Halo 4 is an abomination

[Legion]

Most of the complaints made could be countered with: The game is set 500 years in the future. The idea is that science would have gone a long way since then.

As well as: The Forerunners aren't just 500 hundred years ahead of us in technology, they are hundreds of thousands of years ahead.

In other words. Trying to make sense of the games lack of scientific accuracy judging by today's level of scientific knowledge is akin to trying to explain the internet to somebody in Ancient Greece. You can't.

As for game-play complaints such as the new art design etc. I cannot say that I am much of a fan either. A lot of the new Spartan designs do not really fit, and in many cases they simply do not make sense for emotionless professionals such as the Spartans to wear (like the skull visor).

Spartan Ops are appallingly lazy as well, re-using the same 6 or so small maps over and over again with barely any story except "Go here and kill everything." Even the mission to assassinate a guy ends up with you having to kill everybody else, so why make it about assassinating him specifically?

Overall though I'd say the game is good with a fair few poor choices. It's not a bad game, but it missed out on a lot of potential.

 

[Fidelias]

The only point that I will concede to you is that mission 5 (the one with the uber-elephant) was badly written. Aside from that, I could deal with it. Last mission with the Broadsword, loved it. 343 shamelessly played off of how people remember the death star trench run, and I still loved it. It even had elements that it could call its own, so it didn't suffer much from its inspiration.

Oooohh, yeah, the Broadsword Trench Run was great!
It REALLY makes me want a new Rogue Squadron game though. Like, I would kill for a new Rogue Squadron right now...

In my opinion, Halo 4 was a pretty solid game. Sure, it had some issues. Most notably for me; the bland-looking Prometheans and the new music. And you should NEVER, and I can't stress this enough, NEVER have to watch a movie or read a book to get basic background on key aspects of the game.
We should've been shown clearly in the main cutscenes of Halo 4; Who the Didact was, where he came from, what caused him to hate humans, why he was trapped, who trapped him, and why the Covenant would blindly follow ANOTHER religious leader.
Maybe some of these questions were answered in the game, but if an average gamer like me is still confused about it after the game ended, than the developers have messed up.

But still, the story did it's job, I liked the new aesthetics, the guns and gameplay felt more like a Halo game then Reach, and 343's work on Cortana and the Chief's characters was really amazing, so I think Halo 4 delivers what it promised, and then some.

 

[RatRace123]

Well uh, I like it just fine. In fact, it's right up there as one of my favorites in the series.

 

[cikame]

I enjoyed Halo 1 for being its own thing, and having the best warthog... and assault rifle... and pistol... and because it was an older game i could give it some slack.
I couldn't understand the huge fan base and the near perfect reviews with each new release, i don't see a huge world and story, i just see mediocre to bad animations and "an alien invasion", with no real bad guy and a shambles of human resistance led by characters who tend to just kind of run at their deaths.

Master Chief doesn't feel or act like the super soldier he is, i believe the coolest thing that has happened in all of Halo is when he kicked that rock into the hole in Halo 1, since then it's been a hold the fire button down sleep fest.

 

[Proverbial Jon]

Snip

OK, Halo 4 wasn't perfect:

- The Covenant's redesigns made a lot of them look very similar when they are supposed to all be different races.
- The Covenant were brought back, rendering the war in original trilogy completely pointless.
- The story was convoluted and those who hadn't read the books would miss a lot of relevant content.
- The characters were paper thin and had little in the way of... character.
- The Promethians were utterly rubbish enemies, in my opinion.

...but I still had fun and I don't think it deserves quite the bile-fueled rant that you have created here.

I don't remember a diversity of accents in the previous Halo games by Bungie.
Master Cheif: American accent
Miranda Keys: American accent
Arbiter: American accent
Prophet of Truth: American accent
Cortana: American accent
Sgt. Johnson: American accent

I could keep going...

To be fair to the OP, I distinctly remember seeing in either Halo2 or 3 Asian marines, I heard Australian accents and there was also the marine voiced by Michelle Rodriguez who has a Latino accent. I didn't actually notice this problem in Halo 4 but the previous games did have a fair amount of diversity.

