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[Cranster]

It's just crazy that everyone wants to blame everything except halo-

but here we have a H3 being the most played Xbl game for 2007, 2008, and 2009. In 2009 it lead despite COD WaW, COD MW1-2, GTAIV, And Gears.

Yet somehow people argue that people simply preferred modern mechanics... when Halo was shitting on modern mechanics... year after year... and the moment Halo adopted modern mechanics people stopped playing it.

Modern mechanics is a part of Halo's fall. But people seem to forget though that more competition not just from other franchises but Halo itself was also a factor. within the franchise itself Halo 3 only had to compete with Halo 2. Reach had to compete with Halo 3 and Halo 3 and other franchises, ect.

 

[E92 M3]

Most of the Halo 5 DLC is horrible. I'd rather buy map packs then play on the free ones provided by 343.

Req packs are okay, but mostly made for the boring warzone mode.

 

[Akai__]

Well no becaue it's still dependent on your energy level. You actually have to be playing well if you want to have a God like weapon towards the end of the match. Often times I'll just spam lvl3 random weapons and vehicles and hope for the best.

Having reqs doesn't mean your going to get to use them

Getting your REQ Energy Level up in a Warzone match doesn't take much, so there's really not an issue of not being able to use REQ's. But that's only half of what I meant.

The other half is that people who buy REQ's have a wider variety of REQ's to choose from than people who grind. A player that is only Spartan Rank 20, doesn't have several Scoprions in his back pocket, they don't have Phaetons to spawn with and they also don't have several Power Weapons to counter vehicles. These things take time to unlock and if somebody is buying them from the beginning, they have an advantage. There are plenty of vehicles/weapons that are Ultra Rare/Legendary and not accessible for people who grind. For me, it was not until I hit Level ~75, until I had every single REQ unlocked. With even more and more REQ's releasing (and most of them being filler cosmetics that you can't avoid) it took even longer to get specific vehicles/weapons.

 

[Synth]

Ok, but as a whole it doesn't. It's hard to make an argument for sprint, ads, etc as being necessary nowadays when only one or two characters in that game use those mechanics. Overwatch overall is a good game, sprint and ads isn't the basis of that. No one is saying overwatch is better than halo because you can sprint with soldier.

In either case, this is a debate that can't really be proven either way. Had MCC not been a pile of garbage at launch, then maybe we'd have a better guage of how bad the thirst for classic halo is. In any case, we may be seeing a classic playlist soon I believe. I'll be spending most of my time in that.

Also, I'd like to better articulate my point, but I'm sneaking gaf in at work, so I apologize if I'm not coming across properly.

Yea, I was sneaking in GAF at work also, lol.. so in some cases I was cutting my trail of thought off abruptly, and just posting what I'd managed to write down up to that point... or leaving the reply half-finished and trying to come back to it later. I'm done with work now though, so I'll be trying to make my thoughts clearer in the following posts.

Basically, I'm not saying that Overwatch is successful simply because it contains these aspects, after all much of these things were added to Halo 4 in an attempt to modernise it, and that certainly didn't guarantee its long-term success. At the same time though, I think the argument that "a good game is a good game" as though merely being a good game automatically leads to success is similarly misguided. There are a shitload of factors that determine a products popularity (or lack of), and I feel many of these go against Halo in comparison to other games within the genre. The big one imo is that people often do not like to get beat... and if they are going to get beat, they will be far less discouraged if the game either provides reassurances that its not all their fault, or if there are enough small victories to counteract the feeling of defeat. This is something that I feel Halo for all its popularity was never strong in.. and this doesn't even just really apply to Halo, but the arena shooter in general (so something like Quake as well).

Overwatch doesn't incorporate everything I listed as a standard, but them being incorporated into the characters is also no coincidence. The different characters result in the needs and priorities of a wide spectrum of players being covered. Halo however can't do this without altering the game at its core, because all the players being equal in their abilities is a core element of the design. Give one Spartan a grappling hook, and you give it to all of them

Overwatch is also a lot more friendly to the beginner player (or someone that just sucks). I've played Overwatch with a ton of people now, and there's one constant that I've noticed when any of them suffer a loss... and that's their "team fucking sucks". The performance of everyone on the team, and the reasons for losing are just ambiguous enough, that each player is able to convince themselves that they would have won if only the rest of the people they are playing with would get their act together... and so they continue to play. I've played Halo with many of the exact same people, and their morale gets shredded quickly, even when not losing as often because individual failure is felt so clearly by contrast, and there's no small victories (no hope for "play of the game" via a random Ultimate, or few minutes running around as a Titan etc) to camouflage that feeling. A similar thing has occurred recently on the PC side with MOBA eating the lunch of RTS games for similar reason (and producing similar arguments amongst players). Now, when I used to play past Halos with some of these people, despite the situation being somewhat similar, there was no Overwatch to crawl back to... and as a result there were actually far more people they would find themselves being better than.

Also, it sucks about MCC... but I believe its current status is still a pretty good indicator of how much thirst their is for classic Halo. There's not enough to survive a MCC launch basically. Black Ops II could survive being literally not playable on a console for the first 3 years of its life, and people would still be back.

 

[Trup1aya]

Modern mechanics is a part of Halo's fall. But people seem to forget though that more competition not just from other franchises but Halo itself was also a factor. within the franchise itself Halo 3 only had to compete with Halo 2. Reach had to compete with Halo 3 and Halo 3 and other franchises, ect.

This. is. Not. True.

As stated on the previous page, halo3 actually Knocked off COD3. then it defeated call of duty world at War. If then defeated COD4. it even had more Unique Users than MW2 during 2009.

H3 also defeated battlefield 2 and Bad companies 1 &2. Battlefield 1493,


There was also team fortress 2. Unreal tournament. Timeshift, Medal of Honor, shadow run, soldier of fortune, fear1&2 , left for dead 1&2, far cry, brothers in arms, rainbow6, resistance, haze, Turok, front lines, 007, borderlands, killzone2, Wolfenstein, and many more.

There was a shit ton more FPS games then than there are now, and Halo 3still reigned supreme. of all the FPS Titles that are currently more popular than Halo now, only two of them are new. Overwatch and Destiny.

