Halo 5: Guardians Discussion

[-DeucEy-]

That is true as well though.

 

"You're just living in the past, we have to evolve if we want to move forward as a series."

 

Prime example of inarticulate argument because there is literally nothing that can be said about a game's "evolution" when the numbers of a game have significantly increased over the course of 3 releases... Then noticeably declined once a certain number of features I won't name, were introduced.

[Hard Way]

That is true as well though.

 

"You're just living in the past, we have to evolve if we want to move forward as a series."

 

Prime example of inarticulate argument because there is literally nothing that can be said about a game's "evolution" when the numbers of a game have significantly increased over the course of 3 releases... Then noticeably declined once a certain number of features I won't name, were introduced.

Exactly. People point to new additions like sprint and AA's and claim that's it's evolving the game and it's healthy for the series. Oh really? Is that why the population and general awareness of our franchise have been in the toilet since 2011? There's just zero thought out into this argument, and I cant help but wonder if any of them started on a Halo before Reach.

 

So their plan is to take an insanely popular franchise that's showing no signs of decline whatsoever, and then start changing and adding shit to make it play more like other games? Why would you not want it to stick to what makes it good and stay unique? Ohhhh, because you haven't really played that version of the game, and you have no idea what you're talking about, but still want to spout off like you do...okay, got it Reddit and Waypoint.

[Mr Grim]

Evolution=adding shit from other games apparently

[FLuFFy]

I love not being seen. Holy shit. I'm never playing Team Arena again until they add this new radar.

[Dead]

Redacted 2

[Oriiii]

I think it's a valid argument when used properly. Obviously there is no denying the older Halos had advantages over the current ones but when people look back at Halo 3 and say it was perfect, that's pure nostalgia talking.

Maybe some people actually think it was perfect.

 

Mass effect 1 is my favourite game of all time. People point out a lot of "flaws" and while I see thier point, I wouldn't personally change anything.

 

Same reason people call thier spouse/SO "perfect".

 

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder after all.

[TryHardFan]

Evolution=adding shit from other games apparently

I'm seeing way too much of that in Waypoint. They don't realize how much that logic kicks them in the balls in the end, full of endless contradictions.

[Oriiii]

Exactly. People point to new additions like sprint and AA's and claim that's it's evolving the game and it's healthy for the series. Oh really? Is that why the population and general awareness of our franchise have been in the toilet since 2011? There's just zero thought out into this argument, and I cant help but wonder if any of them started on a Halo before Reach.

 

So their plan is to take an insanely popular franchise that's showing no signs of decline whatsoever, and then start changing and adding shit to make it play more like other games? Why would you not want it to stick to what makes it good and stay unique? Ohhhh, because you haven't really played that version of the game, and you have no idea what you're talking about, but still want to spout off like you do...okay, got it Reddit and Waypoint.

It's so baffling.

 

343 was handed the keys to an ip in the booming, exploding fps market. This product was not only a market leader in a booming industry but it also occupied it's own unique sub niche within said market. That is the holy grail.

 

And then they gave it up. They gave away the holy grail so they could move over to the incredibly over saturated section of the market

 

And then they have the audacity to blame competition for the decline of thier product.

 

HELLO.

 

YOU were the ones who put yourselves into direct competition with those other games.

[FLuFFy]

Why are the servers still absolute trash?

[The Tyco]

A ********, lobotomized monkey could snipe in Halo 5.

[Lukes]

Oh really? Is that why the population and general awareness of our franchise have been in the toilet since 2011?

 

Ohhhh, because you haven't really played that version of the game, and you have no idea what you're talking about, but still want to spout off like you do...okay, got it Reddit and Waypoint.

Nahh, man. The original Halos didn't have any competition like the current ones have which is why the population dropped and the competitive crowd killed H5 by making it too competitive. /Waypoint

[VideoGangsta]

I love not being seen. Holy shit. I'm never playing Team Arena again until they add this new radar.

It'll probably be like every other thing they put in a "test" playlist. Put the playlist out for a month or few weeks to test changes, then don't actually implement any changes.

[arglactable]

I think a lot of people underestimate the drastic impact that a lot of these kinds of mechanics have on not just map design and pacing, but simply on a much more fundamental level. Honestly, the more I play and watch games like CS, Quake, Reflex, actual Halo, etc the more obvious it is to me that those games just FEEL better. They feel more in control; more deliberate. There's no camera shaking, no "immersive" animations, no start and stop pacing and sudden changes in speed. A line from that recent article about Titanfall and its influence from CE caught my eye.
 