 

[Flippincrazy]

Snipped

Nope, we definitely played the game - you just were fortunate enough to enjoy it.

I just personally didn't, and found every attempt at 'deepening' the characters to be a laughable and sad failure. I think that as someone who hasn't read the extended canon, from my perspective 343 have tried to develop the characters of Chief and Cortana where very little had actually been previously realised in the past games. As far as I'm concerned, they just didn't do a good enough job of it. The discussion of any major important themes had Cortana whining to Chief and him essentially going 'meh, gotta do our jerb' each time, which without context, just seems like such poor storytelling.

The ending I just found so woefully poor...starting from said anticlimactic boss fight and ending with the most cliché character death ever - Resident Evil 6 didn't make me cringe as much that ending. I probably just don't have the same emotional connection to the characters as you do, that's the only thing I can imagine which would lead you to read so much into their dialogue. This is a good thing, though, and I wish I enjoyed the story as much as you did, I just couldn't see past its flaws.

Music...eh, going to just disagree with you here. In the earlier games (incl. Reach), I found the soundtrack to be far more pronounced, immersing and enthralling... Halo 4's by contrast was too quiet to be heard over the constant gunfire. As I said, I'm sure there were some good tracks, I just didn't feel that it had as dramatic and great effect over game-play as it did in other games.

As far as I'm concerned from my playthrough, the plot was just too shallow to be taken on without knowledge of extended canon, I felt as if they'd certainly tried to get past the 'save the world' stuff, but ultimately, that is what is boiled down to.

But as I've said, I'm glad you enjoyed it. For me it was just a slightly more colorful shooting gallery with a story that made COD MW3's look good in comparison. Not sure where the truth of the matter lies, and hey, that's opinions I guess.

 

[Jeremy Meadows]

I do love how people went out and bought the game, already giving away their money and then ***** about how bad it is.

And how does making a purchase keep you from being allowed to voice your opinion?
If anything, the people who spent their money are the ones who's opinions matter more.

Well, when they're well-thought-out and explained, as in... nothing like the original post up top there.

Because, it's funny that they can't or couldn't see that it wasn't going to be as good to begin with. Now I love Halo (with the exception of 3), but even I wasn't really looking forward to Halo 4. The more I looked into it, the more I thought, "nah, maybe gonna rent it first". And it turns out I was right. The fact that people went out and threw down money solely because it was a Halo game, then found out they didn't like it, proves how little they pay attention to games and just go with a game because of the namesake and not for the content. So it's funny to me.

 

[Zeh Don]

Personally, Halo 4 is the best in the series in terms of single player campaigns, though Halo 2 is a pretty close second. It's the most emotionally grounded of the lot. While I agree that the Librarian stuff was pretty out of place, it didn't really effect the story all that much and wasn't used again after the reveal.

All I read was a lot of "blah blah blah Halo 4 should be just like previous Halos because I fucking said so blah blah blah" and a complete failure to really justify such bile.

"A complete wreck?" You must be thinking of the third entry, which landed with a resounding "meh" and a general opinion of "This looks just like Halo 2! The fuck?".

 

[xshadowscreamx]

I do love how people went out and bought the game, already giving away their money and then ***** about how bad it is.

And how does making a purchase keep you from being allowed to voice your opinion?
If anything, the people who spent their money are the ones who's opinions matter more.

Well, when they're well-thought-out and explained, as in... nothing like the original post up top there.

Because, it's funny that they can't or couldn't see that it wasn't going to be as good to begin with. Now I love Halo (with the exception of 3), but even I wasn't really looking forward to Halo 4. The more I looked into it, the more I thought, "nah, maybe gonna rent it first". And it turns out I was right. The fact that people went out and threw down money solely because it was a Halo game, then found out they didn't like it, proves how little they pay attention to games and just go with a game because of the namesake and not for the content. So it's funny to me.

wow i dont even remember writing that qoute, am i hacked?.. well i can now look at this from a fresh perspective.
yeah i agree that alot of people will buy the seqoul just because of the name like COD and halo, if call of duty was not on the title then there would be a drop in sales just because the general core audience did not its COD.

