VivaLebowski

This feature is going to take a whole lot of time for 343 to maintain any good output of stuff.. 343 would be better put implementing AI enemies and scripted events in the forge. Then they would rely on the community to do their work for them.

"If you've been devoted to a cause for so long, it is near enough impossible to give up." Oh for Gods sake dont be so melodramatic. I was very sad when they removed Elites from Reach. I was less sad when it was reported they wouldnt be in this one, but not so much as with Reach. But so what? Its a cosmetic difference. You want a cause? Become a Communist or a Christian. At least they believe in something important, even if they are on opposing sides of the spectrum.

Is that sarcasm? Saying Halo 4 is going to be "great" is like saying it automatically sucks. You have no reason to think that is a certainty.

"And I personally think that if Bungie made this game those narrow minded people would praise Bungie into heaven but instead they just go bananas on 343i." I'm not a veteran of the Halo community by any notion, the only game where I payed attention to the forums was Reach BUT judging by that, if your Bungie and you introduce Bloom or Armor Lock, regardless of the merits of these things, your going to piss of these arch-conservative (with regards to the gameplay) Competitive types. So people would in all likelihood be going Banana's if these changes were authored by Bungie. The players dont care overmuch for Bungie...after all, Bungie started this push towards Modernization, customization, etc with Reach. 343 is merely continuing that. From my point of view, Reach's critical flaw was that it tried to keep Halo's classical gameplay intact while introducing COD/BF/modern elements. The thing is you cannot do that. You either make a classical Halo game (which is infeasible from a financial standpoint, it seems to me) or you try to radically alter it. You cannot have your cake and eat it too. 343 is taking risks and being Ballzy here, so its perfectly fair that people are concerned. That said, 343 might pull it off. I certainly hope they do. I dont have "faith" in 343. There's no reason to think they have to get things right here. They have no proven track record working on independent projects. In fact, the "changes" they are making might very well be the result of Profit-minded Microsoft execs breathing down their necks, rather than the result of a carefull process to make a good game. Halo is becoming more COD-esque (this is not a statement of derision, just a statement of the fact), it is being changed, radically, and the classical Halo experience did indeed just go out the window. ALL THAT SAID, Halo needs to change. It needs to be financially successfull. As easily as they could fail epically, they could succeed spectacularly. No doubt allot of talent and money is being invested in this thing. And the elements of classical Halo design which are being maintained ensure a unique product in the end.

It seems like your arguing with someone else...I said Halo cant be financially successful playing to a small group of people (competitive pro diehard fans). The reason I said that is because 343 has to appeal to casuals because they are the majority. I ain't putting out an opinion here on individual features, nor do I think 343 should necessarily cater to the competitive diehards. To make a good AND financially successful game (because 343 needs to make bank if we want them to keep making Halo) 343 must try to make a good game while also going where the money is. I;m not stating an opinion of planned changes, only stating the facts.

I'm not disappointed, just allot more apprehensive. Had to happen some time considering it was only a matter of time until 343 decided it needed to modernize Halo dramatically, and that meant risky changes. I don't have "faith" in 343, nor do I think Halo 4 has to be bad. I have little idea whats going through their minds right now, other than they 1) Are pushing Halo back to its roots in some elements (map design, Campaign, focus on the Chief) and 2) Are radically changing the basic formula. I'm still very much excited for the game, if I had to bet I would say its likely to be good, though probably unlikely that it will top H3 for me, at least as an MP experience.

I dont want Elite Slayer, I just want Elites mixed in as they were in H2 and H3. But what once was may never be again.

That's one thing where I cannot understand the hate this new feature is getting.

One has to wonder to what extent 343's new "vision" is bring driven by profit-minded Microsoft execs who are looking at BF's and COD's sales numbers with Hungry eyes and riding herd over 343 as a result. As has been said elsewhere, Halo's modernization isnt necessarily a bad thing...but its worth pointing out that if you had a whole bunch of Halo fans being given license to make another Halo game but not being tied down to Sales, the final product would probably be much more conservative in its changes than what we are going to get now. Food for thought.

343 isn't motivated simply by what the competitive core of Halo players want. They are motivated by sales. They can't make a financially successful game based simply on playing to a small group of Halo fans. They are being forced to modernize, one way or another. If people want a remake of previous Halos, get over it. Nostalgia and the previous trilogy just left the building, for better or for worse.

I just wish they had come up with a different name...Firefight was good in ODST but I dont particularly feel the need for it this time around. If I were 343 I would just focus exclusively on Forge, Matchmaking and Campaign. Whatever add-ons they try to add are never going to justify the time spent making them in terms of people who consistently play them and/or are encouraged to buy the game beacuse of their inclusion.

Reach's campaign was a huge disappointment for me. If 343 can deliver a campaign which is as good as any of the other Halo campaigns (excluding HWars) and Reach quality multiplayer or better, it will be a good game. I won't call it successful unless both the Campaign and the Multiplayer are original trilogy (or ODST) quality.

