Quote:
Originally Posted by Noct
Well, I agree with a lot of what you had to say, especially concerning the story aspects, but I gotta disagree with your summations of the MP experience.
While some of what you said is true, (the bit about melee going to the healthier person is very interesting and I hadn't noticed that myself) I don't consider many of the changes you brought up to be flaws or unbalanced really...
I think the gameplay changes may not flush with your particular style of play, but that doesn't necessarily make them flawed. Like, we all knew about them making the second weapons visible this time, it was a design choice that I personally think it pretty cool. Granted, you lose some of the surprise element (I used to be a big fan of pulling out the rocket launcher on unsuspecting opponents myself), but that was a design choice the developers made, and it was certainly no secret.
As for the sword changes, yeah, it takes getting used to, and I have definately died based on the delay in opening it, but to be fair, I think it makes the game a bit more balanced, not less...
I think it was unbalanced before when you could whip it out almost instantly and kill a character with full health in one swipe, and at only a fraction of its overall ammo.
I haven't played enough MP to really notice the AR dominating, but I always considered it the best weapon anyways, so I'll take your word for that. But can't you decide what the spawn weapons are online anyways? I have only played sys link thus far, but I could swear we had that set to random...
Also, as far as dual wielding being useless...I don't find it particularly different then it was before. You always had to weigh out grenade use versus dual firing, its not like thats somehting new, and besides, the only real change I noticed was the lack of dual needlers, which I believe they upped the power of, so it was probably a good descision.
Finally, I think the individual reloads add to the experience not take away from it... They give you more reason to dual wield, not less IMO.
You can now A_B your shots between hands and only reload one weapon at a time to assure you are always capable of firing at all times if you pay attention to your ammo. I think that alone gives dual wielding an upper hand on what it was before.
I will say you are spot on about the story though, it was convoluted as all hell, nearly impossible to follow, and did not have anywhere near enough fights in urban Earth locations as I had been imagining all along that it would...
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Well first of all, my concern is that the changes cause OVERbalance, not unbalance. I think the game is getting TOO balanced. I always found the weapon system to be one of the larger distinguishing factors that set Halo apart, but now the weapons are too "even" in my opinion. When your starting weapon is that strong, all you have to do is spawn near someone with his back facing you and you get a free kill. I don't like getting free kills. I get pissed when I spawn behind someone (and I do spawn behind people and vice versa). I want people to EARN their kills and work for their weapons, not be given a great weapon when you die. When you die, you should lose your good weapon!
Second, I play only matchmaking, so its AR starts all around. I must tell you, Matchmaking is a totally different beast than system link games, where you have customization capabilities. I think that despite all the strange weapon issues, if the game had SMG starts, it would be greatly improved.
But thats just my play style. I like calculated victories where you pick apart the other team, gain control of the weapons and map points, and just dominate. Some people prefer trading kills back and forth. I guess my biggest issue is that the potential for domination has shrunk pretty significantly this time around. Again this is just my take on the game based on how used to Halo 2 I have become and how much time I pumped into that playing style.