"Then I could dance around him and see what [bungie] did,” he says, noting how it deals with aim-assist, and how its stable view as you walk gets across a sense of Master Chief’s indomitability.

 

 

People want to talk about feeling like a Spartan? What feels more like a Spartan than being an unwavering, unstoppable fucking force? Weapon ever steady as they charge around the map. Unfazed by incoming fire. Their pinpoint fucking accuracy entirely unaffected by their shields popping and their health decreasing. Descope is their equipment getting in the way. Hip fire works fine, son.

​And what did we get in Halo 4, a game where we're totally supposed to "feel like a Spartan?" FLINCH. That's right. These Spartan 4's are such precious little bitches that they can't even take a few bullets to the face without losing their stability. These guys suck so bad, they need their visor's zooming feature to stay in place under fire. Want to move around the map at reasonable speeds? Better lower your weapon and pump your arms, sport. We know you suck, so how about you call in some power items from the sky, since you're too bad to control the local resources? You can't drop that flag. Don't be ridiculous. We know you'll just go and lose it, you idiot. We'll make your motion sensor cover just about the whole map, because you're probably half blind, you borderline incompetent super soldier.

 

And then you get to Halo 5, where they've piled on the "feel like a Spartan" nonsense with a couple of returning features that should have never left (praise descope, no flinch, and flag juggling). Honestly, I think the whole argument against no radar, that it's more chaotic and we need radar to compensate for the gimmicks (that definitely can't be removed or anything), is missing the forest for the trees. The problem isn't just that the game is "unpredictable" or "chaotic." The problem is that you don't FEEL in control when everyone is flying around the map, starting and stopping, suddenly changing horizontal and vertical speed and direction, changing the height and shape of their character models (crouch, slide, clamber), raising and lowering weapons. There is no sense of stability. Combat ready speeds are slow as hell compared to top gimmick speeds. And you can't even aim properly, a new feature in this game, which makes all of this starting and stopping and instantaneously thrusting in one direction or another in the middle of a fight feel even worse. And all of this in a team-based shooter with long kill times. No, thanks.

[-DeucEy-]

Warning! Incoming DeucEy's Wall of Halo Wish-Items.

 

Exactly. People point to new additions like sprint and AA's and claim that's it's evolving the game and it's healthy for the series. Oh really? Is that why the population and general awareness of our franchise have been in the toilet since 2011? There's just zero thought out into this argument, and I cant help but wonder if any of them started on a Halo before Reach.

So their plan is to take an insanely popular franchise that's showing no signs of decline whatsoever, and then start changing and adding shit to make it play more like other games? Why would you not want it to stick to what makes it good and stay unique? Ohhhh, because you haven't really played that version of the game, and you have no idea what you're talking about, but still want to spout off like you do...okay, got it Reddit and Waypoint.

 

Couldn't have said it better myself my man.

 

Question for you Hard Way, as you're usually pretty articulate on a lot of these topics as well. What is your opinion on the "recipe" so to speak for what would make a ideal Halo? Assuming you had the ability to make every decision that caters to both casual and competitive?

 

If I had to choose, keeping both casual and competitive in mind I honestly would have:

 

• Halo 2's Ranking system. Where it's difficult to rank up, yet a clear separation of skill levels. (Team Slayer for example.. HUGE difference between 32-33s and 37-38s.
   
• Halo 3's matchmaking system. I played a damn good amount of Halo 2 and I'm pretty sure they did this as well, but I can't remember 100% so I'll just cite Halo 3 for this. I don't know about you guys, but the matchmaking system in Halo 3 was probably my favorite feature about the games. Consistent matches combined with a ranking system that separates people appropriately would be god tier. By far one of Halo 5's biggest complaints was not being able to go into matchmaking and have fun because you're getting steam rolled by teams (this may have also been exasperated due to Halo 5's loose skill matching). Me personally, when I actively played this game when it came out, I played at a Champ level consistently and was able to perform pretty well, but I'm not ignorant enough to ignore the blatant disadvantages being presented. In ranked, teams of 4 match teams of 4. To3 + 1 match To3 + 1. To2 can match any mix of To2 or solos.
   
