The Future of Halo: Reform or Revisit?

Games Halo 5: Guardians
1

The Halo franchise began with Halo: Combat Evolved in 2001 on the original Xbox console, which was 13 years ago from around the time this new Halo game will most likely arrive. In these 13 years, Halo has had a place on each of Microsoft’s 3 consoles: The Xbox, the Xbox 360, and the Xbox One, releasing a total of seven titles (including Halo Xbox One but discluding Halo Wars and Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary), all of which included their own multiplayer, save ODST. The first three multiplayers stuck to the formula introduced in Halo: CE, where the other two built off of the previous installment.

In 2010 with Halo: Reach, after nearly a decade of existence as a popular franchise. In this title, Bungie decided to push Halo forward with some new innovations, most notably consisting of armor abilities, loadouts, and bloom. Despite Reach being able to maintain a population of at least 100,000 at almost any given time, these features brought a lot of controversy to the Halo community. Armor abilities and bloom were said to bring a sense of randomness to the gameplay, while the loadouts - even though at this time were preset - were said to break the even spawns in some cases, but was not touched upon as much as the other two. These features upset some fans to the extent of leaving the franchise, leaving their trust with 343i who at the time had said that they would bring Halo back.

In 2012, 343 Industries, due to Bungie’s leaving, released Halo 4 after about a year of hyping up the return of actual Halo. In terms of multiplayer, this did not happen. Not only customizable loadouts were added, but also perks and ordinance drops (scorestreaks), which replaced weapon spawns in Infinity playlists. While at first it was enjoyable, managing to reach a peak of over 400,000 players, it quickly diminished when some problems arrived. This problems were mainly associated with being able to spawn with the combination of the plasma pistol and the plasma grenades at spawn (which killed vehicular gameplay), spawning with the combination of the boltshot (a pocket shotgun which was said would not be present in the game) and active camouflage, ordinance drops, and purposefully over powered weapons (the DMR, most notably). This, along with other issues like the lack of playable Elites, heavy bullet magnetism, the lack of shipped smaller maps (most were big team oriented, which was worsened when the first map pack released contained 3 big team maps), the leveling system, and the perks, drove fans away, taking only a year to drop the game down to a steady peak of approximately 20,000 players. As a result of this, many fans have criticized 343i of trying to assimilate with the other popular first person shooters, Call of Duty being the most referenced (it was even reported that they hired people who were not fond of Halo).

So where does this currently leave the Halo franchise? In what direction will the multiplayer go in the future? As of now, Halo is in a limbo between new and old with 343i trying to balance the classic Halo experience with more contemporary gameplay mechanics. A big chunk of the community has been separated from the rest, never to return unless they decide to purchase an Xbox One to play the next Halo game on. In short, the old ways are dying out and the community is the smallest it has ever been, but also divided by where they think Halo should go back to its roots or on its current route. While not the best situation, this does present 343i two major opportunities: to reform or revisit.

Based off of what was stated before, 343i is in an ample position to reform Halo’s multiple player experience. This new Halo will be the first installment of the franchise on the Xbox One, presenting an opportunity that was not taken by Bungie with Halo 3 when the Xbox 360 release. If it is good, it will draw in a new crowd of fans from the Xbox One players, and only drive off a minimal amount of players. And most importantly, 343i will be able to craft the franchise’s multiplayer into a direction where they want to take it without being held back by the classic features or the run-of-the-mill multiplayer experience; they have nex-gen technology to work with after all. But on a downside, this new multiplayer will probably not be reminiscent of the multiplayer the community grew to love at all, pretty much changing half of Halo into a different game.

On the other hand, they can use this opportunity as a selling point for bringing in old fans to the Xbox One by returning to the multiplayer’s roots and building off of the classic experience that hasn’t been seen in a new game since 2007. The only problem with this, though, is that the classic experience was able to run on the original Xbox, and that is two generations behind Halo now. That, along with the same experience being present for nearly 13 years now, is bound to be stale and presents little room to evolve without provoking an outrage from the community (I’m not saying that Halo 4 was an evolution, I agree it was more of an assimilation). So a new format would give 343i more breathing room for their game.

So what is the point of this thread? Well, a Halo multiplayer reform is most likely on the way due to reasons stated within the paragraphs, and that you should keep your eyes open and give a new Halo a chance in the future. Mutliplayer is what keeps Halo half alive, and for it to be a full and healthy game, the multiplayer has to be able to evolve.

