Why I Hate Halo (And Other Stories)

[Mikeyfell]

Now you're talking rubbish. The whole point of playing games is the fact you're PLAYING A GAME. PLAYING. Key word. I'm not saying Multiplayer should be valued over singleplayer, I'm saying a good story is all well and good, but it'll only last you the once. To me, multiplayer is far more important than singleplayer in a game. Bioshock 2, for example, has a damn good singleplayer, and multiplayer is only a feature.
The multiplayer is dead and game retailers in England are trying everything they can just to sell a few copies.

I would definitely prefer multiplayer playability to single player replayability.

allow me to provide a counter example to your point
you are saying that a good single player story only lasts you as long as it takes to finish it
so for sake of E.G. Modern Warfare lasts 5 hours, Enslaved lasts about 12 hours, and Tales of Vesperia lasts about 60 hours. (and then there are Bioware games that encourage multiple play-throughs)
so that's fine.

but how long does an online multyplayer match last?
5 minutes? 15 minutes if your playing a big team battle? 2 minutes 30 seconds if some douche gets a nuke?
and then what you're done?
then what? you play one of every type of game on every multyplayer map available? that's about 3 or 4 hours?

even if you love multyplayer how many times do you have to play Infection at Sword Base before it starts to get boring?
wouldn't you rather play a well constructed campaign than shoot the same 13 year old douche bags half a million times?

Well, given that I despise MW2, that was a bad example.
Multiplayer is fun for REPLAYABILITY. I have played every gametype on every map on Halo 3, yet I would go back to it in a heartbeat if someone wanted to play with me.
Halo: Reach, for example, my Xbox LIVE expired, so I'm working on getting it back just so I can play Halo: Reach online. I had fun in the campaign. But I couldn't go back through it.
Before you claim it's bad, I finished Bioshock recently, yet I couldn't go back through that. I tried to go back through Mass Effect months after I finished it, and just couldn't get through it.
So in truth, I would rather shoot douchebags. Also, nice stereotype. Way to help your point.

you play on Xbox live you know who I'm talking about [sub]or maybe it's just the head mikes that make everyone sound 13, that still doesn't explain why there all douchebags [/sub]

but why is multyplayer more fun than single player

the Reach single player had some great moments like when you had to fight through the basement full of suicidal grunts or the spaceship combat or the jet pack level.
fighting off waves of enemies or pushing through a fortified base.

multyplayer is just running around a map with no context trying not to get shot by a camper and getting annoyed at bunny hoppers
not to mention getting called a fag every time you die

---(aside)--- the Halo games are the only multyplayer games I actually like and that's mostly because of forge mode.

but I just don't understand how anyone can think multyplayer is more fun than single player

 

[LarenzoAOG]

OT: Sorry OP but I gotta rant about Halo.

I hate Halo, there are 5 Halo FPS's and almost nothing has changed from CE to Reach, the series main charecter is a non-entity, no personality, no backstory, brick. ODST introduced a brick that wore different armor and never spoke, Reach let you decide what color your brick was and if you wanted a boy brick or a girl brick. The best Halo game was Halo 2, and only because you got to play as the Arbiter, the only charecter who seemed to care about what was going on and was even remotely interesting.

The worst part of Halo is the fanbase, when I told a friend my favorite part of Halo was playing the Arbiter he said, verbatim "Why would you want to play an alien when you are supposed to fight them?", I was unaware someone could be so short sighted. Unlike most people who play Halo I actual paid attention to the story, and there is actually an intelligent message to it, the Covenant represents an extermist religous autocricy, zealously persuing what they are told to do by the tenants of their religion, unwilling to try to understand or learn about the "heretic" humans, there's a strong message about the danger of religous extremism and apathy towards mutual understanding, and they did it on purpose! I'm not reading to much into this, I'm simply reading the writing on the wall. But how many Halo fans got that part of the game? In fact, how many people are still reading this? If you actually read this entire off topic rant I want you qoute me.

