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Halo: Infinite

Dankster Morgan

It is better this way
Halo looks so good iv never been this excited for a game. So excited I’ll have time off in December to play a ton of it. I legitimately can’t come up with a complaint about halo when it comes to the impressions of the ads. 343 seem to be trying really hard to win back their reputation with the fans. I think 4 and 5 are decent games but 4 felt dumbed down in the gameplay department and needlessly copied cod. 5 is honestly really good in the multiplayer and I think would have been popular as it’s own thing, but it doesn’t play like halo, and people wanted halo, so it couldn’t retain players. Single player in 5 was trash though. Also can’t stand the way the spartan armor, elites, grunts, forerunner architecture, and most of the art style aside from the promethans themselves look. This looks like a Halo game that Bungie would have made in earth 2 where they had the technology and/or stayed with Halo. Moves it forward while still respecting the past. Don’t wanna suck this game’s dick too much because I don’t wanna be disappointed and Halo means a lot to me, so I don’t wanna feel disappointed by it a 3rd time lol.

also, DOOM horde mode dropped today, super excited to play it, and the mars core master level. World spear master level too which I’ll definitely check out but aren’t AS excited for.
 
Single player in 5 was trash though.
I really disagree with this and still don't understand why people think this. I actually just finished a playthrough of the Campaign last night, first time playing in over a year, and I had a great time. It's not the best Halo Campaign experience, but it's not the worst either, both in terms of story and gameplay.

You finally get Fred, Kelly, and Linda in game, which is huge. You have squad controls with a very nifty Star Wars: Republic Commando feel and they really are a weapon to be used and are a nice addition to the game.

The big con I found was that the squad AI could get confused pathing-wise on some of the more complex areas, and you couldn't issue any complex commands to them. So encounters that were clearly balanced for co-operative teamplay in mind (i.e. the last few Warden battles) were much harder/frustrating in single player when the squad AI just isn't up to snuff.

More refinement on that system is what the game really needed.

The inclusion of a lot of the EU lore, making it A-canon, was great too.

For DOOM: Eternal, I'm looking forward to trying out Horde Mode, hopefully tonight.
 

Dankster Morgan

It is better this way
I really disagree with this and still don't understand why people think this. I actually just finished a playthrough of the Campaign last night, first time playing in over a year, and I had a great time. It's not the best Halo Campaign experience, but it's not the worst either, both in terms of story and gameplay.

You finally get Fred, Kelly, and Linda in game, which is huge. You have squad controls with a very nifty Star Wars: Republic Commando feel and they really are a weapon to be used and are a nice addition to the game.

The big con I found was that the squad AI could get confused pathing-wise on some of the more complex areas, and you couldn't issue any complex commands to them. So encounters that were clearly balanced for co-operative teamplay in mind (i.e. the last few Warden battles) were much harder/frustrating in single player when the squad AI just isn't up to snuff.

More refinement on that system is what the game really needed.

The inclusion of a lot of the EU lore, making it A-canon, was great too.

For DOOM: Eternal, I'm looking forward to trying out Horde Mode, hopefully tonight.
I respect your opinion, and I'm actually planning on re-playing 5 before infinite comes out, so before I say this, I wanna say that I reserve the right to change my opinion on it after I replay it, and I will keep an open mind. My biggest issues with 5 pre re-playing it, and a lot of Halo fans and friends I have talked to seem to share this opinion on a few of these things, so I'm gonna lay it out in no particular order:

story:
  • spartans were too much like superheroes and didn't feel vulnerable. Even in the original trilogy when Chief did some ridiculous shit, it was either something you could see him reasonably doing, or he was struggling to pull it off. In reach you see lots of spartans die. No tension at all in 5. In reach you had Kat getting domed mid sentence because her shields were down for a second, Carter having to go down with the ship because his team would die if he didn't act immediately. It didn't need to be a massacre because Reach was about Noble dying and 5 is more lighthearted, which is fine, but there needs me to be something to make me feel fear for the heroes. No Noble team, Miranda, Sgt. Johnson, or hell even Arbiter, I legitimately thought he might die the first time I played H2. The opening of team osiris running down the mountain looked cool, but the covenant looked like a joke. Idc if it's like that in the books, I don't care to read them, it should be faithful to the tone of the game above all else. Jul Mdama getting absolutely jobbed was so funny and stupid, RIP to all the suckers who forced themselves through Halo 4 spartan ops and were expecting a payoff.
  • the marketing was incredibly misleading, watch the act man's video on it for more details, but even my 15 year old brain at the time of release was fuming.
  • the members of blue team and team osiris, basically any character that wasn't Chief, Arbiter, or Buck, only due to previous games, lacked charisma and any notable qualities. To include blue team or osiris, but not flesh them out at all is a bad move. In reach, you don't get a lot of time with noble team, but you still get a sense of who they are, the battles they have been through, and they were all still memorable in some way. I can't even picture in my head what any of those spartans aside from Chief, Locke, or Buck even LOOKED like, much less their personalities.
  • Cortana was horrendous, Chief acting like a little bitch the whole game. He should be somewhat emotional still, but he got got and looked like an absolute chump. Our hero made the wrong choices and dumb choices the entire time and ended up a clown,
  • Locke could have literally been the most badass character in the franchise if they dumped osiris team and spent the time teaching us who Locke is, some of the things he is done, maybe a flashback mission for his assassination attempt of the Arbiter. The voice actor was incredible and even with little to do, he still came off as cool. What a waste.
  • The elites and grunts are hideous, the forerunner architecture ignores what the original trilogy established as what it looked like, and honestly its pretty obvious why 343 dumped this art style.
  • This is more a personal nitpick, but I preferred Buck as an ODST. Felt like they only did this so they could have Nathan Fillion in the game, which is fine, whatever. Would have rather Osiris get dumped, and if they were insistent on it being a squad based game, have it where Alpha 9 is forced to work with Locke. Might be some actual tension between characters and make some interesting character moments.
gameplay
  • fighting the warden eternal 7 fucking times is absurd. They were so lazy they just recycled this boss fight instead of giving us different ones. We could have had something cool like playing as Locke and fighting Chief and Blue team, but instead we got a shitty cutscene where they punch each other like 90 year old men.
  • Your player health getting nuked to compensate for it being a squad game, making the most viable strategy hide behind cover and use a precision weapon, Better not wanna experiment too much. I go back to CE and I can run and gun with the AR, pick people off with the sniper, rush with the shotgun, abuse the pistol, literally use anything but the needler, and that game is old enough to buy cigarettes.
  • your squad AI and the AI in general is horrendous. The reach elites on legendary shit on anything this game has to offer.
  • lots of cannon fodder enemies that are boring to fight and suck up bullets, the encounters didn't feel as thoughtfully designed with enemy composition compared to original trilogy and reach.
Probably more, but I don't want to keep listing my complaints off and talk myself out of playing it again. I'm going to try and make myself forget all of that and just go in and see how I feel about if after a few years.
 
I respect your opinion, and I'm actually planning on re-playing 5 before infinite comes out, so before I say this, I wanna say that I reserve the right to change my opinion on it after I replay it, and I will keep an open mind. My biggest issues with 5 pre re-playing it, and a lot of Halo fans and friends I have talked to seem to share this opinion on a few of these things, so I'm gonna lay it out in no particular order:

story:
  • spartans were too much like superheroes and didn't feel vulnerable. Even in the original trilogy when Chief did some ridiculous shit, it was either something you could see him reasonably doing, or he was struggling to pull it off. In reach you see lots of spartans die. No tension at all in 5. In reach you had Kat getting domed mid sentence because her shields were down for a second, Carter having to go down with the ship because his team would die if he didn't act immediately. It didn't need to be a massacre because Reach was about Noble dying and 5 is more lighthearted, which is fine, but there needs me to be something to make me feel fear for the heroes. No Noble team, Miranda, Sgt. Johnson, or hell even Arbiter, I legitimately thought he might die the first time I played H2. The opening of team osiris running down the mountain looked cool, but the covenant looked like a joke. Idc if it's like that in the books, I don't care to read them, it should be faithful to the tone of the game above all else. Jul Mdama getting absolutely jobbed was so funny and stupid, RIP to all the suckers who forced themselves through Halo 4 spartan ops and were expecting a payoff.
  • the marketing was incredibly misleading, watch the act man's video on it for more details, but even my 15 year old brain at the time of release was fuming.
  • the members of blue team and team osiris, basically any character that wasn't Chief, Arbiter, or Buck, only due to previous games, lacked charisma and any notable qualities. To include blue team or osiris, but not flesh them out at all is a bad move. In reach, you don't get a lot of time with noble team, but you still get a sense of who they are, the battles they have been through, and they were all still memorable in some way. I can't even picture in my head what any of those spartans aside from Chief, Locke, or Buck even LOOKED like, much less their personalities.
  • Cortana was horrendous, Chief acting like a little bitch the whole game. He should be somewhat emotional still, but he got got and looked like an absolute chump. Our hero made the wrong choices and dumb choices the entire time and ended up a clown,
  • Locke could have literally been the most badass character in the franchise if they dumped osiris team and spent the time teaching us who Locke is, some of the things he is done, maybe a flashback mission for his assassination attempt of the Arbiter. The voice actor was incredible and even with little to do, he still came off as cool. What a waste.
  • The elites and grunts are hideous, the forerunner architecture ignores what the original trilogy established as what it looked like, and honestly its pretty obvious why 343 dumped this art style.
  • This is more a personal nitpick, but I preferred Buck as an ODST. Felt like they only did this so they could have Nathan Fillion in the game, which is fine, whatever. Would have rather Osiris get dumped, and if they were insistent on it being a squad based game, have it where Alpha 9 is forced to work with Locke. Might be some actual tension between characters and make some interesting character moments.
gameplay
  • fighting the warden eternal 7 fucking times is absurd. They were so lazy they just recycled this boss fight instead of giving us different ones. We could have had something cool like playing as Locke and fighting Chief and Blue team, but instead we got a shitty cutscene where they punch each other like 90 year old men.
  • Your player health getting nuked to compensate for it being a squad game, making the most viable strategy hide behind cover and use a precision weapon, Better not wanna experiment too much. I go back to CE and I can run and gun with the AR, pick people off with the sniper, rush with the shotgun, abuse the pistol, literally use anything but the needler, and that game is old enough to buy cigarettes.
  • your squad AI and the AI in general is horrendous. The reach elites on legendary shit on anything this game has to offer.
  • lots of cannon fodder enemies that are boring to fight and suck up bullets, the encounters didn't feel as thoughtfully designed with enemy composition compared to original trilogy and reach.
Probably more, but I don't want to keep listing my complaints off and talk myself out of playing it again. I'm going to try and make myself forget all of that and just go in and see how I feel about if after a few years.
I'm not crapping on your either, mind you. You like a game, or you don't, and that's cool. I'm simply pointing out I don't get most people's complaints about it. I recall we've talked about almost all of your points before as well, so instead of typing bible replies, I'll summarize rebutals for them:

- Spartan-II's are supposed to be on par with Elites, more or less, yet how many Elites has John killed? Kelly? Fred? As the fiction and franchise has gone on, it's clear Spartans are tougher than Elites by a good bit. And remember John's primary attribute for surviving what he has is "luck." That's canon. It's so ridiculous, 343 Industries created the Librarian's plan for John in Halo 4 to further justify things. So generally speaking, Spartan's are the super heroes of the Halo universe.

- False marketing was done by another Halo game first. Halo 2. You were supposed to fight and save Earth on Earth, yet you only spent two missions of the whole game there. Three if you include Cairo Station. Roughly a fifth of the game. Halo 5: Guardians' marketing was about Locke hunting John, and Fireteam Osiris did. For four missions. Slightly more than Halo 2.

