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[Monocle]

I got all the campaign achievements and did solo legendary pre and post patch

So hush

Worst halo campaign Imo. Makes 4 feel fresh

What in the world? Last month I replayed all of Halo 4 besides the last bit of the final level, and there's no way the campaign holds a candle to Halo 5's. It's unrelentingly linear. Your gameplay options are so limited. The Covenant barely show up at all.

The nicest things I can say about it are the voice work is good and Chief's melee attack feels just right. The actual levels are garbo. Halo 5's campaign is so much more enjoyable, with its long series of fun and diverse encounters that you can approach all kinds of ways.

Just the other day I was going through Glassed with my friend. We switched been racing around on a gungoose, swapping between the turret and driver's seat of a warthog, driving a tank, and running around on foot with snipers, power weapons, and the good old Plasma Pistol + headshot weapon combo. That was during the same playthrough of one mission. In the rare instances where a such a broad range of choices is available in Halo 4, you're restricted to stifling corridors or small arenas, and you're made to abandon your vehicles and scavenge basic weapons between nearly every minor battle.

Halo 4 reflects the designers' disregard for the series' classic sandbox gameplay. Halo 5 is just the opposite.

 

[Phat 2000 Dola]

Didn't help they fucked MCC.

COOP on Live never worked.

Biggest of all - they promoted DEDICATED ONLINE SERVERS
.........annnndddd everyone was thinkings WOW....CE DEDICATED SERVERS SHIT MY HOT PANTS NOW!

Launch comes....Sorry CE isn't ready for Live. Then it was all P2P. Fuck me 343 you blew it HARD.

Then there was an apology, but instead of fixing shit they gave us ODST. Fuck ODST (I mean it was great) BUT I JUST WANTED CHILLOUT ON LIVE FFS!.

/endrant #yiasou

 

[Pie and Beans]

Molyneux really shaped how Microsoft approaches the PR cycle forever, huh.

 

[Bits N Pieces]

To be honest, they should fuck all Halo fans and try to make new ones. The Halo SP formula is stale. The MP formula, while I enjoy it, is not what people are looking for and is stale to most. They should do a major shakeup if they want the game to see long term usage.

As a massive Halo fanboy I agree with this post. Not the bit about it being stale in MP as for me its the best its ever been but more the fuck all Halo fans sentiment.

They are never going to be able to please everyone, so why even try.

 

[Trup1aya]

I feel like as long as 343's approach to design indicates a lack of vision and purpose from them for the franchise it is doomed to decline. Now is the time to be bold and make their own mark on the franchise by delivering something new and exciting. Listening to the existing (and declining) fanbase will only appeal to that fanbase. If they want the franchise to grow again they need to look at ways to appeal to new people and create new fans not just continue to cash in and milk on the ones who are already there. MS needs to let 343 go big bold and give them the time and resources they need to do so (And no before you say it introducing a new enemy type is not the sort of innovation I'm talking about albeit it would certainly help if the enemy type was fun to fight against which Prometheans are not). I mean what do MS have to lose at this point? Their biggest most important IP is facing a massive decline. Do you double down on the shrinking existing userbase or swing for the fences and try to reach a new audience? I'd argue the latter is the only sensible thing to do at this point.

As someone who loved Halo 1 and Halo 2 its sad watching the franchise slowly stagnate losing more and more fans and not attracting any new ones.

Wait, this is exactly the line of thinking that brought us Reach and Halo4, e.i. Massive changes that marked the beginning and acceleration of halo's decline, respectively.

Halo 3 grew the franchise to massive heights and we haven't had a H3 styles game since it dominated the market. This is what old fans want. This is what would make the gameplay interesting to new fans who already want something different from today's standard FPS.

343 has been swinging for the fences since they took over, and they've been missing. They need to get on base...