• Halo Reach's Progression System (or Halo 3's playlist progression system). Being able to click on someones profile and simply see their total XP and their ranked vs social games played was pretty cool. Not to mention having the symbols next to each gamertag gave a bit of a sense of accomplishment, regardless if it didn't actually give you anything. That can be easily rectified however by, you know, giving the player something. Emblem, armor, etc.
   
• No grenade hit-markers. I ended up getting into an argument on here with someone, I forget (It was a very stupid argument, that's probably why I forgot), but I still have never heard a legitimate argument for having this feature. Shot hit-markers are okay, I don't think it really matters either way for that. But grenade hit-markers detract from gameplay by having the ability to chuck small radars across the map.
   
• No armor abilities or sprint, save for maybe Ground Pound and/or Stabilize. I don't think Stabalize hurts the game in anyway, I've never seen any complaints about it personally; I actually kind of like it. Ground pound, I personally hate the ability, but I don't think it's game-breakingly annoying though. I'd remove the splash damage it has though in a game with no sprint. Faster movement speed, there's no reason why I should feel like a rock unless I'm pressing 4 different buttons on my controller to traverse a map.
   
• Halo 5's forge. Needless to say this Forge mode is god tier. Easily my favorite feature from Halo 5.
   
• Halo 3's theater mode. Please. Bring. This. Feature. Back. Theater mode is practically useless now and has gotten significantly worse since Halo 3. Meanwhile (with the exception of MW:R and IW -- which is understandable because two games) even going back to the Black Ops 2 days, their theater mode can pause, rewind, fast forward, etc all with multiple people in the party. Being able to go over film with your team was SO freaking beneficial in Halo 3, I wish I could put it into words. Not to mention Halo 5's theater doesn't even accurately show what's happening. Don't really know what that's about.
   
• This one is pretty vague, but smaller arena sized maps. Me personally, I know a lot of people don't like 343's art style that much, but maybe its just that I see things from a design perspective being a developer myself, I love how beautiful a lot of these maps are. However I cannot stand the amount of corridor based, maze maps that are a staple in 343's games. I miss the Midships, the Lockouts, the Sanctuary type maps. NO I DON'T WANT REMAKES. I want the type of maps where battles are consistently happening and teams have to work together to actually control parts of the map by actually shooting... Not sprinting and using all kinds of abilities to traverse the map to potentially find and collapse on the other team. I feel like that aspect of Halo has completely vanished due to the sheer size of the maps. So much more difficult to assist your teammates because there's too many walls/rooms/hallways blocking you from helping a teammate.
   
• This is kind of a side point to the bullet above, but as much as I like the landscapes, we as gamers can completely do without the intense lighting and sun-glare. Nothing says immersion like eye-strain when playing your favorite shooter.
   
• Halo 3's File Share. Highly overlooked feature in my opinion, being able to simply click on someone's gamertag directly in the lobby and look at that person's favorite files and maps without having to press start > find the person and navigate down to a confusing file share button on the profile like Halo 5 and bring up a pretty long loading window.. It's just entirely too much imo. Halo 3's file share was so seamless. *Bonus for Bungie's Favorites.
   
• Ranked playlist. Social playlist. There should never, for any reason, be a game on a scale like Halo to where I can't pick up the game and play with my very underskilled friends in an unranked environment. This was actually one of my biggest pet peeves in Halo 5. I literally could not play with any of my relatives without getting steam rolled because they're legit golds and I was champion level at the time; forcing me to create 15 different accounts for specific people to play with. Yes, there is social now in Halo 5, but that's not my point. It took entirely too much fighting and population decline for this to be added. More playlist variety should be at the beginning of a game, not at the end. I would think that this would be a Lesson's Learned from Halo MCC but I guess not.
• Side note to the playlist, I'm personally on the side that I see absolutely nothing wrong with having different playlist with different settings. The whole universal settings discussion has never really resonated with me. The competitive Halo community specifically has never struggled with a healthy amount of competition whether it was GameBattles that had thousands of teams on each ladder, each season, or the MLG/Hardcore playlists itself. I don't remember a single time during each game's lifespan where finding games was an issue and still matched different players consistently. Not to mention casual players just want to hop into the most casual friendly playlist possible (hence why Social Slayer was always at minimum, twice as populated compared to every other playlist in Halo 3).
   
• Spectator mode. Not much to be said here.
   
• Radar. 25m is a nice standard. It's not a nostalgia thing, it just feels the most consistent and a lot of people including Halo 5 players would agree. Halo 5's is too small, Halo 4's was entirely too large. Allow us to turn it off for competitive instead of making a bunch of tweaks to kind of make a bunch of the other abilities in the game work.