 

[xshadowscreamx]

I do love how people went out and bought the game, already giving away their money and then ***** about how bad it is.

And how does making a purchase keep you from being allowed to voice your opinion?
If anything, the people who spent their money are the ones who's opinions matter more.

Well, when they're well-thought-out and explained, as in... nothing like the original post up top there.

Because, it's funny that they can't or couldn't see that it wasn't going to be as good to begin with. Now I love Halo (with the exception of 3), but even I wasn't really looking forward to Halo 4. The more I looked into it, the more I thought, "nah, maybe gonna rent it first". And it turns out I was right. The fact that people went out and threw down money solely because it was a Halo game, then found out they didn't like it, proves how little they pay attention to games and just go with a game because of the namesake and not for the content. So it's funny to me.

wow i dont even remember writing that qoute, am i hacked?.. well i can now look at this from a fresh perspective.
yeah i agree that alot of people will buy the seqoul just because of the name like COD and halo, if call of duty was not on the title then there would be a drop in sales just because the general core audience did not know its COD.

 

[Spartan448]

Oh, where to begin?

All of your first five examples have already been thoroughly explained before Halo 4 was released. Hard-light has always been a thing, The Storm would gladly follow the Didactic, and much of the non-Storm covenant as well. Imagine God coming to Earth. Much of the other stuff was explained in the many Halo novels that have been written. Lots of people liked that Halo 4 actually made an effort to incorporate the backstory instead of completely disregarding it, much like Reach did.

Part 2: Halo 4 was not supposed to be pretty. The other Halo games could get away with pretty because pretty landscape in games usually begets an upbeat ending. Halo 4's ending was anything but.

Part 3: forerunner buildings have lights everywhere because an actual, living Forerunner is now running them. Everyone in the UNSC has had an American accent for a long time. It's no more immersion breaking than the fact that everyone in Ender's Game, including four-year-olds, could speak perfect English, no matter what country they came from. All MJOLNIR armor has been pretty much the same since Mark V armor (which was the first successful generation of MJOLNIR, mind you), and all resulting generations were based on it. It makes sense for the Pelican and Warthog to have changed radically, don't forget this game is set YEARS after Halo 3. The wealth of Forerunner tech at Onyx, combined with Cortana's intel, certainly begets changes in design. You also mentioned that you like scientific explanation that Bungie apparently used. But you complain about the design of the plasma weapons that, not only makes scientific sense, but is also largely unchanged since Halo 1.

343 did not want to insult Bungie. In fact, many employees at 343 are former members of Bungie's Halo dev team. 343 was formed because Bungie was leaving Halo, but the debs didn't want to.

Halo 4 DOES take a tad too much inspiritation from COD for my taste, but it makes sense. It's 343's first game, and they needed to prove to investors and publishers that they could make a game that sold well, and had mass-market appeal. They also needed capital to continue developing. It would make sense to not see any major changes until Halo 5.

Overall, cutting out Firefight was a bad move, I miss the weapons being scattered across the map (although it DOES do a good job of preventing one team from hogging all of the power weapons.), ordinance drops I have mixed opinions, Reach is still a piece of shit sorry excuse for a game, and READ THE F****** BOOKS the game is based on before complaining about the story.

 

[Spartan448]

Stupid I-pad making me double-post...

 

[mitchell271]

To be honest, I kind of agree with the OP. Not entirely, but mostly. The graphics are great, some of the best on the console, but aesthetically it's trash. Everything looks washed out in comparison to the other games which were bright and colourful. The gameplay felt off and the biggest issue is that it didn't feel like Halo to me. If it had been a new IP, I would have been a lot kinder to it, but the fact that it carries the Halo name makes it different.

I understand why 343i made the changes they did; they wanted to leave their mark on the Halo franchise and universe. They added their own style, their own gameplay elements and made it their own. I personally didn't like the game though. Some people made it their GOTY, but that's why gaming is great. It's all about what you like. You could have liked Amy (however unlikely that is) or Stranglehold.

So let's quit bitching and just enjoy the stuff that we enjoy.