After reading this “little” thread I wrote, where do you think Halo should go? Do you think that change will be the best thing to do in order to keep Halo alive or do you think Halo should stick with what it originally presented back in 2001, with the risk of dying a stale death?

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Hey, GnomeScat (grody), Good post!

Personally, I love the loadout system. As a fan of most of the guns in the Franchise, it was great to see many of these guns gain importance via this change.

So, I say…

-Keep the loadout system, let people play a Classic version if they like.

-Bring back forced unscoping of weapons (or at least some meaningful interruption) when shot

-Utilize AA map pickups?

-Remove Active Camo from Armor Abilities, and add it to Powerups, making it slightly more effective (Think Halo 2 or 3’s Camo). Speed Boost’s powerup color should also be changed to yellow, (as the custom powerup was yellow in H3 and by default gave you a speed boost) Overshield and Damage Boost should remain green and red respectively, and Active Camo should be blue.

-Human friendly Elites in Multiplayer (it would even fit canonically!) if you can balance them (IE manage space and hitbox size)

-Like I’ve said before, if you don’t offer a classic playlist, PLEASE allow us to turn off sprint in custom gametype options! There’s absolutely no excuse when there are mods floating around that FANS HAVE MADE FOR FREE, and 343, who has a team of well paid, veteran coders, SOMEHOW cant manage to make the option on their own.

If 343i/Microsoft hates mods so much, make sure we have those kinds of options so we don’t HAVE to turn to fans who actually care enough to make these options. You’re doing this to yourselves.

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Honestly I think Halo has either 2 options:
-Cut off Halo with classic Halo, and explicitly state it will be a revolutionary change from what Bungie once called “Halo”. Plus, 343 will choose to follow their own path and invigorate new styles of gameplay. Thus contradicting the use of using the title “Halo”. Sort of like a reboot possibly.(Obviously this is too late as we’re in the middle of a new trilogy.)

-Or revisit Halo and implement the multiplayer that was remembered from Halo 2. The only reason to continue this franchise is because it’s a <mark>SEQUEL</mark> to the franchise. If it’s not being a <mark>SEQUEL</mark>, why make a poor excuse for a Halo game when you can make it a whole new IP? All this is doing is taking advantage of the franchise’s reputation, when you could be doing so much better if you had your own vision with your own IP. By not giving some nod to the roots, without doubt inevitably the series would die with all the traditionalists eventually leaving the series.

“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!” - A wise man;though we may have improvements that supplement.
Unfortunately and truthfully, Halo has just about or is near the end of its course.
Just MY 2cents

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> On the other hand, they can use this opportunity as a selling point for bringing in old fans to the Xbox One by returning to the multiplayer’s roots and building off of the classic experience that hasn’t been seen in a new game since 2007. The only problem with this, though, is that the classic experience was able to run on the original Xbox, and that is two generations behind Halo now.

What? How is hardware relevant to gameplay? Even games like Ryse and Titanfall could run on the original Xbox so long as the graphic quality was severely cut.

> That, along with the same experience being present for nearly 13 years now, is bound to be stale and presents little room to evolve without provoking an outrage from the community
> …
> Do you think that change will be the best thing to do in order to keep Halo alive or do you think Halo should stick with what it originally presented back in 2001, with the risk of dying a stale death?

Copy-pasted from a post I just made in another topic:

CoD has had the same basic gameplay since 2007: FPS, aim-down-sights, loadouts. The reason for its success is also its biggest criticism: it hasn’t changed. Not changing has allowed CoD to steadily build its fanbase by attracting new players without losing its existing players. Not changing has also allowed CoD to improve on and nearly perfect its gameplay style. Instead of changing into a completely different game every three years, CoD adds new gametypes, balances the perks, and changes XP or other non-gameplay systems so that players can experience the same 2007 gameplay that they love in different ways every year. That is how you keep a franchise alive for years and years. I’m willing to bet you that the year CoD changes drastically is the year it begins to die, just like Halo.

5

I believe a major part of what happened with Reach and an even larger part of what happened with Halo 4 has to do with the way matchmaking is handled. One of the biggest frustrations with both games is getting the game you want on the map you want. Usually it’s either/or. Halo 4’s lack of local search does not help. Host migration and lag is the most frustrating thing for me these days.

Xbox One will have a new matchmaking system. Players will be matched using a new algorithm called Smart Match. I can’t find any details at the moment, but I have to assume it will work differently from TrueSkill.

