What is 343i thinking now?

[EagleBurn]

You're actually wrong.

CS:GO is not that popular.

 

It's currently the 4th most played game on Steam?

[Vodka]

You're actually wrong.

CS:GO is not that popular.

 

 

Not that popular?

 

It's the 4th most played game on steam  (2nd if we don't count the 2 free to play games on the top) with 39k players online at the moment, meanwhile CS is at 32k and the 7th most played game. All in all there's 3 CS games in the top 10 and none of them have had any major changes to the core gameplay. 

http://store.steampowered.com/stats/

[ssj]

It'd be nice if someone actually brought up the numbers for Halo 4. It's like the only ones who realize how poorly H4 is doing is us.

[rubks halo god]

thy're probably thinkg "halo 5 will sell millions so lets butcher multiplayer some more to get to campaign players to play multiplayer and attract the CoD crowd"

[Velo]

Velo would you say that this opinion is reflective of the rest of the competitive populations opinion or just yours. Im only asking because im trying to think of more reasons in my next post on why this game died, and US giving up on OUR own efforts to HELP is a pretty big reason. I guess sense this post can be seen by the public im more asking everyone here if thats there opinion as well.

 

This is honestly a very old argument. That argument being that the community is at fault in some way for the downfall of halo. This is a complete fallacy. I've written numerous posts on THC about this but the success of a video game is always a function of how much fun people have playing it, everything else is irrelevant. You by organizing any kind of small movement in the halo community cannot MAKE people like halo. Now all you can do is tweet a little bit, maybe start a couple waypoint and reddit threads to bring people out on a certain day for Halo 3 because people actually like playing that game. The community didn't destroy halo in any way, 343i did and therefore paradoxically are the only ones who can redeem halo sadly. This is the crux of the situation, we have no control over the future of halo because Beyond entertainment, MLG, ect. do not make video games and until we do, we will always be at the mercy of developers who don't understand certain facts about the game as much as we do and have an agenda to just sell a shit ton of video games.

[Psycho Seal A89]

Now the inevitable has happened does anyone remember these Ready Up Live videos in the run up to Halo 4? its funny looking back at them lol:

 

 

"Call of Duty does a lot of things right"

 

"Step out of your bubble"

 

"It all makes sense"

 

"You 'competitive players' don't know what your'e talking about"

 

"We're going back to the roots here, this is what Halo should be"

 

On Join in Progress: "I'm just hoping they find a way to make it work so every time I join a game I don't want to be joining a game that's already half over and I'm on the horribly losing team, but I'm sure it'll make sense once we get a chance to try it"

 

"I assure you guys 343 knows what they are doing"

 

 

"What's going to happen when Halo 4 comes out? its going to be the new bar, its going to take what worked in Call Of Duty and they're going to put it into Halo 4, put their own twist on it and Halo 4's going to shoot to the top of the charts in the same way that Halo 1,2 and 3 did."

 

 

"0.00 - 6.38" Too much BS in this one to narrow it down.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_3pYCVWyoM

 

"0.00 - 5.16" and again

 

[The Snazzer]

This is honestly a very old argument. That argument being that the community is at fault in some way for the downfall of halo. This is a complete fallacy. I've written numerous posts on THC about this but the success of a video game is always a function of how much fun people have playing it, everything else is irrelevant. You by organizing any kind of small movement in the halo community cannot MAKE people like halo. Now all you can do is tweet a little bit, maybe start a couple waypoint and reddit threads to bring people out on a certain day for Halo 3 because people actually like playing that game. The community didn't destroy halo in any way, 343i did and therefore paradoxically are the only ones who can redeem halo sadly. This is the crux of the situation, we have no control over the future of halo because Beyond entertainment, MLG, ect. do not make video games and until we do, we will always be at the mercy of developers who don't understand certain facts about the game as much as we do and have an agenda to just sell a shit ton of video games.

 

I agree, I mean what if halo was more popular than CoD, we had HUGE tourneys and viewers. People loved playing the game, now, what can WE do to ruin such a huge game? We can't if people like playing it, they will countinue to do so.

[Legend]

 

Nobody knows what they are thinking, but Halo 4 will be a complete graveyard by the end of November. 

[EagleBurn]

-snip-

 

Greenskull is known for going out on twitter and whatnot against the competitive community.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5jXPIvfrlw&noredirect=1

 

He's the embodiment of Halo fans where their first game was Reach and attempt to justify every change to the series, all while ignoring every stat out there besides launch sales.

[Sam]

It'd be nice if someone actually brought up the numbers for Halo 4. It's like the only ones who realize how poorly H4 is doing is us.

They know the population is bad, they're a company, they're not going to come out and say, "yes we know the population is bad."

[The Snazzer]

343: "... ... ... ...Got it, we'll rob a train." 

Isn't it time for another "What I would do with Halo 5 Youtube video?

[CoachMayyne]

[The Snazzer]

That is from April, You need to upgrade to october The numbers are funnier now.

[CoachMayyne]

That is from April, You need to upgrade to october The numbers are funnier now.

Haha.

[AkaDemiK]

If I were at 343 I would see this as a red flag - but at the same time I think that they have realized that the HALO community has not been satisfied with a game since Halo 3

 

 

Fixed that for you. Our community aren't the only ones dissatisfied with halo atm..