Halo was surpassed by titles that it used to dominate because it stopped innovating , and as a result became less competitive in the market, despite the fact that there are fewer FPS in the market.

It's not that there was more competition. Halo just became less competitive.

Competing against itself shouldn't be Stopping growth... there are 4 COD titles in the top 10 right now. COD and BF releases fragment their own franchise much more heavily since they are so frequent, yet they still grew during halo's decline. Not only that, but each new halo release led to major drops in the population of the previous.

 

[FUNKNOWN iXi]

Overwatch is also a lot more friendly to the beginner player (or someone that just sucks). I've played Overwatch with a ton of people now, and there's one constant that I've noticed when any of them suffer a loss... and that's their "team fucking sucks". The performance of everyone on the team, and the reasons for losing are just ambiguous enough, that each player is able to convince themselves that they would have won if only the rest of the people they are playing with would get their act together... and so they continue to play. I've played Halo with many of the exact same people, and their morale gets shredded quickly, even when not losing as often because individual failure is felt so clearly by contrast, and there's no small victories (no hope for "play of the game" via a random Ultimate, or few minutes running around as a Titan etc) to camouflage that feeling. A similar thing has occurred recently on the PC side with MOBA eating the lunch of RTS games for similar reason (and producing similar arguments amongst players). Now, when I used to play past Halos with some of these people, despite the situation being somewhat similar, there was no Overwatch to crawl back to... and as a result there were actually far more people they would find themselves being better than.

This, I think, is one of the strongest arguments against Halo these days. The game was tough to play compared to other multiplayer shooters back then, and the skill curve is even steeper with Halo 5. The game is so demanding and there's little to attract the people who are not good at all, which is in stark contrast to the welcoming nature and charming personality of Overwatch.

So what I'm saying is Halo 5 should've kept those beta after-match emotes and created more animations as unlocks ;b

 

[Synth]

[1] I'm saying that's just not true. CE was an amazing game. H2 set new standards as to what is amazing. H3 again set new standards. It not an excuse to say "raising the bar is hard because our last game was great". It's sink or swim. Reach sank in that regard, and the rest is history.

[2] what realities are core to Destiny's success would not neccisarily be core to Halo's success. If Halo Reach had shared world co-op experience IN ADDITION to traditional MP without the bullshit, I'm almost certain it would have been a massive success and players wouldn't have any more issue going back and forth than they did going from PvP to Firefight to random custom games in H3. The variety of the experience is core to halo's success.

[3] there's literally no way to tell because there hasn't been a classic halo game released since 2007 except for MCC, which was an utter disaster. What I can say is that, since 2010 halo games haven't been good at retaining fans or attracting new ones- and that can't be blamed on the core formula, because the core formula had been abandoned.

I stopped playing Halo when Reach Launched, in favor of BF and COD. Not because I preferred the style of play those games offered. I actually liked all three franchises for different reasons- but I liked and played halo the most. When Reach launched, it no longer had the gameplay that I liked, while COD and BF expanded upon the things I like about those games.

If I had a new classic-style halo game to play, I would play it. But I can't because no one has made one within the last decade. Many people felt this way with through Reach, H4 and 5.

You have NO EVIDENCE that people who left for other games wouldn't have stayed for more traditional halo titles- Because since H3 there have been no titles to compare.

[4] surely you aren't trying to argue that Overwatch is successful because some Overwatch characters have what you consider modern mechanics . It's successful because it's a good game- and would have been just as successful if it instead had other good characters with different mechanics.

[1] Sure, sink or swim... but what I'm saying is that if everyone else is suddenly swimming instead of sinking, your swimming stops looking so special. Seems like a pretty simple concept to me. Halo was the first to get to a certain level of quality. That level of quality stopped being exclusive to Halo over time, allowing various other aspects to factor more heavily into which game someone chose.

[2] Everything you do in Destiny, win or lose, singleplayer, co-op or multi provides consistent reward and sense of progress/achievement. Bungie would know not to decouple the multiplayer from the singleplayer, as that would just weaken both. Destiny isn't an example of an "in addition" situation. Destiny is Destiny as a whole. There's no "without the bullshit" in its model. That's not to suggest that such a separate mode wouldn't have benefitted Halo... but there's also not much reason to believe that someone playing Destiny now would be playing Halo for providing a neutered version of what Destiny provides today. Warzone can just as easily be pointed to as an additional mode that doesn't fuck with Halo standard, but it wouldn't be simply because Halo is no longer as big as it was when Firefight was introduced.

[3] There's nothing concrete that proves either way... both of us are speculating in this regards... but as someone who has been a fan of a lot of series that lost their places in the market to changing trends, I think it's incredibly optimistic to simply say "you could have just made it good". To me, that's like telling a Blues artist that if they'd innovated like Justin Bieber did, then they'd have a larger audience still. They probably could've done exactly what Justin Bieber did... but simply being a Blues artist today makes that level of popularity super unlikely regardless of quality.

[4] I gave a more detailed reply to this already, but no, I'm not saying that. Though I am suggesting Overwatch's ability to cater a majority FPS player's preferences is a large contributing factor to its success. Are you seriously suggesting "good game = success" (and vice-versa)?

 

[mcrommert]

This, I think, is one of the strongest arguments against Halo these days. The game was tough to play compared to other multiplayer shooters back then, and the skill curve is even steeper with Halo 5. The game is so demanding and there's little to attract the people who are not good at all, which is in stark contrast to the welcoming nature and charming personality of Overwatch.

So what I'm saying is Halo 5 should've kept those beta after-match emotes and created more animations as unlocks ;b

No Goddamn Lies Detected

 

[Complicated]

Again, BS.

Battlefield and COD had all that shit since H2, and H2 and 3 still trounced the competition. Halo 3 still held its own against COD:MW despite being 2 years older at the time of its release.

This isn't true. They released 2 months apart and COD MW almost beat Halo 3 in sales on 360 alone without even counting other consoles.

Edit: I will say this: Halo is now much LESS accessible than it ever has been. It takes several button presses to simply make a jump now...

