo 5 Beta itself, and the gameplay shown in that…it looks different, it looks fast paced, and I’ll see for myself how it plays in a few days. But what do you guys think? Personally, out of loadouts and armour abilities and equipment, I liked the equipment in Halo 3 the best–it was always a one-use only thing, just like a power-up [Overshield and Invisibility]. Halo 5 seems to have gone in the opposite direction, with new abilities being available permanently for everyone. That doesn’t preclude the use of additional, non-integral equipment.

–Anyway, these are just some of my ideas. What do you think? I have more further down this page.

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Here is a water level from Halo Custom Edition (a legal, official version of Halo PC that allows custom maps and modding)

There’s boats, but the water itself isn’t something you fight in. Rather, the water is a hazard, if you sink, you just drown. So a lot of the gameplay revolves around knocking people off their boats into the deep, or stopping boats before they reach your base / island. People would disagree but this is the kind of water combat I want to see, not water combat where you’re swimming in the water and shooting.

You’ll also notice the map has jetpacks, but in the form of a vehicle instead of an ability.

To be honest, Halo Custom Edition is years ahead of its time. There’s a lot of neat ideas that are original yet still actually play like Halo. But I digress.

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> 2533274819302824;3:
> Here is a water level from Halo Custom Edition (a legal, official version of Halo PC that allows custom maps and modding)
> There’s boats, but the water itself isn’t something you fight in. Rather, the water is a hazard, if you sink, you just drown. So a lot of the gameplay revolves around knocking people off their boats into the deep, or stopping boats before they reach your base / island. People would disagree but this is the kind of water combat I want to see, not water combat where you’re swimming in the water and shooting.
> You’ll also notice the map has jetpacks, but in the form of a vehicle instead of an ability.
> To be honest, Halo Custom Edition is years ahead of its time. There’s a lot of neat ideas that are original yet still actually play like Halo. But I digress.

Thanks for the link! Whenever the community is given modding tools–whether with Halo Custom Edition/Vista, or with Forge, they just run with it, which I find amazing. However, there is so much content out there that even interested players are never going to see a fraction of the fan-created content.

I’m not sure where anyone got the idea that Spartans can swim in 1000 pound Mjolnir armour. They have a 90 minute air supply, so they can walk on the bottom, and I guess they have emergency thruster packs, so it would be a bit like fighting in extremely low gravity–which is something else Halo has only dealt with once in Reach.

What I don’t get, is the lack of battleships, aircraft-carriers, underwater missile silos and submarines in Halo. Halo 2 dealt somewhat with going underwater and flooded underground corridors, but that’s it. Take a look at the Ghost and Wraith, and the upcoming UNSC Kestrel. Those are hovercraft, so they should be able to hover equally well on water. But they sink. Heck, look at that scene in Halo Wars where the Spirit of Fire has the sea part below it. That ship even looks like a wet-navy ship. I keep seeing these hints of viable water-based combat in Halo, and yet, nothing has been done with it.

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> 2533274880692195;2:
> –Unify the entire Halo Sandbox in Forge–the Master Chief Collection is a step in the right direction here. Take a look at the vast array of vehicles, weapons, equipment, grenade types, armour abilities, power-ups, aircraft, stationary turrets and miscellaneous toys and structures there are in the Halo franchise. How great would it be if ALL of them were available on a map.

And if they were to take all the custom game options from Halo 3, Halo Reach, and Halo 4 and added them all with even more options in Halo 5. What’s the use of making crazy maps if we get very simple play options. They should allow all gametypes ever created such as Stockpile and headhunter from Reach, option to award points for kills in an oddball game, etc.

Then the sky is the limit if creative players are given all of that.

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> 2533274800746556;5:
> And if they were to take all the custom game options from Halo 3, Halo Reach, and Halo 4 and added them all with even more options in Halo 5. What’s the use of making crazy maps if we get very simple play options. They should allow all gametypes ever created such as Stockpile and headhunter from Reach, option to award points for kills in an oddball game, etc. Then the sky is the limit if creative players are given all of that.

Hey, you’re right! I never even realized that a lot of gametypes and customizable options went missing between those games. I was just upset at the vehicles and weapons being limited. Just for fun, I’m in the middle of making a list of all the vehicles, weapons, and equipment in the games, to see how crazy a Forge mode like that would be. It’s already at Borderlands-levels of insanity, but I guess I’ll add in this as well.

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Maybe if this thread gets really in depth about stuff like that, 343i “MIGHT” see this and take a lot of this into consideration since in all honesty, they still have a lot of time to build, test, and package a lot of features. I just hope they don’t go the easy way out and just do campaign and basic multiplayer can call it a day. Since they took Halo over, they really neglected all the extra stuff Bungie had us accustomed to.