 

[Monocle]

I feel like as long as 343's approach to design indicates a lack of vision and purpose from them for the franchise it is doomed to decline. Now is the time to be bold and make their own mark on the franchise by delivering something new and exciting. Listening to the existing (and declining) fanbase will only appeal to that fanbase. If they want the franchise to grow again they need to look at ways to appeal to new people and create new fans not just continue to cash in and milk on the ones who are already there. MS needs to let 343 go big bold and give them the time and resources they need to do so (And no before you say it introducing a new enemy type is not the sort of innovation I'm talking about albeit it would certainly help if the enemy type was fun to fight against which Prometheans are not). I mean what do MS have to lose at this point? Their biggest most important IP is facing a massive decline. Do you double down on the shrinking existing userbase or swing for the fences and try to reach a new audience? I'd argue the latter is the only sensible thing to do at this point.

As someone who loved Halo 1 and Halo 2 its sad watching the franchise slowly stagnate losing more and more fans and not attracting any new ones.

That mindset is apparently what lead 343 to make a series of obnoxious and wrongheaded design choices for Halo 4, so no, if anything they need to cleave closer to Bungie's original trilogy.

 

[nekkid]

As a massive Halo fanboy I agree with this post. Not the bit about it being stale in MP as for me its the best its ever been but more the fuck all Halo fans sentiment.

They are never going to be able to please everyone, so why even try.

Yep, me too.

"We want classic Halo"
"Halo is stale"
"Halo is 'me too'"

Ugh.

 

[Jonneh3003]

are we getting halo 3 remastered?

Halo 3 Anniversary would make my year.

 

[Vince DiCola]

Yeah, the lack of Chief wasn't the only issue.
The bland, uninteresting story in most levels was, the forced "co-op" even in single player was, the boring way you used Osiris and Blue team was, the lack of confidence you showed in the ending of Halo 4 (which I actually enjoyed the story of. It wasn't a complex masterwork but it was enjoyable to me), the place Halo 5 ends up in just cheapened or even invalidated Halo 4.

Multiplayer is good I've heard, I usually dive in straight after finishing the campaign but i just turned off Halo 5 and havent played it since.

Halo 5 was a disappointing chapter in the saga, worst by a long way. This is coming from a long time fan and one who has enjoyed and seen the merits of every Halo game that came before.

Halo 5 burned me to the point that I didn't buy Halo Wars 2 and at this point in time, won't buy Halo 6

 

[spanks]

Can we get rid of the shitty bad guys too? I even forgot their name, they're so bad.

I'd rather see more in-depth stories about the Covenant. And the humans. Politics, civil conflicts, personal dramas. You don't have to keep adding new species just because it's sci-fi. You don't always have to be saving the world/galaxy/universe. You don't even always need aliens. Halo already has a unique setting, use it.

 

[TheUnsunghero26]

are we getting halo 3 remastered?

Halo 3 Anniversary Beta included with every copy of Crackdown.

 

[Monocle]

To be honest, they should fuck all Halo fans and try to make new ones. The Halo SP formula is stale. The MP formula, while I enjoy it, is not what people are looking for and is stale to most. They should do a major shakeup if they want the game to see long term usage.

No it's not. The original game's campaign still hasn't been topped from a gameplay perspective. Give me two or three new Halos with Silent Cartographer-quality levels and then we can talk about shaking up the formula. Maybe.

As it stands, the defining trait of every Halo game's best missions is their resemblance to the open design of Halo CE's signature levels.

 

[nekkid]

Halo 3 Anniversary Beta included with every copy of Crackdown.

Ha, that would be great.

 

[Neuromancer]

Who in their infinite wisdom would have ever imagined that people would be so attached to the main character of a long running franchise?

Yeah, that sure does sound crazy!

 

[Jonneh3003]

Halo 3 Anniversary Beta included with every copy of Crackdown.

 

[Metfanant]

I've said this before...just retcon everything after Halo 3's ending and start fresh...explain away Halon4 and 5 as some sort of dream that Chief has and throw them both out...

 

[JaggedSac]

No it's not. The original game's campaign still hasn't been topped from a gameplay perspective. Give me two or three new Halos with Silent Cartographer-quality levels and then we can talk about shaking up the formula. Maybe.

As it stands, the defining trait of every Halo game's best missions is their resemblance to the open design of Halo CE's signature levels.

I disagree. And therein lies 343's conundrum.

 

[Vigilant Walrus]

Not played Halo 5, but I recall that the Locke character seemed really generic in pre-release material. I welcome playing as side characters, and I think there is no reason why they'd have to go back to Master Chief.