Halo was just as accessible as any of its competitors prior to reach ( if not moreso) when they started adding bullshit.

If this is referring to Halo 5 I don't even know what you're talking about. There is still just one button for jumping. If you think Halo CE,2, or 3 are as easy to play as Call of Duty then I don't know what to tell you. You don't seem particularly well-versed on this stuff though.

 

[blue_phazon]

This isn't true. They released 2 months apart and COD MW beat Halo 3 in sales on 360 alone without even counting other consoles.



If this is referring to Halo 5 I don't even know what you're talking about. There is still just one button for jumping. If you think Halo CE,2, or 3 are as easy to play as Call of Duty then I don't know what to tell you. You don't seem particularly well-versed on this stuff though.

He said make a jump, not simply jump. There's a bunch of jumps that require sprint + hover + crouch + clamber all at the same time.

I don't think anyone argues that old Halos were easy compared to COD, but they were certainly accessible. Accessible =/= easy. The old Halo games were easy to learn/grasp, but difficult to master. With newer Halo games, the actions needed to get good feel convoluted to learn from the start. In other words, Halo 5 has raised the skill floor too high.

 

[BraXzy]

I figured this was the case. Which is why it annoyed me that half the DLC was remixes and there were less maps, less frequently.

 

[ethomaz]

This isn't true. They released 2 months apart and COD MW beat Halo 3 in sales on 360 alone without even counting other consoles.

Sorry but that is false.

No CoD on 360 sold more than Halo 3.

MW did what? 5m on 360? Halo 3 did over 14 million.

Edit - The best selling CoD on 360 is Black Ops with ~12m units sold.

 

[Complicated]

He said make a jump, not simply jump. There's a bunch of jumps that require sprint + hover + crouch + clamber all at the same time.

There are a bunch of jumps in previous halos that require crouch jumping and glitching as well. The majority of people who ever played Halo never learned to crouch jump or superbounce or sword glitch. It's not necessary to playing the game casually and neither are any of the movement abilities in Halo 5.

 

[Cranster]

This. is. Not. True.

As stated on the previous page, halo3 actually Knocked off COD3. then it defeated call of duty world at War. If then defeated COD4. it even had more Unique Users than MW2 during 2009.

H3 also defeated battlefield 2 and Bad companies 1 &2. Battlefield 1493,


There was also team fortress 2. Unreal tournament. Timeshift, Medal of Honor, shadow run, soldier of fortune, fear1&2 , left for dead 1&2, far cry, brothers in arms, rainbow6, resistance, haze, Turok, front lines, 007, borderlands, killzone2, Wolfenstein, and many more.

There was a shit ton more FPS games then than there are now, and Halo 3still reigned supreme. of all the FPS Titles that are currently more popular than Halo now, only two of them are new. Overwatch and Destiny.

Halo was surpassed by titles that it used to dominate because it stopped innovating , and as a result became less competitive in the market, despite the fact that there are fewer FPS in the market.

It's not that there was more competition. Halo just became less competitive.

Competing against itself shouldn't be Stopping growth... there are 4 COD titles in the top 10 right now. COD and BF releases fragment their own franchise much more heavily since they are so frequent, yet they still grew during halo's decline. Not only that, but each new halo release led to major drops in the population of the previous.

My point just flew past you, didn't it?

 

[RichiRamjag]

This, I think, is one of the strongest arguments against Halo these days. The game was tough to play compared to other multiplayer shooters back then, and the skill curve is even steeper with Halo 5. The game is so demanding and there's little to attract the people who are not good at all, which is in stark contrast to the welcoming nature and charming personality of Overwatch.

So what I'm saying is Halo 5 should've kept those beta after-match emotes and created more animations as unlocks ;b

That aim doesn't help either. I didn't play for a good year because I was getting sick of it throwing off my muscle memory in destiny or whatever else I was playing. No other FPS does that to me. It always felt too odd to return to.

[1] Sure, sink or swim... but what I'm saying is that if everyone else is suddenly swimming instead of sinking, your swimming stops looking so special. Seems like a pretty simple concept to me. Halo was the first to get to a certain level of quality. That level of quality stopped being exclusive to Halo over time, allowing various other aspects to factor more heavily into which game someone chose.

[2] Everything you do in Destiny, win or lose, singleplayer, co-op or multi provides consistent reward and sense of progress/achievement. Bungie would know not to decouple the multiplayer from the singleplayer, as that would just weaken both. Destiny isn't an example of an "in addition" situation. Destiny is Destiny as a whole. There's no "without the bullshit" in its model. That's not to suggest that such a separate mode wouldn't have benefitted Halo... but there's also not much reason to believe that someone playing Destiny now would be playing Halo for providing a neutered version of what Destiny provides today. Warzone can just as easily be pointed to as an additional mode that doesn't fuck with Halo standard, but it wouldn't be simply because Halo is no longer as big as it was when Firefight was introduced.

The heck it does! Destiny makes me feel like the worlds biggest loser lol. Got five hawkmoons before finally getting a last word last year. That game is the betting man's elixir. I've probably tried to get a grasp of Malok over 200 times.

 

[VincentMatts]

It's just crazy that everyone wants to blame everything except halo-

but here we have a H3 being the most played Xbl game for 2007, 2008, and 2009. In 2009 it lead despite COD WaW, COD MW1-2, GTAIV, And Gears.

Yet somehow people argue that people simply preferred modern mechanics... when Halo was shitting on modern mechanics... year after year... and the moment Halo adopted modern mechanics people stopped playing it.

I dont agree. Halo struggled when they started shipping unbalanced MP games as their primary games types. Halo Reach MP was mostly unbalanced, so was Halo 4. They didnt focus on making a balanced arena style MP and wanted to go bigger with their Invasion mode in Reach and the new BTB in 4 with the kill streaks. Halo 1 to 3 were more eSport focused in the way they designed their games. Smaller arena gameplay while Reach and 4 were not. And i know what youre gonna say: Reach is when they implemented 'sprint' so that much be the reason. It isnt. That had nothing to do with it. Halo Reach was not designed to be an eSport game and neither was 4 and thats why they failed.