/rant

Apologies for double post, but I gotta explain something to you. Master Chief, the main character, does have a backstory. You have to do a teensy bit of digging to find it, but it's there. Would you rather have the main character come and tell everybody about his life story? The guy speaks little, he's just supposed to be an ass-kicking machine. The idea I got from Halo was a generic shooter that had to implement a storyline to keep up. Bad thing? K, but Duke Nukem was bloody brilliant, and he's less of a character than Minecraft Man.

If they released a Covenant-sided game, I'd play it. I'd be interested to see how things worked on their end of the deal.

But in short - Of course he has personality. He also had it beat out of him during the training program. Would you rather him make wisecracking one-liners with every kill?

I don't mind a little digging to learn about a charecter, as long as it doesn't involve reading a novel. And "Ass-kicking MACHINE" is the problem, I want to play as a person, with emotion and motives and all that malarky, now I have to stop before I begin another rant about Duke Nukem.

Why do you want a character with emotions so badly? I mean, look at Batman! He's like...completely epic, but he doesn't really have a personality. He just hits people. Okay, his parents died. He doesn't spend a lot of time on that fact, just uses it as an excuse to hit people.
If you just read the comics, you'd get a slightly angsty ass kicker. You'd have to play Arkham Asylum to get any deeper.

Why not read a couple of Halo comics? You find out about Master Chief that way. Does every character need a whole thread of shit happening to them in their past? How many real people do you know who have that? Would you tell a soldier to quit because he isn't fighting for vengeance or something? He joined the Army because he couldn't get another job. Now he just shoots at people for a living. He doesn't burst into tears or yell WHEREZ MAI WIEF!!! He just shoots at people when on duty, and drinks on his own when off duty.
Some people simply don't have that complex emotional life that you seem to be determined for everyone to have.

I don't want Batman to cry himself shitless when someone mentions Father's Day, but even the exposition you just gave isn't mentioned in the games. Not everyone needs an epic backstory or righteous agenda, these things make games better but I won't create a law that every game needs to be an emotional journey to the deepest parts of the human soul, they just need something to make me give a shit, I'll give you that Master Chief's anonimity is part of his mystique, but he really has no other charecteristics.

If I wanted to see uninteresting charecters doing shit no one really cares about in a plot that is barely coherent I'd watch a Micheal Bay movie, I play video games to enjoy a well written story with interesting and believable charecters, not every game has to bring me to my knees while I tearfully applaud (though that would be nice) I just want a game where I care about whats happening.

Also I thank you for staying civil and supporting you statements with actual knowledge, not vehement convictions that Halo is the cat's meow, and also Batman is boring, he is the most boring Batman charecter, and I for one would like to see a movie or video game about the Joker's origin.

 

[The Procrastinated End]

the Modern warfare games are another great example of the above. Both games had excellent, well produced, action-movie like campaign modes, that were difficult, fun, varied and inventive. Admittedly, MW2 cut the length down, but they seriously upped the intensity and the action-movie feel.

These are not games that exemplify half-assed singleplayer tacked on to a fully-realized multiplayer game.

[HEADING=1]NO NO NO NO[/HEADING]

NO

you could beat both of the Modern Warfare games in less then the time it takes you to take a piss.

I played CoD 4 and If you cut out all the cheep deaths by invisible sniper and all the times the boring cover based gameplay and uninteresting story made me fall asleep I was probably playing it for 2 hours

and even though Modern Warfare 2 was more interesting I still beat it in one sitting in less than 6 hours including all the cheep deaths and power naps behind cover. 2 and a half of those hours were spent trying to beat the "Wolverines" mission

and this was on Hardcore difficulty

have you ever played a single player game?

I mean a real one, a single player game that doesn't have multyplayer.

Hey you know if you cut out all those annoying matches from BlazBlue it turns out to be nothing but a visual novel with the occasional animated video clip,

If you cut out those irritating puzzles from Portal it turns into you listening to a computer talk to you for about an hour,

If you remove that whole sandbox exploration of Fallout it turns into a very short succession of fights with some variations of enemies,

Who can forget how much better WoW would be if they just got rid of all those damn monsters?

And if we cut away what you pretty much quoted from Yahtzee your left without an argument.