 

[MysteryM]

I've said this before...just retcon everything after Halo 3's ending and start fresh...explain away Halon4 and 5 as some sort of dream that Chief has and throw them both out...

Yep that would be my take, halo 3 was the pinnacle of halo story telling, it just went downhill so fast after that.

 

[Outrun]

Awesome news.

The Chief should never be in a position where he needed to be saved by Osiris.

 

[horkrux]

Both Osiris and Blue Team lacked personality.

Does Chief not lack personality? All he has is Cortana and a voice and armor you recognize, since you've been playing him for years.

Not directed at you, but I really didn't get what people's problem with playing Arbiter was in 2, just as I didn't get what was so bad about playing Raiden in MGS2.
I'm not saying the new characters were great, but I see little reason to listen to the endless complains about playing different characters after they've already made it happen. I think there is potential in introducing new protagonists and if they are lacking in their current form, improve them.

 

[NoHeDidn't]

Sure they will.(does a jerking off motion)

 

[Detective]

I don't understand why the need to learn/ have learned something that should be so obvious without the learning curve.

Like in Halo 4, are you telling me that no one on the entire studio didn't notice the messed up MP section? The weapons sound?

Or No one didn't notice H5 campaign? The story?

Or Blue team introduction ?

Or how crappy and terrible idea Osiris was?

And how come the same studio that released H4 with tons of content and releases the next game with almost nothing compared to their previous release? Just how?

Like no one checked that MC saga should be about and played by MC?

Or the cheap , OMG the cheap COD action sequences.


Bungie experimented with other characters, outside the Main games, and I must say they nailed it. Because they were not forced. Like Noble six, legendary imo.

I love 343, I respect you, love Halo, but there are some quality issues within the studio.

 

[Buddy Mcpuddy]

Have you played the first three Halo games? He is far from being a generic space marine. Dude is a badass.

I played the first two and got half way through 3, he's definitely a generic space marine. The games were fun especially in coop, but the setting and characters have always been pretty meh.

 

[Falchion]

To be honest I'm more concerned with the direction they've taken with Cortana than with the lack of Master Chief in 4. She's always been the best character in the series for me but she was just awful in 5, hopefully things get better.

 

[levyjl1988]

I enjoyed the Halo franchise.
Halo 4 was an emotional turning point as Cortona seeminly sacrificed herself for the Chief. Then when I found out she's alive in Halo 5, it felt like a massive cheat. They also gave her clothes, WHY? Also they introduced new characters I don't give a shit about. I went back to playing Destiny where my character felt like my own. I also enjoyed the verticality and agility that Destiny provided despite both Halo 5 and Destiny having a shitty story. Good lore, shitty story.

For me personally Halo is best left at 4, it got more convoluted after that.

 

[Slythe]

Halo is at its best when the story is kept ambiguous, the characters are few have laser focused characterization, and Chief gets to jump from arena to arena in various locales.

The problem with the 343 games is that they keep overwriting the games' "lore", and flooding the series with more and more soldiers and backstories that dilute the adventure.

 

[Coxy100]

I enjoyed the Halo franchise.
Halo 4 was an emotional turning point as Cortona seeminly sacrificed herself for the Chief. Then when I found out she's alive in Halo 5, it felt like a massive cheat. They also gave her clothes, WHY? Also they introduced new characters I don't give a shit about. I went back to playing Destiny where my character felt like my own. I also enjoyed the verticality and agility that Destiny provided despite both Halo 5 and Destiny having a shitty story. Good lore, shitty story.

For me personally Halo is best left at 4, it got more convoluted after that.

They also made her evil.

Evil...Cortana... thanks 343.

 

[Final Verdict]

Seeing 343i say stuff like this, it just seems unreal.

How in the world can they act like this is surprising when the exactly same thing happened ELEVEN years ago with Halo 2??

The. Exact. Same. Thing.

To quote Will Ferrell: "I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!"

Oh well... Let's see what the future holds.

Edit: Just want to add this: I fully expect 343i to kill off Blue Squad in the next game. It will be the icing on the cake on all this mess.

