I haven't even touched any of the specializations yet, none of them really interest me. I've been using Dexterity and Mobility since day 1 and they've been working well. Maybe I should try some different ones out.
(Forza Horizon is awesome)
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Halo |OT13|
- Thread starter kylej
- Start date
- Status
I haven't even touched any of the specializations yet, none of them really interest me. I've been using Dexterity and Mobility since day 1 and they've been working well. Maybe I should try some different ones out.
(Forza Horizon is awesome)
it's very good. temper expectations though. all the omg goty amazing so good hype will probably let you down if you go into it expecting to blow your mind.
For the low low price of 200 MSP each? YES.
Rogue's Stability Support Upgrade reduces flinch. Use it in my primary load-out.
Wetworks Stealth Support Upgrade reduces the effect of PV from other players.
You can download the first episode for free if you haven't done so already.
See if you like it.
I think the last official word was early 2013. Might be mistaken on that. Also totally unacceptable for Euro folks.
Yes.
The Antitype
Banned
BLOPS2 isn't annihilating Halo 4 because it's catering better to the competitive crowd. It's because COD has established itself as a king of a certain gameplay style, and most consumers would rather play the real thing, than the other guys' best attempt at aping that gameplay style.
In a market as over-saturated as the FPS genre, differentiation is critical. Turning your product in a me-too COD Lite has ALWAYS been the mark of death since MW2, and yet 343i had the hubris to believe they could do it. Or they were just too busy circle-jerking each other over Halo lore to realize it.
Reach had better population numbers that Halo 4 almost 2 years after release because - love it or hate it - it was giving players something DIFFERENT to play than every CoD and CoD-wannabe. Halo 4 now just a CoD wannabe.
343i need to go back and re-evaluate what makes Halo, Halo, and why people continued to play it as well as CoD. What were the gameplay elements that set it apart, focus on and build out those, not find cute little equivalents to the systems that CoD innovated.
In a market as over-saturated as the FPS genre, differentiation is critical. Turning your product in a me-too COD Lite has ALWAYS been the mark of death since MW2, and yet 343i had the hubris to believe they could do it. Or they were just too busy circle-jerking each other over Halo lore to realize it.
Reach had better population numbers that Halo 4 almost 2 years after release because - love it or hate it - it was giving players something DIFFERENT to play than every CoD and CoD-wannabe. Halo 4 now just a CoD wannabe.
343i need to go back and re-evaluate what makes Halo, Halo, and why people continued to play it as well as CoD. What were the gameplay elements that set it apart, focus on and build out those, not find cute little equivalents to the systems that CoD innovated.
It's awful. Just play MW1
Seeing people perma'd back in 04, feelsbadman.
But this:
Time machine.I got a Killtacular with a sniper rifle the other day,definitely my proudest moment
NullPointer
Member
So awesome. And actually winning one of those rally events takes a level of intense concentration and balls to the wall insanity that it takes me about 10 minutes to come down from winning an event. So fucking good.
Are you talking about the rally pack? I still have to pick it up, thought I would play through the game first before I got the expansion. I also read that the expansion adds rumble on dirt, no idea why it wasn't in the game to begin with though.
Rickenslacker
Banned
It is worth playing, but it is a very pared down point and click adventure style game. It's not much in the way of puzzles, but the meat of it is in the dialogue system and character interaction. I would say it is something that needs to be experienced.
NullPointer
Member
True words here, but I don't think Halo 4 plays like COD. Not even a little bit. It took a bunch of COD systems and tweaked them a bit, but the end result isn't COD with Halo visuals.
You've still got shields, more vertical mobility, vehicles, far more interesting weapons, and Halo 4's kill streaks aren't nearly as overpowered as the COD variety. Halo 4 also has a solid balance between infantry and vehicles, mobility to offensive power, and guns to melee.
I had fun with MW1 and 2, but like most online shooters it ended up being connection speed determining who wins a fight, and that just saps my will to play. That and sprint stabbers. And noob tubers.
Hell, Halo 4 is the only online shooter that has just about everything I look for. Its not perfect, but its the most fun I've had playing versus on the console.
Steelyuhas
Member
I thought that wasn't until tomorrow?
