My concerns with Halo 5

Games Halo 5: Guardians
1

It reminds me of a game called Call of Halo: Advanced Guardians.

No, but jokes aside.

Firstly, I’d like to express my appreciation to 343 Industries for their hard work, and to this forum in general which allows people to voice their opinions.

Secondly, I’d like to give a brief introduction of who I am. My name is Chris and you could call me a Halo fan. I enjoyed Halo: CE, Halo 2 and Halo 3, and like many of you I have fond memories of playing all three games. In particular, I used to play Halo: CE competitively online with a small team and casually with friends, and Halo 3 semi-professionally, being sponsored by small companies along the way. I currently have a Halo: CE montage uploaded on YouTube which I am very proud of: - YouTube. With this experience behind my back, I consider myself an above-average Halo player, experienced enough to express somewhat informed views on Halo 5.

Now onto my concerns.

I am very disappointed with Halo 5:

  1. Halo 5 tries too hard to be a competitive game, while ignoring the features that made the original Halo games so great. Everything about Halo 5 from the Spartan callouts to the large number of arena-style maps indicates that 343 Industries is attempting to appeal to the competitive community. 343 Industries forgets that Halo: CE, Halo 2 and Halo 3 were standalone games which were good on their merits, on the actual gameplay experience they provided. The competitive side of those games was a byproduct or a result of such a great game. Yet 343 Industries is working backwards: they start by trying to mould Halo 5 into a competitive game, and then once all their efforts are exhausted, they focus on trying to make the game good. There is nothing organic or dynamic about Halo 5, as it just feels unnatural as a Halo game.

  2. Halo 5 tries too hard to revive a dead community. One of the most crucial things that make a game good is its community. Halo 3 once had a large and integrated community. Remember those days watching Red vs Blue on YouTube, or Machinima videos such as Arby ‘n’ Chief produced by DigitalPh33r? How about those community Recon challenges when people would upload crazy videos in hopes of unlocking that highly sought-for piece of armour? Back then the MLG pro scene was emerging, with players like Walshy, Tsquared, Pistola, etc. making a splash into the Halo community. Many people and many fans looked up to these players, and the competitive community was growing day by day. What about the forge community? The theatre community? Halo 3 had so much in terms of community, and that’s what made it a brilliant game. Halo 5 is trying to revive this community, which is great, but it won’t succeed. The majority of casual players, filmmakers and the professional players have moved on with their lives, leaving the rest behind. A dead community can’t be revived. For Halo 5 to have the same kind of community Halo 3 did, it needs to do something revolutionary to attract an influx of new players. So far it hasn’t.

  3. Halo 5’s gameplay is not the gameplay players have come to know and love. Smart Scope (similar to Aiming Down Sights in Call of Duty), armour abilities like groundpound and sprint, Spartan callouts, and everything you have already seen with Halo 5 beta are all terrible gameplay features. It is no wonder that critics say the game resembles Call of Duty too much, or Titanfall. Gameplay is too cluttered and seems sophisticated, and weapon and grenade sounds are totally different compared to previous Halo games. Halo 5 just doesn’t feel like a Halo game. It seems like a complete remake of Halo 4 with better graphics, making Halo: Reach look like a significantly better game.

What can be done about these issues?

I think 343 Industries should go back to Bungie’s old formula. If the final game looks anything like the beta, I am confident the game will fail like Halo 4, which now has a population that barely reaches 10, 000.

If you think I am wrong about everything, just wait a few months after Halo 5 releases and then we’ll see. Of course, I could be wrong, but based on everything I’ve seen so far, including beta footage, player reviews and news articles, this game looks like it is destined for disaster.

2

O pls… get real man. Stop the whining BS.

COD and Titanfall may wish their games would play as competetive as Halo does. So far i see from h5 it looks like the best halo game ever.

You bashing h4, but we can compare halo 4 now with the other halo’s and to be honest. Halo 4 plays the best. The only major fail in halo 4 were the ordnance drops with to much superweapons.

