The Halo Bulletin 3.20.13
The Halo Bulletin 3.20.13
http://blogs.halowaypoint.com/Headlines/post/2013/03/20/The-Halo-Bulletin-32013.aspx My world is crumbling. Stonehenge did not make the cut. :(
Halo 4 Title Update
As we announced last week, various teams across the studio have been hard at work on an additional title update for Halo 4. Expected to release within the next few weeks, it’s in a finalized enough state where we’d like to go ahead and share its change list with you. Before I divulge the specifics, I’d like to say one thing: While the list may appear small at first glance, one thing in particular presents a myriad of future opportunities. More on that momentarily. For now, here are the changes that will hit Halo 4 once you’re prompted to download this update.
- Enabled “X-Markers” on the HUD to designate when and where teammates are killed.
- Updated Active Camo to fully reveal players when they fire all weapons.
- Reduced the auto aim, magnetism and damage on the Gauss Warthog.
- Fixed an issue in which some players at SR-130 did not see their Specialization on their in-game Player Card.
- Fixed various issues with ordnance navigation markers.
- Fixed various join-in-progress issues with Flood.
- Added the ability to make weapon adjustments via backend tuning.
If your ears perked up with that last one, you probably understand what this means. Previously added weapon adjustments, such as the Bolt Shot Nerf that went live last month, needed a title update in order to be released. With this title update, we are adding the ability to make weapon adjustments outside of the standard title update process. This will allow us to fine tune and tweak the Halo 4 sandbox as often or not as often as needed. One thing to keep in mind is that even the tiniest of changes affects the sandbox as a whole, so these adjustments will be closely scrutinized and carefully tested before being released. We’ll be sharing more about the different things we can do with our soon-to-be-acquired weapon-tuning “knobs” in our PAX East panel, so keep your ear close to the ground for the latest on that particular aspect of the title update.
It's good they're actually doing something, but it's been a long time after release for this to all happen. We were told that only three map packs are coming out, so it sounds, to me, that we're on the back nine of the title's shelf life. Are they going to keep supporting Halo 4 through when Halo 5 gets released?
What do you mean by carry forward? Like, they're not releasing any more H4 maps, so those ideas get carried over to H5?
Depends. How do you feel about nostalgia driving map (re)creation? I'm not sure many people want H4 maps remade/carried over, especially so quickly.
By the way, if that does happen, and someone makes another big map at all in H5, I'll obviously bitch about that. If they carry forward the whole H4 map catalog, they're drowning in shitty big maps.
I appreciate the changed that are coming. I do have one nagging thought that just keeps me shaking my head. Why the hell did it take 135+ days (at the very least) for the ability to do backend adjustments for weapons.
I am not a developer, I am not a coder and I am by no means an expert when it comes to design or implementation with creating a game. But at no time did I ever think they would not have the ability to "adjust" weapons without doing a TU. I assumed they had to do a TU for the BS because maybe range was not figured into that capability..
But how did this miss getting put into the game? This has been around a LONG time. This capability was in XBLA games like Monday Night Combat that was released in August of 2010 and I think other games had it before that..
What the hell is going on at 343 studios? I mean really? Did no one from the dev team think to raise their hands during the development phase and say...Ugh hey, should we not have something in place to tweak weapon performance after launch?
I mean this is not only a 343 issue, other studios have pulled this bone head move. But for the love of all things gaming and pew pew...WTF IS GOING ON!
I think Call Of Duty was able to address balance tweaks like this after Blops 1. That was after they royally shit the bed with the MW2 launch, where there were multiplayer bugs everywhere.
Edited to add:
So, they nerf the gauss which has ALWAYS been a badass hitscan vehicle. Wonder if they'll nerf the scorpion too? I do NOT think the gauss is overpowered, I think they put it on quite possible the SHITTIEST map, Exile.
I remember a Halo 4 preview that said that Exile was the best map that Halo 4 had to offer, and that it showcases everything the game has to offer. When I first read that, I thought it was crazy, but his reasoning was pretty sound. It's a huge map (H4 is very big map-heavy) and it's chaotic (it certainly is that, especially with ordnance drops). Sounds like Exile is Halo 4 in a nutshell to me.