Date played: November 2nd
Platform: Xbox One
Session fun rating: 10/10
After installing for what seemed like an eternity, I finally got to play Halo 5! I played the first two missions of the campaign, then spent most of my time in Arena, sprinkled with a few Warzone matches.
The campaign begins with Locke and his team of 3 spartans. As usual for this series, the story is not very well communicated, but that's ok, since the fun comes from shooting aliens. As Locke, we were tasked with rescuing Dr. Halsey, the woman who created the spartans, from the Covenant and the Forerunners.
The second mission featured Master Chief and his team of spartans. They assault a USNC ship, the Argent Moon, that was captured by the Covenant , deep in outer space somewhere. All the familiar enemies are back, including the hilarious, yet deadly grunts, the elites, the jackals, the hunters and even the brutes. Of course, Forerunners are around too and they have a few new units in their ranks. Towards the end of the level, Master Chief receives a message from Cortana, who is supposed to be dead. She tells him to save her, that she is captive on a distant planet. The team communicates this info with the UNSC, but are told to stand down. Master Chief and his friends decide to ignore the command and head out to save Cortana...
There's a lot to love in Halo 5 so far. Mechanically, many small changes make a big impact. There is now a dash move that can be used in emergencies. There's a short hover ability when aiming down sights. Oh yeah, it's possible to aim down the sights too now! It doesn't really change how the game plays, but it helps with longer range shots. Melee is stronger than before, and there's even a powerful shoulder charge move and a dive bomb move.
These changes make sense in the campaign, but they really shine in the Arena multiplayer modes. Arena is good old multiplayer Halo! People shoot at each other until one of them dies. Simple as that. I played a lot of Team Slayer, maybe 8 or 9 matches. At first, I really struggled, as expected. However, I was soon doing rather well. I wasn't at the top of the scoreboard, but I kept a positive kill/death ratio. A really cool addition to the game is that the power weapons, like rocket launchers and fuel rod guns, now spawn on a timer and in a specific spot. It's even announced to all players, making for some pretty cool battles at the weapon spawn points. So far, the maps have been lots of fun too.
Warzone is a whole different beast and honestly, I'm not really sure I like it yet... Warzone pits two large teams against each other in huge maps. There are capture points, similar to something like Battlefield. The twist is that there are AI enemies also. Both teams compete to kill the AI characters to score lots of points. There are vehicles here too, but they must be summoned with "REQ cards", a consumable. This kind sucks. Maybe in Arena capture the flag, I'll be able to drive a Warthog without using cards...
Platform: Xbox One
Session fun rating: 10/10
After installing for what seemed like an eternity, I finally got to play Halo 5! I played the first two missions of the campaign, then spent most of my time in Arena, sprinkled with a few Warzone matches.
The campaign begins with Locke and his team of 3 spartans. As usual for this series, the story is not very well communicated, but that's ok, since the fun comes from shooting aliens. As Locke, we were tasked with rescuing Dr. Halsey, the woman who created the spartans, from the Covenant and the Forerunners.
The second mission featured Master Chief and his team of spartans. They assault a USNC ship, the Argent Moon, that was captured by the Covenant , deep in outer space somewhere. All the familiar enemies are back, including the hilarious, yet deadly grunts, the elites, the jackals, the hunters and even the brutes. Of course, Forerunners are around too and they have a few new units in their ranks. Towards the end of the level, Master Chief receives a message from Cortana, who is supposed to be dead. She tells him to save her, that she is captive on a distant planet. The team communicates this info with the UNSC, but are told to stand down. Master Chief and his friends decide to ignore the command and head out to save Cortana...
There's a lot to love in Halo 5 so far. Mechanically, many small changes make a big impact. There is now a dash move that can be used in emergencies. There's a short hover ability when aiming down sights. Oh yeah, it's possible to aim down the sights too now! It doesn't really change how the game plays, but it helps with longer range shots. Melee is stronger than before, and there's even a powerful shoulder charge move and a dive bomb move.
These changes make sense in the campaign, but they really shine in the Arena multiplayer modes. Arena is good old multiplayer Halo! People shoot at each other until one of them dies. Simple as that. I played a lot of Team Slayer, maybe 8 or 9 matches. At first, I really struggled, as expected. However, I was soon doing rather well. I wasn't at the top of the scoreboard, but I kept a positive kill/death ratio. A really cool addition to the game is that the power weapons, like rocket launchers and fuel rod guns, now spawn on a timer and in a specific spot. It's even announced to all players, making for some pretty cool battles at the weapon spawn points. So far, the maps have been lots of fun too.
Warzone is a whole different beast and honestly, I'm not really sure I like it yet... Warzone pits two large teams against each other in huge maps. There are capture points, similar to something like Battlefield. The twist is that there are AI enemies also. Both teams compete to kill the AI characters to score lots of points. There are vehicles here too, but they must be summoned with "REQ cards", a consumable. This kind sucks. Maybe in Arena capture the flag, I'll be able to drive a Warthog without using cards...