3

^troll. Good post op. I think your critiques are interesting. Can you talk a little bit more about the gameplay and key differences you see between Halo 5 and previous halo’s.

4

Review aside till beta gets a good work out. 343i will not be changing much after the beta ends, so people can cry and moun all they want on these forums as I highly doght they have anyone at 343i reading every bodies wants and needs that pop up on this forum.

5

> 2535460581617230;4:
> Review aside till beta gets a good work out. 343i will not be changing much after the beta ends, so people can cry and moun all they want on these forums as I highly doght they have anyone at 343i reading every bodies wants and needs that pop up on this forum.

343 has adamantly PROVEN their inability to converse with their fanbase, as well as actually accept feedback from that fanbase.

6

Problem with the call outs is that nobody wants to talk anymore, all your gonna get us some screaming kids not in party or some guy who’s left his kinect on and can hear his kids in the background.
People prefer to stay in parties, I would like to talk however every game of anything I every join is just a French person. I hate the language (come at me bro, jk no offense) and can’t even listen to it and end up muting the said player.

7

I agree with everything you have said, but a little more critical analysis would be better. Instead of saying that Halo 5 isn’t good and then leaving it at that say what you don’t like.

From my limited preview beta access I can tell you that this could either be the best or the worst Halo. 343i need to listen to their base in order to create a solid product, because that base is what is going to be there in 6 months to a year, not the “casuals” (I hate that word). I’ve made a couple of posts going into detail about what I would like to see changed. If you are interested in what I have to say I would look those up.

8

I find betas are only a mirror of what the final game will be. I honestly hated halo reach during beta. When it arrived in its finished form it was a different game. So I am gonna let them get there feedback and shape the game before I pass judgment. Till then I’m gonna enjoy playing it :slight_smile:

9

> 2533274800772611;7:
> I agree with everything you have said, but a little more critical analysis would be better. Instead of saying that Halo 5 isn’t good and then leaving it at that say what you don’t like.
>
> From my limited preview beta access I can tell you that this could either be the best or the worst Halo. 343i need to listen to their base in order to create a solid product, because that base is what is going to be there in 6 months to a year, not the “casuals” (I hate that word). I’ve made a couple of posts going into detail about what I would like to see changed. If you are interested in what I have to say I would look those up.

General reply:

There are so many things wrong with Halo 5 that it would be counterproductive to compile a 50-point list of every single feature I dislike about it. All of those things together make Halo 5 bad. It’s not just SmartScope or just the weapon sounds. It’s everything.

Specific reply:

*“Instead of saying that Halo 5 isn’t good and then leaving it at that say what you don’t like”*1. Halo 5 tries too hard to be a competitive game, while ignoring the features that made the original Halo games so great.

  1. Halo 5 tries too hard to revive a dead community.

  2. Halo 5’s gameplay is not the gameplay players have come to know and love.

These three points are explained quite clearly in my original post which I suspect you may not have read, given your incorrect comment.

Final words:
If Halo 5 is going to be a good game, it needs to be nothing like the beta which we currently see. And all betas are fairly accurate representations of the final product. Sure, you can remove SmartScope, fix the sounds and change the ranking system, but ultimately Halo 5 will look substantially the same. Of course Halo needs to evolve, but it should do so judiciously without introducing gamebreaking features that break the game and jeopardise the future success of the franchise.

Halo 3 should be the starting framework for Halo 5, and then 343 needs to build on that.

Right now, it looks like Halo 5 has ripped off elements of Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, Titanfall and Destiny, in a tryhard attempt to create a competitive game. It isn’t working. The maps are terrible, the gameplay is terrible, the sounds are atrocious, the general feel of the game is very alien to Halo and overall the game is not enjoyable to watch nor play. This isn’t just my view; just go on YouTube and hear what the pros are saying, and hear what everyone else is saying. Better yet if you want to get down to specific numbers, look at the current Halo 4 population: barely 10, 000 players online in peak hours. Halo: CE on PC had more in 2005-2006 in its peak years.