Transcendence
Active member
Hello, all. Like the title states, what do you want to see in Halo 5? It is pretty much regarded as fact; Halo 4 was terrible. Not mechanically, but the immense amount of Cod-esque features threw off a lot of the community and due to the randomness of the game and the contract with Virgin Gaming (External company) the series that made MLG, was no longer on the circuit for the winter season. This saddened me to no end. I was a biblical Halo player. Back in 2008 (When I was 12/13) I was invited to an MLG event by Snipedown, one of the best Professional players in MLG history; so this thread is coming for someone who really cares about Halo and knows every in and out of the series. I will compile what I want to see regarding MP, Competitive and Campaign and then I would like to hear your thoughts (Note: These aren’t in order of importance even though they are numbered; they are all equally important).
1. In the sandbox that currently contains the DMR, BR and Carbine, cut it down to just the BR like Halo 2 and Halo 3. The DMR has no business being in any game past Halo Reach because it was from a prequel understandably, whereas every game which chronologically superseded it (Halo 1, 2, 3) all didn’t have it and had a single gun Sandbox. What made Halo 2 and 3 so good for pro players (including me) was knowing that it was you versus another person, BR v BR, and the one with the better shot would win. This provided Halo with one of the largest skill caps, as opposed the minimal cap in Call of Duty.
2. Like the recent weapon tuning, keep the Battle Rifle as a 4 shot. 343 realized the faults after a while. While both the DMR and BR killed in 5 Headshots each, the sheer accuracy of the DMR (and range) completely rendered the BR obsolete as anyone can easily pop 5 shots to the head in 2-3 seconds for a kill. This shows they are thinking of how they catered to the community and their wants.
3. Remove ordnance for good. Halo for the most part is a straight forward game. As a veteran of Halo 3, knowing the power weapon spawns was the key to every game. Control of these weapons meant a significant advantage for your team. This had an added aspect of skill and insight because it would force people to gain familiarity with the maps so they can reap the benefits of the weapons on it. Example of this would be Pit TS, the MLG variant. Rockets spawned green room and usually 1-2 players (in MLG) would rush them for rocket control and only 1 person would go and take sniper. From there would you would establish map control and pace the game. Ordnance was a terrible idea because it is reminiscent of COD kill streaks which throws off die hard Halo fans. 343 has recently learned about this and now most maps have Sniper spawns at pre-determined locations like previous Halo’s.
4. Limit armor abilities to the point where they don’t over centralize the game. I understand the need for innovation, but to me this was a step in the wrong direction. If anyone played the Halo Reach beta they know the extent of Armor Lock… It was OP and absolutely horrendous. Armor abilities again have a Cod-Esque aura about them because of the “perk” benefits they give. This made making competitive settings much lengthier as opposed to the older Halo games where the game was nearly competitive from launch will only minor changes done to incorporate v1 or v2 settings.
5. The difference in appearance that both the BR and Sniper have gone through is a little offsetting. I’m ok with the aesthetic changes, but they are way off the original Halo 2 and 3 counterparts. Revert the designs back to something similar to Halo 3 albeit higher resolution and bid of refinement to make it look “next-gen” (Not like now there is no real scanner on the sniper like Halo 2 and 3 had).
6. The maps need to be more cleverly designed like Pit, Narrows, Blood Gulch etc. Halo 3 for the most part had amazing map design for both competitive and casual. In MLG (Both the playlist and actual competition) the common MLG maps like Narrows, The Pit, Construct etc. all had amazing design and catered to every game mode. In The Pit, established either tower control on Sword room, Narrows you would either control top mid or bottom mid and when you had control you would spawn trap to gain further control of the map and in Construct especially, Gold Room camo spawn could turn the tide of a game, controlling the lifts would mean you can gain a couple of unsuspecting kills and so forth. They were amazing and really had people playing a lot; which led to the long life of the game and it being played well into 2011, 4 years after release with 70000 people on. Halo 4 doesn’t even garner 40000 people at one time if they’re lucky.
7. Scrap the leveling system from the past two Halo games and revert back to the Ranking system that Halo 3 WAS HUGE FOR. Ranking was an indication of skill. I had a 50 in MLG, Slayer, Lone Wolf etc. and people knew I was good. In Halo 4, I’ve played with people well above my level and have absolutely smacked them silly. Ranking signifies skill, leveling does not. This is another Call of Duty characteristic that has been wrongfully incorporated into Halo.
