The Good, The Bad, The Ugly - Halo 4 Review

Games Other Halo
1

Disclaimer: I am and avid Halo Fan. Therefore, please do not discredit me right off the bat as not being one. Some things you see may make me seem not a Halo fan, others you will praise and agree with. As a rule with all of my topics: Follow the Forum Rules, be courteous to my review (because I took time to write it), and read it fully before jumping to the worse of the worse and passing judgment on me. AND PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOODNESS, do not suggest I go play BLOPS2, because I have and its meh.

OVERALL I give Halo 4 an 8/10, see why below.

Hello community,

I decided to write an extensive, well-thought-out review of Halo 4. I will highlight the good, the bad, and the ugly parts of the game after my review of each individual part of the game. Below will be reviews of the Campaign, Spartan Ops, and Matchmaking (OH GOD NOT ANOTHER ONE OF THESE!). So please sit back and enjoy. I will be more than happy to answer questions and post replies to your concerns. Always a Halo fan, never will stop being one. ALWAYS, the review will be SPOILER FREE!

Campaign:
First, the campaign was absolutely AMAZING. I felt like I was in a move. There has been scrutiny by some as the campaign was “linear” or did not have really anything exceptional. I disagree wholeheartedly. The campaign had little to none in the way of glitches (for me anyways) and offered a good, clear, and concise story backed up by the terminals you find in the game. The terminals were so good in this game I cannot see straight, they offered a different perspective of the campaign and offered better insight on why certain people were in certain places or why certain people or races arrived in the campaign and the way they did. The campaign, overall, touched on all the senses that make a good game: emotion, action, and story. 343 did an absolute EXCELLENT job on the scenes. The scenes, at first, actually seemed like live-action clips and not graphical rendered scenes.

Rating: 10/10

Spartan Ops:
Spartan Ops is by far the coolest thing. Yes, it is not Firefight, but honestly I got so bored of firefight I was falling asleep in Halo: Reach. Mainly, because I played the absolute crap out of Firefight in Halo: ODST but I realized the game needed a different touch. The scenes for Spartan Ops, again are on par with the campaign’s. 343 did so good in this aspect of the game it shadowed some others, I will get into momentarily. The overall glitches and issues with Spartan Ops are not terrible. Yes, there is sometimes annoying lag but it is not Matchmaking, therefore, I am more receptive to dieing in Spartan Ops and just respawning. Really, Spartan Ops is easy as crud. It is not challenging at all and sometimes leads me to believe Halo 4’s Spartan Ops was somewhat OVER-HYPED on the DIFFICULTY. Which is fine, because I honestly only play Spartan Ops to sit back and relax.

Rating 9/10

Matchmaking:
This part of the review will be rather long. The new “style” of matchmaking is undeniably “different”. It offers a different feel to the Halo series and shows us what 343 has up their sleeves in respect to future Halo releases. The multiplayer ideas are so fascinating and original (OH NOES HE ACTUALLY DOES NOT REALIZE HALO COPIED BLAH BLAH). This is incorrect, while Halo 4 did “take” ideas from other “modern games” you have to understand that Halo 4 did them oh so much better. I love the Battlefield-COD-like Halo. It takes the good from those games and takes out the ugly. The playlists are another story, there is absolutely nothing innovative here (except Dominion). Regicide is by far the worst piece of garbage playlist and gametype that was ever added to the HISTORY of Halo. This playlist is so bad, I wont even touch it ever again. It is stupid. Infinity Slayer on the other hand, follows suit as “borrowing” ideas from other modern games and making them better. The ordinance drop system is cool and offers something different to the game. I disagree that the ordinance drop system should be randomized, because it is absolutely purely luck for another team to consistently get Damage Boost or Sniper Rifles EVERY SINGLE DROP. (I will discuss further what I believe needs fixing later). I swear it seems like half of the time I am the only one that gets nothing out of them. The whole “fast-paced” change to Halo 4 is kind of good, I think sprint should have continued to stay as an armor enhancement. It makes spawn killing and clean-up kills WAY to easy. I have killed so many people and always seem to get a guy who just spawned, sprint half the map and still somehow kill me before I can get away. This promotes camping and not-Halo play. More or less the spawn system, is terrible. I sometimes spawn move an inch or two and get triple-team DMR’d across the map. That is plain stupid, especially considering the game promotes teamwork but only sticks you with the team that looks up in the sky and grunt dances while you are being shot at instead of helping. The overall, “true-skill” is stupid. Yes, it promotes “fair” play but 99.99999999% of the time it is me versus Final Boss and Str8 Rippin. The game was designed to prevent this, it has not.