I won't go into weapon balance and user interface stuff because I can go allllll day with that but these are the main points I wanted to hit on from a birds-eye-view of a Halo experience. Obviously this is one entire wishlist and would be very developer demanding, but I will point out, it's not as if most of these capabilities don't already exist within their code repositories or even in the game currently. That would be my wishlist personally. As an avid Halo player, I honestly think this list would benefit Halo tremendously. Nothing to do with my vision of the game or any of that. Simply from what I think everyone would enjoy.

[QuietMan]

I think it's a valid argument when used properly. Obviously there is no denying the older Halos had advantages over the current ones but when people look back at Halo 3 and say it was perfect, that's pure nostalgia talking.

Agreed.  I recently played the team slayer playlist in MCC for a couple hours.  Played each Halo experience several times.   

 

It was easy for me to see:

CE >                     H2 >      H3 >                   all the other Halo cancer.  

 

There's no nostalgia about it.  Just direct comparison between multiple Halo experiences in a 2 hour window.  

[Banamy]

I used to be accepting of all the new stuff. I used to make excuses on why sprint is fine, or spartan charge. But after really studying all the halos. We need classic more than ever. Imagine a classic halo in an age where everything is similar. Look at bf1 for example, changed the perception on that franchise for the better.

 

Now I wont be fully happy with a halo until all the gimmicky stuff is gone. Thrust is fine though, adds another healthy layer to combat.

[EagleBurn]

I used to be accepting of all the new stuff. I used to make excuses on why sprint is fine, or spartan charge. But after really studying all the halos. We need classic more than ever. Imagine a classic halo in an age where everything is similar. Look at bf1 for example, changed the perception on that franchise for the better.

 

Now I wont be fully happy with a halo until all the gimmicky stuff is gone. Thrust is fine though, adds another healthy layer to combat.

 

Welcome to the light and thrust won't be fine until we're able to shoot our weapon during. Then it can be taken seriously.

[Banamy]

Welcome to the light and thrust won't be fine until we're able to shoot our weapon during. Then it can be taken seriously.

Hopefully that change happens, what do tou think of ground pound with no aim assist?

[QuietMan]

Hopefully that change happens, what do tou think of ground pound with no aim assist?

I view it as "do it at your own risk"; its more risky than useful.  Kinda of like an animated assassination.  I don't really have beef with GP.  

 

Sprint, Clamber, and Spartan charge need to GET THE FUCK OUT though.  

[MultiLockOn]

Go into custom settings and decrease thrust distance to 50% and make the cooldown 2x as fast. Makes it primarily a strafing tool/midair control and you're not sitting there the entire fight mashing the thrust button waiting for it to come up.

[Miggs14]

Is it just me or does this game get worse by the day ? seems Im having to dashboard and restart at least 2-3 times every time I play, either beng stuck waiting to connect to a lobby or like the black screen im stuck with right now waiting to go into a game.

[Banamy]

Is it just me or does this game get worse by the day ? seems Im having to dashboard and restart at least 2-3 times every time I play, either beng stuck waiting to connect to a lobby or like the black screen im stuck with right now waiting to go into a game.

Hard reset your xbox

[Miggs14]

Hard reset your xbox

Already did be other day, still have same issue. Think i might re-install see if that does anything

[Mow]

@@MultiLockOn I remember making and showing Smartan those exact settings in custom games ages ago, I compared it to how the Titan worked in Titanfall 1, like more of a sidestep/dodge mechanic instead of an outright "Press thrust to get out of jail free", I much prefer it over what we have at the moment, the only thing I would change is maybe extend the range on the forward thrust a tiny bit so it doesn't feel so awkward.

 

 

 

The biggest problem with thrust is that it is you best option 100% of the time to escape a shitty situation you put yourself in.

[XenonYoshi]

I don't feel like crouch was ever really a inherently useful mechanic, strategically

 

It was artificially given utility by making it the only way to stay off radar. And there's absolutely nothing skillful about it

 

Crouch really should be about dodging shots and getting behind cover. It also adds some stability to some guns.

I mean, crouch really isn't skillful, and is mostly only useful for crouch-strafing and the occasional crouch jump anymore. 

 

I didn't mean that I didn't like the change, I fully understand the purpose and it'll definitely be better for competitive. But for me, its going to be a major change for me to adapt to players moving so fast while staying off radar, because I relied on it too much