So, I’ve been an avid player of the Halo games since the release of the first one. I seem to recall Frankie and few others from 343 asking for feedback as to how they can make a better game, so here it is from me. Hopefully SOMEONE from 343 will see this thread.
I have numerous complaints about Halo 4 but almost all of them can be summed up in addressing the tone of the game. I’m going to purposefully set aside the multiplayer right now to specifically talk about campaign. I don’t really have a problem with the general story outline (although I have always thought the CHIEF’s story was better left finished in Halo 3 and Halo 4 could have focused on someone else, i.e. Thel and his home planet), but moreseo the way it is all delivered. Even though everything is there, it isn’t. It doesn’t feel like Halo aesthetically, in the same way Reach did to an extent. Here’s how I think the next game could be improved:
*different art direction
The forerunner architecture in H4 is quite different than the rest of their architecture. Cortana’s face is very different. Master Chief looked like a shell of his former self. Cortana is overly sexualized for reasons I don’t understand. Covenant forces are mostly welly portrayed, but the Sangheili looked off. I do give props to certain visual qualities, especially the clean, sharp image without any motion blur whatsoever - that’s good, maintain that - and the faces of characters (disregarding Cortana) but there are numerous technical things, like priority of overdone lighting in the form of bloom and lens flare like effects over sheer detail in the form of textures, that bother me. The art direction should…well, resemble HALO more, because that’s the game you’re make.
*different and BETTER sound design
One of the things that bothered me the most was sound design in H4, since this is something Bungie always did so well. I feel like, honestly, a lot of the sounds come off as a mixture of transformers and dubstep. Promethean weapons sound too wet, human weapons sound very off, Covenant weapons sound atrocious (with the exception of the beam rifle, which sounds different but still satisfying - one of only a few in the game like this). Every plasma-based weapon doesn’t sound like it AT ALL in comparison to the previous games. The fuel rod based weapons don’t sound right either (the Carbine is okay, but still sounds off, while the fuel rod gun on the other hand sounds like I’m at the batting cages). The mix itself is very poor. Friendlies are too quiet, ambience is inaudible in many locations (if there even is any. I also feel that the music, although good in many areas, should be done by someone who can deliver a tone more suitable to this game’s universe and story. There were few moments, notably the percussive electronic sections, where it felt right. This is most prominent in Shutdown. However, broadly it still feels very “off”.
All of this, however, could be dismissed as simply a shift in design, and reception is subjective. Where the “better” part comes in is SOUND QUALITY. In Halo 4, cutscenes sound awful. Even worse, the music in the game sounds like it is playing at a very low bitrate. This is not anything new - Halo CEA had sounds that were lower in quality than the rest and the original soundtrack plays at a very low bitrate, inexplicably. 320kbps MP3s are not data intensive. What I hear in both games is somewhere around 80-96kbps, possibly at a variable bitrate that is almost always less 128kbps. It is very poor to go from a cutscene where everything but the character’s voices sound muffled and compressed to being in game and having the sounds be a lot better, save for the music.
*Retention of proper story delivery
You’re catering to a broadly (typically 16-26) adult audience here, or at least you should be. Making a mature rated game for the people who either grew up with the original games or played them as an adult to begin with. We don’t need to be spoonfed every little detail. When I first played the game, I didn’t have a problem with this, although I was disappointed in the lack of proper terminals (something that should return, along with finding skulls in game). Even though I don’t like what he’s done, I presumed you needed to read Greg Bear’s books and look into the details more clearly to understand the story in full. After watching the domain videos though, I realized this was false. Instead of having to figure out things for ourselves we are shown very clearly, in ways that aren’t remotely subtle, the backstory of the Didact and his motivations as well as the librarian - from videos “downloaded” from terminals that appear in places they don’t even belong sometimes (i.e. the one on Composer under the platform with the Mantis.) While reading Bear’s books reveal more subtle details, they no longer are necessary at all. Every necessary key to the puzzle is right there, delivered for whatever by a series of videos, I guess because we, the game players, are apparently too stupid to read. Nevermind that a huge chunk of us had already gathered a large amount of information about Mendicant Bias, the Didact and the Librarian back in Halo 3, only there was a mystery to it all. It was delivered in the form of messages left behind, and we didn’t see any forerunner or hear any forerunner or interact with any forerunner (on that note, I do not think faces of the forerunner should have ever been shown, they should have remained in their combat skins).
Finally, my biggest complaint regarding the tone:
*BETTER WRITING
There is a sharp decline in the quality of writing from Halo 1-3 to Halo 4. Halo 4 is filled with corny lines, forced romance elements between Cortana and the Chief, and things that just in general are cringeworthy when I hear them. There’s no nice way to put this. I thought Greg Bear’s interpretation of the Forerunners was bad enough, but this aspect of the game manages to be just as bad. When the best line of dialogue in the game is a quip about area rugs, that’s a problem. Also, Chief talks WAY too much.
On a note not regarding the tone:
*fix the control scheme
This one is simple: as a bumper jumper player, I am unable to user jetpacks without playing claw. This is an issue I addressed to Bungie regarding Reach and it was met with a glorified “deal with it”. I have proposed numerous fixes, but the most applicable would just to make it so that for this control scheme, pressing jump (and holding it for however long you want to fly) again while in the air after jumping activates the jetpack. This is how it works in the game Section 8 and it’s a good idea.
Anyways, that’s about it. This is all my advice on how to make the game better. If you guys are serious about “doing much better next time”, you can start by having absolutely none of what was in your trailer at E3 be in the actual game. Please don’t take any of this in an offensive manner, but the I see the series drifting off and suffering from an identity crisis if this is not resolved. Halo 4 exists, it is what it is, and nothing is going to change that. 343 has the opportunity to start anew, on a new platform though, and I feel like they can nail this game properly IF they take into considerations things like this.
