Okay so everyone loves the flood (Get’s booed off stage)
Seriously, how could 343 make the flood scary again or surprising, If they are even in this game?
They arent in this game though xP
but if they are in the future, yes they should be much scarier 
They’re not in 
Make them invisible. So invisible that their attacks don’t even do any damage, and their rotten bodies make not a sound.
That being said, I think the Flood reached peak creepiness in the animated Mona Lisa.
Instead of having them be all, limp and soggy, and able to pick up weapons, and flail their arms about…make them sturdy, but have their bones crunch about. Have them howl and moan in pain! The human inside isn’t dead yet, they’re just a “passenger” while also being the vessel. Heck, have a few scream. I think screaming is scary.
When I think of Halo, I think of 2 inspirations: Star Wars and Aliens. The Covie missions are like Star Wars and Flood missions are like Aliens. We haven’t had any Aliens-style missions since Halo 3 and those weren’t exactly dark or creepy.
I’ve wanted Halo to do a Mona Lisa-style (Dead Space/Doom-inspired) horror game featuring the Flood for a while now. There is just so much potential with this franchise to venture into different genres and still remain the FPS we know and love at it’s core. More Mona Lisa, less Halo Wars.
The Flood weren’t exactly that scary…
> The Flood weren’t exactly that scary…
Exactly our point xD
Should the Flood return in 5 or 6, the first thing 343i should do is keep them a secret up until the release date of the games. Second, the encounters with the Flood should be in confined spaces (think Dead Space). We also shouldn’t hear a Gravemind (should there be one) speaking through them, it kind of takes the scare away. There should also be more variants of both infected and pure forms. I also feel their bodies should be their weapons (again, like Dead Space’s necromorphs). Lastly, the first encounter should be unexpected like when the first Promethean Knight jumped the Chief. Of course, this is just my opinion. I feel a more Dead Space-like route with the Flood would lead them to be (somewhat) scarier.
Id like them to come out of nowhere in Halo 6, by Halo 5 we’ll be like “yup we really did kill em all hooray!”
Come time for Halo 6 (mid way through) “yeah we’re winning!! Hoora-…FUUUUUUUU”
xD
> Should the Flood return in 5 or 6, the first thing 343i should do is keep them a secret up until the release date of the games. Second, the encounters with the Flood should be in confined spaces (think Dead Space). We also shouldn’t hear a Gravemind (should there be one) speaking through them, it kind of takes the scare away. There should also be more variants of both infected and pure forms. I also feel their bodies should be their weapons (again, like Dead Space’s necromorphs). Lastly, the first encounter should be unexpected like when the first Promethean Knight jumped the Chief. Of course, this is just my opinion. I feel a more Dead Space-like route with the Flood would lead them to be (somewhat) scarier.
Dead Space is an awesome game, but I don’t think it would complement HALO.
And besides, the Necro’s are just jump scares. And it’s mostly an annoyance and trouble, than actual FEAR! “Hey, I’m behind you, just like the last 50 times! Oogahbooga! Look at my eyeballs falling out of my skull! Are you scared yet? What if I bang on some of these pipes in the background, and have steam burst from above you?! Are you scared yet? Watch the vents! Watch the vents! Rawr!” >:p
Edit: nevermind, my first post kinda contradicts this one. lol
> > Should the Flood return in 5 or 6, the first thing 343i should do is keep them a secret up until the release date of the games. Second, the encounters with the Flood should be in confined spaces (think Dead Space). We also shouldn’t hear a Gravemind (should there be one) speaking through them, it kind of takes the scare away. There should also be more variants of both infected and pure forms. I also feel their bodies should be their weapons (again, like Dead Space’s necromorphs). Lastly, the first encounter should be unexpected like when the first Promethean Knight jumped the Chief. Of course, this is just my opinion. I feel a more Dead Space-like route with the Flood would lead them to be (somewhat) scarier.
>
> Dead Space is an awesome game, but I don’t think it would complement HALO.
> And besides, the Necro’s are just jump scares. And it’s mostly an annoyance and trouble, than actual FEAR! “Hey, I’m behind you, just like the last 50 times! Oogahbooga! Look at my eyeballs falling out of my skull! Are you scared yet? What if I bang on some of these pipes in the background, and have steam burst from above you?! Are you scared yet? Watch the vents! Watch the vents! Rawr!” >:p
But…but…but that was AWSOME! (in a scary way) xD
They aren’t in Halo 4, however I’m sure they could make em pretty creepy by changing the sounds around. The flood used to always creep me out anyway.