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> 2533274800746556;7:
> Maybe if this thread gets really in depth about stuff like that, 343i “MIGHT” see this and take a lot of this into consideration since in all honesty, they still have a lot of time to build, test, and package a lot of features. I just hope they don’t go the easy way out and just do campaign and basic multiplayer can call it a day. Since they took Halo over, they really neglected all the extra stuff Bungie had us accustomed to.

I seriously doubt that this thread is going to do anything but founder in the wash of complaints about the MCC and the eternal arguments between those players who do and don’t like change. I guess you can say that the entire point of this thread is: Halo’s gameplay changes significantly from game to game. You can see that in the MCC. Halo 5 will once again, be different, so instead of arguing about the merits of change, how about we discuss what you would like to see in the Halo 5 instead?

Halo 4 suffered significantly due to hardware limitations. Not so much due to Xbox processing power, or anything like that, but simply due to lack of storage space. Remember, we had to install the entire multiplayer experience–which was on a separate disc–and then download the rest of the Spartan Ops Episodes, and then download the DLC multiplayer maps? The major difference between Xbox 360 [console] games vs PCs or the Xbox One is the fact that you didn’t need to install anything, you could run the game off your disc, so buying extra storage space [hardware] was never required. That is a major advantage that consoles had over PCs, which was slowly lost through the Xbox 360’s run. With the size of video games now, it’s like they’re trying to make the consumer give up on having a physical, transferable copy–never realizing that they could just sell us games on USB memory sticks and avoid having download/internet issues and including Blu-ray players.

Anyway, what I guess I’m trying to say is that 343 industries–for good or ill–likes tying together all the various bits of canon and gameplay. HCEA and The MCC is proof of that in itself. So something like bringing every weapon, vehicle, equipment, game type, and everything else together into one unified Forge/campaign experience is right up their alley. I just hope they realize that in time for Halo 5.

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yep

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Add the option for INDESTRUCTIBLE VEHICLES–In Halo Combat evolved the Scorpion Tank and Warthog were indestructible. Other vehicles were rather tough. Usually, the battle would result in the driver of the vehicle being killed, and the vehicle being left behind intact, at a random location on the map, for other players to take. Halo 2 made every vehicle destructible and hijackable, and Halo 3 added the Plasma Pistol. The Plasma Pistol, essentially, nerfed vehicles entirely, and things have gone south for vehicles ever since then. Don’t misunderstand me, sometimes you can still run into people who get ridiculous amounts of kill streaks in vehicles, and it’s impossible to bring them down due to a lack of plasma pistols or power weapons. Oh, wait…I just put the plasma pistol into the category of a power weapon. Anyway, having indestructible vehicles, or at the very least, less destructible vehicles, would alter the flow of gameplay, simply because when the driver is killed, the victor gets the vehicle instead of a smoking wreck.

The Plasma Pistol is OP in multiplayer, and is too weak in campaign–I should mention this–Rapid Assault Vehicles [Ghosts, Warthogs] are superior to Spartans. Wraiths are superior to RAVs. Aircraft [Banshees, Hornets, and Falcons] are superior to Wraiths, and Tanks beat everything. However, in actuality, a Spartan with a plasma pistol beats everything else. Now, attempts have been made to rectify this by reducing the Plasma Pistol’s ammunition, which is a rather dumb decision seeing as the Plasma Pistol is essential for the campaign and Spartan Ops on higher difficulties. Taking out a Promethean Knight without a Plasma Pistol by your side on Legendary is suicide. Its almost like we need two Plasma Pistol variants: an EMP weapon with only a few shots which can disable a vehicle, but is useless against shields, and a shield-disabling variant which has a large amount of charge, but has no EMP effect on vehicles. Trying to combine both of these weapons into one thing just doesn’t work.

More Weapons and Vehicles with the Plasma Pistol’s properties– I’ve gone over this before, but you’ll find that most weapons belonging to one faction–UNSC, Covenant, Brutes, Forerunners–have equivalents in the other factions. I just don’t get why the Plasma pistol, with its properties of disabling vehicles and shields in one overcharged shot which tracks its target, and has a standard mode with weak, pathetic shots which can be fired as fast as you can pull the trigger–is a one of a kind weapon, I mean, it was based on Forerunner technology and wasn’t invented by the Grunts, right? For that matter, why isn’t there a vehicle in multiplayer which has a weapon that can disable other vehicles? Actually, I know there is one in Halo lore–the Gremlin in Halo Wars.

First person POV in vehicles, passengers on Tanks–minor change, but I loved the fact that you could ride on the side of a Scorpion tank or in the passenger seat of a Warthog and get a beautiful cinematic first person view. Perhaps if there was an option to switch between the two modes? Third person doesn’t really offer that much of an advantage, and it’s visually less impressive. There is also the fact that Scorpion tanks can hold four passengers in campaign, and the Falcon can also hold more passengers than the gunners. I get that this was removed in multiplayer for balancing issues, but seriously, so what? The Hornet could carry passengers, and if there is concern about the Wraith being unable to, then design a Covenant vehicle that does the same thing, like the Spectre or Prowler.