It is truly disappointing.
Sure we wanted more chief than just 3 short levels, but that wasn't even the biggest issue. The biggest issue was the lack of heart in the story. It felt about as emotionless as it's main character Locke, and the ending with chief and cortana, while decently executed, would have been so much more impactfull if we had actually focused more on the relationship between those two characters.

Halo 2's campaign should not be compared to this though as arbiter was actually a compelling character with a compelling story and they seemed to have an equal amount of levels for you to play both (so it's not like you were playing with him the whole time).

I think the criticism for Halo 2 came mostly for the ending which left on a huge cliffhanger, and Chief didn't have the last level. Overall though I don't think it is all that comparable as halo 2 in my opinion is one if the better campaigns.

 

[LordOfChaos]

Neat.

Isn't his VA mostly retired? I thought maybe that was why they hedged with Halo 5 and had other characters take more screentime.

 

[ShinAmano]

Thank God. Halo is Chief...Chief is Halo.

Laces out!

 

[The Salt Life]

Was lack of chief that bad? Or was Lovke really that horrible.


Problem is, outside of Locke, everyone is more enjoyable than Chief because Chief is intentionally a blank slate.

Halo universe could survive with out chief. Locke is not your replacement, dude was ass. They can have a game around Buck.

 

[tiredheadcrab]

I think Halo can survive without Chief. Eventually they will need to either retire the character in the current time period or do something different a few decades or a 100 or so years into the future. Or do a prequel that takes place thousands of years before the main story starts.

 

[hwalker84]

Halo 5 had more story issues than not playing as Chief the whole time.

Who the F is Blue Team? (I know who they are but if you didn't know a single thing about the extended universe it made no sense if all you played were the games)

What is even going on in the first place? What happened since Halo 4?

The Warden fights....

Ad campaign that lead you to believe the game would be something that it wasn't.


I thought Halo 4 was a much more tighter game Single Player wise only. I still hate how Chief being re-introduced was handled. Every solider should've been in complete awe. Every Spartan should've dropped their helmets. Instead you had a wet fart of an introduction. I was so furious. This is humanities savior and all you had was a chick saying "I thought he'd be taller...."

 

[Toxi]

"The Samus Effect".

It's impossible for a character to be around for that long and not have at least some characterisation, no matter how much of a blank slate they are intended to be. And that small amount of characterisation will be latched upon by fans who create their own idea of what the character is, which becomes an idea of what the character should be. And if you try to fight that, well... good luck.

Glad they realised this, blank slate characters are shit to begin with.

"You know what would have made Super Metroid and Metroid Prime better? Samus chatting about her daddy issues."

 

[wipeout364]

I think one of the issues for me is that when they make multiplayer campaigns playing it solo feels like crap in most cases. I play most campaigns solo and occasionally go back to play the multiplayer aspect. The guardians feel like a design decision for multiplayer, they are also used too much. I didn't have any problem with Osiris team but the game flow was bad which I partially attribute to my above comments.

 

[10k]

Good stuff.

 

[jmartoine]

They also made her evil.

Evil...Cortana... thanks 343.

To be fair Cortana being evil/ going rampant was hinted in the Halo 2 legendary ending.

 

[Gestault]

Part of the problem was having more fleshed out writing and execution in marketing material than in the actual game. The "Hunt The Truth" audioplays were leagues better at evoking an emotional response in the Halo setting than Halo 5. Mind you, I still think the H5 campaign story was fine, but part of that is because I'm read up on the extended fiction from the books. I think it's trash story design to rely on that.

Videogame stories should be mostly self contained to those games, with extra nods and winks for those who know more. Mirror's Edge Catalyst, which was trying to launch a series refresh, skipped showing the basis for it's own story. They even went so far as to have a loading-screen message that players should check out their comic to learn the story. My response there was very much like I'm sure Halo players who haven't read the books have felt since Halo 3; It's basically a "fuck you."

Please take this into consideration, 343. You end up with weaker books and weaker games if you're stringing out key information between the two. That's not more engaging, it's just worse. I think it's simplistic to assume the problem is as easy as "people only want to play as Chief." Yes, people say (and really mean) that, but I think that in itself isn't the solution to the underlying issue they're experiencing.

 

[infinit777]

Seeing 343i say stuff like this, it just seems unreal.