- Osiris absolutely has personality, and the characters talk a lot about their pasts, where their from, relationships, motivations, etc. if you let them. You learn far more about Fireteam Osiris in game than Noble Team by a large, large margin. Noble Team are generally quite basic. They're Spartan's, they're a team that has banter, and they want to protect Reach because Covenant and Covenant are bad. That's it. Noble Six (and even the Rookie) are bland and not developed at all in-game; Locke's got far, far more personality than both of them put together. Blue Team also has talk and development, but much less so, as 343 was, it appears, relying more on EU knowledge there from fans.

- I don't see how she was horrendous; we finally got the "villain" Cortana people have been looking for and predicting since Halo 2 ended. John wasn't a "bitch" either, he just made mistakes based on attachments, emotions, and loyalty. And he did so because the Spartan-II's are, in many ways, broken and socially inept, and Cortana manipulated this in him; John actually began to realize this through the penultimate level. It was actually a very interesting character arc for him.

- See my above comments on Locke.

- This isn't the Covenant though, and these aren't the same disciplined and professional military of Elites and Grunts we fought in the original triliogy. This is Jul M'Dama's Storm Covenant, and the bulk of them came from a distant Covenant colony that hadn't even heard the Hierarchs fell. They're basically irregulars, and look "lesser" because, well, they are. Atriox, and some other Elite Commanders, enlisted/conscripted a lot of actual and proper Covenent-ex military (which is why in Halo Wars 2, the Elites and Grunts look classic-like). In the footage I've seen of Halo: Infinte so far, Grunts look like irregulars as well. I'm pretty sure I've seen a mix for the Elites, but might be wrong there.

- They were actually going to go with another character other than Buck (for the life of me I can't recall who), but switched to Buck because it's Nathan Fillion and more of a fan fav than the other character was. So yes, he was forced into things, so to speak.

- For the Warden Eternal battles, most of them are actually not bad, and he uses different abilities in different ones and the map layout and support he uses makes the engagements different. "Boss" battles are always hard though, as Hugo Martin said. People with either love them or hate them. Personally, I think every boss battle in DOOM (2016) and DOOM: Eternal is hot garbage as it forces you to abandon the general core gameplay loop. At least in Halo 5: Guardians, that's not the case.

- Since you typically get "downed" instead of killed, I actually found you had far more liberty to run around out in the open. And having a perma-Sprint as well as always having Thrusters added to this viability. At least on Heroic. Legendary was too tough for me beyond the first third of the game.

- I posted my thoughts on the AI earlier.

- I didn't see any issue with the encounters, generally, outside of the select few balance issues I mentioned earlier.

I am curious to see if your opinions change after a replay now, since I'm guessing it's been years. Let me know!


For DOOM: Eternal, I tried Horde briefly last night, and aside from me being horribly rusty (as I haven't touched the game since June), it was pretty nifty. Hard with only the Shotgun. I didn't pass the Second Arena and got a Bronze medal overall.
 

Dankster Morgan

It is better this way
I'm not crapping on your either, mind you. You like a game, or you don't, and that's cool. I'm simply pointing out I don't get most people's complaints about it. I recall we've talked about almost all of your points before as well, so instead of typing bible replies, I'll summarize rebutals for them:

- Spartan-II's are supposed to be on par with Elites, more or less, yet how many Elites has John killed? Kelly? Fred? As the fiction and franchise has gone on, it's clear Spartans are tougher than Elites by a good bit. And remember John's primary attribute for surviving what he has is "luck." That's canon. It's so ridiculous, 343 Industries created the Librarian's plan for John in Halo 4 to further justify things. So generally speaking, Spartan's are the super heroes of the Halo universe.

- False marketing was done by another Halo game first. Halo 2. You were supposed to fight and save Earth on Earth, yet you only spent two missions of the whole game there. Three if you include Cairo Station. Roughly a fifth of the game. Halo 5: Guardians' marketing was about Locke hunting John, and Fireteam Osiris did. For four missions. Slightly more than Halo 2.

- Osiris absolutely has personality, and the characters talk a lot about their pasts, where their from, relationships, motivations, etc. if you let them. You learn far more about Fireteam Osiris in game than Noble Team by a large, large margin. Noble Team are generally quite basic. They're Spartan's, they're a team that has banter, and they want to protect Reach because Covenant and Covenant are bad. That's it. Noble Six (and even the Rookie) are bland and not developed at all in-game; Locke's got far, far more personality than both of them put together. Blue Team also has talk and development, but much less so, as 343 was, it appears, relying more on EU knowledge there from fans.