Modern mechanics work, when done right. When they are balanced. Halo5 is 'modern' and it plays the best out of all the halos, even Bungies. Only thing Bungie did better, were maps. Modern mechanics work and Halo 5 proved that.

 

[Complicated]

Sorry but that is false.

No CoD on 360 sold more than Halo 3.

MW did what? 5m on 360? Halo 3 did over 14 million.

Edit - The best selling CoD on 360 is Black Ops with ~12m units sold.

I left out an "almost". 360 CoD 4 was right behind Halo 3 and launched two months after Halo 3. Edited for clarification.

 

[Banjo-Kazooie]

But all I've heard is how much it sucks and tanked.

For some reason people don't factor in how much money micro transactions reel in. Wouldn't be surprised if Gears was the same

Glad to hear that Halo 5 is doing that good. Based on the narrative one can find around the game was the last nail in the coffin for a Halo game sales wise.

That's just typical ecochamber reactions from people who think units sold is be all end all in 2017

 

[FUNKNOWN iXi]

Halo 1 to 3 were more eSport focused in their way they designed their games. Smaller arena gameplay while Reach and 4 were not. And i know what youre gonna say: Reach is when they implemented 'sprint' so that much be the reason. It isnt. That had nothing to do with it. Halo Reach was not designed to be an eSport game and neither was 4 and thats why they failed.

Bungie didn't give a damn about the competitive community. Halo 1-3 were not designed around an esports focus, the gameplay had to be adjusted in order to be competitively viable to that community, not to mention the exclusion of several maps, modes, weapons, etc.

Halo 5 is the first Halo game where they actively promoted a competitive focus and took actual strides toward listening and improving the competitive experience. Just wanted to make that distinction.

 

[E92 M3]

Bungie didn't give a damn about the competitive community. Halo 1-3 were not designed around an esports focus, the gameplay had to be adjusted in order to be competitively viable to that community, not to mention the exclusion of several maps, modes, weapons, etc.

Halo 5 is the first Halo game where they actively promoted a competitive focus and took actual strides toward listening and improving the competitive experience. Just wanted to make that distinction.

343 controls all of the settings and just now got rid of OP autos, years later. Halo 2 and 3 were in a much better competitive state.

 

[Cranster]

Bungie didn't give a damn about the competitive community. Halo 1-3 were not designed around an esports focus, the gameplay had to be adjusted in order to be competitively viable to that community, not to mention the exclusion of several maps, modes, weapons, etc.

Halo 5 is the first Halo game where they actively promoted a competitive focus and took actual strides toward listening and improving the competitive experience. Just wanted to make that distinction.

And Halo 5's biggest flaw is that they focused too much on the competitive community. Hopefully with Halo 6 they found a better balance to cater to all parts of the community without leaving out the majority.

 

[RichiRamjag]

Bungie didn't give a damn about the competitive community. Halo 1-3 were not designed around an esports focus, the gameplay had to be adjusted in order to be competitively viable to that community, not to mention the exclusion of several maps, modes, weapons, etc.

Halo 5 is the first Halo game where they actively promoted a competitive focus and took actual strides toward listening and improving the competitive experience. Just wanted to make that distinction.

That's what I was thinking. To me halo esports grew around halo and later, things were adjusted. Halo 5 is the only one I remember where you heard nothing about esports. If anything, I felt like they focused on it a bit too much.

 

[Kill3r7]

I left out an "almost". 360 CoD 4 was right behind Halo 3 and launched two months after Halo 3. Edited for clarification.

It was not even close. COD4 lifetime only sold around 4 million on 360. Halo 3 sold 14+ million. I would guess outside of GTAV, Minecraft and maybe Kinect Adventures not much else beat it.

 

[Synth]

The heck it does! Destiny makes me feel like the worlds biggest loser lol. Got five hawkmoons before finally getting a last word last year. That game is the betting man's elixir. I've probably tried to get a grasp of Malok over 200 times.

Ok yea... to an extent.

But even when you're getting your 40th shitty dupe, you still know that the next thing you do may get you something you legitimately want.. rather than just another L to go on your permanent record.

 

[VincentMatts]

Bungie didn't give a damn about the competitive community. Halo 1-3 were not designed around an esports focus, the gameplay had to be adjusted in order to be competitively viable to that community, not to mention the exclusion of several maps, modes, weapons, etc.

Halo 5 is the first Halo game where they actively promoted a competitive focus and took actual strides toward listening and improving the competitive experience. Just wanted to make that distinction.

Bungie made maps in halo1 to 3 that were made for competitive play. Symmetrical maps. Reach was all invasion and 4 was all BTB. Plus, Bungie always put MLG playlists in their games. That doesnt look like they "didnt care" to me.

343 controls all of the settings and just now got rid of OP autos, years later. Halo 2 and 3 were in a much better competitive state.

Yeah, thats one of 343s biggest flaws. They take too long to do anything.

And Halo 5's biggest flaw is that they focused too much on the competitive community. Hopefully with Halo 6 they found a better balance to cater to all parts of the community without leaving out the majority.

That's what I was thinking. To me halo esports grew around halo and later, things were adjusted. Halo 5 is the only one I remember where you heard nothing about esports. If anything, I felt like they focused on it a bit too much.

Whether its too much is another story. But the fact that they did is very important and one of the reasons halo5 has sustained all this time.

 

[SpartanN92]

It was not even close. COD4 lifetime only sold around 4 million on 360. Halo 3 sold 14+ million. I would guess outside of GTAV, Minecraft and maybe Kinect Adventures not much else beat it.

Where are you getting this figure?
That's not even half of what banned site that Chartz Video Games says.

Surely they aren't off by THAT much.

 

[RichiRamjag]

Ok yea... to an extent.

But even when you're getting your 40th shitty dupe, you still know that the next thing you do may get you something you legitimately want.. rather than just another L to go on your permanent record.

I wish. Lol, luck was so bad that when I unlocked my 5th (and last) hawkmoon, I yelled "nooooooo" to the heavens and uninstalled. Wife thought I had lost my mind.