Downloaded episode 1 for free yesterday and played the first few chapters. Interesting, and I'll definitely pick up the other 4 because they'll only be 10 bucks with the sale, but it doesn't immediately grab me as some amazing experience (given, I've only played the first few chapters so far).
Speaking of which, I'm 59, so I'm going to get stability soon, is there a consensus next specialization to go through?
I just didn't feel much emotion in her lines. Outside of a few moments, it seemed to me like her voice actor was reading the script for the first time.
That said, the interaction between her and Lee is incredible. Literally every time after I did something, I went and talked to Clementine to see how she was doing.
Should be up, as far as I know. So far, all the sales have gone up early.
NullPointer
Member
The rumble fix came with the title update, which you already have, I'm sure. Just check the settings, as what used to be 100% rumble is now only 60% after the update.
And yeah, the rally stuff can wait. Enjoy the base game - there is plenty enough there to love. But if you want some dedicated, gorgeous, intense off road events, look it up later. Fair warning - its hard as hell.
Steelyuhas
Member
Ah, just checked xbox.com and they are listed as 200 points each for me, so I guess you're right. Thanks.
Shit, my reign of free xbox live content has finally come to an end, I only have 270 points left. Now I have to pay for points like a scrub.
It has taken the biggest thing CoD is known for: randomization (as in global and personal ordnance). If they would gut that in Halo 4, then much of the esthetics stuff would not be so annoying. Still there would be problems, such as flinch, but a larger population would stick around.
I never got that impression. I was personally more annoyed by Kenny.
I'd be down with this. Just not sure if Halo has the population nowadays that can handle a game every year, especially 2 completely different games.
But I'd love for a more realistic, CoD like Marine/ODST gameplay. Squad focused. Bring back the ODST/Firefly crew.
Then arena style classic Spartan Halo the other year.
Remember the double standard I mentioned earlier? You did it again silly, you can't ask me not to call you out after calling Kyle out twice and me once for my typo.
Syphon Filter
Member
Hell no i rather have Halo three yers apart.
NullPointer
Member
Yeah, I can get on board with this.
That and I think the perks are unnecessary. They either shouldn't exist, or should be the base traits in the game.
I can't imagine them sticking with the Halo 4 loadout system in Halo 5. Not only is there less reward from unlocking a perk that undoes some wrench thrown into the game for that very purpose, but it also paints 343 into a corner when it comes to fine tuning the game balance after release.
This is going to sound like blasphemy, but if loadouts stay, they'd be better served going the route of games like MAG where each loadout item has a point cost out of a total loadout budget. That way 343 could tune the points cost of certain loadout items without having to nerf them. But at the end of the day this is just another complication to fix something that wasn't broken to begin with.
I do like choosing my primary weapon and AA though.
Slightly Live
Dirty tag dodger
You got it wrong. Drop it. Or at least carry it over to PM's. I'd be more than happy to tell you how wrong you are in private messages.
I can't remember who it was that said this but I found myself very much agreeing with it.
When Bungie gave us Reach, you could tell by the tone of what they said and the approach of the end of their relationship with the franchise that the changes to the core gameplay were very much an experiment. I feel that Bungie accomplished much of what they wanted to with Halo by the time they started working on Reach, so the next step for them was to try something entirely different. The experiment - bloom, AAs, difference in shield function, changes to movement and jump height - failed. People just didn't like it very much. I think Bungie understood that too. They were finished, though. Tired of Halo. Time to move on. But surely Halo wasn't finished, so what was next for the franchise?
This is the part where I stop understanding. Bungie's experiment wasn't well received, so I expected that with the announcement of a new trilogy, 343 would first identify what previous Halo games did right, and what they did wrong. Lean back toward the older style of equal starts. Remove bloom and AAs altogether. Perhaps try something completely new and original like Bungie had in Reach, but in the opposite direction. Enhance and expand what was special about Halo 3.
That's why I was completely blindsided by that GameInformer feature. What had gone wrong? More AAs? Features that are obvious CoD ripoffs? A step even further away from balance. I was distraught. Were there no lessons learned from Reach? I don't get it.
Someone please tell me what happened.