Troop Transport Hog, Pelican, Phantom, other Vehicles left out in MP–elaborating on an earlier point, why isn’t the Troop Transport Hog usable in multiplayer? Or the Grenade launcher Falcon? Or the Pelican? Or the Phantom? Why don’t we have a missile launcher hog [Halo 3 turret]. Or the Anti-Air Wraith? Why can’t the pilot of the Falcon use the main gun? Granted, some of these need to be modified for multiplayer, because the rate of fire is OP, but that’s all that needs to be changed, the rate of fire. Features like this don’t need to be removed, and if the Covenant–or any other faction–don’t have an equivalent vehicle, then design one.

Weaponless vehicles, Civilian Vehicles, and Forklifts–honestly, the worst vehicle in the entire Halo series has to be the Mongoose. It’s a military, weaponless vehicle which, at best, can have a Spartan with a fuel rod gun on the back of it. In Halo Reach, we got some more drivable vehicles: the Truck, which at the very least provided a lot of protection to the driver. The Cart, which is fun with a bunch of players with power weapons on the back of it, and the Forklift. The Almightly Forklift. Bungie, if you already had programmed the forklift to be able to lift things, then why on Earth would you waste time removing that feature? You could have used it in campaign or multiplayer to shift objects around, blocking or opening up pathways in maps. It was a cool feature which could have altered the course of a battle. Sure, it’s a crazy idea, but crazy ideas work. On another note, I’m very appreciative of the fact that 343 industries has created the Gungoose, and is bringing back the Kestrel VTOL from Halo 2’s cut content. Anyway, I hope to see some more non-military vehicles, human and Covenant, in future Halo games.

Dropping in to Multiplayer, Stop Using Teleport–once again, I haven’t seen much Halo 5 Beta gameplay–I’ll see what it is like on the 29th. Whenever I see the ODST drop pods–or even the Pelican, Phantom, and Spirit dropping off reinforcements or weapons, I think that would be a great way to start a multiplayer match or get weapon drops, either arriving in orbit, or stepping off a dropship. Heck, you could even have a Mammoth or Elephant or Scarab or Shadow driving in to drop off the troops. With all of these methods of transportation–even Forerunners had the gondola and underwater cages and man-cannons, why is it that in multiplayer and campaign, there is so much teleportation? I understand that there were teleporters even in the first Halo, but they at least are site-to-site only. Clearing out enemies and having more suddenly teleport in out of nowhere isn’t just annoying, it’s bad design. Speaking of which, if drop pods and phantoms are appearing out of nowhere, then I want to see the capital ship or location they are coming from, and that way, when I finally defeat all the enemies, it doesn’t feel arbitrary, because I can see that no more troops are going to suddenly appear out of thin air.

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> 2533274880692195;10:
> AHAHAHAHA! Why!? Stupid 7,500 character limit. I have more things to add to the two original posts, as the author of this thread! I suppose I could have made a few dozen threads instead…hmm…
>
> Add the option for INDESTRUCTIBLE VEHICLES–In Halo Combat evolved the Scorpion Tank and Warthog were indestructible. Other vehicles were rather tough. Usually, the battle would result in the driver of the vehicle being killed, and the vehicle being left behind intact, at a random location on the map, for other players to take. Halo 2 made every vehicle destructible and hijackable, and Halo 3 added the Plasma Pistol. The Plasma Pistol, essentially, nerfed vehicles entirely, and things have gone south for vehicles ever since then. Don’t misunderstand me, sometimes you can still run into people who get ridiculous amounts of kill streaks in vehicles, and it’s impossible to bring them down due to a lack of plasma pistols or power weapons. Oh, wait…I just put the plasma pistol into the category of a power weapon. Anyway, having indestructible vehicles, or at the very least, less destructible vehicles, would alter the flow of gameplay, simply because when the driver is killed, the victor gets the vehicle instead of a smoking wreck.
>
> The Plasma Pistol is OP in multiplayer, and is too weak in campaign–I should mention this–Rapid Assault Vehicles [Ghosts, Warthogs] are superior to Spartans. Wraiths are superior to RAVs. Aircraft [Banshees, Hornets, and Falcons] are superior to Wraiths, and Tanks beat everything. However, in actuality, a Spartan with a plasma pistol beats everything else. Now, attempts have been made to rectify this by reducing the Plasma Pistol’s ammunition, which is a rather dumb decision seeing as the Plasma Pistol is essential for the campaign and Spartan Ops on higher difficulties. Taking out a Promethean Knight without a Plasma Pistol by your side on Legendary is suicide. Its almost like we need two Plasma Pistol variants: an EMP weapon with only a few shots which can disable a vehicle, but is useless against shields, and a shield-disabling variant which has a large amount of charge, but has no EMP effect on vehicles. Trying to combine both of these weapons into one thing just doesn’t work.
>
> More Weapons and Vehicles with the Plasma Pistol’s properties– I’ve gone over this before, but you’ll find that most weapons belonging to one faction–UNSC, Covenant, Brutes, Forerunners–have equivalents in the other factions. I just don’t get why the Plasma pistol, with its properties of disabling vehicles and shields in one overcharged shot which tracks its target, and has a standard mode with weak, pathetic shots which can be fired as fast as you can pull the trigger–is a one of a kind weapon, I mean, it was based on Forerunner technology and wasn’t invented by the Grunts, right? For that matter, why isn’t there a vehicle in multiplayer which has a weapon that can disable other vehicles? Actually, I know there is one in Halo lore–the Gremlin in Halo Wars.