Pause, before you say “YOU SUCK THEN BLAH BLAH” I have an almost 2.0 K/D and I am SR 47. So please refrain from using that comment.

Back, anyways, the game “promotes” competitive play but falls short because of the broken true skill system and terrible spawns. The maps, overall, are pretty decent. I have noticed on specific game modes there is a specific side Red or Blue, that has an overwhelming advantage because of their spawn point. On Complex for an example, blue team SPAWNS by the rooftops, and can easily hold them down and absolutely dominate / spawn kill with proper team play. Oh but wait, the true skill is supposed to stop this. You are right, whenever I am blue team I get true skill rank 1 kids versus a true skill rank of 40000000 and the other team rolls us and vice versa. Halo was always known for its “SOCIAL” playlists not “I NEED TO TRY HARD EVERY SINGLE GAME or its not fun”. While I agree with some things in Matchmaking I DISAGREE with a lot of things. I will talk more about it below.

Rating: 7/10

Now, before you read these lists, know that I love Halo 4 I just think these are some things that I have noticed are issues or are extremely good. Do not “discredit” what I believe and look at my A) Rank, and B) K/D ratio before you start flaming “You are terrible and thats why you think these are bad or ugly”.

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The Good:

  • The “new” style of Halo 4 (combination of other modern games to create something unique)
  • The campaign
  • Spartan Ops
  • Class loadouts are awesome!
  • Specializations are cool, and offer rewards for ranking up.
  • Commendations are not totally useless after all (You only got exp in Reach, now you get COOL armor).
  • Armor customization (I think the armor looks the best so far).

The Bad:

  • Forge World (take something good and make it as worse as possible by limiting things and giving small maps to work with)
  • Playlists (YES, they are adding some but still, you should have had playlists that are actually popular with HALO fans not garbage Slayer Pro - that was a Reach fan base that consisted of a total maybe 40,000 people who actually liked it.)
  • Vehicles (are so fricking weak its stupid, oh wait the banshee takes 4,000 shots to kill but a warthog takes about 10). Some over powered some too weak.
  • Certain weapons that should not be in “Competitive-like” play (the incinerator cannon - is WAAAAAY too good. A noob can pick it up and pwn with it, that does not sound like a “competitive game” to me nor does it promote it)
  • Some Perks are just stupid (i.e. Promethean Vision, because you get a specialization at 50 that can completely negate this perk. 343 should have thought a little bit more when allowing certain specializations and when you can actually get them.)

The Ugly:

  • True Skill (stupid, plain stupid. Does not belong in a “HALO” game. It is broken and does not seem to work because 90% of the time I AM PLAYING PROS not just mediocre players and uncoordinated people + it allows people to abuse it by joining games with “trash friends” so they can beat up on people to keep their 5.0 FALSE KD).
  • Joining sessions in progress (Yes there are “Pros” but the “Cons” definitely out weigh them. I like to have a full team in the beginning not be put into a game 2v5 CTF, its not fair nor is it reasonable because half the time no one joins and it gives other teams free wins).
  • No punishment for leaving games (thought I should add that because if you have a “join in progress option” YOU HAVE TO punish people for leaving games. Plain and Simple, this way it promotes actually staying in games and does not punish people who do. (i.e. people who stay 2v5 and get roflstomped in CTF) So am I just SUPPOSED to lose when that happens, not fair play.)
  • Spawn system promotes spawn camping and camping in general.
  • While weapon loadouts are freaking awesome they do not promote usage of most weapons, they promote using the best weapon and that weapon only. Something 343 said that weapon loadouts would promote, but fail to realize when you make a said weapon amazing and the others take twice as many shots, herp derp, no one will use them and be successful. (AKA DMR wins over everything, period. No point in using anything else because any sort of FPS experience with the DMR beats every other weapon in the game).
  • Gametypes (Yes, Dominion out of the new gametypes is AMAZING, others are garbage i.e. Regicide. Why not keep the player count on most things to 4v4 like Halo should be, grr 343).
  • How in the world do you use an old peer-to-peer system of matchmaking when Halo: Reach (an atrocity) had a better and well-balanced host system in place. HERP DERP, you went backwards and not forwards on how people connect to the servers, the lag is sometimes unbelievable, and host selection takes an hour and a half (and most of the time you are booted to the lobby when you were doing good).
  • No banhammer feature.