When Bungie gave us Reach, you could tell by the tone of what they said and the approach of the end of their relationship with the franchise that the changes to the core gameplay were very much an experiment. I feel that Bungie accomplished much of what they wanted to with Halo by the time they started working on Reach, so the next step for them was to try something entirely different. The experiment - bloom, AAs, difference in shield function, changes to movement and jump height - failed. People just didn't like it very much. I think Bungie understood that too. They were finished, though. Tired of Halo. Time to move on. But surely Halo wasn't finished, so what was next for the franchise?
This is the part where I stop understanding. Bungie's experiment wasn't well received, so I expected that with the announcement of a new trilogy, 343 would first identify what previous Halo games did right, and what they did wrong. Lean back toward the older style of equal starts. Remove bloom and AAs altogether. Perhaps try something completely new and original like Bungie had in Reach, but in the opposite direction. Enhance and expand what was special about Halo 3.
That's why I was completely blindsided by that GameInformer feature. What had gone wrong? More AAs? Features that are obvious CoD ripoffs? A step even further away from balance. I was distraught. Were there no lessons learned from Reach? I don't get it.
Someone please tell me what happened.
Tbh, not real sure during the day. Trying to crate train her since I'm gone most of the day. I come home for lunch and let her out/feed her and by then she's quiet, but she's not too fond of going in there to begin with. She does like to sleep on her bed in the evenings but I try to not let her sleep too much so she'll rest through the night. Have to wake up at 2:30 to let her out and then again at 5:30 (which I'm up for work anyways).
Hard work... Nothing like a child I suppose!
Feel the same way, wish that people that "love" Halo understood that.
I think a combination of
1. It's a new company with new people. These people didn't create Halo, so I think they feel they can put their own inputs into it, whereas at Bungie everyone always knew what Halo was and how it worked, for the most part.
2. Industry trends
Please quit calling me out.
Needs pointing out that it isn't just the added, regurgitated features that make Halo 4 unsavoury, but also the extensive yet needless tinkering with proven Halo staples that distorts the overall package in conjunction with the rest to multiply that feeling of 'this isn't fucking Halo'.
Why 343 decided to change the scoring system, or the basic UI setup, is completely beyond me. These were things that just didn't need overhauling, but needed careful refinement.
Nothing adds to my general sense of 'couldn't give a fuck' whilst playing Halo 4, than when I look down to check the score in a game of Slayer and both teams are on 400andsomething points, and my brain just does a middler finger up at the game.
The medals, too, dear lord.
WHY?
It feels like an elaborate joke. Frank's a fairly intelligent guy, how did he ever see that and think they were acceptable? I really don't understand.
Bungie were worn out by Halo, hence their decision to split from Microsoft, and that final ensemble responsible for Reach used the leeway afforded by the 'Reach' name to experiment and boldly change the traditional Halo formula. And they did, and it didn't work, and it shouldn't have mattered. 343 took over because they were meant to love Halo, it's the opposite of how Bungie were feeling, I expected passionate Halo fans to be positively buzzing at returning to what made Halo 2 and 3 such a resounding success.
But then we were told weapons would spawn in randomly as players achieved in game points for killing opponents and I drank myself into obliv.....
Why 343 decided to change the scoring system, or the basic UI setup, is completely beyond me. These were things that just didn't need overhauling, but needed careful refinement.
Nothing adds to my general sense of 'couldn't give a fuck' whilst playing Halo 4, than when I look down to check the score in a game of Slayer and both teams are on 400andsomething points, and my brain just does a middler finger up at the game.
The medals, too, dear lord.
WHY?
It feels like an elaborate joke. Frank's a fairly intelligent guy, how did he ever see that and think they were acceptable? I really don't understand.
Yea, that was me.
Bungie were worn out by Halo, hence their decision to split from Microsoft, and that final ensemble responsible for Reach used the leeway afforded by the 'Reach' name to experiment and boldly change the traditional Halo formula. And they did, and it didn't work, and it shouldn't have mattered. 343 took over because they were meant to love Halo, it's the opposite of how Bungie were feeling, I expected passionate Halo fans to be positively buzzing at returning to what made Halo 2 and 3 such a resounding success.
