I’d like to provide some context before we get right into it. A friend, my brother, and I played through campaign on legendary and it took approximately 10 hours. We are all good enough to make heroic look like easy mode and have been rabid fans since “the good 'ol days”.
So the good;
When is the last time we had such a polished and relatively pain free launch? Obviously can’t speak for everyone but I have had 0 (zero) problems with online. Through the entire campaign and the 10+ hours in matchmaking no disconnects, no lag, just clean and smooth games. Same goes for the people I normally play with.
The campaign was new and well crafted and the attention to detail was excellent. Having an full team of 4 Spartans is a nice change, as well as how they throw you right into the fight, no nonsense about it. Adding some new faces (aka blue team and fireteam osiris) was a much needed breath of new life. As previously mentioned, we tore through on legendary first thing and had a lot of fun doing it despite some very frustrating fights. New enemies that require new tactics (looking at you soldiers & warden) are always welcome.
Matchmaking has been a blast. Arena combat and the return to even starts and weapon pick-ups has been a long time coming, takes me back to Halo 2 matchmaking. All I really have to say here is it plays the way I believe halo has been meant to be from the beginning, it just took this long to get here. The boost/sprint/clamber feel like a natural progression and is something that makes it that much better. Nothing like getting ambushed and winning the engagement against stacked odds and I’m glad that it’s possible again. No more first to shoot gets the win. Breakout is a surprisingly fun and fast paced game type and is likely trying to replace griffball, so take that how you will. I personally never liked nor played much griffball so I’m obviously not impartial here.
The Bad;
Unfortunately this part will likely be longer than any of us would like. Campaign. God the Campaign. First and worst, not controlling Blue Team for at least an equal amount of time as Fireteam Osiris is possibly the single biggest mistake anyone has ever made in the history of the Halo franchise. No continuity in the story from 4 to 5 being a close second. We have no idea where Locke and his crew came from and thus no reason to care about them and their missions and the same can be said of Blue Team with the exception of the Chief. The whole thing feels rushed and has no context, making for one big hot mess of a campaign with a very linear and objective-less feel. Felt like they forgot to ship the first half of the game, the part with all the context and build-up and Blue Team missions. I can appreciate adding new heroes to the mix but shoving them down our throat without even sweetening the deal with an at least equal part Chief is a great way to drive away loyal fans. The whole revival mechanic feels out of place as well, or could be I don’t like new things.
Multiplayer. No split screen? no sense beating a dead horse but felt it should at least be mentioned. A lack of variety in the shipped-with maps and incomprehensible commendation system as well as not being able to see other players ranks and armor and all that fun stuff in pre-game lobbies is just a huge step back to the stone ages of FPS games. Customization is lacking as well. With only helmet, visor and armor to change it’s just very limited. The fact that what you get to choose from is random is just icing on the cake. That brings us to emblems. Can’t even begin to comprehend the thought process here. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it right? Warzone matches always feel cramped for the amount of activity on them, while warzone assault matches take place in a very small portion of very large maps. Weird. Seen a lot of people complaining about aiming but I’ve had no trouble with precision personally. Probably I’m just not a good enough player or something.
The Ugly;
Why 343 chose to focus on getting 60 fps and 1080p game play at the cost of so many other important features is anybodies guess. There really isn’t a huge, noticeable difference for the average person. Before you all say “get a better tv”, I play on a 52" LED. Extravagant by some standards. Also 30 fps cutscenes are definitely a noticeable drop in quality.
TL;DR - Matchmaking is good. Campaign is Awful.
What I would like to see is a return to Reach or Halo 4 lobbies, commendations, and customization options as well as the addition of something similar to Spartan Ops to address the lack of Blue Team missions and to provide the necessary info for context that people who only played the games are missing. <—This stuff for free of course.