My Proposed Fixes:

  • Nerf the DMR and the Boltshot (“OH NO HE ACTUALLY SAID TO NERF MY GUNS I USE”, yes I did. You have class loadouts for a reason, use other weapons and get good with everything make a “balanced” approach to multiplayer 343 not make it so one weapon can win in any long range engagement and the other win in any close range engagement. Not to mention, INSTA RELOAD, on the boltshot is so stupid and over powered I cannot see straight when I think about it.
  • Fix the filter systems in place (meaning actually help people who are lagging their butts off because of your garbage filter system or add a regional filter. Plain and simple.)
  • Tweak “True Skill”, make it so whoever has the highest true skill in the party finds matches with said true skill. Makes no sense to add something like this for people to just abuse. Its stupid and promotes cheating more than helping people. Plus I unseeingly continue to face pro teams and full teams constantly, there is no middle ground and it frustrates me when people say true skill matters, when really it matters for extremely terrible halo players not people with a 1.0 KD or higher.
  • Fix the gametypes, we want 4v4 CTF not 5v5, its stupid.
  • Add a ranking system faster than “EARLY” 2013, yeah right. Add it next week, it is seriously annoying to only play against high ranked people who will probably never touch social playlists when the ranking system comes out. Give the community what it wants by adding ranking sooner, not even going to mention the obvious that it should have been added in the beginning of the game. We are not trying to take a step back from previous installments of Halo.
  • Forge World, obvious fixing. Make it so the community can add cool stuff on file share, etc. At least make it consistent and easily accessible (very glitchy currently).
  • Increase the XP Cap to like 150k per reset (12 am and 5am resets), its stupid to have double exp promotions when I hit the cap after 10 games. Fix it. Let’s not re-live the rage of Halo: Reach and it would get rid of like 50% of the garbage threads on all the forums screaming “WHAT HAPPENED TO MY XP”, etc.
  • Increase the damage it takes to kill a warthog slightly and decrease the damage it takes to kill a banshee ALOT, banshees are WAAAAy to good its stupid. If I can go 30-2 in a vehicle and stay alive the entire match its OP.
  • Spawn System needs to be reworked. Too many instances where I get continuously spawn killed and cannot even react.
  • Buff the Suppressor a bit, make it not as inaccurate, the AR rapes a Suppressor user. It does way too little of damage for how much the spread is.
  • Remove the incinerator cannon from any and all close quarters maps.
  • BRING BACK THE BANZHAMMERZ! Lol the Banhammer system was phenomenal and actually banned the crud out of people who were lag switching, or breaking the rules. Need to be implemented in the game again.

Overall Ratings (Lasting Appeal):

Graphics: 10/10
Sound: 10/10
Gameplay: 7/10
Lasting Appeal: 8/10
Re-playability: High

Again, I am an avid Halo fan and want to see Halo 4 succeed. At its current state, I approximate about half of what we see online will be gone VERY soon if some thing is not done and fast. I know of a lot of people who left the game for something as stupid as the XP Cap, so let us not relive Halo: Reach all over again and nip some concerns in the bum now. I actually like Halo 4, and while there are fixes I proposed some are not detrimental for me to stay playing the game. I love 343, so far, more or less because of them salvaging an atrocity of a game Halo: Reach but it makes me wonder if they are following in Bungie’s footsteps of “Oh we released the game, oh well screw everyone we like it”.

