Numbers don't lie. H4 is lame. SAVE IT!

Games Other Halo
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>

Thanks for the reply Tsassi. I’ll be the first to admit that I definitely generalized the problem and didn’t necessarily provide a comprehensive argument. So, please permit me to add some clarity.

  1. You’re right - the game absolutely should include other game variations. I personally do enjoy a good game of objective based play. Unfortunately these are harder to come by due to changes in the game that have been made over time (to be addressed in a moment).

  2. The amount of effort/time/maps should be more proportionate to player preferences and activity. For example, a new map pack with 3 maps should include at least 2 slayer maps. My understanding is that the new pack (that I unfortunately already paid for in the $100 bundle) neglects the most popular game types. This has been an ongoing issue since Halo Reach - diversifying gametypes to the point that maps need to be specifically designed around them. The result is spreading the map hopper too thin across too many gametypes.

Regarding objective gametypes - they can be AWESOME! Some of the best memories I have in Halo have been around last minute CTF games. Unfortunately for these games to really be great it requires a few things

  1. A team with good communication, comparable skill and a desire to win.
  2. An opposing team with the same.

Halo has continued to move down a path of preventing these matchups from taking place. The decisions have been poor, shortsighted and almost completely destroyed objective games. The numbers speak for themselves - most people don’t prefer to play object gametypes. In my previous post I came across as saying its because they suck (actually its just invasion, flood, regicide, spartan ops that suck).

Another, and equally likely, explanation for low populations in non-slayer variants are that fundamental necessities for a good objective game are not being met.

  1. Players are not ranked and are less likely to care about the outcome of a game. Losing? Just quit and find a new game, no skin off your back. Why put in the extra effort for a slim chance at victory when you can just quit the game? Without ranks you lose the desire to win. The ‘everybody wins’ credit/level up mentality just doesn’t cut it.

  2. Teams are not encouraged to communicate. Without communication objective games are completely pointless. The introduction of ‘party chat’ with the 360 was the worst thing to happen to Halo. You need to completely ban party chat from competitive matchmaking. Players should rely on in-game chat only - not be chatting it up with their other friends that are watching Buffy the Vampire slayer on netflix. I believe competitive matchmaking should also require a mic to play. Without one you don’t belong in a team based objective game - period.

Because of the two points above, the even matches in objective games are few and far between. Play alone and you’ll find yourself in a party that doesn’t communicate, quits early and has no desire to win. Play with a group of friends and you’ll get matched up against a rag-tag team with no communication and completely annihilate them.

So - there you have it.

42

I too, am one of the folks who mostly plays slayer. For roughly every 5 games of slayer that my group play though, we always pop into an objective game for a match or two.

I know they aren’t going anywhere, but I would be extremely saddened if they did.

Yeah slayer is great, point and shoot! As fun as that is, it gets old. Objective games really give you an opportunity to hone your teamwork skills, making your team slayer games that much more efficient.

Does Halo 4 have some problems? Sure. My biggest gripes at the moment are ordinance drops being mislabeled… which isn’t a huge deal really (except when you sprint across the map for a binary rifle and it turns out to be a needler :P). Also, instant respawning is kind of lame, IMO. I miss having my x show up on the screen so I could direct my teammates to where people were camping in SWAT, or where I just dropped some fancy weapon. The unbalanced objectives for daily and weekly challenges could use a tweak too.

All in all, I’m extremely satisfied with the games. Heck, Spartan Ops can be fun if you play it on Legendary solo.

To the folks talking about not having a competitive skill rank, from what I understand, they’re going to be adding this feature soon. It will only be viewable to you in your Waypoint profile though.

Hope to see you guys on the battlefield!

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> during those years Microsoft added a userbase of mainly causal players. Kinect/the new xbox slim helped bring in new users. I don’t think all of those people are going to go out and buy Halo 4.

Agreed. Out of my friends list, maybe only a third of them play the Halo series at all.