now that the plasma pistol is a pickup in h5 it all works fine, fair starts is a blessing :slight_smile:

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People don’t like change and for those who don’t, play MCC.

The plasma pistol is OP in Halo 2. In other gamers it’s not that awesome. In my opinion, the plasma should have an EMP effect against vehicles and Spartans.

Halo 5 has the potential to bring alot of what we are talking about into reality. I really hope that they are doing that. They have been doing a great job connecting the Halo Universe. I’m sure they will add even more to their second main stream game since they took the time to connect HCEA and H2A as well.

If I fire up Halo 5 and it is this amazing game with balanced multiplayer, a very immersive and replayable campaign, and then tons of community content creation and sharing tools (extensive forge and custom game options with community searchable files), I probably will not buy another Xbox One title for a long time.

I want the Hornet in Halo 5 :wink: its amazing in Halo 2 Anniversary BTB.

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> RoderickVI said: now that the plasma pistol is a pickup in h5 it all works fine, fair starts is a blessing :slight_smile:

Ah…you might think that would solve the problem, but it really doesn’t. Try playing Spartan Ops solo sometime, and you’ll see what I mean. Weapons dropped on the ground despawn within seven seconds, and you will quickly find that you run out of ammunition. Especially against Promethean Knights, the Plasma Pistol is essential, and often the only way to acquire it when there are no Grunts is to equip it in the loadouts–and because of the low amount of uses the Plasma pistol has, the player ends up committing suicide in order to recharge the plasma pistol–so it is rather frustrating and canonically inconsistent for the Plasma Pistol to be the sole weapon effective at repeatedly removing shields and EMPing vehicles

> ExG Trigger said: People don’t like change and for those who don’t, play MCC.

Anyone who plays the MCC because they don’t like change in Halo is, speaking bluntly, suffering from blinkered thinking. I believe I have provided a rather clear indication that the MCC is all of Halo’s gameplay changes throughout the last 14 years combined in the OP. More bluntly: if you don’t like change, you can’t play Halo. Aside from that sentence, the rest of your post is great. :slight_smile:
As to the plasma pistol being OP in Halo 2–I don’t think it should be dual wielded. It’s essentially a power-weapon in every single game. If we’re talking about other OP weapons in Halo 2, then I need to look no further than the needler. Ah heck, I just had another idea…

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Dual wielding needs a major rethink–In terms of balancing issues, currently it just breaks everything. Weapons which are useful on their own become overpowered when dual wielded, and weapons which are balanced when dual wielded are just pathetic on their own. Case in point: needlers in Halo 2, and the magnum pistol in the same game. If dual wielding was to make a return, it might have to be primarily for the campaign. In multiplayer, you could have a mode with no dual wielding whatsoever, and then you would have another mode with every weapon being dual wielded. Actually, that might be interesting, especially if the weapon spawns only had one of each weapon. It would definitely encourage crazy combos.
The key thing with dual wielding is to significantly reduce the accuracy of weapons when dual wielded–not to restrict ammunition, or only have certain weapons to be dual wielded. For example: dual energy swords. Sounds fun, right? Well, what if you couldn’t use the lunge ability when dual wielding? Add that to the fact that two energy swords would block a significant chunk of the screen. With dual fuel-rod cannons, you would have tunnel vision, and your aim would be wobbling all over the place.

