I can see where it's coming from . . . (Gaming)

by cheapLEY , Wednesday, November 25, 2015, 21:45 (3289 days ago) @ INSANEdrive

I just don't agree completely. I can definitely understand the things being said about the story, even if I don't necessarily agree with all of it.

Halo 4, Halo 5, and all of 343i's extended universe fiction seems to be trying to build a more "grounded" version of Halo. Is Del Rio and an idiot? Yeah, probably, but at the end of the day, he's the captain of the ship, he gets to make the call. He's not the bad guy because he opposes the Chief. The Chief's job is to do whatever the hell he says. That's how the military works. I think 343i is trying to present things in a more realistic manner than the Chief just going off and doing things because his AI told him to. Whether they succeed or fail, or if that's a good or bad thing, is definitely up for debate, and I still haven't completely figured out how I feel about it. In some ways, I think it's smart, and I don't think they've leaned into that aspect hard enough.

In Bungie's original trilogy, the Master Chief saved the galaxy from the both the Flood and complete annihilation from the Halos. How do you top that? 343i has certainly tried, but the general consensus seems to be that they've failed (even though I happen to think Halo 5 sets up a potentially really great Halo 6). I think they would have been smarter to lean into much smaller, personal, more grounded stories, like ODST and Reach presented. The galaxy had already been saved. Instead of manufacturing a new galaxy-wide threat, why not focus on post-war clean up? They could have drawn that out for multiple games in interesting ways. The story of Spartan Ops could have certainly been really interesting and fun, had it been the main focus of Halo 4 and expanded upon. The Master Chief could have stayed asleep, and we could have followed another Spartan team through that story for Halo 4, and continued it in Halo 5.

That being said, the article says,

But, hey, the gameplay’s fun, right?

I wish.

The difficulty tuning is off. In Halo 4, Normal felt too easy and Heroic felt just… wrong. It was easy if I played it like a pop and stop shooter, but Halo’s all about strafing and dodging and throwing grenades and melee. It’s a game about movement, about dancing through the combat space. With Halo 4, your armor has the durability of wet toilet paper. It’s easy to die, and worse still, the enemies are massive bullet sponges.

The same is true of Halo 5 on Heroic. I once unloaded half a clip from a BR, a shotgun round or two, and a punch into a Forerunner Soldier’s face. For my trouble, I was downed instantly from a single punch by the Soldier. I’ve shot enemies 3 and 4 times with a sniper rifle before killing them, used an entire BR clip on an enemy with no perceptible effect. Once, I told three spartans to target an elite, then dashed back to get some ammo. When I returned, they hadn’t even brought the elite’s shield down. The much-touted squad system is useless.

The gameplay is the most important part, and I disagree with basically all of that. It's been a while since I've played Halo 4, but I don't remember anything like that, and I enjoyed the gameplay.

But Halo 5 is one of the best Halo games ever in terms of how fun it is to be playing, and how good it feels. As far as the Heroic tuning, I felt like it was honestly a bit too easy. I breezed through it, other than the double and triple Warden battles. And I didn't play it as a "pop and stop" shooter (again, other than those damn Warden fights). I was running and gunning and playing Halo like I've played every Halo. So I'm not sure what he's talking about. I also found the other Spartans to be pretty good about taking out designated enemies without me having to worry about it.

I don't know. It was a good article; it just doesn't ring true for me.