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> When are people gonna realize that the reason why Halo 3 had so many players is because it had no competition back then? Halo 4 is awesome

Even then, saying that Halo 3 had much more players than Halo 4 is an overstatement. “Marginally more” is a more suitable term. That said, it’s true that Halo 3 managed to hold on to players longer than Halo 4 has this far managed to (Halo 3 was still well over 200,000 players month after its release).

Ultimately, the reasons for why a certain game doesn’t have as high of a population than its predecessors are numerous. Trends change, market variety increases, player base changes, et cetera. What this means is that population is a good metric for one thing and one thing only: popularity. We can go back and forth with the population arguments and argue has the relative popularity of Halo dropped, but ultimately, it tells nothing about the quality of the gameplay experience. This is evident straight from the fact that the most popular shooter today is also one that can, in no way, be called a quality game.

As a matter of fact, if getting a Halo 4 that is actually enjoyable to play, true to the original gameplay, and not filled with flaws meant that Halo 4 would not reach 100,000 players at any time of day, I’d be willing to accept it. After all, popularity doesn’t matter. As a matter of fact, the most popular media often aren’t the media with the best quality, but with that underlying psychological factor that gets people excited about something that, after deeper observation, is nothing you should get excited about.

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> When are people gonna realize that the reason why Halo 3 had so many players is because it had no competition back then? Halo 4 is awesome

NO COMPETITION??? I beg to differ. Apparently you’ve failed to mention the big releases of Call of Duty Modern Warfare 4, MW2, Gears of War 1, and GOW2.

So y-e-a-h, Halo 3 had “no” competition during it’s lifespan.

Oh but guess what… H3 isn’t dead yet! Know why? Because Reach and H4 have both strayed so far away from the original “tried-n-true” formula of what used to make Halo actually feel & play like HALO.

“Evolve” my -Yoink!-. IF IT AIN’T BROKE, DON’T FIX IT…

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H4 is my favorite MM experience yet. I have yet to play the new CoD, but nobody can beat the pink mist. Respect the pink mist!

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> 2. The amount of effort/time/maps should be more proportionate to player preferences and activity. For example, a new map pack with 3 maps should include at least 2 slayer maps. My understanding is that the new pack (that I unfortunately already paid for in the $100 bundle) neglects the most popular game types. This has been an ongoing issue since Halo Reach - diversifying gametypes to the point that maps need to be specifically designed around them. The result is spreading the map hopper too thin across too many gametypes.

A good map would be one that is optimal for most gametypes and has support all the way from Slayer to CTF. I would claim that up until Halo 2 that worked fairly well, and it’s no impossibility to make maps that are good in many game types in the modern Halo as well. If anything, I would say that most map designers in the industry have been lost since the early 2000.

However, it’s true that maps are currently done for maybe too varied gametypes, have been since Reach with the introduction of Invasion and its non-conventional mechanics that don’t fit conventional map design. In case of Halo 4, the main problem I see is that the maps are made for larger player counts than they should be made for. Out of the three new maps, one is said to be small to medium, one medium, and one large. But what I see there is three maps, two of which are medium to large.

But as far as the gametypes go, I wouldn’t say they have too big of an impact on how playable the map is for Slayer. After all, Slayer is the least demanding gametype in terms of map design. If you have a good CTF map, chances are it will work at least as well with Slayer. So, I wouldn’t blame the catering to too many gametypes (unless you have a very unique one like Invasion), but bad map design in general.

> Because of the two points above, the even matches in objective games are few and far between. Play alone and you’ll find yourself in a party that doesn’t communicate, quits early and has no desire to win. Play with a group of friends and you’ll get matched up against a rag-tag team with no communication and completely annihilate them.
>
> So - there you have it.

And that’s a good point. But as you said, the only gametypes that can really be considered problematic for map design are Invasion, Flood, Regicide, and Spartan Ops. And even out of those, I would only consider Invasion and Spartan Ops needing enough of their own map design to impact other gametypes.

So, I agree the emphasis has been put on the wrong area. That’s something I would agree needs to be fixed. Simply making properly sized maps that don’t double as Spartan Ops play spaces would improve the quality of maps. On the other hand, even that improvement is only marginal if the designers can’t find the right tune the industry lost long ago.