But then we were told weapons would spawn in randomly as players achieved in game points for killing opponents and I drank myself into obliv.....
StalkerUKCG
Banned
NullPointer
Member
That seems like a serious oversimplification. Bloom wasn't well received by some, and armor lock was a giant stink on the boards, but I wouldn't call it a failed experiment on the whole. A very lightweight class system that provided a fourth pillar to the holy trinity seemed like the way Halo was always going to move.
Right there with you on your other points though.
Whats wrong with the medals?
Everything.
Does anyone have a picture of the medals to illustrate my point? Or alternatively just load the game up and look out for them, and think back to the medals from previous games. If the difference was minor then this would be pedantic, but the Halo 4 medals are a huge step backwards in almost every way.
It is a simplification, I would have written much more if I wasn't on my phone. I just wanted to get to the point of 'lose the bad, keep the good' from Reach to 4 that I expected from 343 but didn't see happening. I didn't dislike it that much, but I was hoping they would revert from it or refine it rather than multiply it.
NullPointer
Member
You mean how they display in-match? I never actually notice them, so that part is true at least.
They all have the same wierd blue color scheme, are tiny as hell and there are a lot of irrelevant ones spamming your feed.
I swear, you get a standard kill and 4 medals fly at you.
Syphon Filter
Member
you know exactly why they pout that there....
Tawp's spelt out the major issues, but that you can't recall them speaks volumes for how bad they are. I can't actually picture in my head where they pop up on the screen, nor what each medal looks like, just that they're all the same colour of blue and they're miniature.
Compare:
to
xxjuicesxx
Member
I'm a Halo purist. I want the most basic Halo.
The Henery
Member
No. We really don't. This misguided notion that Halo needs to get back to number one in the Live charts because their predecessors were is what has led the series down the path of chasing COD and blanching the games identity.
My opinion of what happened post-Halo 3: Bungie completely lost their bottle when the upstart COD 4:MW started giving them a bit of light bruising in the Live charts, something they'd never experienced before. Instead of retaining Halo's core values and doubling down on the feature set, they opted, in a sudden collapse of confidence from the first serious bit of competition they'd faced, to instead attempt to ape some of the characteristics of the game they were trading the number one spot with week in, week out.
We got Reach, complete with 'gritter' (read: modern, not sci fi) visuals, players starting with different abilities from each other (which couldn't be visually determined by opponents), players starting with plasma nades in their loadouts and sprint. Inferior fileshare presentation, degraded theatre, significantly more framerate dips, bloom on the primary precision weapon and a dramatically debased matchmaking experience which suffered from its lack of ranked and social divide, no 1-50 and pathetically loose trueskill priorities.
What it should have been: More of the same with an emphasis on strengthening Halo's meta features and intelligently improving on some of Halo 3's weaker aspects.
- If AA's were the answer to the so called 'problem' of players not using it then make them map pickups; I don't recall equipment being a map pickup ever being invoked as to why they were problematic.
- 1-50, broaden the banhammer's wrath, maybe add the dip to 49 at the end of each month
- Recognise that filesharing, forge and theatre were incredibly successful additions to the franchise and focus hard on improving and expanding on them.
- Hitscan BR after the scandal of 3's spread
- Maps specifically made for gametypes and objective settings tailored individually to each map (no 30 second flag reset on small maps just because a larger map has it)
There exists an argument central to these Halo threads now that pontificates on why Halo declined in popularity: Is it because of COD or is it because it so hastily abandoned its core principles to chase COD? The most frustrating element of this debate is that the core gameplay principles that carried the original Halo trilogy were never permitted a chance in the post Modern Warfare era. If Reach had launched as a natural evolution of Halo 3 (as I've outlined above) and it absolutely bombed in the Live charts, didn't sell well, kids wouldn't play it because it didn't have sprint etc then nobody on this forum could blame Bungie/343 if they then decided to change the formula for fear of ongoing obsolescence. However, Halo as we knew and loved it was never given that chance.