Bungie made maps in halo1 to 3 that were made for competitive play. Symmetrical maps. Reach was all invasion and 4 was all BTB. Plus, Bungie always put MLG playlists in their games. That doesnt look like they "didnt care" to me.



Yeah, thats one of 343s biggest flaws. They take too long to do anything.





Whether its too much is another story. But the fact that they did is very important and one of the reasons halo5 has sustained all this time.

I personally don't agree, I think the focus is to their detriment if anything. Bungie gave it attention when it got popular, but it wasn't the original focus by any means.

 

[Akai__]

343 controls all of the settings and just now got rid of OP autos, years later. Halo 2 and 3 were in a much better competitive state.

After 530+ days, just like it took them 550+ days to fully acknowledge that there is indeed an issue with heavy aiming and that they have a fix coming Soon™.

People don't even know how Pros got treated before that. 343i pulled stuff like giving pros a multiple choice answer with 3 options that were all considered bad by pros and they still made them pick 1. Afterwards they said: "We gathered Pro Feedback and this is what they want."

I actually think that Bungie did a smart move by not intervening with the competetive crowd. People loved what MLG did for Halo. They loved the gametypes, the map settings and of course the several tournaments. With 343i and ESL it's just one issue after an other.

 

[FUNKNOWN iXi]

343 controls all of the settings and just now got rid of OP autos, years later. Halo 2 and 3 were in a much better competitive state.

That's a different argument though, one that's not necessarily fair anyway. You can't fault 343 for trying to make autos competitively viable, not to mention they're actively trying to balance them further for all levels of play.

And Halo 5's biggest flaw is that they focused too much on the competitive community. Hopefully with Halo 6 they found a better balance to cater to all parts of the community without leaving out the majority.

This is an argument that conflates some issues imo. Halo 5 has several options to cater to all communities, both at launch and even moreso now with additions like the customs browser. How can you say otherwise when Warzone is the antithesis to an esports scene? Just because they focused more on the competitive community compared to previous games DOES NOT MEAN they focused they focused "too much" on it.

 

[ethomaz]

I left out an "almost". 360 CoD 4 was right behind Halo 3 and launched two months after Halo 3. Edited for clarification.

Maybe if look only for US in 2007...

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=17006

Nah... it was not close... sorry... MW probably did a bit more than 4m ltd on 360 and that is lower than first year of Halo 3 in US.

 

[VincentMatts]

I personally don't agree, I think the focus is to their detriment if anything. Bungie gave it attention when it got popular, but it wasn't the original focus by any means.

Youd be wrong.

This:

This is an argument that conflates some issues imo. Halo 5 has several options to cater to all communities, both at launch and even moreso now with additions like the customs browser. How can you say otherwise when Warzone is the antithesis to an esports scene? Just because they focused more on the competitive community compared to previous games DOES NOT MEAN they focused they focused "too much" on it.

 

[dLMN8R]

I don't get it.

Thread subject and interview in OP: Halo 5 is very successful, surpassing many in the series, both in player numbers and in revenue.

Current thread discussion: Speculation about why Halo 5 wasn't successful

???

 

[ethomaz]

I don't get it.

Thread subject and interview in OP: Halo 5 is very successful, surpassing many in the series, both in player numbers and in revenue.

Current thread discussion: Speculation about why Halo 5 wasn't successful

???

Because the claim was pretty bullshit in player numbers at least.

 

[RichiRamjag]

That's a different argument though, one that's not necessarily fair anyway. You can't fault 343 for trying to make autos competitively viable, not to mention they're actively trying to balance them further for all levels of play.

This is an argument that conflates some issues imo. Halo 5 has several options to cater to all communities, both at launch and even moreso now with additions like the customs browser. How can you say otherwise when Warzone is the antithesis to an esports scene? Just because they focused more on the competitive community compared to previous games DOES NOT MEAN they focused they focused "too much" on it.

As someone who feels warzone isn't a good replacement for big team battle, I don't agree. Based on what we have now, sure. Hopefully, they don't neglect those modes going forward.

Youd be wrong.

This:

Uh, ok. I still don't agree. Lazy replies and Showing me what he said isn't going to change my mind. The focus on that led to neglect in other areas. This is why the game launched missing many casual modes. Esports are nice, but the bulk of players in halo were never high tier players anyhow.

Yes it does, the fact that Halo 5 had less game modes and map variety than Halo 1 proves it. It basically killed alot of first impressions with players. The group from HBO I play customs night with every week were not happy with the lack of content and ended up going back to Reach for awhile as MCC customs still has issues and Halo 5 lacked Forge mode and gametypes. Warzone in itself at launch was extremely repetitive as there are no custom options for it and is controlled by 343i.


No doubt Halo 5 sold well and brought in a ton of revenue, my argument is that Halo shouldn't need to sacrifice features and community options at launch in order to do it.

Yep. No BTB and what was warzone then? Like two maps. It was crazy repetitive and boring. I didn't come back full time until this year because of it. Many of my other pals never came back at all.

 

[Cranster]

This is an argument that conflates some issues imo. Halo 5 has several options to cater to all communities, both at launch and even moreso now with additions like the customs browser. How can you say otherwise when Warzone is the antithesis to an esports scene? Just because they focused more on the competitive community compared to previous games DOES NOT MEAN they focused they focused "too much" on it.

Yes it does, the fact that Halo 5 had less game modes and map variety than Halo 1 proves it. It basically killed alot of first impressions with players. The group from HBO I play customs night with every week were not happy with the lack of content and ended up going back to Reach for awhile as MCC customs still has issues and Halo 5 lacked Forge mode and gametypes. Warzone in itself at launch was extremely repetitive as there are no custom options for it and is controlled by 343i.

I don't get it.

Thread subject and interview in OP: Halo 5 is very successful, surpassing many in the series, both in player numbers and in revenue.

Current thread discussion: Speculation about why Halo 5 wasn't successful

???

No doubt Halo 5 sold well and brought in a ton of revenue, my argument is that Halo shouldn't need to sacrifice features and community options at launch in order to do it.

