When I bought this game I had very high expectations and believed that this Halo would be the Halo. The Halo to iron out all the issues past games had and to provide a multiplayer experience that no other game in the industry could, what with Forge, Custom Games, File Sharing, and so on. As a Halo fan I wanted to give you all, 343, a chance to right your wrong with the pathetic release of The Master Chief Collection that has seen very little support and effort to correct the issues that it had, resulting in a lacking population.
This game is arguably worse than that.
I’m not even going to bother with the fact that your campaign advertisement was blatantly thrown out the window in favor of some fanfic tier trash, but your multiplayer is severely lacking. With the new File Share system, playing Custom Games that friends and other people have made is damn near impossible. The idea that I have to add people to my friends list I don’t care for to simply play Custom Games that end up being broken any way by some unknown bug is beyond me. This example alone is enough to say you as a company have taken two steps backwards. Speaking of which, that brings me to Arena.
Why, oh why, oh why, is there no Social anything? Why is there so much emphasis on competitive play? Every time I get on this game, it has to be a competition. I and many others don’t find that fun. For a time I enjoyed getting a rank simply for the emblem because again, your playlists lack variety, but I and many other people don’t enjoy a ranked playlist and non-ranked playlists with hidden MMR being the only thing I can play. This doesn’t make sense to me. Why so much emphasis on a competitive environment?
“Oh you moron there’s Warzone.”
Warzone has even less variety. That’s not even an argument.
Four maps with the same events over and over and over. Warzone Assault? It’s almost always a one sided crush not to mention that the point of me ranting is that I don’t want to play the same gametype over and over.
“But Team Arena!”
The same issue is there. There are but so many combinations that can be had when you have a number of maps you can barely count on two hands and gametypes you can count on one.
This drives away so many players because they feel obligated to try so hard to play the game, not to mention the toxic atmosphere that engulfs your playlists. Having casual players, or players that simply don’t care for a ranking system that arbitrarily chooses how to rank people, creates a stale experience, and cultivates that toxic atmosphere; those who want to win so bad become hostile because someone’s not playing “up to par”.
Let those who want to play for keeps have their environment, and those who don’t care have theirs. It’s really that simple.
I want to revisit the fact that you have no Social playlists. You have your moments where you introduce your weekend playlists that have no ranking. Is this what you consider Social?
It’s not.
Having a playlist stay for about a week only to remove it without having to earn a rank isn’t a Social playlist. Handing us two Warzone weapons and branding it “Mythic Shotty Snipers” Isn’t a Social playlist. That’s closer to an Action Sack gametype than anything else.
It’s a temporary unranked playlist that ends up becoming a mask for you all to say that you’re listening to our requests and try to seem like the good guy. Bungie so far still has you beat when it comes to Social playlists. They didn’t retract much and the ones they did where playlists like 7 on the 7th and the Bungie Day community playlists and others I can’t think of. I’m almost certain that they had more maps in rotation in one playlist than you have in Warzone and Arena combined. I’m not even going to mention the gametypes.
Since Assault was introduced in it’s social playlist, which was honestly the most fun I had since I bought the game at midnight on release day, I have played it not once. That. Is. An. Issue.
I fail to see why you all over at the “Matchmaking Dept.” decide that we can’t have Social playlists after we beg and plead and ask nicely. Yeah, I know, not everyone asks nicely, but honestly, that’s not entirely their fault.
You shower us with near worthless content monthly to say “look free DLC! Love us!” when majority of your new content is just a rehash of what already exists in the game. It’s simply a thin blanket on another issue that I won’t get into because at this point because the topic is the lack of variety in your game.
Not to mention a lot of your armor is tasteless in terms of aesthetics.
I honestly don’t care if we don’t get anymore DLC. I’d much rather have a revised playlist hopper where I can have more variety in what I can play and who I can play with. If nothing changes between now and your Halo 6 release, I can only expect more of this pathetic “we’re listening to your feedback” trash you’ve been feeding us since release.
I think it’s saying something when, as someone who absolutely detests Activision as a company, and hates Call of Duty with a passion, went to play Black Ops III because it provided much more variety even if when the skill gap is near nonexistent.
I am asking that 343 take steps to improve their matchmaking. This isn’t really a debate. It’s simply something that needs to happen.
Depending on what happens between now and Halo 6’s release will determine if I buy Halo 6. Sorry, not sorry.
I really shouldn’t determine whether I’m going to purchase a game based on your current record, but when you think about it, it’s completely justified. You’ve proven too well that you will provide mediocre support and content for your games, so it’s only natural that I feel as though you’ll continue the pattern.
This honestly isn’t up for debate. This is something that simply needs to happen. The purpose of this post wasn’t to debate it with community members but you are all welcome to add your opinions. The purpose of this post is for it to be acknowledged by an employee of 343 Industries that will take action and not simply say “yeah I read it” with no course of action.