Now, let the comments start rolling. Happy Gaming.

-UnSeEnZ

3

AMEN!

Everything you said about TRUESKILL is so true. Im sick and tired of going in by myself and having to try my heart out every single time. When I bring my friends I start doing a lot better but also they hate playing with me because they get matched up against people who are WAY better than them, therefore taking the fun factor away from them. One of them already sold the game and bought COD because he got tired of getting -Yoink- on playing with me lol. People just don’t understand how bad Halo really needs ranked and social playlists. Idc if COD or whatever other games don’t have em, that’s why they’re not Halo for the love of jesus.

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I hate you, and I hate spartan ops and COD,cough, I mean Halo 4 MP…

5

Woah there champ, you’re calling Slayer Pro garbage and not something that Halo fans like?

I have to call you out on that. Slayer Pro (or any pro variant) hits home to me and the people I play with as the most “authentic” multiplayer experience. The restrictions make it so enjoyable: relying on valuable teamwork, no radar, and very limited loadout options (in me and everyone I play with’s opinion) a more enjoyable and skill based experience.

In fact, I wish there were more pro playlists, namely objective ones. I’ve been here since CE, and I have enjoyed the Pro playlists more than any other. So, back to the Pro being garbage statement -LOLNO

6

> Woah there champ, you’re calling Slayer Pro garbage and not something that Halo fans like?
>
> I have to call you out on that. Slayer Pro (or any pro variant) hits home to me and the people I play with as the most “authentic” multiplayer experience. The restrictions make it so enjoyable: relying on valuable teamwork, no radar, and very limited loadout options (in me and everyone I play with’s opinion) a more enjoyable and skill based experience.
>
> In fact, I wish there were more pro playlists, namely objective ones. I’ve been here since CE, and I have enjoyed the Pro playlists more than any other. So, back to the Pro being garbage statement -LOLNO

You get the picture though right? I mean they could have added definitely more meaningful playlists at launch opposed to Slayer Pro. Not saying Slayer Pro is aweful but it did only catch on last year.

7

An all-digitizin’ forerunner - thought to be extinct - freak awakes in his ridiculous red-glowing orb. This all-digitizin’ Didact wants to wipe out humanity, and coincidentally his already all-digitized ex-wife wants to stop him. Oh, I forgot, humanity’s home is not the earth, they were banned to it (sounds like UFO-Nazis in Germany or like Scientology) by forerunners. Strangely the knowledge about this fact has become completely lost in mankinds history.

Besides that, MC - ice-cold killing machine, wiped out whole armys - discovers that he has feelings for a - surprise, surprise - DIGITIZED copy of a doctor!

Sorry, 343. I want to have back my alien killing cyborg. Until Halo: Reach, Halo was kind of utopic. Now it’s childish fantasy.