Impractical spaceship interiors–Oddly enough, in Halo 4, we didn’t actually fight in the interior of a large Covenant spaceship. We did get treated to the interior of the Mantle’s Approach and Forward Unto Dawn, as well as the Infinity. Perhaps 343 industries felt that there were just too many corridors. I’m not sure why there has to be so many corridors in spaceships. I liked the Pillar of Autumn level–you got a clear sense that humans actually spent time on board that ship, with the cafeteria, the drinks stands, the armory, the hangar bay, the engine room, the cryo-bay, the bridge, the escape pods. We never got to see the entertainment centre, the kitchen, the sports gym, the officer’s lounge, the crew quarters, life support, hydroponics, or anything like that though. Think of Mass Effect’s Normandy, or a sea-going ship, or the Andromeda–all of that has to be there, not just for human ships, but for alien ships as well. Instead, we get–corridors, with random ammo crates scattered everywhere. Is the Didact’s ship being helpful or something? Hey, look, a human just invaded the ship! Let’s give him some of our weapons! It’s not like the Prometheans can teleport directly from the armory, or anything…

**Halo Wars bases–**I’d also like to see some more use of the UNSC and Covenant bases in Halo Wars–we kind of see that in Spartan Ops, but not to any great effect. Even though many people derided the compact “ready made UNSC/Covenant base in a kit” design, I think it’s actually the type of thing that a futuristic military would go for. Fighting against Covenant and need a base? Sure! We’ve got a bunch already made in orbit. We’ll just drop one in.
I’m kind of disappointed that these bases didn’t show up in Halo 4…or any Covenant base. We’ve seen the Covenant’s spaceships [mostly corridors] and we’ve seen the outskirts of the Covenant Holy City: High Charity [some open areas and corridors overlooking an impractically huge abyss] but we’ve yet to see what the Covenant are like on the ground. We saw a little of what UNSC colonies are like in Reach and UNSC science team bases in Halo 4, but they didn’t have airbases or vehicle depots or manufacturing facilities–and nothing like instantly deployable military bases. I’d like to see these in Halo 5, possibly as part of campaign, possibly as part of the multiplayer/Forge/Firefight experience.

Modify Ammo crates, Promethean ammunition, and please don’t delete discarded weapons when they have ammunition in them!–The UNSC has ammo crates for one very good reason: human weapons need ammo. Covenant weapons usually have a battery. Once the battery is depleted, the weapon is useless, and requires replacing. Who makes a weapon like that? Do the Covenant not understand how to recharge their own weapons*?* Wouldn’t it make sense for all those containers of plasma lying around to be for recharging their depleted weapons? Even if the battery is a non-rechargable type, at the very least, shouldn’t there be a way to swap out the battery instead of discarding the entire weapon? For that matter, I liked the Halo Reach ammo crates which actually showed ammunition packs. I just don’t get storing extra ammunition inside the weapon in the crate, and then having the weapon disappear. More ammo packs and batteries, less weapons in crates. I liked it in Halo CE when there were needler shards and ammunition packs just lying around.
So, humans have ammunition packs. Covenant weapons should have replacable batteries or should recharge at plasma stations, and ammunition packs of needles and fuel rod cells. What about the Prometheans? Well, they use hard light, so I’m guessing they should be solar-powered or something, and recharge over time. The fact that Prometheans can currently teleport in from anywhere means that it’s impractical for the Prometheans to have so many ammo crates. Why should they need ammo in the first place? It doesn’t make any sense. The fact that the Forerunner weapons use antigravity when reshaping to fit your Spartan hand, or reloading, or simply have floating parts should use far more energy than simply firing projectiles. Forerunners shouldn’t need ammo crates. They should just request a weapon from their armour, or from the ship, etc, and have it coalesce in their hands.

Nerf Promethean Teleportation–Prometheans should only be able to teleport line-of-sight, with some sort of visual indicator to show the direction they have gone in. Or, after teleporting, their shields should always be depleted for several seconds… Remember in Halo CE? Using the teleportation grid would require a “rather consequential expenditure of energy?” Shooting a Promethean Knight, having it teleport to a random location, and having its shields instantly recharge is cheap boss fight logic–poor game design.
When a Watcher generates a turret or Crawlers or revives Knights, then until they are fully formed, the Watcher needs to be immobile, otherwise the turret/Crawlers/Knights disintegrate, as opposed to the Watcher waltzing off somewhere else, and the turret/Crawlers/Knights materializing a few seconds later.
Only Knights should be able to teleport in to the battlefield directly–with their shields down. They can quickly create Watchers, and then those Watchers can quickly summon turrets and Crawlers or revive Knights. I like this sort of cascade system, it’s what intelligent battle AI would do. Having Crimson Team or Master Chief clear an area of Watchers and Crawlers and Knights time and time and time again, only to have more teleport in out of nowhere is bad game design. Especially when, after an indeterminate amount of waves, the Prometheans stop teleporting in for no reason whatsoever. Then later, you have to go back to the area and clear it out again, because apparently the UNSC don’t know how to fortify an area.
Watchers and Crawlers need to arrive through the portal terminals. As in, there actually needs to be some portal-generating structure instead of portals randomly appearing in the sky for Watchers to come through.
Just because a portal is open doesn’t mean that Prometheans should then magically be able to spawn anywhere. They need to walk directly through the open portal [like in Stargate].