 

[Ensis235]

(Also, a short campaign does not equal a bad one.)

Well said. Sure, a campaign can last for 5 hours, but what if those 5 hours were spent playing an enjoyable and well made campaign that has plenty of replay value?

 

[Mikeyfell]

I'm thrilled you managed to breeze through them so quickly. I was of couse talking about production value, not length, but clearly your opinion is the only valid one.

-m

what the Modern Warfare games felt like was going to a movie and in the first 2 minutes there's a car chase and a big explosion then the credits roll
and the only thing left to do is throw your popcorn at the other people in the theater

and you didn't answer my question. Have you every played a game with out multyplayer in it?

 

[Ironic Pirate]

Look, some games were never going to have good stories. Twenty years ago, instead of multiplayer, they'd just be a shit game. Multiplayer isn't "destroying" single-player, not at all. The games that eschew story for multiplayer would never have had a strong single-player, they would have had a strong nothing. There are just as many story driven games now as there were five or ten years ago, if not more. The multiplayer ones are just more popular.

Also, "Other people are having fun differently than I am, and instead of accepting that and playing games that cater to my interests, I demand that they cease their enjoyment so that every game made is just perfect for me, because I have to play each and every one."

 

[Ampersand]

I can't help but feel that, refering to this as a problem is a bit shallow and narrow minded. Not all games will be tailor made for you and you have to accept that different people want different things from thier gaming experience.
Halo is alot more fun if you play them with friends, that's the way it's been since halo 2, even the story is alot better when you've got someone with you. It seems like you're saying that this is a bad thing.

 

[Mikeyfell]

[HEADING=1]NO NO NO NO[/HEADING]

NO

you could beat both of the Modern Warfare games in less then the time it takes you to take a piss.

I played CoD 4 and If you cut out all the cheep deaths by invisible sniper and all the times the boring cover based gameplay and uninteresting story made me fall asleep I was probably playing it for 2 hours

and even though Modern Warfare 2 was more interesting I still beat it in one sitting in less than 6 hours including all the cheep deaths and power naps behind cover. 2 and a half of those hours were spent trying to beat the "Wolverines" mission

and this was on Hardcore difficulty

have you ever played a single player game?

I mean a real one, a single player game that doesn't have multyplayer.

Hey you know if you cut out all those annoying matches from BlazBlue it turns out to be nothing but a visual novel with the occasional animated video clip,

If you cut out those irritating puzzles from Portal it turns into you listening to a computer talk to you for about an hour,

If you remove that whole sandbox exploration of Fallout it turns into a very short succession of fights with some variations of enemies,

Who can forget how much better WoW would be if they just got rid of all those damn monsters?

And if we cut away what you pretty much quoted from Yahtzee your left without an argument.

yes all of the things you said are true

but the things I cut out of Modern Warfare were time I spent not playing, not time I spent playing.
Arbitrarily killing me 6 inches away from a checkpoint is not lengthening gameplay
making me chill for 90 seconds behind cover every time I take a bullet is not lengthening gameplay
it's frustrating

and just because Yahtzee noticed it too doesn't make the Modern Warfare games any longer

 

[Mikeyfell]

I can't help but feel that, refering to this as a problem is a bit shallow and narrow minded. Not all games will be tailor made for you and you have to accept that different people want different things from thier gaming experience.
Halo is alot more fun if you play them with friends, that's the way it's been since halo 2, even the story is alot better when you've got someone with you. It seems like you're saying that this is a bad thing.

it's a problem because
yes not every game is tailor made for me
but 90% of games are tailor made for online FPS players
and they try to divide up the other 10% to everyone else

if ...say...Halo and Call of Duty were the only FPS games available and other companies tried to cater to other markets
then it wouldn't be a problem

but everyone and their dog is trying to make the next big crappy FPS and nobody cares about us shmoes who like single player games.

 

[Seneschal]

So, do you want art or do you want toys?

Because multiplayer is a toy. You PLAY with it. You play with other people, you spend time, you get some skill in it, and you have fun. It's like playing cards or board-games.

A single-player is a story. It tells you something, you learn something. It may enrich you, or it may just entertain you, but it's primarily an interactive narrative.