8. While I have said to scrap a lot, with all that free space, let that be used to completely revolutionize the customization of your Spartan armor. It’s something that Halo 4 got right, but couldn’t completely capitalize on because of the other things they tended to. You can have the most simplistic armor, or with a little bit of time, some of the most aesthetically pleasing and complex armor ever devised; and it’s entirely YOURS. This would keep people coming back to the game because it would make the game personal for them. They can come back and choose what they want to do with their armor each time. With that said; Bring back the Hayabusa armor that was iconic in Halo 3.
9. BRING BACK FORGE WORLD. It is literally the best component of Halo Reach. It was simply astounding what you could do in it. Forge is absolutely useless in the new Halo and it is sad because Forge being “good” was one of the main staples for Halo games for years. Again, another thing to get people to come back to the game even more.
10. To split the Ranked vs Casual like in Halo 3, in casual everyone would start with the BR (Or whatever the game mode entails) whereas in Halo 3, like every MLG playlist, you would start with a BR. On that note, bring back the timed weapon spawns for the power weapons like in Halo 3, which will give the added benefactor of competitive value. Also, have the competitive players or “tryhards” at least have a section which is reminiscent of the Ranked matches in Halo 3; where each game mode would be set to competitive settings
Guns I would like to see return:
- Battle Rifle
- Sniper Rifle
- Rocket Launcher
- Assault Rifle
- Boltshot (From Halo 4)
- Magnum
- Plasma Pistol
- Covenant Carbine (as a spawn on most maps)
- Spartan Laser
- Shotgun
- Suppressor/SMG
- Beam Rifle
Other Promethean based weapons will obviously be introduced, but I'd rather the core guns that actually have significance (Bolt shot and Suppressor for example) be incorporated into MP as opposed to everything (Like the Binary rifle which was completely unneeded).
There should be no loadouts as it provides the most reminiscent part of Cod into Halo which is baffling and once again, offsetting.
Playlists for Casual:
- Team Slayer (4 v 4)
- Big Team Slayer (8 v 8)
- Rumble Pit
- Griffball
- Multi-Team
- Capture the Flag
- Oddball
Competitive:
- MLG (Ranging from Team Slayer to CTF and Oddball) basically anything that is ran in MLG.
- Lone wolves
- Capture the Flag
- Team Doubles
- Team Snipers etc.
As you can see (If you’ve bared with me the whole time reading this) Halo 4 failed big time and a lot of this incorporates many Halo 3 characteristics; which was the most popular Halo population wise to date. This should draw back both MLG and all the fans of Halo that dropped the recent installment because of the vast amount of unneeded changes surrounding it.
As for campaign, this is something that 343 did pretty much perfectly. I only hope they incorporate Cortana correctly as there is no chief without Cortana.
1. In the sandbox that currently contains the DMR, BR and Carbine, cut it down to just the BR like Halo 2 and Halo 3. The DMR has no business being in any game past Halo Reach because it was from a prequel understandably, whereas every game which chronologically superseded it (Halo 1, 2, 3) all didn’t have it and had a single gun Sandbox. What made Halo 2 and 3 so good for pro players (including me) was knowing that it was you versus another person, BR v BR, and the one with the better shot would win. This provided Halo with one of the largest skill caps, as opposed the minimal cap in Call of Duty.
2. Like the recent weapon tuning, keep the Battle Rifle as a 4 shot. 343 realized the faults after a while. While both the DMR and BR killed in 5 Headshots each, the sheer accuracy of the DMR (and range) completely rendered the BR obsolete as anyone can easily pop 5 shots to the head in 2-3 seconds for a kill. This shows they are thinking of how they catered to the community and their wants.
3. Remove ordnance for good. Halo for the most part is a straight forward game. As a veteran of Halo 3, knowing the power weapon spawns was the key to every game. Control of these weapons meant a significant advantage for your team. This had an added aspect of skill and insight because it would force people to gain familiarity with the maps so they can reap the benefits of the weapons on it. Example of this would be Pit TS, the MLG variant. Rockets spawned green room and usually 1-2 players (in MLG) would rush them for rocket control and only 1 person would go and take sniper. From there would you would establish map control and pace the game. Ordnance was a terrible idea because it is reminiscent of COD kill streaks which throws off die hard Halo fans. 343 has recently learned about this and now most maps have Sniper spawns at pre-determined locations like previous Halo’s.
4. Limit armor abilities to the point where they don’t over centralize the game. I understand the need for innovation, but to me this was a step in the wrong direction. If anyone played the Halo Reach beta they know the extent of Armor Lock… It was OP and absolutely horrendous. Armor abilities again have a Cod-Esque aura about them because of the “perk” benefits they give. This made making competitive settings much lengthier as opposed to the older Halo games where the game was nearly competitive from launch will only minor changes done to incorporate v1 or v2 settings.