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> > When are people gonna realize that the reason why Halo 3 had so many players is because it had no competition back then? Halo 4 is awesome
>
> I know right?
>
> People don’t understand that now there are a HUGE variety of online multiplayer games to play AND single player games track statistics as well.
>
> Halo 4 has to compete with games like Minecraft, Assassin’s Creed III, Skyrim, and a bevy of sports games.

Idk what you two are talking about because Halo 3 did have competition. Every year around christmas time a whole bunch of games come out, and has been like this for a while. Games like Gears of War and CoD Modern Warfare 1 were competing with halo3

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> > > Yep being #2 on the most played xbox games list and the top selling Halo game of all time does speak volumes.
> >
> > Halo 4 is not the top selling Halo game of all time.
> >
> > http://www.vgchartz.com/gamedb/?name=Halo&publisher=10313&platform=&genre=Shooter&minSales=0&results=200
> >
> > Also, Halo 3 was the #2 most played game on live over 2 years after it’s release.
> >
> > http://majornelson.com/2009/12/22/live-activity-for-week-of-dec-14th/
>
> Let’s see Halo 3 made $170 Million in it’s first day. Halo 4 made $220 million in i’s first day. Well on it’s way of becoming the top selling Halo game of all time. Check and Mate.

Halo 3 sales were only recorded for North America (not even Canada), and Halo 4’s was recorded for the globe.

So considering that, mixed with the fact the the Xbox live consumer population grows by a hefty amount of players every year, I’d say that it is very possible that Halo 4 didn’t do as we’ll as you think.

Check and mate.

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Well, for better or worse these predictions did not come to pass. Although I have to admit I was looking forward to receiving the life-sized spartan with the special edition of Halo 4.

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this game is too noobfriendly i hope 343 makes the rank playlist not so noob friendly power down the ar power down the body shots and play kill have a halo game strafe dodge run fight this still does not feel like a halo game i donno way to easy to kill and get killed people dont go out there and fight like a ninja nomore they dont jump around and try to have epic br battles they just hide between rocks and wait for you to run around the corner jet pack up and shoot what is happpppennning to halo who the hell thought spawning instantly was a good idea for slayer are you wack maybe big team but slayer what the hell is going on…:frowning: this is beyond stupid.

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> It’s sad how Halo 3’s population was sporting over 250K players online shortly before Reach three years after its release while this game has already lost significant amounts of popularity among gamers less than a month later.

That’s probably 250k people over 24 hours. Halo 3 had a 24 hour counter not real time.

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> I couldn’t of said it better myself. This game is turning into a complete joke. On average I have played every Halo installment on a daily basis (even Reach). I just went a week without playing Halo 4. There is something to be said about one of your biggest fans growing bored with your game within its first month.
>
> The reality is myself and many other competitive intelligent true and devoted fans of Halo saw the downfall of Halo 4 on the horizon. REMOVING RANKS WAS THE WORST DECISION MADE IN THE HISTORY OF THIS SERIES. It’s pathetic to think you placed your resources into other areas of the game that don’t matter (Dominion, Regicide, Spartan Ops). The inclusion of ranked matchmaking should have been the first thing on your “to do” list for Halo 4. Luckily for us, some of you seem to have half a brain and realize you dropped the ball big time on that one, to bad we have to wait at least another month.
>
> I thought the maps in Halo Reach were bad, but Halo 4 takes it to an entirely new low. The maps are far to large, cluttered, there are no strategic areas to hold. This game is an absolute mess. Ragnarok is voted for every time for a reason! Your new maps follow the formula of “we need to design these to be big and stupid so dominion will play well on them”. Nobody cares about Dominion, on average there are 3000 people playing it. Same goes for Regicide. I just watched your poorly edited Crimson Map Pack trailer to see two of the three maps are “ideal” for 2 worthless gametypes. Accept your losses and move on 343, the vast majority hate your new gametypes, hate your new maps, and in general hate Halo 4.
>
> I truly feel sorry for newcomers to the series, Halo wasn’t always this bad. Halo 2 had more online features than this garbage, (Ranked matchmaking, proxmity chat, clan support, maps that didn’t suck, etc.)
>
> <mark>Frankie I’m guessing your scratching your head right now baffled at the rapid decline of players in Halo 4. Let me give you a hint to one of the many reasons this is happening. You stated in an interview only 1% of the population cares about ranked matchmaking. You are truly a blind ignorant fool if you believe this to be the case. The numbers don’t lie.</mark>