[Joseph]

Fixed that for you. Our community aren't the only ones dissatisfied with halo atm..

 

True - I was just specifying that our community in particular has lashed out pretty hard

[AkaDemiK]

But what does Ghost think?  :ghost: #v5 

 

Halo 3 V9? 

 

unless it's citadel being added to the rotation...leave the settings/gametypes alone

 

can someone set up an mlg version of chill out tho?

 

 

True - I was just specifying that our community in particular has lashed out pretty hard

 

ok gotcha

[TheFunkyChickn]

Yea it could see increase in population, from the hardcore players at least. However, casuals are quitting faster and faster, and they're the majority.

 

But did the majority of all Halo players quit because of no ranks, no de-scope, and no sprint?(All these things scream competitive, not casual). In my opinion, the casuals probably didn't really care about those things. Something else killed it for them probably. Not sure what that would be though.

Not having the competitive friends that can backpack them and have fun winning  :frankerz:

[TheFunkyChickn]

Seems like you're implying the population decrease has to do with Halo being too old and that's not the case. Counter-Strike is proof that if the developers stay loyal to the core mechanics, it'll continue to thrive. As long as Halo goes back to where it was, it'll pick up steam again.

Counter-strike, Valve, pick up Steam...

 

I see what you did there.

[Psycho Seal A89]

Greenskull is known for going out on twitter and whatnot against the competitive community.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5jXPIvfrlw&noredirect=1

 

He's the embodiment of Halo fans where their first game was Reach and attempt to justify every change to the series, all while ignoring every stat out there besides launch sales.

That video just made me really mad.

[Proven]

Do you know what's sad? Not only is Halo 4 a bad game for the competitive community, it seems worse for everyone else. 150k people were playing Halo Reach at this point in Reach's life cycle. Maybe more. I know several casual players that H-A-T-E Halo 4. Halo 4 just isn't a good HALO game period. For 0 communities. Forge is significantly worse than Reach, the campaign people don't like that there's no theater mode, custom options are SIGNIFICANTLY worse than the last 2 games, so that makes the custom game/ casual player upset. We all know about the hardcore players, and Matchmaking is broken. Literally every community is upset with Halo 4 and not even Reach messed up that bad.

[Kalon]

I'll say it once again. It is not enough to ask for just 'options'. We need a competitive vanilla Halo.

[Sam]

Do you know what's sad? Not only is Halo 4 a bad game for the competitive community, it seems worse for everyone else. 150k people were playing Halo Reach at this point in Reach's life cycle. Maybe more. I know several casual players that H-A-T-E Halo 4. Halo 4 just isn't a good HALO game period. For 0 communities. Forge is significantly worse than Reach, the campaign people don't like that there's no theater mode, custom options are SIGNIFICANTLY worse than the last 2 games, so that makes the custom game/ casual player upset. We all know about the hardcore players, and Matchmaking is broken. Literally every community is upset with Halo 4 and not even Reach messed up that bad.

And they removed Firefight for all the kids who liked that.

[zoojoo]

Greenskull is known for going out on twitter and whatnot against the competitive community.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5jXPIvfrlw&noredirect=1

 

He's the embodiment of Halo fans where their first game was Reach and attempt to justify every change to the series, all while ignoring every stat out there besides launch sales.

My first real Halo game was Reach, but even I know that Reach sucked compared to the other installments.

[deathwishcow]

Here are Frank's thoughts on Halo 4 as of January.

http://blogs.halowaypoint.com/Headlines/post/2013/01/09/The-Halo-Bulletin-1913.aspx

 

So let me save you the trouble of trolling my statement: We have a lot to learn. We made a lot of mistakes. We can do better. 

...

Halo 4 is the best and fastest-selling Halo game in the series.

 

So 343's perception is they did a great job with Halo 4.  But Frank conceded there were mistakes made so what are they and what do they see as areas of improvement?

There are a ton of things we wish we'd done better: Features that didn’t make it into the final game. Glitches that emerged. Missteps made. DLC fiascos. Communication breakdowns. But there were things that went astonishingly well – the creation of a genuinely competitive AAA studio chief among them. A collection of talent and souls that can do something genuinely amazing on this and next-generation hardware. The overhaul of an amazing game engine – but one that really needed to be overhauled – and an amassed education on systems, people, code and audience that will stand us in great stead for the future. 

 

For the most part these areas of improvement are logistical.  There's no mention of improving gameplay or maps or the interplay of gameplay and maps.  Only a positive note on the game engine overhaul.

 

Halo 5 was probably already past the planning stages before the Halo 4 population flatlined.  343 probably felt comfortable building on the Halo 4 mechanics for Halo 5.  Expectations for Halo 5 should probably be pretty low.

 

343 doesn't seem to get their audience.  They don't seem to understand the nuances of the interplay between game mechanics and map design.  For Halo 5 to be good, they'd have to:

 

1) Accept that Halo 4 multiplayer has "massive room for improvement".

2) Know how to improve it.

3) Be capable of implementing the improvements in a very short timeframe for a major title.

 

It'd take a series of miracles for Halo 5 to be good.  It's going to be more of the same...modded NS game types and forge maps for the newer Halos or playing older Halos.  Btw if NS was even going to be an option in Halo 5, I'd think they'd have implemented it as an option in Halo 4 by now.