 

[Trup1aya]

[1] Sure, sink or swim... but what I'm saying is that if everyone else is suddenly swimming instead of sinking, your swimming stops looking so special. Seems like a pretty simple concept to me. Halo was the first to get to a certain level of quality. That level of quality stopped being exclusive to Halo over time, allowing various other aspects to factor more heavily into which game someone chose.

[2] Everything you do in Destiny, win or lose, singleplayer, co-op or multi provides consistent reward and sense of progress/achievement. Bungie would know not to decouple the multiplayer from the singleplayer, as that would just weaken both. Destiny isn't an example of an "in addition" situation. Destiny is Destiny as a whole. There's no "without the bullshit" in its model. That's not to suggest that such a separate mode wouldn't have benefitted Halo... but there's also not much reason to believe that someone playing Destiny now would be playing Halo for providing a neutered version of what Destiny provides today. Warzone can just as easily be pointed to as an additional mode that doesn't fuck with Halo standard, but it wouldn't be simply because Halo is no longer as big as it was when Firefight was introduced.

[3] There's nothing concrete that proves either way... both of us are speculating in this regards... but as someone who has been a fan of a lot of series that lost their places in the market to changing trends, I think it's incredibly optimistic to simply say "you could have just made it good". To me, that's like telling a Blues artist that if they'd innovated like Justin Bieber did, then they'd have a larger audience still. They probably could've done exactly what Justin Bieber did... but simply being a Blues artist today makes that level of popularity super unlikely regardless of quality.

[4] I gave a more detailed reply to this already, but no, I'm not saying that. Though I am suggesting Overwatch's ability to cater a majority FPS player's preferences is a large contributing factor to its success. Are you seriously suggesting "good game = success" (and vice-versa)?

[1] what you are arguing it was easier for Halo's competition to innovate because Halo was more popular. You are underselling the accomplishments of Halo's comp. in the eyes of the market, they met the standard set by Halo, then passed it. There's no reason Halo can't pass the standard it set. You're basically saying it's easier for the underdog. Which makes no sense.
[2] again, destiny's integration of its various systems isn't neccisarily how Halo would have had to implement such system. Halo has always had disparate systems complementing each other. Forge and Firefight, for example are completely different addative components to Halo's core system. There's no reason to think a additive co-op experience wouldn't have been seen as an innovation for Halo. Hell, forget Destiny for a moment- if Warzone was Reach's additive mode, and the core mechanics didn't change from H3 for arena and campaign, i believe the game would have had much more staying power.
[3] no I'm extrapolating, you are speculating. Halo 3 was the most popular FPS on the planet, despite assaults from a ton of other FPS. All signs pointed to people wanting H3 to be the bases of a sequel. Yet Reach went in a completely different direction. Your analogy does not compute:

What we have is the equivalent of a Blues Artist being the biggest artist on the planet and his last album was the biggest album ever released. For his next album, he makes a blues-pop album, purely because Justin Beber is the worlds second biggest artist. His longtime fans don't like This new album nearly as much and he doesn't gain many new fans. He makes blues-pop for the next 7 years.

Instead of drawing the rational conclusion, you conclude that people just don't like Blues as much as they used to- which is baseless, because no one has released a true blues album for 10years- and the last time one was released, it lit the world on fire. All we know is people prefer Pop over blues-pop.
[4] "good game" is a better catalist for success than throwing out core principles that helped propel your game to the top of the world in favor of principles that work better for other games.

Interestingly halo used to be very approachable. I'd argue CE-Reach are more approachable than OW, because there are no characters to learn. The addition of new mechanics has made halo much less inviting to new players because there are so many more inputs to consider, and the way mechanics interact with each other is more complex. (If you wanna run, you can't shoot or heal, if you wanna jump and zoom, you'll float- unless you turn that auto-feature off and tie it to sprint button, some jumps require you to zoom at the peak of your jump, if you want to melee while airborne your have to allow for a .3sec delay because the game has to be sure you don't want to ground pound. Some jumps require you to sprint-thrust-jump-groundpound cancel-thrust-clamber, etc.... you used to just run, jump, shoot, and throw grenades)

 

[VincentMatts]

Uh, ok. I still don't agree. Lazy replies and Showing me what he said isn't going to change my mind.

Im not gonna re-write the same thing if its already there. Thats being effective, not lazy.

Yes it does, the fact that Halo 5 had less game modes and map variety than Halo 1 proves it. It basically killed alot of first impressions with players. The group from HBO I play customs night with every week were not happy with the lack of content and ended up going back to Reach for awhile as MCC customs still has issues and Halo 5 lacked Forge mode and gametypes. Warzone in itself at launch was extremely repetitive as there are no custom options for it and is controlled by 343i.


No doubt Halo 5 sold well and brought in a ton of revenue, my argument is that Halo shouldn't need to sacrifice features and community options at launch in order to do it.

That i agree with. 343 dropped the ball big time in terms of features and game modes for custom games and that to me is a big reason why halo 5 got that much criticism/hate. Even Reach was bad, but not like 4 and 5 were.

 

[FUNKNOWN iXi]

Bungie made maps in halo1 to 3 that were made for competitive play. Symmetrical maps. Reach was all invasion and 4 was all BTB. Plus, Bungie always put MLG playlists in their games. That doesnt look like they "didnt care" to me.

Just because there was a playlist doesn't mean they actively cared and fully supported the competitive community; it just made sense because of how big the competitive community was. Shit.. if they can have a Grifball playlist, you bet your ass there better be an MLG/competitive playlist. So maybe my use of "didn't care" was too harsh, rather "indifferent" or "not too concerned with its future" may have been more appropriate.

And plus, Destiny happened. Competitive Halo fans were ready to flock to Destiny for their fix, but it simply wasn't there. If Bungie would have created some sort of competitive scene for Destiny, I'm sure even more people would have left Halo.

As someone who feels warzone isn't a good replacement for big team battle, I don't agree. Based on what we have now, sure. Hopefully, they don't neglect those modes going forward.

Whether you like the mode or not is irrelevant; it's still a mode designed for casual play. And I'd like to note that I agree with your sentiments that I hope they don't neglect BTB and other fan favorites going forward because they are heavily missed.