The other thing is that the game will be server based, which many believe will solve a lot of problems. We shall see.

From what I can gather, one might be able to pick the game and map they want, and then let Smart Match do its thing while you occupy yourself with other things. You may not be forced to choose to play a game with settings you don’t like or on a map you don’t like. I don’t know that all games on Xbox will be forced to use this system, but I can see some advantages. There are probably some disadvantages, and I will leave it to the community to point them out. My point is that multiplayer will most likely be different from anything we have seen so far, and if we are going to make suggestions we should keep in mind that ELO and TrueSkill will be gone, and our ideas should revolve around what might be possible with the new system.

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> One of the biggest frustrations with both games is getting the game you want on the map you want. Usually it’s either/or. Halo 4’s lack of local search does not help. Host migration and lag is the most frustrating thing for me these days.

I don’t see how those issues are relevant because they’re common both to previous Halo games and to other shooters like CoD. Even in Ghosts, players have to deal with host migrations and not playing the maps they want.

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You raise an excellent point OP. I think that, to answer your question should halo reform or return, 343 should do both.

Let me explain, there’s certain characteristics that make Halo, Halo such as the use of the reticle instead of aiming down sights, the use of shields, and most importantly EQUAL STARTS. (to name a few)

Equal starts represents a huge part of the multiplayer. True fans and pro players play halo for this reason, take away this and you lose an important part of the fanbase.

Now usually these hardcore players stick to smaller matches such as 4v4 playlists, while more casual players go for games such as BTB.

This lets 343 know where they can reform while sticking within the parameters of certain groups of players. I’m not necessarily a competitive player, I prefer casual so I cannot really give my opinions over smaller playlists.

For larger playlists, I would like to see a bit of destructible environment, and other levolution such as buttons for doors and bridges. This i think will show Halo at a next gen level.
I would like to see big battles like in the campaign. Although I would like to see it someday, I can appreciate that scarabs and mammoths on the battlefield may be a bit difficult. I would be pleasantly surprised if this happened.
Realistically, I would expect a lot more vehicles than previous tittles. UNSC air vehicles is a must or i probably wont but unless theres a really good substitute eg insurrectionist air vehicle.
Larger player counts would be greatly welcomed, 16v16 would probably be best. If 343 pulled this off well, I would say go for larger, but at the minute 16v16 would probably be the most ideal. More open maps like forgeworld maps, valhalla, tempest rather than closed maps like vortex, exile or meltdown - which are meant to be vehicle maps!

When it comes to AAs, equipment and sprint, I think a possible solution maybe to have equipment on the d-pad, keep AAs on RB, but make them limited, and return sprint to AA. And/Or possible have sprint default but slower and the AA/powerup makes sprint incredible fast.

I think most innovation should be with co-op game modes such as firefight. There have been some good topics about this on the forums.

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>

I wasn’t referencing hardware, but age. This multiplayer has been around since 2001 and has not done much to move forwards in its own way, primarily because Halo’s formula makes it difficult to do that. First of all, Halo is traditionally an arena styled game. This means equal spawn, all weapons are present on the map, and everything is fair. These are good grounds to base a competitive multiplayer, but where do you go from there? All you can do is add weapons, maps, and non-gameplay altering accessories without disrupting this vision. Armor abilities, a single feature, created an uproar in the community, and what 343i did by furthering this trend of unequal spawns depleted it to an all time steady low in only a year (~20k peak per day). With this information, how can you stay true a 13 year old arena type shooter while evolving and freshening it up?

> CoD has had the same basic gameplay since 2007: FPS, aim-down-sights, loadouts. The reason for its success is also its biggest criticism: it hasn’t changed.

But what about before 2007? The multiplayer was an incredibly different experience, the only major similarity being ADS and movement (which actually excludes sprint and knifing, see CoD 2 for example). They changed the formula in 2007 so that they can stop changing. That doesn’t sound very logical at first, but let me explain: They established custom classes, attachments, perks, and grenade types; all which can be extended upon in various ways over time, which it has. Look how the create-a-class system has evolved - not changed - over the years. It’s become more complex and in-depth, presenting a new feel to the multiplayer, where as all Halo can do is dump more weapons, equipment, and vehicles into the sandbox without going through a change, which you said would kill a franchise.