8

> The Good:
> - The “new” style of Halo 4 (combination of other modern games to create something unique)
> - The campaign
> - Spartan Ops
> - Class loadouts are awesome!
> - Specializations are cool, and offer rewards for ranking up.
> - Commendations are not totally useless after all (You only got exp in Reach, now you get COOL armor).
> - Armor customization (I think the armor looks the best so far).
>
>
> The Bad:
> - Forge World (take something good and make it as worse as possible by limiting things and giving small maps to work with)
> - Playlists (YES, they are adding some but still, you should have had playlists that are actually popular with HALO fans not garbage Slayer Pro - that was a Reach fan base that consisted of a total maybe 40,000 people who actually liked it.)
> - Vehicles (are so fricking weak its stupid, oh wait the banshee takes 4,000 shots to kill but a warthog takes about 10). Some over powered some too weak.
> - Certain weapons that should not be in “Competitive-like” play (the incinerator cannon - is WAAAAAY too good. A noob can pick it up and pwn with it, that does not sound like a “competitive game” to me nor does it promote it)
> - Some Perks are just stupid (i.e. Promethean Vision, because you get a specialization at 50 that can completely negate this perk. 343 should have thought a little bit more when allowing certain specializations and when you can actually get them.)
>
>
> The Ugly:
> - True Skill (stupid, plain stupid. Does not belong in a “HALO” game. It is broken and does not seem to work because 90% of the time I AM PLAYING PROS not just mediocre players and uncoordinated people + it allows people to abuse it by joining games with “trash friends” so they can beat up on people to keep their 5.0 FALSE KD).
> - Joining sessions in progress (Yes there are “Pros” but the “Cons” definitely out weigh them. I like to have a full team in the beginning not be put into a game 2v5 CTF, its not fair nor is it reasonable because half the time no one joins and it gives other teams free wins).
> - No punishment for leaving games (thought I should add that because if you have a “join in progress option” YOU HAVE TO punish people for leaving games. Plain and Simple, this way it promotes actually staying in games and does not punish people who do. (i.e. people who stay 2v5 and get roflstomped in CTF) So am I just SUPPOSED to lose when that happens, not fair play.)
> - Spawn system promotes spawn camping and camping in general.
> - While weapon loadouts are freaking awesome they do not promote usage of most weapons, they promote using the best weapon and that weapon only. Something 343 said that weapon loadouts would promote, but fail to realize when you make a said weapon amazing and the others take twice as many shots, herp derp, no one will use them and be successful. (AKA DMR wins over everything, period. No point in using anything else because any sort of FPS experience with the DMR beats every other weapon in the game).
> - Gametypes (Yes, Dominion out of the new gametypes is AMAZING, others are garbage i.e. Regicide. Why not keep the player count on most things to 4v4 like Halo should be, grr 343).
> - How in the world do you use an old peer-to-peer system of matchmaking when Halo: Reach (an atrocity) had a better and well-balanced host system in place. HERP DERP, you went backwards and not forwards on how people connect to the servers, the lag is sometimes unbelievable, and host selection takes an hour and a half (and most of the time you are booted to the lobby when you were doing good).
> - No banhammer feature.
>
>
> My Proposed Fixes:
> - Nerf the DMR and the Boltshot (“OH NO HE ACTUALLY SAID TO NERF MY GUNS I USE”, yes I did. You have class loadouts for a reason, use other weapons and get good with everything make a “balanced” approach to multiplayer 343 not make it so one weapon can win in any long range engagement and the other win in any close range engagement. Not to mention, INSTA RELOAD, on the boltshot is so stupid and over powered I cannot see straight when I think about it.
> - Fix the filter systems in place (meaning actually help people who are lagging their butts off because of your garbage filter system or add a regional filter. Plain and simple.)
> - Tweak “True Skill”, make it so whoever has the highest true skill in the party finds matches with said true skill. Makes no sense to add something like this for people to just abuse. Its stupid and promotes cheating more than helping people. Plus I unseeingly continue to face pro teams and full teams constantly, there is no middle ground and it frustrates me when people say true skill matters, when really it matters for extremely terrible halo players not people with a 1.0 KD or higher.
> - Fix the gametypes, we want 4v4 CTF not 5v5, its stupid.
> - Add a ranking system faster than “EARLY” 2013, yeah right. Add it next week, it is seriously annoying to only play against high ranked people who will probably never touch social playlists when the ranking system comes out. Give the community what it wants by adding ranking sooner, not even going to mention the obvious that it should have been added in the beginning of the game. We are not trying to take a step back from previous installments of Halo.
> - Forge World, obvious fixing. Make it so the community can add cool stuff on file share, etc. At least make it consistent and easily accessible (very glitchy currently).
> - Increase the XP Cap to like 150k per reset (12 am and 5am resets), its stupid to have double exp promotions when I hit the cap after 10 games. Fix it. Let’s not re-live the rage of Halo: Reach and it would get rid of like 50% of the garbage threads on all the forums screaming “WHAT HAPPENED TO MY XP”, etc.
> - Increase the damage it takes to kill a warthog slightly and decrease the damage it takes to kill a banshee ALOT, banshees are WAAAAy to good its stupid. If I can go 30-2 in a vehicle and stay alive the entire match its OP.
> - Spawn System needs to be reworked. Too many instances where I get continuously spawn killed and cannot even react.
> - Buff the Suppressor a bit, make it not as inaccurate, the AR rapes a Suppressor user. It does way too little of damage for how much the spread is.
> - Remove the incinerator cannon from any and all close quarters maps.
> - BRING BACK THE BANZHAMMERZ! Lol the Banhammer system was phenomenal and actually banned the crud out of people who were lag switching, or breaking the rules. Need to be implemented in the game again.
>
> Overall Ratings (Lasting Appeal):
>
> Graphics: 10/10
> Sound: 10/10
> Gameplay: 7/10
> Lasting Appeal: 8/10
> Re-playability: High
>
> Again, I am an avid Halo fan and want to see Halo 4 succeed. At its current state, I approximate about half of what we see online will be gone VERY soon if some thing is not done and fast. I know of a lot of people who left the game for something as stupid as the XP Cap, so let us not relive Halo: Reach all over again and nip some concerns in the bum now. I actually like Halo 4, and while there are fixes I proposed some are not detrimental for me to stay playing the game. I love 343, so far, more or less because of them salvaging an atrocity of a game Halo: Reach but it makes me wonder if they are following in Bungie’s footsteps of “Oh we released the game, oh well screw everyone we like it”.
>
>
> Now, let the comments start rolling. Happy Gaming.
>
> -UnSeEnZ

