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Forums - Microsoft Discussion - Halo's Fall from Grace

I still think Halo 3 is the best looking Halo game. Lighting and art direction at least.



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teamsilent13 said:
Halo 5 is sometimes disappointing, but it still exceeded my expectations because I had literally no faith in 343.

I did not like anything from Halo 4. I tried to get into it multiple times coming back after weapon tuning and DLC because I bought the collector's edition. I had no trouble doing well because I used all the overpowered setups before they were popular: Thruster pack, ammo, mobility. I pretty much was on cycle in that game with constant power weapons so my k/d was actually higher than past games. However, I felt the game required no skill, wasn't Halo, and had COD elements added without tuning and implemented poorly. It's honestly the worst multiplayer I've ever played. It reminded me more of Section 8: Prejudice than a AAA title. All the maps were complete garbage and boring.

I also hated the graphics of Halo 4 and don't get the appeal to it at all. I also found a ridiculous amount of bugs in the game especially related to the AI which made the game on legendary super easy. I beat it blind in 5 hours on my first playthrough on legendary and it wasn't challenging at any point. I thought the story was completely out of place with the series and the soundtrack didn't feel right. They couldn't get theater or fileshare right for months. There were little tiny changes everywhere that all added up to making the experience worse. They went out of their way to change things for no reason such as being able to move when you pause for the scoreboard. Multiply that by a 100 and you get my point. I was on full board with the "Halo is dad" train after Halo 4. Halo 4 was the worst AAA game I ever played. Halo is one of my favorite gaming series and I don't say that simply due to expectations. I just thought it was a bad video game. If it wasn't Halo I wouldn't have bought it.

Then we had MCC which had its own list of issues. So at this point I did not expect much from Halo 5. I bought it mostly just to see if 343 could make a good campaign. Once again I was let down here.

However, after playing a lot of Halo 5 I have mostly positive feelings about the gameplay. Halo 5 is a fun game with decent mechanics that takes more good than bad from Call of Duty and fixes a lot of stupid things Reach and 4 did wrong. I could go a lot more in depth, but basically core gameplay is the best since Halo 3. It doesn't feel like classic Halo, but it feels unique in its own right.

Halo 5 has a lot of problems that are not related to gameplay. No infection, oddball, or king of the hill. There's a lack of good quality maps (still better than Halo 4 maps) and due to one DLC map coming a month it seems like it will be a while before that is fixed. I have a lot of negative things I could say about the REQ system.

I'm not going to nitpick the game to death because right now I enjoy it. 343 redeemed themselves, and I will consider getting Halo 6 at full price. I got Halo 5 for half because of abusing a bing rewards special that was going on a couple weeks prior to release.

It's weird for me reading that, because (for me at least) if you swap reach and 4 with 5 each time in your post then for me it reads perfectly. After how disappointed I was with 5 going back and playing Reach and 4 (on the MCC) is what kept me going with halo



Personally I believe Halo 5 has the most fluid gameplay by a fair margin compared to other Halo games. However, it just didn't capture me like Halo games used to. The combination of the lackluster campaign, and my continually growing preference for single player games has driven me to only playing it a handful of times since the game came out.

Despite the exceptional gameplay, I just get bored most of the time playing it. My hope is they do something to revitalize the series with Halo 6 (like making it more fun with content similar in nature to Destiny with their raids and questing, or having Mass Effect's exploration aspect).

At this point, I'm not sure I'll be buying Halo 6.



Although I consider Halo 2 to be inferior to Halo 1, in spite of the addition of online multiplayer, I think it's a fine game. The story veered in a direction I found a bit unsavory, but yeah, good stuff. As for the rest, I cannot comment. Halo 2 was the last Halo game I played.



- "If you have the heart of a true winner, you can always get more pissed off than some other asshole."

IIIIITHE1IIIII said:

What used to be the symbol of Microsoft's successful step into the world of home console gaming now stands in shame as a prime example of how greed and lust for monetary gains can ruin an entire gaming franchise and everything that it stands for. How could this be possible? Did no one understand what was going on- and what was going to happen if no one raised his voice in time? Were they threatened to remain silent by their employers? The questions are many, and will only increase in numbers as answers remain hard to come by. Just about the only thing that we know for sure is that a tragedy has taken place.

It all started back in the early 2000's as Halo: Combat Evolved shook the gaming world immediately after release. It was revolutionary in many respects; a first-person shooter featuring regenerating health, vehicles far less clumsy than previous attempts, artificial intelligence that actually seemed intelligent and, above all, a highly immersive setting.

Everyone remembers the first time that they exited the escape pod and saw the Halo ring rising at the horizon, going all the way up across the screen and back down on the other side. The sense of isolation. The will to explore and figure out what the ring is and why it was made. The connection you form with the marines - and sense of grief in the event that you fail to save them. You felt strong among allies, yet weak alone against the enemy. Your character was powerful, but not all-powerful. And the final mission truly tested your limits, giving you a great deal of satisfaction as you made it out alive, witnessing Sergeant Johnson finally making a truce with a Covenant Elite moments before the Halo ring blows up. At that moment you knew that Halo would remain a monumental experience in your gaming career, and that any series looking to top it would have a mountain to climb.

Then it happened. Halo 2 was released and suddenly everything that made the original so great and so memorable was swept away in a heartbeat: Master Chief starts flying around in space, Sergeant Johnson apparently survived the explosion somehow, marines are few and far between, the mysterious Covenant aliens start talking English, electric guitars start making noises during combat situations, the bland and uninspired Brutes become the new primary enemy, the final boss battle lacks any sense of grandeur and the game ends in a painful cliffhanger. The series became just another generic science fiction movie with some admittedly still good but not legendary gameplay. It was not Halo anymore.

 

I am usually a very forgiving person, but the thing that Bungie and Microsoft did to Halo is something that I will never be able to forgive them for. Halo could have been so much more, but instead ended up as yet another attempt to appeal to the masses at the cost of the game's core.

Because of this, they have earned my eternal contempt.

That is just like your opinion. 

I like all the halo's including halo wars and  spartan assault



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Halo has always been a big science fiction blockbuster. I dont know why this is new. 343 pays more attention to story detail than Bungie ever did and look at bungie today. THey made another game and still suck at the story. Halo five was a buffer game in preparation for Halo six. The true fans will buy the game. I know I became a truer fan of Halo under 343 than I ever did with Bungie.