In short, 343i has to find a way to evolve Halo to a point where it can feel fresh with every title, and so far there are no ways the franchise can do that without digging it’s own grave even deeper before it is sealed. I’m not saying that Halo has to radically change to a completely different game; I don’t even want it to. But the fact of the matter is that you eventually run out of ways to freshen up a game when you have the amount of constrains that Halo does, and if you don’t do anything about it the game will become stale. Nobody wants to buy stale bread, so why would someone want to purchase a stale game?

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> > One of the biggest frustrations with both games is getting the game you want on the map you want. Usually it’s either/or. Halo 4’s lack of local search does not help. Host migration and lag is the most frustrating thing for me these days.
>
> I don’t see how those issues are relevant because they’re common both to previous Halo games and to other shooters like CoD. Even in Ghosts, players have to deal with host migrations and not playing the maps they want.

I brought it up because with Reach and 4 343i tends to stack the deck, so to speak, in favor of games they want you to play. I then pointed out that there will be a new matchmaking system available that might mitigate that.

Wasn’t trying to steal the thread or anything.

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> how can you stay true a 13 year old arena type shooter while evolving and freshening it up?

Who said it needs “evolving and freshening up” so drastically? Before Halo: Reach, no one would’ve thought that Halo would die if it didn’t change. All of this talk of evolution, Halo getting stale, and arena shooters dying didn’t happen until after Halo had already changed. There is no evidence to support the claim that Halo needs to forego its arena gameplay now or in the near future.

If and when Halo’s gameplay simply becomes old, it won’t be because Halo didn’t change; it will be because the arena shooter subgenre is no longer in demand. The reason games like Tomb Raider, Mario, and Banjo-Kazooie died out isn’t because they didn’t change and stayed the same; it’s because their genres (platformer) lost demand.

My opinion is that Halo shouldn’t change into a different subgenre until change becomes necessary (i.e. the arena shooter subgenre begins to die). Since Reach, Halo has been changing regardless of if or what change is necessary. So let’s give the Halo multiplayer fans their Halo multiplayer, and for the people who get tired of of it, there are plenty of other non-Halo games out there. As long as the number people who will play an unchanging Halo outnumbers the number of people who will only continue to play Halo because it changes, Halo should not change.

> They changed the formula in 2007 so that they can stop changing.

Right, or to put it another way, they found something that worked and then they ran with it. The difference between Halo and CoD in this respect is that Halo started with what worked.

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> If and when Halo’s gameplay simply becomes old, it won’t be because Halo didn’t change; it will be because the arena shooter subgenre is no longer in demand. The reason games like Tomb Raider, Mario, and Banjo-Kazooie died out isn’t because they didn’t change and stayed the same; it’s because their genres (platformer) lost demand.
>
> My opinion is that Halo shouldn’t change into a different subgenre until change becomes necessary (i.e. the arena shooter subgenre begins to die). Since Reach, Halo has been changing regardless of if or what change is necessary. So let’s give the Halo multiplayer fans their Halo multiplayer, and for the people who get tired of of it, there are plenty of other non-Halo games out there. As long as the number people who will play an unchanging Halo outnumbers the number of people who will only continue to play Halo because it changes, Halo should not change.

OK, don’t bite my head off, but I’m going to ask a question I’ve been asking since Reach released.

If there had never been a Reach, what would Halo 4 have looked like? What would have made it more compelling to play than Halo 3, other than it was a shiny new game?

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> If there had never been a Reach, what would Halo 4 have looked like?

I have no idea. Before Halo 2, I never would’ve considered vehicle boarding or dual-wielding. Before Halo 3, I never would’ve thought of its progressive/skill rank combo, Theater, Forge (the simpleness of its integration), and file sharing. Even Halo: Reach added modes like Invasion and Firefight, which are quite unlike regular competitive multiplayer, but still very well-received.

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It needs both re-visitation and reformation. Halo 4 had good intentions, but borrowing aspects of other popular FPS games doomed it and made it generic. Halo is first and foremost an arena shooter emphasizing equality; anything that deviates from this heavily is bound to fail.

This is why Halo 4 population rapidly declined. Long-time fans/hardcore gamers hate this and casuals will inevitably move onto the next big game that comes along and provides simple, easily-adaptable gameplay with minimal challenge.

Yet at the same time, we can’t simply bring back Halo 3’s gameplay. People will tire of that. Those that are saying Call of Duty is still popular after doing the exact same thing for years now should take a look at Call of Duty: Ghost’s critical reception and sales. It pales in comparison to former titles. Doing the same will only kill Halo, albeit at a slower rate.