This is the best description of Halo 4 I’ve seen.

9

343i NEEDS to see this type of stuff. If they just made these fixes this game would be 10x better. Come on 343i. All it needs is the right patch. The sooner the better.

10

> 343i NEEDS to see this type of stuff. If they just made these fixes this game would be 10x better. Come on 343i. All it needs is the right patch. The sooner the better.

Everyone thank and favorite this guy’s post. He really did a fine job. As long as people keep this thread alive, someone important will see it. That, or we can directly email people of 343i or post this thread on blogs.

Either way, well done, OP. Only thing I did not like was the proposal to nerf the DMR. It’s my preferred rifle, so I would prefer it not touched. :slight_smile:

11

The Good:
-343 actually listened. Some things they restored in the campaign were very unlikely to happen
-the sandbox is useful
-AI animations are convincing (a la CE)
-graphics
-MP custom games options aren’t as bad as I expected

The Bad:
-Legendary is still cheap. I was hoping for CE Legendary: the AI are engaging and convincing. The enemy AI on Legendary are mediocre at best. Their animations are believable but their actions are far from convincing. Legendary Covies = grenade spam + needler supercombining + surprise fuel rods and Jackal snipers
-campaign is linear and short, it’s only artificially lengthened by difficult encounters, button pushing, and in Reclaimer’s case, having to wait for the Mammoth
-no real distinction between difficulties besides enemy spawn changes, damage, health, grenade throwing rate, and projectile speed. The QTEs are always the same, the enemies never change tactics, the Legendary ending’s only difference is showing Chief’s eyes
-barely any replayability in the campaign. MP gets all the interesting game changers while campaign has the same old skulls which get old after a while (at least for me). Also, no campaign scoring or theater
-only Forerunner has two way battling between enemies
-no campaign exclusive weapons (i.e. Sentinel Beam) or AAs (i.e. Promethean teleport)

The Ugly:
-Spartan Ops exclusive to Gold members, can only be played online, first few episodes are revisits to campaign locations, most objectives are the same
-you don’t get any XP for playing campaign while you can just leave a custom game running for at least 10 minutes and get XP for it. I play a lot of campaign offline because there’s really no reason to play it online
-Firefight Versus has no replacement

The campaign is pretty much just an extension of MP gameplay with a few minor differences. Very limited and disappointing.