Basically, I think we should just divide the two categories completely. One is a toy, the other is a storytelling medium.

 

[TerranReaper]

Whoever says (FPS) multiplayer is just about "shooting a 13-year old douchebag" is just overgeneralizing on the topic. People play multiplayer for a reason and not all of them are looking for an immersive story in their games. For me, I enjoy multiplayer games for its competitive gameplay and to win. Of course, I'm talking from a background of a PC gamer.

But last I checked, there are still plenty of single-player games left out there.

 

[Canid117]

the Modern warfare games are another great example of the above. Both games had excellent, well produced, action-movie like campaign modes, that were difficult, fun, varied and inventive. Admittedly, MW2 cut the length down, but they seriously upped the intensity and the action-movie feel.

These are not games that exemplify half-assed singleplayer tacked on to a fully-realized multiplayer game.

[HEADING=1]NO NO NO NO[/HEADING]

NO

you could beat both of the Modern Warfare games in less then the time it takes you to take a piss.

I played CoD 4 and If you cut out all the cheep deaths by invisible sniper and all the times the boring cover based gameplay and uninteresting story made me fall asleep I was probably playing it for 2 hours

and even though Modern Warfare 2 was more interesting I still beat it in one sitting in less than 6 hours including all the cheep deaths and power naps behind cover. 2 and a half of those hours were spent trying to beat the "Wolverines" mission

and this was on Hardcore difficulty

have you ever played a single player game?

I mean a real one, a single player game that doesn't have multyplayer.

Mass Effect 2!

Story driven Rpgs! The genre that can't sacrifice single player quality and claim to make up for it with multiplayer. It's why I love Bioware.

 

[Ampersand]

I can't help but feel that, refering to this as a problem is a bit shallow and narrow minded. Not all games will be tailor made for you and you have to accept that different people want different things from thier gaming experience.
Halo is alot more fun if you play them with friends, that's the way it's been since halo 2, even the story is alot better when you've got someone with you. It seems like you're saying that this is a bad thing.

it's a problem because
yes not every game is tailor made for me
but 90% of games are tailor made for online FPS players
and they try to divide up the other 10% to everyone else

if ...say...Halo and Call of Duty were the only FPS games available and other companies tried to cater to other markets
then it wouldn't be a problem

but everyone and their dog is trying to make the next big crappy FPS and nobody cares about us shmoes who like single player games.

Maybe 90% is a bit of an exaggeration. I mean out of all of the game i own(for the x-box) maybe 10% are FPS That's Halo reach and ODST.(I also have bioshock but.....it doesn't count) The rest are all single player games, and all of them came out in like the last year and a half. So it's not like there arn't enough strong single player experiences out there.

On that note are you as excited as I am for Batman Arkham city?

 

[Mikeyfell]

have you ever played a single player game?

I mean a real one, a single player game that doesn't have multyplayer.

Mass Effect 2!

Story driven Rpgs! The genre that can't sacrifice single player quality and claim to make up for it with multiplayer. It's why I love Bioware.

I love Bioware as well
Bioware is awesome

Mass Effect, Dragon Age, and KOTOR are some of the best games ever made

 

[quantumsoul]

Multiplayer is an easy way to add replay value without adding content and it's the part of the game where players voice the most complaints. Game take some much time to develop now it only makes sense.

Though I liked how bioshock did it. First game focus on single player. Second game more resources and not working from scratch they can add multiplayer with out sacrificing much.

 

[Thyunda]

snip

Actually, if you play Arkham Asylum, there is one scene which really puts Batman and the Joker into perspective. If you've not played it, but want to know the scene, you'll need to pm me. I don't wanna spoil anything.

also snip

I don't mean to be offensive, but have you no friends? There is nothing that compares to the major laughs to be had while playing online. I live in England, and I play often with a friend in Chicago. Me, him, my brother and his brother always play as a team, and we have the most fun ever. Singleplayer might be good for a quick runthrough, but the multiplayer is where the serious fun is. I could play a multiplayer game for years. The experience is something new everytime. Okay, sometimes it is just dicks yelling into the microphone, but there are some truly fun people on there.
With singleplayer, it's the same shit over and over again. But, if it counts for anything I can't read the same book more than once, or watch the same film repeatedly.