It just annoys me when some would chase COD for the number one spot when it's basically fools gold. You can't catch COD, it's a force of nature, "sweeping leaves on a windy day" as the deacon on The Wire said. What Halo should've done and should do going forward, is accentuate its differences and really solidify the core of what attracted people to this wonderful game in the first place. Forget COD and its success; you might as well be chasing Guitar Hero or Tony Hawk when it comes to implementing gameplay features or elements. Most of the time, they're simply not compatible with Halo.
That is an excellent post. I was expecting 343 to do the same thing, go back to Halo 3 and expand from there, but they really didn't (aside from player movement which is better than Reach but still not good enough). I hope 343 is paying attention now. And I really really hope they're more upfront with the community. I feel like we make valid points and copious amounts of bugs and problems have been pointed out and they've largely ignored us.
The Antitype
Banned
I agree all those things are great. But they're undercut at every turn by an attempt to move toward the COD model, whereby advantage is earned not through skill and fighting for weapons or position on the map, but by filling up meters and rolls of the dice.
A lot of people here hated armor abilities in Reach. I didn't mind them, the only thing I wanted addressed in future Halo games (if armor abilities were to stay) was for 343i to make it visibly OBVIOUS what armor ability the enemy is using from afar. Is armor lock annoying? Sure, but only because it's a fucking surprise when somebody uses it - if I know he's packing armor lock, then I can plan and play accordingly.
Instead of addressing that, 343i did the OPPOSITE. Now do I not only have no idea what armor abilities a dude is packing, I also have no idea what PERKS he's packing, and since weapon spawn awareness is now worthless, I have no idea what random weapon he lucked into on an ordinance drop either, and I (and my team) had no real opportunity to keep that binary rifle from him or take it for ourselves.
It just adds more random factors into battles that end QUICKER, and you just find yourself feeling like the deck is stacked. And I haven't even gotten started on the stopping power system and how the shoot/grenade/melee trifecta has been blown out to SHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT/grenade/melee by virtue of the pathetic melee range and the fact that the speed of the grenade animation wasn't updated to take the quicker kill times into account.
Basically, even if it is slightly better than CoD, Halo 4 is still very much a 'he who sees the other dude first, wins' game. It's not fast or visceral enough to match CoD on it's level, and it's no longer tactical, competitive, or pure enough to offer something all it's own.
If Reach was an imperfect mix of Shadowrun and Halo, then Halo 4 is the unholy, second generation bastard spawn of Halo Reach and CoD.
They don't have any sort of visual identity. They're not immediately recognizable because they look the same at a glance, are very small in-game, and disappear quickly. The actual illustrative designs are nice and informative, but the way they're presented and colored destroys that.
The first set is identifiable when you get a nice look at them and have the descriptions handy, but when they appear in the corner of your HUD for a split second, you can't rely on people looking directly at them. Past medals were nice and bright and had lots of contrast. Halo 4 has kind of a contrast problem in general that really affects readability on a lot of their feedback elements. As an example, Reach had a very clean HUD. Not a lot of visual elements on it, so when something colorful popped up, you noticed. Halo 4 has those outlines and tiny numbers and all this noise, and when little things pop up for a split second, your attention isn't drawn towards them. I'm actually in the process of thinking up a writeup about what makes feedback in 4 so difficult to comprehend, and HUD noise has a lot to do with it.
vs.
I have bad luck with getting posts anywhere but the bottom of the page.
Arnie, I agree with pretty much everything you have to say, but honestly, why do you even bother at this point? No one at 343 is reading and caring about what criticism you or anyone else have. Their heads are stuck so far up their own asses they have actually convinced themselves they've made a great game. If Halo 5 comes around and they don't admit they were completely fucking wrong on about every single issue then I think we can all say safely that Halo is fucking dead.
And I don't care if Frankie comes in here every now and then to tell us they are "working on it". Working on fucking what? The game has been out for a month now and most of the player base has moved on, even if they did fix anything (lol, yeah right) it will be too little too late.
I'm trading this piece of shit in.
And I don't care if Frankie comes in here every now and then to tell us they are "working on it". Working on fucking what? The game has been out for a month now and most of the player base has moved on, even if they did fix anything (lol, yeah right) it will be too little too late.
I'm trading this piece of shit in.
- Status