if the game is designed properly yer damn tootin I do. But even most comparable games to Halo, like BFBC2, manage more than 6v6 (BFBC2 I believe does 12v12)
I think designing that game is going to be a serious hassle, especially since nothing has gotten even close to those numbers and done it well.
Regardless, I don’t think the type of player targeted by Halo Reach enjoys much above 5 v 5.
not on consoles, sure. But many PC games are well up there (battlefield 2 was 32v32 and that came out 5 years ago). But the point I was trying to make was that the original Halo game, before Bungie was bought my MS, was going to be a 40v40 open world combat game, and yet for nearly 10 years now they’ve contented themselves to a far more limited multiplayer experience (6 years if you start counting from Halo 2). Basically other games do it bigger and better, and Halo Reach is just proof (to me, anyway) that Bungie is content merely to copy what other people do and are total crap at innovation
Who wants 40 v 40? That’s waaay too much going on.
If they’re crap at innovation, they wouldn’t have the best lobby system, Saved Films, Theater, Forge, the level of customization they do have, Bungie.net, and et cetera. Sure, they’ve taken ideas from other games. Who the fuck hasn’t? They’ve just put them together and made some great games from them.
that’s where you and I disagree. I’d say they’ve put them together and made some middling games. Just a difference of opinion I suppose. But I honestly cannot understand the appeal
Tribes 1 supported 64v64, and it was a friggin blast.
holy crap was that really 12 years ago?
Again, who wants that? Hell, 8v8 is almost too big.
Bigger != better (even if the technology allows it).
I think Bungie very consciously avoids bigger matches in their Halo games. Like it or not, they have an established audience with the Halo franchise that expects (and enjoys) a particular gameplay style. Bungie can and does create permutations of that gameplay style with each new installment (dual wielding in Halo 2, equipment in Halo 3, Firefight in ODST, loadouts in Reach), but the core gameplay remains the same - and this is entirely intentional.
Halo has never been about massive armies clashing, or about Modern Warfare-style upgrade purchasing. It’s a tactical/reflex game first and foremost, very vehicle-centric compared to most FPSes, but focused primarily on one-on-one clashes and the strategy involved in that kind of battle.
It’s also very much about impact players (that is, the idea that every single player makes a large contribution to the outcome). You can’t do impact players-style gameplay with 40v40. Hell, you can barely do it with 8v8, which Halo has supported since Halo 1. There’s a reason why the 4v4 team playlists are by far the most popular in Halo multiplayer, even though Bungie has always offered an 8v8 “Big Team Battle” option, and it’s because the teams are just big enough for individual players to specialize in particular tactics (flag capture, flag defense, vehicle harassment, etc), while still small enough to feel like their personal contribution has a defining impact on who wins and who loses.
Not to say that big battles can’t be a blast - Tribes itself proves otherwise. But to say that 40v40 is necessarily superior to 4v4 is to ignore myriad aspects of gameplay that player number impacts. It’d be like saying, “Mario was fun with one player - it must be four times as fun with four players!” The Halo games are designed from the ground up as 2-16 player games, and every aspect of the multiplayer game design reflects that. You double or quadruple the number of players, and you have fundamentally changed the way the game plays.
Lastly - if Bungie makes another FPS as their hypothetical “new IP” with Activision, I wouldn’t be surprised to see them go for a bigger scale - your 40v40 scenario being one possibility. They’ve expressed similar ambitions before. But that would be because they’re not making a Halo game. It doesn’t matter than Halo 1 was conceived as a massive strategy game. What matters was that Halo 1 came out as a tactics-oriented twitch shooter, and that set the tone - and the expectations - for the rest of the series.
All multiplayer games are about teamwork and communication. Halo is certainly no exception. I’d argue that, traditionally, they’ve been amazing in this aspect, and with Reach, they’re even pushing it further towards that flavor of gameplay.
MLG, or, Major League Gaming, took the customization that Bungie allowed in Halo 2 and the expanded customization in Halo 3 and turned it into a spectator sport. This game will be huge in the competitive circles where games like Gears of War and Call of Duty wish they could be. The main reason for that is the gameplay that Halo brings to the table.
Just got on the Beta… wow, I love playing as a stalker. Reminds me of my rogue days in WoW. 
Maybe a dumb question but how do you properly assassinate someone? If I hit them from behind sometimes I get the assassin badge icon but it just says I beat them down and doesn’t do the cool little animation.
Hold the melee button down.
This download is taking forever, reminds me of being on dial up
Declan
I don’t own a 360 (though my friend does and I play Halo with him a lot, so I’ll play this eventually), so forgive my ignorance, I’m just getting some info based on the little bits I see and hear.
When I originally saw the box art/promo images, and it showed like five or six types of Spartans, I thought it would be a Team Fortress type of thing, where you could choose to be the sniper/heavy weapons guy/scout/etc…, but upon reading the short article in Wiki, is that not the case?
There are a couple different classes and each has its own power - guards have the armor lock thing where they can become invulnerable for a couple seconds, stalkers have stealth, scouts have a sprint move, and airborne units get a jetpack. It’s pretty cool. Although I hate trying to shoot while using the jetpack, since on bumper jumper layout the power is activated by the “X” button, which makes aiming with the right analog stick while holding down X very difficult. Some people seem to have mastered it though.
Not really, no. As Rigamarole said there are a couple different classes, each has a power (armor lock, stealth, sprint, jet pack) and a starting weapon, but it’s nothing like the class system in Team Fortress 2. It’s much more similar to Battlefield, where you have different classes but you can change but picking up a new kit on the battlefield. In Halo Reach you can’t change your class until you die, but you’re not stuck with the starting guns. Anyone can pick up any gun they find lying around
It’s the same as the other Halo games, except you have some loadouts that give you a perk and starting/secondary weapons and/or grenades.