How in the world can they act like this is surprising when the exactly same thing happened ELEVEN years ago with Halo 2??

The. Exact. Same. Thing.

To quote Will Ferrell: "I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!"

Oh well... Let's see what the future holds.

Edit: Just want to add this: I fully expect 343i to kill off Blue Squad in the next game. It will be the icing on the cake on all this mess.

I wasn't online as much back in the halo 2 days... but I loved halo 2 and playing as the arbiter.

I still think the H5 campaign story was fine, but part of that is because I'm read up on the extended fiction from the books.

I thought it was great and i hadn't read up on most of the extended fiction. I have just read the first 3 books and listened to hunt the truth. Oh, and watched both shows.

 

[Col.Asher]

Finish of the trilogy, then do a time skip where the covenant species and humans live in relative peace. You're a space cop spartan with an Elite partner where you go stop terrorists groups or something. Halo doesn't need galaxy ending threats.

 

[Samurai G0SU]

Also make sure your MARKETING is actually relative to the STORY you are telling in the game it is trying to sell.

Hunt the truth? More like, catch up and save-a-hoe!

 

[Gestault]

Finish of the trilogy, then do a time skip where the covenant species and humans live in relative peace. You're a space cop spartan with an Elite partner where you go stop terrorists groups or something. Halo doesn't need galaxy ending threats.

I don't wanna single you out in particular, but that doesn't sound like a writing springboard that would keep my attention. The idea of just making Halo about some guy shooting terrorists sounds awful.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

To be fair Cortana being evil/ going rampant was hinted in the Halo 2 legendary ending.

Bungie didn't intend her for her to become evil. In fact, in the HALO CE commentary, Joe Staten and Marty scoff and laugh at the idea of Cortana being evil. It was apparently one of their original plot ideas, but swiftly scrapped it.

The first game's creators thought of that potential plot thread and laughed...lol

 

[Zeta Oni]

I also really wish they would fix the damn tone of the series.

We went from a scifi Saving Private Ryan-style universe where everything from simple engagements to full out war was never something "fun". Now we basically have fucking power rangers sky diving onto planets with 0 reprecussions.

No game 343 has touched has come close to emotional heights of games like Reach or Halo: ODST

No book 343 has been in charge of has come even close to the work done by Eric Nylund in the Halo books.

The people in charge of this franchise really need to take a long time and look at what makes Halo, Halo, because everything from the updated art style to the tone of the series has proved they simply don't.

 

[Samurai G0SU]

I have a feeling in my bones that if Halo 6 does not provide me the same type of experience as halo 1-3 and reach, i may leave this franchise :'( ....

Well i lie, ill be back for the MP LOL Of course if they keep it balanced as it is in H5.

 

[Stripper13]

Yeah, the lack of Chief wasn't the only issue.
The bland, uninteresting story in most levels was, the forced "co-op" even in single player was, the boring way you used Osiris and Blue team was, the lack of confidence you showed in the ending of Halo 4 (which I actually enjoyed the story of. It wasn't a complex masterwork but it was enjoyable to me), the place Halo 5 ends up in just cheapened or even invalidated Halo 4.

Multiplayer is good I've heard, I usually dive in straight after finishing the campaign but i just turned off Halo 5 and havent played it since.

Halo 5 was a disappointing chapter in the saga, worst by a long way. This is coming from a long time fan and one who has enjoyed and seen the merits of every Halo game that came before.

Halo 5 burned me to the point that I didn't buy Halo Wars 2 and at this point in time, won't buy Halo 6

This pretty much sums up my thoughts. However I did play a decent chunk of the multiplayer.

It was quite good mechanically but I don't feel the maps are particularly interesting, and the Spartan design is truly awful.

Edit: I also think Warzone and REQ packs feel really out of place, and I'm by no means a Slayer/Arena purist.

 

[psyfi]

I didn't care about the story deviating from MC... It's what the story ended up being that bothered me. Give Chief a break, I'm cool with that. But this Cortana plot is pretty bad so far.

 

[Future PhaZe]

The bigger issue was forced coop and once again the trash prometheans

I don't mind just swapping between Locke and Chief but get rid of the coop partners. Leave coop for PVE modes.

 

[Akai__]

Moved.