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Continuing my theme of improving Promethean design:

Increase Promethean Types for variety in combat: The Crawlers, Watchers and Promethean Knights as they are designed now are so overpowered and so lacking in visual variety, it’s not funny. Let’s break this down.

  • The Crawlers: These things are like a crossover between a Grunt and an Infection Form. They swarm all over the place, clambering on walls and ceilings, lunging forwards with a powerful melee, leap, lunge, and ability to teleport in from nowhere. The snipers can even use Promethean Vision to track the player. The only viable way to kill them is through a headshot.- I one major problem with the Crawlers. It’s hard to tell the types apart. Essentially, all Crawlers are is mobile weapons, and they have the pick of three weapons: boltshot, suppressor, and binary rifle. Unlike the Covenant, their type is determined by the weapon they carry, and they are, with difficulty, distinguished by their spines and fins, not through quickly identifiable armour colour codes like the UNSC, Covenant, and Sentinels. They have no shields, and they have no ranks, so all Crawlers have the same amount of health, and are equally easy to kill. Their behaviour is, of course different depending on what weapons they use.- I would like to see a Crawler ranking system with differing amounts of health. I would also like to see the higher ranked Crawlers be able to use special abilities, with lower ranks using less to none. For the Boltshot Crawler, the higher ranks could use the charged bolt function when they get in close. For the higher ranked Suppressor Crawler, they would be able to lunge, leap from place to place, and melee the player. For the Sniper crawlers, I would prefer it if they were larger, and have two firing modes: one in which they use the Lightrifle and are mobile, and one in which they deploy in a specific location and use a Binary Rifle. There should also be shielded and invisible Crawler variants, and possibly a Crawler variant which uses grenades. This crawler could lock down in one location and serve as a tripmine, or sneak up to the player and explode.- The Watchers: These things are crazy. They fly away from the player when shot, they have a ridiculously small head, they can revive dead Knights, they can generate hardlight shields in front of Prometheans, they can summon/create packs of Crawlers or Stationary Turrets, they can return grenades to sender, they have rechargeable shields and they can shoot at you. I think that’s a little too much for one flying pest. If it had more health and better weapons, it would be classified as a boss enemy.- I think that Watchers should never fly away from the player, or hide behind cover when they have shields. They’re hard enough to hit as it is–just have them strafe from side to side. Once again, the Watchers need different ranks and types. Have the lower ranked ones be without shields, and have less health. Have an invisible variant. Break up the Watchers’ abilities and give them to separate types, leaving room for the Uber-Watcher which has them all Have Watchers with different weapons and behaviours–boltshot, suppressor, lightrifle, binary rifle, scattershot, grenadier. Have a Watcher variant dedicated to reviving Prometheans and spawning in turrets, have an aggressive Watcher variant which hunts and pursues the enemy, and have one dedicated to support and returning grenades by shielding Knights, Grunts, Crawlers, Elites, other Watchers, etc. Most importantly of all, colour code the different types, don’t just put extra fins or have a second tiny head.- The Knights: Each fight against these guys is like a mini-boss. It’s just too much. They have ridiculously tough shields which recharge incredibly quickly, a high amount of health, and a tiny head requiring multiple headshots after the shields go down. Add that in to the fact that they have a short range teleport ability, a terrifying leap and lunge ability, a savagely powerful melee attack, no less than three one-shot kill weapons to choose from, the ability to create Watchers out of their backs and be revived, lob grenades long distances with great accuracy and frequency, and can use armour abilities like Forerunner Vision and Autosentry.- Once again, colour code the ranks and types of these guys, have different ranks with differing amounts of health and shields, and have the current “Promethean Knight,” which can use every ability, redesigned as a mini-boss. Have types categorized by ability use–Promethean Blade, teleport, leap, create Watchers, summon auto-sentry, use the one-shot power weapons. Have some Knights be shieldless, or invisible, or have overshields, or sprint.In essence, separate the current abilities and assign them to different ranks and sub-variants, which have varying shield strengths and health, have the current enemies be the highest ranking Prometheans, don’t forget about overshield and invisibility, and make sure that the variants and ranks are at least colour coded. I can’t wait to see a black, green, or blue Promethean Knight with those orange highlights.

Have non-orange highlighted Prometheans and Promethean weaponry–minor point, but when not under the Didact’s control, the Prometheans and Promethean weaponry is blue. The different Sentinel types, including Enforcers aren’t orange, and they don’t fire orange beams. Orange appears to be the Promethean colour signifying anger or rage, so I’m not sure why the weapons stay orange for the Chief. I’d like to see some blue-highlighted forerunner weapons in multiplayer.

