Hey everyone,
Thought I’d share this article around that I wrote in rebuttal to the article over at Kotaku regarding Halo 4 multiplayer unlocks and I’m keen to know what everyone’s thoughts are on the points I’ve made.
Hope you all give it a read and share your comments.
http://oxcgn.com/2012/12/13/counterpoint-multiplayer-unlocks-dont-ruin-halo-4/
> John: The items that you are able to unlock and use for your loadouts are very basic. They’re the simple guns of the game – standard issue assault rifles and carbines. No power weapons, no one hit kills. No shotguns, no sniper rifles, no rocket launchers – unlike most other shooters with customisable loadouts.
Not tried the Bolt Shot then?
> All you get are visual armor upgrades and weapon skins that don’t change gameplay whatsoever.
>
> Higher levels in Halo 4 do not have any advantages, except the obvious bonus of experience.
The specializations available to over half the population do offer advantages and all other things being equal can make you lose fights against people you would have beaten on a level playing field.
Something like Rogue giving you the chance to unlock something to stop weapon flinch will clearly disadvantage a straight 1 v 1 shoot out. Not only is that not available to low levels it’s not even available to whole continents right now. Unless they paid extra or got store specific pre-orders from a shop that almost went bankrupt and couldn’t fulfill pre-orders of a game as big as Mass Effect 3.
It’s been handled terribly. Alienating large portions of Halo fans. It messes around the people that bought the LE, the people that bought the Console and people that bought the regular edition. I don’t see any great benefit from making all these different tiers of access to abilities, other than to sell them to people.
Ironically if they’d been upfront about just how long people would be stuck at 70 they’d have made more money off the LE.
Nice article bro!
What Umopapi said, it might not have been so bad had they made rogue and operator the first two available as those are the ones with the most significant combat advantage, but that fact that I am able to win a ghost v ghost fight after my opponent gets the jump on me, simply because I’ve played more than him, is quite stupid, even more so when you realize it wasn’t even close in spite of him getting the first few shots.
Unlocks don’t ruin halo 4 since halo 4 was already ruined in the first place.
The boltshot is a one shot kill at very close range but still the player needs to get up to you to do that.
I don’t run in aimlessly without direction in a gun fight because if the opponent may have a shotgun or bolt shot common sense.
Also with regards to Specialisations I’ve come across players who have been 80+ and 100+ and they have been at the bottom of the leaderboard after the match. Their K/D ratio have always been less than stellar.
I’m currently now ranked 42 and am usually in the Top 3 players at the end of the match still using the basic load out with the Mobility and Dexterity.
Even then I still get my -Yoink- handed to me when a player outsmarts me in a gun fight or gets the jump. Specialisations to me do nothing.
Again if the player behind the ability does not know how to use it to their advantage it is useless to them.
But I appreciate your reply 
Feedback in always welcome!
> The boltshot is a one shot kill at very close range but still the player needs to get up to you to do that.
>
> I don’t run in aimlessly without direction in a gun fight because if the opponent may have a shotgun or bolt shot common sense.
>
> Also with regards to Specialisations I’ve come across players who have been 80+ and 100+ and they have been at the bottom of the leaderboard after the match. Their K/D ratio have always been less than stellar.
>
> I’m currently now ranked 42 and am usually in the Top 3 players at the end of the match still using the basic load out with the Mobility and Dexterity.
>
> Even then I still get my -Yoink!- handed to me when a player outsmarts me in a gun fight or gets the jump. Specialisations to me do nothing.
>
> Again if the player behind the ability does not know how to use it to their advantage it is useless to them.
>
> But I appreciate your reply Feedback in always welcome!
No, the boltshot has a longer range than the shotgun, and scattershot. Hardly a short range.
> > The boltshot is a one shot kill at very close range but still the player needs to get up to you to do that.
> >
> > I don’t run in aimlessly without direction in a gun fight because if the opponent may have a shotgun or bolt shot common sense.
> >
> > Also with regards to Specialisations I’ve come across players who have been 80+ and 100+ and they have been at the bottom of the leaderboard after the match. Their K/D ratio have always been less than stellar.
> >
> > I’m currently now ranked 42 and am usually in the Top 3 players at the end of the match still using the basic load out with the Mobility and Dexterity.
> >
> > Even then I still get my -Yoink!- handed to me when a player outsmarts me in a gun fight or gets the jump. Specialisations to me do nothing.
> >
> > Again if the player behind the ability does not know how to use it to their advantage it is useless to them.
> >
> > But I appreciate your reply Feedback in always welcome!
>
> No, the boltshot has a longer range than the shotgun, and scattershot. Hardly a short range.
Guess I haven’t come across anyone that can use it effectively at such long range. I have been victim to it from close range though, then decided to give it a go myself and you need to be accurate for it to work.
On close quarters maps like Adrift or where there are objectives, you can have little choice but to engage. People camped around corners with it can run out and beat most other weapons. It is the last secondary you unlock and is very powerful.
Your point about having no specs and beating people level 80 is irrelevant. In Halo 3 if you had better skills you’d have beaten them there too. The advantage kicks in and matters when other things are equal and you face someone who has roughly equal skills. You can’t deny there is an advantage, I’m not saying it’s huge, but it only takes a slight difference to win/lose some games.
When you feel like you had the upper hand and lost, even though you engaged them first, then see they have a bunch of specs unlocked, you’re going to wonder if one of them made the difference.
In broad terms the part I despise most about multiplayer unlocks is the store specific pre-order advantages players get, as witnessed by the specs here but Halo 4 is by no means the first game. It’s commonplace now, but most games manage to keep it to singleplayer or cosmetic things.
To offer months of (however slight) advantage over people who bought the game from a different store in one country, while most of the rest of the world gets it given to them even if they didn’t buy the game, all they had to do was play it once, is a new low in the marketing ruination of multiplayer gaming.
> > > The boltshot is a one shot kill at very close range but still the player needs to get up to you to do that.
> > >
> > > I don’t run in aimlessly without direction in a gun fight because if the opponent may have a shotgun or bolt shot common sense.
> > >
> > > Also with regards to Specialisations I’ve come across players who have been 80+ and 100+ and they have been at the bottom of the leaderboard after the match. Their K/D ratio have always been less than stellar.
> > >
> > > I’m currently now ranked 42 and am usually in the Top 3 players at the end of the match still using the basic load out with the Mobility and Dexterity.
> > >
> > > Even then I still get my -Yoink!- handed to me when a player outsmarts me in a gun fight or gets the jump. Specialisations to me do nothing.
> > >
> > > Again if the player behind the ability does not know how to use it to their advantage it is useless to them.
> > >
> > > But I appreciate your reply Feedback in always welcome!
> >
> > No, the boltshot has a longer range than the shotgun, and scattershot. Hardly a short range.
>
> Guess I haven’t come across anyone that can use it effectively at such long range. I have been victim to it from close range though, then decided to give it a go myself and you need to be accurate for it to work.
It’s really not hard to use, extremely easy.
That, after being told the reason for the daily XP cap was to ensure the integrity of the progression system and to stop some players running amok with unlocking everything. To then be given a continent wide XP cap for months while specs may be gradually released one or two at a time over those months. Meanwhile the rest of the world can run amok.
It’s enough to make you think they don’t care for your business and value you not one iota.