 

[RichiRamjag]

Just because there was a playlist doesn't mean they actively cared and fully supported the competitive community; it just made sense because of how big the competitive community was. Shit.. if they can have a Grifball playlist, you bet your ass there better be an MLG/competitive playlist. So maybe my use of "didn't care" was too harsh, rather "indifferent" or "not too concerned with its future" may have been more appropriate.

And plus, Destiny happened. Competitive Halo fans were ready to flock to Destiny for their fix, but it simply wasn't there. If Bungie would have created some sort of competitive scene for Destiny, I'm sure even more people would have left Halo.


Whether you like the mode or not is irrelevant; it's still a mode designed for casual play. And I'd like to note that I agree with your sentiments that I hope they don't neglect BTB and other fan favorites going forward because they are heavily missed.

It was designed for casual play and it was extremely repetitive. It had what, like two maps at launch? That is relevant imo. Where were people who didn't like the mode, but enjoyed bigger battles supposed to go? To other games obviously. Halo 5 is my main game now, so I'm not trying to shit on it, but that was a massive (well maybe not massive lol)problem at launch.

I'm gonna stop though. Really didn't mean to go so off base.

 

[Kill3r7]

Where are you getting this figure?
That's not even half of what banned site that Chartz Video Games says.

Surely they aren't off by THAT much.

Last known numbers put sales of 3.04 million in the NPD with another million in the U.K. but admittedly they can still be way off but not enough for COD4 on 360 to have outsold Halo 3.

 

[Blueblur1]

I spent like $30 on Halo 5 and I totally regret it. What we received as post launch support was awful, IMO.

 

[Gaogaogao]

fuck card based loot boxes

 

[VincentMatts]

I spent like $30 on Halo 5 and I totally regret it. What we received as post launch support was awful, IMO.

I think you're exaggerating. Still a great game But yes, i think too many REQ cards and not enough maps. And no, forge doesnt count.

 

[Ryouji Gunblade]

I only spent money on the announcer pack. I have mixed feelings about the DLC in this game because some of it is high quality and other parts are just ugly reskins/remixes.

"Unskinned" armor would be fantastic.

 

[Trup1aya]

I dont agree. Halo struggled when they started shipping unbalanced MP games as their primary games types. Halo Reach MP was mostly unbalanced, so was Halo 4. They didnt focus on making a balanced arena style MP and wanted to go bigger with their Invasion mode in Reach and the new BTB in 4 with the kill streaks. Halo 1 to 3 were more eSport focused in the way they designed their games. Smaller arena gameplay while Reach and 4 were not. And i know what youre gonna say: Reach is when they implemented 'sprint' so that much be the reason. It isnt. That had nothing to do with it. Halo Reach was not designed to be an eSport game and neither was 4 and thats why they failed.

Modern mechanics work, when done right. When they are balanced. Halo5 is 'modern' and it plays the best out of all the halos, even Bungies. Only thing Bungie did better, were maps. Modern mechanics work and Halo 5 proved that.

No this isn't what I'm saying. The inclusion of sprint is PART of the reason Reach was unbalanced. But there was also armor abilities, loadouts, and bloom. Also maps that couldn't possible handle all the nonsense.

There might be an avenues for balancing sprint in a halo game, but it would likely involve allowing people to sprint in all directions, at anytime w/o putting their gun down... which is essentially how it worked in every halo prior to reach.

There might be a hypothetical halo game that works with modern mechanics. But there is stone cold proof that halo doesn't need modern mechanics to work well... the last time halo was sold w/o modern mechanics 12 million people bought it and it was the most played game for 3 years. Beating a dozen other shooters that used modern mechanics.

H5 hasn't proven anything. Whether or not it plays better than Bungie's halo is subjective... but the market largely disagree with that idea.

 

[VincentMatts]

No this isn't what I'm saying. The inclusion of sprint is PART of the reason Reach was unbalanced. But there was also armor abilities, loadouts, and bloom. Also maps that couldn't possible handle all the nonsense.

There might be an avenues for balancing sprint in a halo game, but it would likely involve allowing people to sprint in all directions, at anytime w/o putting their gun down... which is essentially how it worked in every halo prior to reach.

There might be a hypothetical halo game that works with modern mechanics. But there is stone cold proof that halo doesn't need modern mechanics to work well... the last time halo was sold w/o modern mechanics 12 million people bought it and it was the most played game for 3 years. Beating a dozen other shooters that used modern mechanics.

H5 hasn't proven anything. Whether or not it plays better than Bungie's halo is subjective... but the market largely disagree with that idea.

Market has also changed since 2007. Thats like releasing a movie that was shot and made in 2007, but releasing it now when it may or may not be relevant anymore. Theres more to it then just: It was popular so it works. Timing of stuff is important.

It was popular then with people now who have kids and families and are in their 30 to late 30s. That doesn't mean their kids are gonna like it and so on. Its a new generation that play and buy games now and they might not love that game from 2007 like you did just like they rarely watch old movies because they're 'old'. Its not complicated to understand. Youre not selling Halo to the same people in 2017.

 

[FUNKNOWN iXi]

Yes it does, the fact that Halo 5 had less game modes and map variety than Halo 1 proves it. It basically killed alot of first impressions with players. The group from HBO I play customs night with every week were not happy with the lack of content and ended up going back to Reach for awhile as MCC customs still has issues and Halo 5 lacked Forge mode and gametypes. Warzone in itself at launch was extremely repetitive as there are no custom options for it and is controlled by 343i.

No doubt Halo 5 sold well and brought in a ton of revenue, my argument is that Halo shouldn't need to sacrifice features and community options at launch in order to do it.

It was designed for casual play and it was extremely repetitive. It had what, like two maps at launch? That is relevant imo. Where were people who didn't like the mode, but enjoyed bigger battles supposed to go? To other games obviously. Halo 5 is my main game now, so I'm not trying to shit on it, but that was a massive (well maybe not massive lol)problem at launch.

My response to both of you: Right, so why not complain about too much focus being put on a new, unproven mode like Warzone (a casual mode that probably received more attention than anything in competitive) then instead of something where there's an active community that's been begging for years to receive the slightest attention?