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> > > > > Yep being #2 on the most played xbox games list and the top selling Halo game of all time does speak volumes.
> > > >
> > > > Halo 4 is not the top selling Halo game of all time.
> > > >
> > > > http://www.vgchartz.com/gamedb/?name=Halo&publisher=10313&platform=&genre=Shooter&minSales=0&results=200
> > > >
> > > > Also, Halo 3 was the #2 most played game on live over 2 years after it’s release.
> > > >
> > > > http://majornelson.com/2009/12/22/live-activity-for-week-of-dec-14th/
> > >
> > > Let’s see Halo 3 made $170 Million in it’s first day. Halo 4 made $220 million in i’s first day. Well on it’s way of becoming the top selling Halo game of all time. Check and Mate.
> >
> > Have you ever considered that more people own a 360 today than in 2007? The sales numbers should have been higher (nearly double) that of Halo 3.
>
> during those years Microsoft added a userbase of mainly causal players. Kinect/the new xbox slim helped bring in new users. I don’t think all of those people are going to go out and buy Halo 4.

Funny, because this game is directed towards casuals.

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> I’ve been playing dominion, such a good spin on domination!

Haha this, dominion is rapidly becoming my favourite halo game type of all time.

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If you don’t like the game don’t play it. For the 10-15 people in this thread complaining about parts of the game there are 10,000 people enjoying the game. And honestly I don’t understand why people assume there needs to be some ranking system, this isn’t CoD this is Halo which since the very first one has been about GAMEPLAY, getting in a game and PLAYING not worrying about ranking up. Thats why I strayed away from CoD I spent all my time focusing on rank and forgot to just have fun and play.

And to the guys who want small maps, I used to love small maps when I played CoD why because I have trouble finding enemies, plain and simple the larger maps would cause confusion, however that has yet to be a problem for me someone who will openly admit to losing his way in other games. I really don’t care how big the map is if it achieves the result I seek, keeping my search times low and my battle times high.

Other than server issues that sometimes cause the game to not function properly I think 343 did a great job. They created a game that I can pick up the controller and have a blast for hours on end, with my friends, or alone. One that I can not play for a few days and comeback too and not feel like everyone is so far ahead of me in ranks or whatever that I can’t compete either.

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> And ignoring 25% of the population sounds like a bad idea.

You mean like they did when they changed the core of this game from a classic Halo game into something completely different? Yes it does sound like a bad idea.

ANYWAYS…

Infinity Slayer is plagued by random ordnance and other balance issues. These issues aren’t as noticeable in the objective playlist.

For Halo to become popular, Infinity Slayer needs fixed because it is the most popular gametype.

As for the maps, I haven’t seen them yet. What I do know though is that this game has barely any truely small maps in it. Map design in general is larger though due to the addition of sprint.

> Halo which since the very first one has been about GAMEPLAY, getting in a game and PLAYING not worrying about ranking up.

I agree entirely. However, the gameplay still doesn’t compare to past Halo games, ranks or no ranks.

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The general public is too stoopid to play objective based games, so they have an easy shoot anything that moves mode for people like OP

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You pay $100 for a game?

Am I the only Australian that isn’t stupid?

https://www.beatthebomb.com.au/

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> I don’t understand why people assume there needs to be some ranking system, this isn’t CoD this is Halo which since the very first one has been about GAMEPLAY, getting in a game and PLAYING not worrying about ranking up. Thats why I strayed away from CoD I spent all my time focusing on rank and forgot to just have fun and play.

Playing ranked gameplay and having a visible incentive is fun for some people.