To make the Flood Scary the would have to Reintroduce us to them or them to us…
Imagine this…
(Cut Scene)
“Master Chief Wakes down a lonely, and empty and quiet Hallway… Too Quiet of a Hallway. Halfway down the hallway, There’s a loud bloodcurdling scream… Then silence… in the Pitch black… Then the lowest pitch and most bass filled giant monster rumbling growl/roar you ever heard… Then the power is restored slowly. And the lights are very dim and flickering… Master chief looks around, then continues proceeding down the creepy hallway… To a Set of Very familiar Locked Doors… With Black Blood Splattered all over it… A Red Blooded Hand Print on the Lock Button of the Door…
Master Chief then walks up to the door and, then hears a noise behind him and turns to look back down the long hallway, he just came down. One By one Each light Shatters down the hallway starting from the farthest on the end making their way down, in chief’s direction…
But suddenly the Lights stop shattering on the lights just before chief… Now only the area just in front of the door, and the door itself are lit… As master chief turn’s back to face the door and looks through the little window on the door… He Notices the room just behind the door is lit… And there’s a thin greenish haze/fog starting to form… He looks closer… And Closer… And Closer…
Then BOOM! A Giant Creature Rams the Door from behind the Glass and Cracks the glass! It’s Revealed to be a giant mutated Flood Juggernaut… It Stops and Looks at the Chief Intensely… Makes a Horrific and Demonic Growling sound, then slowly turns and walks away into the thick green fog, and into the Darkness it came from (Like the Big Daddy’s in Bioshock and Scare Crows Hallucination in Batman Archam Asylum combined)…
Moments later the little light on the door flashes and the familiar sound of a door opening is heard. The Door opens and chief hesitantly enters… The Screen goes black for a few seconds…”
(END OF CUTSCENE)
Now the Player is back in control… And as the weapons and hud appear on screen, the usual name of the section of the level appears on the bottom of the screen. It Read’s.
Two Corpses… in One Giant Grave…
And it would make it more Creepy if it happened Randomly halfway or two thirds of the way through the game… And even though we saw the cameo of the flood and all the marking’s of them. We don’t encounter any… Leaving us to wounder… Where did that Massive sized Juggernaut go? Why was there no flood? And what does this all mean for Halo 5 and 6?..
Not have them be annoying, repetitive and give them better, more deformed and ugly models.
It’s very simple. Don’t do what H2/H3 did:
-headshots are instant kill
-easily killed by melee (H3)
-slow movement (H3)
-excessive leaping (H3)
-reanimating dead uninfected bodies absorbs (instead of having them pick up) nearby weapon (H3)
-having infection forms stay back and not do anything when there’s “enough” combat forms (H3). This can be used with creating Flood buddies to make Infection Form buddies
-damage sponge “upgrades” (a.k.a evolved Flood a.k.a Pure Forms) yet easily killed by melee weapons (H3)
-infection inconsistencies (H3, on Floodgate, sometimes a marine will be infected before the Flood drop down. And sometimes, even if you save the marine from the infection forms, he’ll transform anyways)
-slow Carriers
-impossible to save marines from Flood (H3, try saving all the marine victims on Floodgate. It’s pointless because even if you get them to the Elites, they’ll end up dying)
-absorbing grenades (H3, Pure Form switching, commonly when sticking Ranged Forms)
-high melee damage (H2) and inconsistent health (H3, sometimes when you melee a Flood, they do not crumble as expected. It takes several melees) to compensate for poor cqc
-tactical. Flood are expendable, even rocket launcher Flood. Flood forms with shields and camo should be the only ones trying to preserve themselves
-Flood can’t actually use melee weapons (H3)
-irrelevant but I got to include it: inconsistent geometry (scroll down to the bottom of this page). In H3, when dropping, juggling, stockpiling weapons, it’s inevitable that you will encounter H3’s wonderfully broken geometry. Whereas in CE, it’s controllable; you can drop a weapon between the legs of a combat form and go down the elevator to retrieve it without the need to go back up.
Then restore:
-berserking
-fast running
-large numbers (CE)
-wall climbing (H2)
-persistence
-suicidal (CE)
-massive 2 way battles where the enemies don’t prioritize on you all the time
-sword Elite allied support (H2).
On Floodgate, Bungie tried so hard to stop the Elites from being useful. But they didn’t stop me:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3QQOJm8ydA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gclbRJLdgRI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXYsCsZsb-g
Of course, these only reaffirmed my opinion: the Elites frequently ended up rolling off to their deaths or getting killed due to having slowed down melees and not having the brains to take cover.
To compensate for sword Elite allies, there could be a lot more Flood.
Finally throw in:
-Juggernauts
-get rid of Ranged Forms, fix or get rid of Tank Forms, and include the deleted Pure Forms. Pure Forms should be support platforms while combat forms or new Flood should be the main infantry
-Half Flood. How about Flood leaving their hosts outward appearance intact? Or retaining qualities of their hosts (berserking)? Or modifying the equipment of their hosts (shield recharge rate)?
-more Flood buddies. 
Taking out Flood buddies is like taking out Grunts panicking. That’s why I didn’t find Heretic Grunts very interesting
-switching weapons. This shouldn’t be scripted of course
-more weapon compatibility. Flood couldn’t use spartan lasers IIRC. Unless they were half Flooded.
TLDR: 1. Don’t make the same mistake as H3.
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Make Flood scary and unpredictable, but above all, make them consistent and fun.
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Give some spotlight for allies. It’s awfully tedious to fight Flood without allies. It should be a fun and engaging side-mission to save/preserve allies.
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Also consider lighting. Look at the Xenomorphs in Alien games. Older or outdated models/graphics are used for the enemies but the lighting makes them look good and function.
Flood evolution. If you’ve ever seen Halo Legends, you’d see that the flood evolves pretty quickly based on organisms/technology that they consume. Naturally the flood becomes bigger/badder/smarter. The flood on Halo 2 was actually the most evolved and difficult flood to fight. They weren’t exactly big, but they were incredibly intelligent. They grabbed every weapon, attacked and stole sentinels/sentinel weapons and they were the only flood that could drive vehicles (that we’ve played in a game so far).