 

[RichiRamjag]

My response to both of you: Right, so why not complain about too much focus being put on a new, unproven mode like Warzone (a casual mode that probably received more attention than anything in competitive) then instead of something where there's an active community that's been begging for years to receive the slightest attention?

Ah, I get what you're saying. I don't think it's one versus the other though. I do complain about both at different times tbh, I think the convo just kind of led me in that direction. Still, I feel ya.

 

[Trup1aya]

This isn't true. They released 2 months apart and COD MW almost beat Halo 3 in sales on 360 alone without even counting other consoles.

So in other words, Halo beat MW on Xbox? Also halo sold 12million copies on a single console. MW sold 17.4 across Xbox, PS3, and windows.

Wait which part isn't true?

If this is referring to Halo 5 I don't even know what you're talking about. There is still just one button for jumping. If you think Halo CE,2, or 3 are as easy to play as Call of Duty then I don't know what to tell you. You don't seem particularly well-versed on this stuff though.

I'd like to see you jump from yard to top yellow on plaza with one button press. Or red window to blue window on colesium with one button press. Or red 2 to top mid on truth. Low cat to top cat on eden with one button press. FOH with that nonsense.

I've put hundred of ours into every halo game except Reach and H4, because they are trash. Im very well versed. I never said Halo was "easier" than COD. Obviously it has less auto aim and longer kill times. I suggested that they previous halo's were very accessible- meaning they had very low barriers of entry. they also had a ton of depth. These two properties combined made them attractive to causal and hardcore gamers alike. You can FOH with the obviously bullshit insults here too.

You can say anything about my opinions, but you can't say shit about my knowledge. We're having a civil discussion and there are plenty who disagree who wouldn't question my knowledge.

There are a bunch of jumps in previous halos that require crouch jumping and glitching as well. The majority of people who ever played Halo never learned to crouch jump or superbounce or sword glitch. It's not necessary to playing the game casually and neither are any of the movement abilities in Halo 5.

Are you kidding, the skill floor was quite obviously raised between H5 and every other halo game in existence... making it less accessible.

The maps were quite obviously designed with Spartan ability use in mind. So Failure to use them does threaten ones ability to find enjoyment. Sure you can play halo 5 without sprinting, clambering, thrusting, and stabilizing, but not doing these things will put you at a disadvantage - in every gamemode, at every level of play.

 

[Synth]

[1] what you are arguing it was easier for Halo's competition to innovate because Halo was more popular. You are underselling the accomplishments of Halo's comp. in the eyes of the market, they met the standard set by Halo, then passed it. There's no reason Halo can't pass the standard it set. You're basically saying it's easier for the underdog. Which makes no sense.
[2] again, destiny's integration of its various systems isn't neccisarily how Halo would have had to implement such system. Halo has always had disparate systems complementing each other. Forge and Firefight, for example are completely different addative components to Halo's core system. There's no reason to think a additive co-op experience wouldn't have been seen as an innovation for Halo. Hell, forget Destiny for a moment- if Warzone was Reach's additive mode, and the core mechanics didn't change from H3 for arena and campaign, i believe the game would have had much more staying power.
[3] no I'm extrapolating, you are speculating. Halo 3 was the most popular FPS on the planet, despite assaults from a ton of other FPS. All signs pointed to people wanting H3 to be the bases of a sequel. Yet Reach went in a completely different direction. Your analogy does not compute:

What we have is the equivalent of a Blues Artist being the biggest artist on the planet and his last album was the biggest album ever released. For his next album, he makes a blues-pop album, purely because Justin Beber is the worlds second biggest artist. His longtime fans don't like This new album nearly as much and he doesn't gain many new fans. He makes blues-pop for the next 7 years.

Instead of drawing the rational conclusion, you conclude that people just don't like Blues as much as they used to- which is baseless, because no one has released a true blues album for 10years- and the last time one was released, it lit the world on fire. All we know is people prefer Pop over blues-pop.
[4] "good game" is a better catalist for success than throwing out core principles that helped propel your game to the top of the world in favor of principles that work better for other games.

Interestingly halo used to be very approachable. I'd argue CE-Reach are more approachable than OW, because there are no characters to learn. The addition of new mechanics has made halo much less inviting to new players because there are so many more inputs to consider, and the way mechanics interact with each other is more complex. (If you wanna run, you can't shoot or heal, if you wanna jump and zoom, you'll float- unless you turn that auto-feature off and tie it to sprint button, some jumps require you to zoom at the peak of your jump, if you want to melee while airborne your have to allow for a .3sec delay because the game has to be sure you don't want to ground pound. Some jumps require you to sprint-thrust-jump-groundpound cancel-thrust-clamber, etc.... you used to just run, jump, shoot, and throw grenades)

[1] No. I specifically said improve. The better something is, the more difficult it becomes to improve on it. This does somewhat apply to what you believed I meant however, as the better something is, I'd argue the more difficult any innovations will be seen as improvements also. I'm not saying it's easier for the underdog. I'm saying the underdog would likely have always been someone else if the others weren't underperforming originally.... that Halo and COD could be exactly as good as each other, and most would then choose COD.

[2] I'm not arguing that they couldn't have added them. For example, I'm saying that Warzone would count as one such innovation for example. I'm just saying that what makes Destiny's setup work isn't directly replicable for Halo, because the unification of everything is part of why it works for Destiny.

[3] Well, in this case, Spotify and Last.fm also show that almost nobody's listening to that artists previous hits either, even in comparison to the blues-pop releases.

[4] Obviously a game being "good" (which Halo 5 is, let's not get silly) makes success more likely, but there's pretty much no form of entertainment media where I'd say it even begins to approach being the largest contributing factor to success. And whilst Halo CE mechanically simpler than Overwatch, that doesn't necessarily make it more accessible. Two human players can play an incredibly complex game (let's say they're part of a Smash Bros 4 player FFA) and owing to them both lacking in ability, they'll never feel overwhelmed. On the other hand, two weak players can play something comparatively simple, but due to the consistency that even a small difference in ability manifests as a win or loss for each player, one of them is very likely to become discouraged very quickly. Halo CE I would argue today is the Halo game most likely to cause this.