What we need is something that revitalizes the core gameplay – Bungie’s golden triangle – while paying respect to some of the new ideas of the recent games. AAs (e.g. sprint and jet pack) can easily be converted into pick-ups the gameplay will be less random and more balanced that way. Loadouts should not be customizable and should be limited to same classes of weapon. Nobody should start off with something as devastating as plasma grenades and plasma pistols. There’s also annoyances like bullet magnetism to solve.

Throw in some new ideas and cranks to Halo’s gameplay that work with Halo’s forumula without compromising its emphasis on balanced gameplay, and you should end up with an incredibly successful Halo game. I think 343i can do this provided that they listen to us. They’ve done some respectable work and appear to respect the franchise.

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> Those that are saying Call of Duty is still popular after doing the exact same thing for years now should take a look at Call of Duty: Ghost’s critical reception and sales. It pales in comparison to former titles.

Call of Duty also makes minor adjustments to its games every year (as opposed to Halo’s 2-3 years) and then charges players $60 for them. It should be no surprise that not all CoD players everywhere rushed to buy a game that they had basically already spent $60 on less than a year before.

What’s important regarding multiplayer is neither sales nor critic reviews; what’s important is how many people are playing it. While you may be able to say that CoD failed to break sales records for the fifth time consecutively, you can’t say that the number of CoD players is down. Sales and/or population beginning to level out ≠ dying. Sales and/or population dropping with several subsequent releases = dying.

15

> > If there had never been a Reach, what would Halo 4 have looked like?
>
> I have no idea. Before Halo 2, I never would’ve considered vehicle boarding or dual-wielding. Before Halo 3, I never would’ve thought of its progressive/skill rank combo, Theater, Forge (the simpleness of its integration), and file sharing. Even Halo: Reach added modes like Invasion and Firefight, which are quite unlike regular competitive multiplayer, but still very well-received.

So the consensus seems to be that despite the improvements to things like Forge, Theater and file sharing (and I’ll just include custom games), Reach hurt the franchise by introducing a class-based multiplayer with loadouts that is said to have made the game unbalanced, and introduced visible bloom that reduced the skill gap.

Halo 4 did nothing to improve Forge, Theater, custom games and file sharing, added some weapons to the sandbox, continued the class-based multiplayer with loadouts, and added perks and PODs.

The forums suggest that loadouts are the main culprit and should not be part of Halo 5. This would make multiplayer more like the older games and, therefore, would return multiplayer to it’s former glory (I’m aware that there are other things, but having a choice on spawn seems to matter the most). I wonder, though, if a return to Halo 3 style multiplayer with some new weapons and a new thing like dual wielding or assassinations will be enough for Halo 5 and, perhaps, reduce expectations for Halo 6? If they don’t roll with classes, what could they possibly add that will make us want more?

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I could quote ALL of Vektor0 posts. I agree with everything he has said here so far. Well said man! Love the COD piece, couldn’t of said it better myself.

There was NO reason at all for Halo to leave it’s arena style. To me reach started the downfall of halo. Why 343 decided to copy reach is BEYOND ME! Just look at the sale #'s/ popularity or Halo 1-3 to reach or heck just take halo 3…or 1 I don’t care because all three beat reach in all arenas.

Yes 343 did do some things well on halo 4 but honesty to me they changed/took out things of just for the sake of it! Also I feel they did a sloppy job of testing there online play.

Halo 4 failed online due to it trying to be something halo is not… A class base shooter. 343 just added all the “cool” stuff from other shooters. Adding things like perks, kill cams, POV etc Bad idea.

A other thing 343 has also copy from COD and Class base shooters is STARTING A MATCH WITH UNEVEN TEAMS!!! WHY??? This has to be one of the WORST things to copy EVER!!! Halo 1-3 and even Reach would NEVER start a match being say 4-2 (unless someone lost power or signed out or something) If you have 8 players in the lobby (playing 4-4 here) and then all the sudden you have 7, the game doesn’t start till it finds a other player to make it even again, but what does halo 4 do… just starts the game… UNREAL!! It’s one of my biggest complains I have with games like BF and COD. In 5 hours of playing BF4 online I’ve only played two games with even starts…TWO!!! I’m done with that game. I know the backing out of the lobby is the main reason this happens in Halo 4 but holy mother of god how did 343 not see this and fix this!!! Or if they did and were ok with it, then I’m sorry but you need to fire/let go A LOT of people there.

