The Moment You've Been Waiting For

Or not, most likely you're all just playing the beta right now.

Warning, this post is going to be long...

I intend to cover each aspect of the beta here. I'm going to break it down by section and I'm going to try and post a little bit more as I go. Until I'm finished posting the bottom will say "More to come soon." That being said feel free to comment as I go and I'll try and adress anything else you bring up that I may have left out unintentionally.

I'll start us off with weapons, and balancing. Since I could probably make an entire post about all of my thoughts on the weapons and each individual change I will currently keep this short. My current opinion on the state of the weapons is that they are far more balanced than in any previous Halo, or maybe even first person shooter for that matter. Each weapon fulfills a specific roll within the gameplay and as such each weapon is powerful in its own right. That being said I can see one underpowered and one overpowered weapon in the game. I'm sure many of you have heard my complaints but honestly the sword needs some tweaking. I don't care if you can contest the sword on rare occasions, I actually think thats kinda cool. It's pretty rare to begin with. What I do take issue with is the fact that you can sprint with a huge hammer and use it immediately but the sword in that capacity is useless? The sword is the single most underpowered weapon in the game. Most of the other weapons have received nice tweaking to make them useful again, or to scale them back and force them into their specific roles. The DMR is a perfect example of this. As predecesor to the BR it is the mid to long range headshot weapon. It fits this role perfectly and becomes significantly more difficult to use over increasing and decreasing distances giving it greater purpose. I personally find this to be good, you should have to choose your weapons wisely, not pair X Y and Z with BR and you get an instant win. While this should and could work in a situation like MLG, this is not the way the game has to play. Weapon combinations, including range choices, should be a large part of a player and subsequently a teams strategy. This should take into consideration what the player has already, what their armor ability is, what their teammates weapons and armor abilities are and what the current objective is. The latter includes taking a position on the map for optimum slaying capabilities. I think I got lost somewhere in there, back to my original grievance; the weapon I find most overpowered, the Plasma Launcher. I have no problem with the mechanics of this gun except it's tracking is a bit much at close range. My real problem is that it yields no way to avoid it. Even the new fangled powerful needler can be avoided should you catch it in time, or have the upper hand based on position. With the Plasma launcher there is little to no warning that someone has locked onto you and whats worse is that they can kill you pretty easily without actually hitting you. The gun is almost there, it just needs some adjustments in some areas to make it a more skill based weapon. What if it fired more straight with slightly increased velocity but didn't track? Food for thought...

Armor Abilities? I love them, but I was definitely right to assume that they would be for a less hardcore crowd. They're fun and I think they will be best used in a big team battle session. What they are best at is creating those epic halo moments that we are all familiar with. A lone soldier sprints toward the new rocket spawn but is assassinated by an invisible guy he passes on the way to the spillway. Little did the invisible guy know but above him flying on a jetpack was some jackass with the pro pipe. With the fiery death of the invisible guy comes a reward, Rockets. Here comes one more to the party to experience them first hand, but wait, he has armor lock. The rocket that seemed to have the late comers adress dialed in was instead returned to sender. Imagine this but 8 vs 8 with Elites vs Spartans, vehicles and flags. It will be like 1000 ninja's running through a hospital zone on fire and oh yeah here comes the Spartan laser! So to be completely honest I love them. You can turn them off so hell yeah I love them. Using them together adds that much more variety to your team. Where you cover and with what armor abilities can make all the difference in the world. Sprint I think adds the most to the game as it stood in halo 3. It creates the ability to change the tide with a spike of speed boost. Used correctly you can do all sorts of wonderful with it. Just look at the overkill I got on the fileshare, sprint is win.

I'm goign to continue on to Elites now because it's definitely related to armor abilities. Elites are my favorite! Hands down, I like being an elite in this one. I feel like a badass, not like the wimpy ass Spartans who seem to run away, hide, bare a shield or fly away. Elites are faster, more agile, stronger and can jump like beasts. I wish they would make a spinoff based on the Elites in this game. It's fun to play as them, I love their tech, I love their evade!

It's what makes Elites fun that detracts from the overall game. Spartans feel weak. They don't jump high enough, they don't shoot as accurate, the sniper feels a bit too slow, and everyone seems to like non-headshot weapons. All in all it does feel a bit less hardcore, a bit less about the individual and very team oriented. This is and isn't a good thing. It should be based on your teams performance, but at the same time a single individual should be able to go clutch. I think games should mirror Basketball. What I mean is that there should be star players who can hit the three pointer with 1 second left on the clock. Similarly a team should be able to win by struggling together to push for the win. It is a team effort but Kobe can rally the team. Perhaps thats a tired metaphor but I think it rains true through to the end. Halo 3 really feels like that. To be honest I would play a Halo 3 with an updated BR spread, better connection and fancier graphics. Thats what we have to remember, this isn't Halo 3 upgraded, it's Halo Reach. The checks and balances are different, there are different things to do and the game plays slightly different. It still feels like halo, although it leaves the taste of HL2 in my mouth because of it's new frantic pacing coupled with low jumps and gimmicky armor abilities but hey, Half Life rocks. This is the beta, so somethings can still change. I don't mind the grenades and I could live with the new DMR, it adds a unique team element and keeps you at range. What I really want is jump hight increased and some UI revisions cause honestly it's confusing. We'll see what everyone thinks come Friday with invasion mode.