 

[Mikeyfell]

I can't help but feel that, refering to this as a problem is a bit shallow and narrow minded. Not all games will be tailor made for you and you have to accept that different people want different things from thier gaming experience.
Halo is alot more fun if you play them with friends, that's the way it's been since halo 2, even the story is alot better when you've got someone with you. It seems like you're saying that this is a bad thing.

it's a problem because
yes not every game is tailor made for me
but 90% of games are tailor made for online FPS players
and they try to divide up the other 10% to everyone else

if ...say...Halo and Call of Duty were the only FPS games available and other companies tried to cater to other markets
then it wouldn't be a problem

but everyone and their dog is trying to make the next big crappy FPS and nobody cares about us shmoes who like single player games.

Maybe 90% is a bit of an exaggeration. I mean out of all of the game i own(for the x-box) maybe 10% are FPS That's Halo reach and ODST.(I also have bioshock but.....it doesn't count) The rest are all single player games, and all of them came out in like the last year and a half. So it's not like there arn't enough strong single player experiences out there.

On that note are you as excited as I am for Batman Arkham city?

90% is an exaggeration I'll admit but developers of singleplayer nonFPS games are in a huge minority

sorry I don't get excited for sequels or spin-offs any more
Except Mass Effect 3!!! that's going to be the best game ever!!!! [sub]in case you couldn't tell, I'm in denial right now [/sub]

 

[Geo Da Sponge]

Since everyone seems to have taken this thread as another chance to sling a few more insults at Halo, and specifically at Master Chief's personality.

To which I would respond with this:
Master Chief has no personality. That's kind of the point. He's literally socially retarded.

Why?

Because he was abducted at the age of six and from that point on he was interacting in the formalised military hierarchy. The only reason he's halfway approachable is because Cortana acts so informally while inside his head, something which he finds bewildering when they first meet. In fact, at one point Master Chief beats a man to death because he took an order very literally. Now admittedly most of these details are hidden away in the surrounding media, but Bungie still weaves it into the story of the games. Cortana's interruptions in Halo 3 are a good example of this, almost all of them based on what happend to Master Chief when he first started his training. So while you may say the story in the games is bad because they don't explain all this extra stuff properly, you can't really ignore that it's there.


So in short; what's Gordon Freeman's excuse?

 

[Aurora Firestorm]

Thanks, OhJohnNo. I'm a giant Homeworld fan. Glad to see another.

But I'd like to address this:

So, do you want art or do you want toys?

Because multiplayer is a toy. You PLAY with it. You play with other people, you spend time, you get some skill in it, and you have fun. It's like playing cards or board-games.

You're saying now that games such as TF2 CAN NEVER BE REAL ART. That the schtick of the game, the balance, the creativity involved in the team classes, all of that is just a bunch of trifles. You're being narrow-minded now. I don't even like multiplayer in most games and I think you're being overkill.

Multiplayer is not killing single-player. Really, it isn't. You did say something I thought worked -- they are fundamentally different art forms. This means that neither is encroaching on the other's territory. They're different aims, different objectives.

 

[Eldritch Warlord]

(Also, a short campaign does not equal a bad one.)

Well said. Sure, a campaign can last for 5 hours, but what if those 5 hours were spent playing an enjoyable and well made campaign that has plenty of replay value?

I agree wholeheartedly. I've played all the way through Half-Life 2 twice, I've played all the way through Gears of War at least 8 times. HL2 is a better game for sure, but Gears is far more replayable simply by being shorter and faster-paced and replayability is a factor I value too.

Also one further point about the Halo series specifically. It is very apparent to me that Bungie's Halo games are complete designed for multiplayer, including the campaign. Just look no further than the Warthog, one guy drives while one guy shoots, it's the perfect co-op vehicle. Halo is a social game all the way through. Campaign isn't the single-player mode, just the one mode that is best suited for the solitary player (again, it's better with more people).