@Director Ive got no idea who your arguing with but its worth pointing out with all this that having "Halo 3 with AA's" is hardly like Halo 3, considering AA's are the biggest difference. Another thing, allot of what defines the Halo games is their map design. Reach's maps were lower quality campaign rips as opposed to standalone arenas custom made. That and I personally felt like their human centric nature also really decreased the classic Halo artistic style...its important to have a mix of Forerunner, Human, Covie maps. Sure, Reach had forge World, but a Forge map lacks the stylistic depth and quality of a custom made battlespace, and of course it got pretty monotonous looking at the same blocks time after time. So its hard to say Reach could ever be like Halo 3 (relatively speaking), even if they made every single non-AA aspect of the game play exactly the same. Also, "If Halo becomes COD, it will still be the best damned COD game you've ever even dreamed of playing. You are not psychic, you haven't traveled back in time, you DO NOT KNOW how Halo 4 is going to play, or whether or not it is going to be a good game." You don't know its going to be the "best damn COD game" either. 343 is modernizing Halo 4 in the direction of COD, no point denying it. We simply do not know if 343 is going to modernize it well, or modernize it badly. I don't know if this guy your arguing with has any valid points to make, but people certainly have a right to be apprehensive.

Yeah, but why would the covenants supreme commander be in the field before he was even an arbiter? Regardless, even if it was supposed to be him it wasnt very obvious.

Having customization options do not necessarily make the game...its be expected that there will be small advantages due to certain weapons being OP. Wouldn't surprise me if, for instance, the BR is OP slightly versus the AR or vice versa come launch time... What 343 needs to watch out for is stupid Armor Abilities, like AL, or including power weapons in their loadouts. As long as they confine loadouts to a good set of AA's and keep the possible weapons things like the AR, BR, Magnums, Carbines, etc etc. Now, if 343 starts trying to bring the power weapons into the mix, we have a major MAJOR problem.

Actually rather surprised...dedicated members seem to go out of their ways not to be dicks. Not like what I saw of the Bungie forums...then again, I was only really invested in that in the lead up to Reach. Gotta watch out for an excess of friendliness...telling you all right now, I think its a communist conspiracy.

Ch-ch-ch-changes! But thats what this all comes down to. Its a brave new world, haha.

If they just changed these stupid names that would be like half of peoples objections canceled out right here!

I wish the arbiter had been in Reach as a sympathetic bad-guy...or maybe only appeared at the end. They jump out of slip space and Arby sees the Pillar in the distance and the ring beyond that, through the command deck on his ship. Cut to credits. That would have made for a hell of a legendary ending...(yet another problem with Reach) What do you bet, somewhere along the line, we will be able to play as him once more?

I have issues with these changes, but I can't understand why everyone's terrified of people joining in-game. So now you might have to occasionally play a little stub of a game...well before you had to play entire games with out people. What a nightmare!

I feel your pain here. Makes sense if you want to wait and see to buy it. Safe to say, rather you buy or not buy, we are all just going to have to wait and see. Halo is not going to be the same. Rather thats a good or bad thing? Who knows? all that said, one thing I still have allot of cautious optimism for is the campaign. Reach was missing the kinda weird sense of Alien Wonders that Halo's 1 2 and 3 had. Oddly, ODST completely lacked that, but its probably tied to be my favorite Campaign...Anyway, as DoctorB said, they are going off the books with the campaign. Could be interesting.

Heres the bottom line: 343 is not going back to the past. They aren't being conservative. They are trying to totally reinvent Halo. We are quite justified in being concerned because they run a high risk of failing. But they do not HAVE to fail. Its not set in stone. Who knows...they might be visionaries in their own right... I was initially upset by the GI leak...to a certain extent, I still am...I'm very anxious about Halo now, as opposed to before when I was cautiously optimistic. But its not because I know its going to suck...its because I know 343 is taking a gamble. They might succeed or they might not. All that said, I have to give 343 props. They've got balls. The combination of classic Halo elements (arena map design, shields, power weapons) with modern FPS design (Custom classes, Sprint, SpecOps-esque stuff) is going to make for an interesting and innovative game which may or may not succeed. Unlike Reach, which was a failed effort to introduce a bit of the class system while keeping every element of the classical Halo gameplay intact. With Halo 4, 343 could have done two things and make a good game; keep everything the same and make a classic Halo game but probably lose sales in the modern market OR aggressively move the game forward in an effort to reinvigorate the series and gain sales. 343 has chosen the latter option and that is riskier BUT we can hope.

With Reach, Bungie tried to take H3's equipment and PowerUps (which, when acquired, give you an advantage over your opponents) and adapt them so that everyone could have one at the same time but still be in some sense symmetrical (as in, I have Sprint you have Camo but in Theory we are equal). The problem was in the fact that they were trying to turn something inherently asymetric into symmetric game play and the disconnect resulted in half-ass, pseudo CoD classes which neither had the customizing fun of a CoD/BF game nor Halo's classic symmetric game play. So you gotta remember, whatever 343 is doing, it seems like they are going much farther than Reach ever did. Yes, Halo is being made more CoD esque and BF esque. But please please please PLEASE remember we don't know if that is a good or bad thing yet. You cannot judge any effort to modernize Halo simply because past ones have failed. Im no Reach lover, and I think 343 is taking risks. Safe to say, whatever Halo 4 is, its not going to be a chance for us to indulge in some nostalgia for the Halos that were. For better or for worse, thats the past. We are just going to have to wait and see...maybe 343 is going to fail, maybe they will reinvent Halo.

I didn't care for the Firefight in Reach...I cant say why but it just didn't do it for me. Its hard to define what made the ODST firefight so engaging. If 343 wants to bring back firefight, they should just do Halo ODST 2. Even though I hate the name "Spartan Ops" it actually sounds like a better way for 343 to be spending their time.

Hmmm, I had always heard that the hidden health in the previous Halo's remained damaged after shield recharge. If I were Halo, I would stick with health and shields being rechargeable, like in H2, H3...not that it matters much either way. I was never bothered by having to look for health packs in Reach.