Sentinels and Engineers as enemies: There are many different types of Sentinels in the Halo games; the standard Aggressor Sentinel, the Major Sentinel, the Super Sentinel, the Protector Sentinel [Offensive, Shield and Healing], Constructors [repair drones] and Enforcers [Halo 2, giant vehicle crushers with hardlight shields]. Exactly why aren’t these AIs fighting with the Didact? Sentinels have been ubiquitous throughout the original Halo Trilogy, and Halo Wars, and whilst they are sometimes allies, they have always made an appearance as an enemy in those games. So why not in Halo 4? At the very least, it would provide some variety to the relentless Crawler, Watcher, Knight combat. The Librarian AI initially controlled all of Requiem’s AIs, not just the Sentinels, so why is it that she still has full control over the sentinels?
Engineers are also Forerunner creations, which in combat provide overshields to any nearby troops. Why were these absent in Halo 4?

Sentinels, Engineers, Elites, Hunters, Mercenary Jackals, Grunts, Prometheans as allies, some of which serve aboard the Infinity or other UNSC warships. Or have humans serving on Elite warships– honestly, what happened here? Sentinels, Prometheans and Engineers are all neutral AIs who can serve as allies or enemies. Engineers are supposed to serve on the Infinity. Jackals are described as a mercenary species, and may be persuaded to fight alongside humans. Elites, Hunters, and Grunts have at various times been allies. The Elites and Humans had joint military operations in Halo 3. Why are there no Elites on the Infinity or other UNSC warships? Particuarly Elites like N’tho ‘Sraom and Usze ‘Taham? I’d like to see the lines between ally and enemy species blurred in future Halo games–we already had the Flood as a temporary ally once.

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I really like how this thread is going. Gets me excited about Halo again thinking about the possibilities of the next Halo game and hoping they stumble upon some of these threads for ideas.

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> 2533274800746556;16:
> I really like how this thread is going. Gets me excited about Halo again thinking about the possibilities of the next Halo game and hoping they stumble upon some of these threads for ideas.

Well, thanks!
Personally, I don’t like how this thread is going. I was hoping that people would actually criticize or point out the flaws in my ideas, or contribute with what they would like to see, or what they want to get rid of. Or even, as a last resort, tell me “No! You’ve got it all wrong! We don’t need change! Halo has never changed! 343 industries ruined things by changing Halo!”
Did I scare everyone away? I am actually running out of new gameplay ideas, although I could always go into more detail… :slight_smile:
I would also like to thank *you–*as you are the only one thus far in this thread who seems to be really enthusiastic about some of my ideas, and have actually gone into detail as to why.

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> --Unify the entire Halo Sandbox in Forge–the Master Chief Collection is a step in the right direction here. Take a look at the vast array of vehicles, weapons, equipment, grenade types, armour abilities, power-ups, aircraft, stationary turrets and miscellaneous toys and structures there are in the Halo franchise. How great would it be if ALL of them were available on a map?

What are you hoping to accomplish by doing this though?

Obviously there’s going to be a ton of incompatibility (Halo 1’s 3sk Pistol versus Halo Reach’s extremely slow-killing DMR) and redundancy (Brute Shot and Concussion Rifle in the same game). You could put Halo 2 exclusive weapons on a Halo 5 map but in the end it’s not going to play like Halo 2.

I can understand redesigning / balancing old weapons and reintroducing them to the new game, but just dumping everything from every title into one game seems kind of pointless to me.

> Dropping in to Multiplayer, Stop Using Teleport–once again, I haven’t seen much Halo 5 Beta gameplay–I’ll see what it is like on the 29th. Whenever I see the ODST drop pods–or even the Pelican, Phantom, and Spirit dropping off reinforcements or weapons, I think that would be a great way to start a multiplayer match or get weapon drops, either arriving in orbit, or stepping off a dropship.

To start a match, alright, but only at the start. Throughout the match would be beyond broken though. Your spawn position would be given away each time.

> Dual wielding needs a major rethink–In terms of balancing issues, currently it just breaks everything. Weapons which are useful on their own become overpowered when dual wielded, and weapons which are balanced when dual wielded are just pathetic on their own.

Dual Wielding is just a gimmick. There’s two aspects to Dual Wielding, the visual and the mechanical.

The mechanical aspect of Dual Wielding is the “swap grenade ability for more power” mechanic, which really isn’t all that beneficial to the depth or skill of the game.
You can’t balance it because it’s fundamentally imbalanced. Too powerful, it removes the point of using grenades in tandem with weapons. Too weak, it has no purpose being in the game.
I believe there’s no reason for a Dual Wielding Mechanic to exist, but there are still ways to retain the Visuals of Dual Wielding.