5. The difference in appearance that both the BR and Sniper have gone through is a little offsetting. I’m ok with the aesthetic changes, but they are way off the original Halo 2 and 3 counterparts. Revert the designs back to something similar to Halo 3 albeit higher resolution and bid of refinement to make it look “next-gen” (Not like now there is no real scanner on the sniper like Halo 2 and 3 had).
6. The maps need to be more cleverly designed like Pit, Narrows, Blood Gulch etc. Halo 3 for the most part had amazing map design for both competitive and casual. In MLG (Both the playlist and actual competition) the common MLG maps like Narrows, The Pit, Construct etc. all had amazing design and catered to every game mode. In The Pit, established either tower control on Sword room, Narrows you would either control top mid or bottom mid and when you had control you would spawn trap to gain further control of the map and in Construct especially, Gold Room camo spawn could turn the tide of a game, controlling the lifts would mean you can gain a couple of unsuspecting kills and so forth. They were amazing and really had people playing a lot; which led to the long life of the game and it being played well into 2011, 4 years after release with 70000 people on. Halo 4 doesn’t even garner 40000 people at one time if they’re lucky.
7. Scrap the leveling system from the past two Halo games and revert back to the Ranking system that Halo 3 WAS HUGE FOR. Ranking was an indication of skill. I had a 50 in MLG, Slayer, Lone Wolf etc. and people knew I was good. In Halo 4, I’ve played with people well above my level and have absolutely smacked them silly. Ranking signifies skill, leveling does not. This is another Call of Duty characteristic that has been wrongfully incorporated into Halo.
8. While I have said to scrap a lot, with all that free space, let that be used to completely revolutionize the customization of your Spartan armor. It’s something that Halo 4 got right, but couldn’t completely capitalize on because of the other things they tended to. You can have the most simplistic armor, or with a little bit of time, some of the most aesthetically pleasing and complex armor ever devised; and it’s entirely YOURS. This would keep people coming back to the game because it would make the game personal for them. They can come back and choose what they want to do with their armor each time. With that said; Bring back the Hayabusa armor that was iconic in Halo 3.
9. BRING BACK FORGE WORLD. It is literally the best component of Halo Reach. It was simply astounding what you could do in it. Forge is absolutely useless in the new Halo and it is sad because Forge being “good” was one of the main staples for Halo games for years. Again, another thing to get people to come back to the game even more.
10. To split the Ranked vs Casual like in Halo 3, in casual everyone would start with the BR (Or whatever the game mode entails) whereas in Halo 3, like every MLG playlist, you would start with a BR. On that note, bring back the timed weapon spawns for the power weapons like in Halo 3, which will give the added benefactor of competitive value. Also, have the competitive players or “tryhards” at least have a section which is reminiscent of the Ranked matches in Halo 3; where each game mode would be set to competitive settings
Guns I would like to see return:
- Battle Rifle
- Sniper Rifle
- Rocket Launcher
- Assault Rifle
- Boltshot (From Halo 4)
- Magnum
- Plasma Pistol
- Covenant Carbine (as a spawn on most maps)
- Spartan Laser
- Shotgun
- Suppressor/SMG
- Beam Rifle
Other Promethean based weapons will obviously be introduced, but I'd rather the core guns that actually have significance (Bolt shot and Suppressor for example) be incorporated into MP as opposed to everything (Like the Binary rifle which was completely unneeded).
There should be no loadouts as it provides the most reminiscent part of Cod into Halo which is baffling and once again, offsetting.
Playlists for Casual:
- Team Slayer (4 v 4)
- Big Team Slayer (8 v 8)
- Rumble Pit
- Griffball
- Multi-Team
- Capture the Flag
- Oddball
Competitive:
- MLG (Ranging from Team Slayer to CTF and Oddball) basically anything that is ran in MLG.
- Lone wolves
- Capture the Flag
- Team Doubles
- Team Snipers etc.
As you can see (If you’ve bared with me the whole time reading this) Halo 4 failed big time and a lot of this incorporates many Halo 3 characteristics; which was the most popular Halo population wise to date. This should draw back both MLG and all the fans of Halo that dropped the recent installment because of the vast amount of unneeded changes surrounding it.
As for campaign, this is something that 343 did pretty much perfectly. I only hope they incorporate Cortana correctly as there is no chief without Cortana.