- I don't see how she was horrendous; we finally got the "villain" Cortana people have been looking for and predicting since Halo 2 ended. John wasn't a "bitch" either, he just made mistakes based on attachments, emotions, and loyalty. And he did so because the Spartan-II's are, in many ways, broken and socially inept, and Cortana manipulated this in him; John actually began to realize this through the penultimate level. It was actually a very interesting character arc for him.

- See my above comments on Locke.

- This isn't the Covenant though, and these aren't the same disciplined and professional military of Elites and Grunts we fought in the original triliogy. This is Jul M'Dama's Storm Covenant, and the bulk of them came from a distant Covenant colony that hadn't even heard the Hierarchs fell. They're basically irregulars, and look "lesser" because, well, they are. Atriox, and some other Elite Commanders, enlisted/conscripted a lot of actual and proper Covenent-ex military (which is why in Halo Wars 2, the Elites and Grunts look classic-like). In the footage I've seen of Halo: Infinte so far, Grunts look like irregulars as well. I'm pretty sure I've seen a mix for the Elites, but might be wrong there.

- They were actually going to go with another character other than Buck (for the life of me I can't recall who), but switched to Buck because it's Nathan Fillion and more of a fan fav than the other character was. So yes, he was forced into things, so to speak.

- For the Warden Eternal battles, most of them are actually not bad, and he uses different abilities in different ones and the map layout and support he uses makes the engagements different. "Boss" battles are always hard though, as Hugo Martin said. People with either love them or hate them. Personally, I think every boss battle in DOOM (2016) and DOOM: Eternal is hot garbage as it forces you to abandon the general core gameplay loop. At least in Halo 5: Guardians, that's not the case.

- Since you typically get "downed" instead of killed, I actually found you had far more liberty to run around out in the open. And having a perma-Sprint as well as always having Thrusters added to this viability. At least on Heroic. Legendary was too tough for me beyond the first third of the game.

- I posted my thoughts on the AI earlier.

- I didn't see any issue with the encounters, generally, outside of the select few balance issues I mentioned earlier.

I am curious to see if your opinions change after a replay now, since I'm guessing it's been years. Let me know!


For DOOM: Eternal, I tried Horde briefly last night, and aside from me being horribly rusty (as I haven't touched the game since June), it was pretty nifty. Hard with only the Shotgun. I didn't pass the Second Arena and got a Bronze medal overall.
Definitely excited to replay it, I for sure want my mind to be changed, I love halo. Will keep you posted, and will go in with an open mind about Osiris team, Cortana, John’s decision making, and all of that. One thing about the Spartans vs Elites though, I don’t necessarily agree that the Spartans are always much stronger than elites. John and blue team, noble team members, Jerome, Locke, etc are outliers for how powerful and capable Spartans are. Noble was all Spartan 3 minus Jorge, but they had access to Mjolnir armor and generally survived a lot of crazy stuff. Carter, 6, Kat, and obviously Jorge probably being the best examples. All these guys have killed hundreds of elites. Then on the flip side, there are elites like the Thel Vadame Arbiter who would stack up quite well against the majority of the Spartans. Jul was built up to be a threat, but ended up being a joke. Atriox was such a good villain for a lot of reasons, one of them being the terrifying first impression of straight up toying with spartan red team. If there is no way that Jul could even touch Locke, much less hurt him, why should I bother getting invested in this part of the story?The beginning of Halo 5 feels a bit insane to me, just not even looking grounded at all like Halo used to be, looked like the opening of the avengers.

I gotta say you’re absolutely right about Halo 2 also having false marketing. I was however 4 in 2004, so I never got burned by it, where as in 2015 I was old enough to feel cheated, so that is my personal experience and bias creeping in to make me forgive Halo 2. However, two wrongs don’t make a right, was a scummy move in both games.