If all people care about is the visual aspects, we could simply treat a specific pair of weapons as a single weapon.
I.e. you’d swap your current weapon for a “Pair of ___”.
The game would treat it as a single weapon, where holding the right trigger fires both at the same time or alternating and you can still throw grenades with the other trigger.

Example, we could replace the Suppressor in Halo 4 with a “pair of auto pistols”. They would function the exact same, with the same damage output and ability to throw grenades, melee, etc, only you have the appearance of firing two auto pistols at the same time instead of a single SMG.

> Or even, as a last resort, tell me “No! You’ve got it all wrong! We don’t need change! Halo has never changed! 343 industries ruined things by changing Halo!”

You use things like new weapons as examples of change, then if someone says that’s all they want you’ll probably turn around and accuse them of “hating change”.

Can you not see the inconsistency?

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When it comes to Forge and custom games, why can’t you have all the weapons from each game? What if someone wants to build a map but hates the brute shot and wants to use the concussion rife? What if someone else rather use the brute shot? It’s forge for a reason. Not saying you should have concussion rifle and brute shot on the same map in matchmaking.

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> You use things like new weapons as examples of change, then if someone says that’s all they want you’ll probably turn around and accuse them of “hating change”.
> Can you not see the inconsistency?

Edit: Actually, I’m not sure what you’re saying, here. Basically my point was: Someone! Anyone! Respond! With anything! Just get this thread going! Now that you’ve started the ball rolling, I’m happy, even if you’re misinterpreting what I said and are accusing me of being inconsistent. Oh, well.

> You can’t balance [dual-wielding] because it’s fundamentally imbalanced. Too powerful, it removes the point of using grenades in tandem with weapons. Too weak, it has no purpose being in the game.

You forgot that it affects melee, too. :slight_smile: That aside, I believe I did mention that if dual-wielding was to return, it needs a major rethink. I don’t believe it is fundamentally imbalanced. I just think that balancing it is very difficult.

Aside from preventing instant access to melee and grenades, dual wielding could be balanced by having the targeting reticle wobble all over the screen, or two seperate targeting reticles which converge and diverge, to simulate the difficulty inherent in accurately aiming with two weapons. Why use dual-wielding, then? Because you have an extra weapon with you, and you can use different combinations of weapons. Battle rifle and plasma pistol dual wielded? What an OP combination if you hit the target–but have fun aiming! Dual rocket launchers? Yeah, have fun with the rockets going in two different directions, mate. With this simple change, dual wielding suddenly requires much more skill to use properly.

Here’s an idea for a new weapon mechanic: why is it that the player always has to carry a secondary weapon, anyway? Why not swap it for extra ammunition for the primary weapon, or more grenades, or two armour abilities? This idea would, of course, be linked to the return of ammo packs scattered over the ground, and would make more logical sense than the often weird, illogical and arbitrary Halo 4 loadout/support upgrades/specializations

> To start a match, alright, but only at the start. Throughout the match would be beyond broken though. Your spawn position would be given away each time.

Agreed. You could have Pelicans or Phantoms flying in to drop off extra vehicles and weapons, though–instead of always magically respawning in multiplayer. It would also make it rather obvious to everyone on the map that the Tank is about to be deployed. For players–no, having a HEV pod splatter an enemy or friendly Spartan, with you leaping out afterwards might be fun, but it wouldn’t work in many instances.

> What are you hoping to accomplish by [unifying the entire Halo sandbox] though? Obviously there’s going to be a ton of incompatibility [and redundancy].

Fun. Lots and lots of fun. :slight_smile: We’ve had redundant weapons in Halo, and it didn’t hurt the game one bit–look at the Brute and Elite plasma rifles. We’ve had next-to-useless vehicles and weapons in Halo–the Mongoose and Halo 2 pistols being prime examples. We have had incredibly unbalanced weapons–you already mentioned the Halo CE pistol, which made pretty much every other weapon in the Halo CE game useless in multiplayer–but all that needs to be done with that is to treat it almost like a power-weapon, like the energy sword or fuel rod gun–a rare weapon on a map which people fight to acquire.

Halo’s weapons and vehicles range from the mundane to the wacky–visually and mechanically. Having more variety is always fun–it means that you can take your time choosing. Canonically, even when a weapon or vehicle is no longer being manufactured, or has been replaced by an “upgraded version,” those old weapons will still be in existance. The most obvious real-world example is the AK-47. That thing is everywhere, and yet it’s a weapon from 1946. Heck, for hunting animals, people still use bows and arrows. So, having redundant, obsolete, and possibly incompatible weapons would make the Halo Universe feel a little more like this one.

Finally, it would be a boon to machinima productions, and those people who just want to battle it out and see which weapon/vehicle is better than the other.