So to answer the OP I think they should revisit Halo no IF ENDS or BUTTS!!

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A mix of both. I personally enjoy having loadouts, but not as overpowered as the ones they have now. In fact, loadouts made for some pretty enticing custom game variants.

They should keep loadouts in, strictly for that reason, but not make them as focal as in Halo 4. Halo Reach’s style was fine; No matter what loadout you chose in standard MM, the only difference was ability. Personal loadouts, on the other hand, are upsetting.

I swear, you people make it sound like all matches in Reach had a hidden loadout where the enemy team spawned with sniper rifles with underbarrel-mounted instant-shot boltshots and full-auto unlimited ammo rocket launchers that locked onto everything, with a super invincibility ability that lasted forever and allowed you to teleport at will. It’s ridiculous.

I actually think Reach’s MP was the best in the franchise. Bloom was the only major blemish, and I rarely noticed it.

Sure, Jetpack’s annoying, sure, but it really only broke level geometry. Sure, Armor Lock was tough, but temporary, and easily countered. Sure, Active Camo was able to make you ‘invisible’, but best used as a radar jammer, as it wasn’t good enough to be used as often as people say. But most armor abilities didn’t make the game unplayable to all but the most stubborn of fools.

So, if you are asking my opinion, I think they should revisit Reach-Style MP, with a few extra features.

-Fully Recharging Health with a visible meter-
-No Jetpack-
-Active Camo as a pickup-
-Less cluttered maps-
-Weapon Skins for loadout weapons, selectable in the ‘customize’ tab of the start menu-

18

Why not both?
As far as population and issues go, I’d recommend revisiting the Halo 3- Reach gameplays and seeing what got them such great populations and what bugs or faults must be avoided.

After this, the reform can happen.

The issues which I believe were pressing in the 360 titles or at least controversial:
Armour Lock- Fixed
Jetpack Map Breakers(by boosting into out of map area, unfair sightlines, etc)- Present(halo Reach and Halo 4)
Bloom- Fixed
Flinch(unneeded, random and sometimes frustrating)- present(Halo4)
Promethean Vision(wall hacks)- present(Halo4)
Personal Ordnance(added an extra layer of randomness and unfair options…it should at least be tuned to give all players the same possibility and have lesser equipment involved ONLY)- present(Halo4)
Unequal Number of Players on Each team at start- present(Halo4)
Non Recharging Health- fixed
Active Camo at spawn- present(Halo Reach)
Lack of Custom Games Settings- present(Halo4)
Imbalanced Loadout options- present(Halo4)
Perks- present(Halo4)
Lack of theater Options- present(Halo4)
No Fileshare off release- present(Halo4)

Correct if you think that these reasons were incorrect…

Sprint is very, very controversial and Halo can live with it…(Don’t start on this)

Loadouts can be better balanced and adjusted to be fine. What I personally recommend are 3 options only, Main Weapons, Secondary, or Grenades.
The Weapons are limited to the corresponding Playlist to patch unneeded or imbalanced choices… Like Reach there are five choices of AAs to go with your Loadout for the Playlist…

Perks need to be removed…

Custom Games should use Halo Reach as a base…same with the theater

POD must be reduced to a SET selection for all players with lesser weapons or AAs or Grenades in it, not major Power Weapons

Descope should be added in to replace Flinch…

AC should return to its original state and Speed Boost should have a yellow effect instead.

AAs should be rethought of and replaced(especially PV and JP

Lastly the Game should wait for both teams to have equal amounts of players.

So to answer your question…both!

19

> or do you think Halo should stick with what it originally presented back in 2001, with the risk of dying a stale death?

Halo is completely dead in its current state. There’s nothing to lose from going back and taking out all of the garbage.

20

> The issues which I believe were pressing in the 360 titles or at least controversial:
>
> Personal Ordnance
>
> Unequal Number of Players on Each team at start
>
> Armor Abilities (e.g. PV, camo)

These are my personal dealbreakers, if they have random stuff like Ordnance and unbalanced Armor Abilities, I will not buy HXO. If they have bad lobby system (ie uneven teams 2v4, lack of ranking or sorting, bad map selection method) I will probably not buy it.

Rankings, Descope, A lot of maps, Pickups (camo, damage,overshield) are an extra bonus id love to see, but not required for me to buy.