WOW!! What a fun ride these last few weeks have been. Unfortunate that it’s all over now, but now I’ve really got something to look forward to.
Hello 343, I’m here to give my final, personal, as well as educated feedback on the Halo 5 Guardians beta. What I’m gonna do is give a quick break down on the following
-What I liked
-What I didn’t like
-What I hope for in the final game
-and what I NEVER want to see
so here we go…
-WHAT I LIKED-
I am absolutely overjoyed that the slayer game mode is returning to it’s original roots from Halo 2. Victory depends on weapon control, and weapon control depends on who gets them first. No more of the cheapness that was ORDINANCE in Halo 4. I am also impressed with the mechanic that discourages sprinting away from a fight when your shield is down. Keep calm and take cover, or run and get one-shoted. I LOVE that.
-WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE-
Now before anyone goes off on me for naming this list. Acknowledge that I AM aware that this was a beta test, and that I am certain that What I didn’t like will be improved upon by launch. First up! the graphics. Normally I am a gameplay over graphics kind of guy, but I really want 343 to do their best with this games development. The graphics to me appeared to be a bit past-gen. Like I said, I’m sure there will be improvements, but if not I’m cool with it. The game itself so far is KICK -Yoink-. Second, the armor abilities, well some of them. Parkour and edge grabbing are cool, dashing is great for staying alive, so I guess that just leaves two abilities, The Ground Pound and Sprinting, these abilities are only good in certain situations, some of which you will not always encounter. Ground Pound would be better if it had a shorter recovery time. If you see two or three guys below you and wanna give em the old HULK SMASH, you better have good aim, otherwise if you miss, you’ll be stunned for a good 0.5-1 second giving the other team an easy kill, unless their aiming is so bad they can’t shoot the broad side of a barn, in which case you’d be EXTREMELY lucky. As I mentioned before, Sprinting is not recommended for making a get away while under fire. The longer you use it the longer it will take your shield to regenerate. I can only see it really being useful when racing to get power weapons.
-WHAT I HOPE FOR IN THE FINAL GAME-
I hope we can see some more new game modes. I primarily play Slayer, but it will be exciting to see more new game modes besides Breakout and Strongholds. An improvement on graphics would be nice though not totally necessary as far as I’m concerned, again, I’m just pointing that out. Lastly, how about a more challenging Legendary difficulty in the campaign? Not since Halo 2 has Legendary been much of a challenge for me. Halo 4 Legendary was WAY too easy in my opinion.
-WHAT I NEVER WANT TO SEE…EVER-
Please 343, for the love of God keep doing what your doing with the multiplayer. Don’t try to make it another flippin CALL OF DUTY clone. That was your mistake with Halo 4 and it was BAAAD. Custom loadouts?, Ordinance drops? I’m surprised you guys didn’t get slapped by Activision with a copyright lawsuit. What you’re doing now with Guardians is a million times better than that. This is HALO, not COD. So please, don’t do that again. I know this next one is a long shot and probably not entirely under your control but… could we maybe NOT have any Day-One DLC, Pre-Order bonuses or microtransactions? These 3 disasters are what is sapping the life out of the video game industry. If you can help it, DON’T FEED THE BEASTS.
Well I think that’s gonna wrap it up. Great job 343. Keep up the awesome work with Halo 5: Guardians. I shall try to keep myself posted with updates over the next 10 months leading up to launch night. As for my fellow members of the Halo community. What are your opinions on the beta? Agree or Disagree? Let me know, and please do keep it civil. Be kind to one-another folks. If that isn’t too much to ask then I look forward to your input. Keep it real, and I will see you guys on XBOX LIVE.