I think warden was a good fight, but not good enough for 7 times. I like the DE bosses except the dark lord is super anti climactic. Kahn Maykr and Seraphim being highlights to me, emphasizing movement, situational awareness, and quick reflexes like Doom at its best.
 
When you do replay it, let me know all your thoughts. And take your time when looking for collectibles and such, giving your squad mates time to talk. You'll hear some cool stuff.

Jul was, for the games, a wasted opportunity. He has a very brief appearance in Halo 4, kneeling to the Didact when he first emerges from his Cryptum, and otherwise, you don't see him until Halo: Spartan Ops. He plays a big role there, and he also does a lot of stuff in the novels and comics. I was surprised they nixed him so quickly in Halo 5: Guardians because he would have served as a good secondary antagonist. The Storm Covenant became pretty faceless pretty quick. Honestly, I felt the Didact should have been kept around, since he'd have made an interesting re-occurring antagonist. He even survived Halo 4, but was killed in comics...

Atriox is excellent, I actually just started another Halo Wars 2 playthrough the other day.

And new Halo: Infinite trailer:
 
With Halo: Infinite just over a month away, I figured I'd make a thread for it since there are several Halo fans here on TestYourMight. The thread can also be used for other Halo talk as well, of course.

@RoboCop If you are able to pull our Halo posts out of the DOOM: Eternal thread and merge them here, that'd be great. If not or if it's too much of a hassle, no worries.
 
@Dankster Morgan You mentioned in our private discussion that you saw Locke's helmet with Escharum. Can you link to that, by chance? I looked and couldn't find it.

Related though, I found out that J.D., otherwise known as "The Rookie," is dead. He was executed by an insurrectionist leader in one of the novels. Mickey tried to save him but failed, and this event twisted Mickey, where he blamed the UNSC for sending them after humans as opposed to aliens. He eventually betrays the UNSC and helps the rebels, but gets arrested.

Prior to that but after J.D.'s death, Dutch retires, and Buck, Romeo, and Mickey accept an offer to be augmented and become Spartan IV's. Mickey is arrested as a IV. During the Reclamation though, Buck ends up working with Mickey again, he's released from prison, and they all make amends.


Also, on your point about Thel's height, keep in mind in Halo 2 and Halo 3 that Sanghelli are hunched by balance design, they were taller in Halo: Combat Evolved and again in Halo: Reach when Bungie was satisfied tech-wise they could go back to that and not mess up balance. So seeing Thel much taller in Halo 5: Guardians is his proper, non-hunched height.
 

Dankster Morgan

It is better this way
Ah, interesting! Reading the character's page on the wiki, it mentions it's the same armour variant that Locke uses, but not that it's specifically his. Be interesting to see if that's the case!
True, it could just be any generic Spartan 4, and Brutes would definitely be one’s to take trophies, but taking out a higher tier Spartan like Locke could be what got Hyperius at the level to a part of the hand of Atriox. So long as they don’t do something awful like kill him off screen I’m good.
 
True, it could just be any generic Spartan 4, and Brutes would definitely be one’s to take trophies, but taking out a higher tier Spartan like Locke could be what got Hyperius at the level to a part of the hand of Atriox. So long as they don’t do something awful like kill him off screen I’m good.
Brutes absolutely would take trophies.

I loved in Halo 2 how after the Great Schizm started, Tartarus had an Elite skull on his shoulder pad.
 

Dankster Morgan

It is better this way
Brutes absolutely would take trophies.

I loved in Halo 2 how after the Great Schizm started, Tartarus had an Elite skull on his shoulder pad.
Tartarus was such a good villain, I think they killed him too early, I would have liked to see him escape and have Arbiter finish him in 3. 3 was really lacking a physical threat equal to Chief or Arbiter. Which is another reason I'm excited for Infinite and the Hand of Atriox, and hopefully Atriox himself. Looks like 343 is leaning back into boss fights. Jega 'Rdomnai, the elite with the red energy sword and shield from the campaign overview that is famous for being a Spartan killer is probably going to be very fast and mobile, with good defense, and presumably doing a one hit kill up close, meaning you will need to capitalize on openings with quick reflexes. Not at all unlike the Doom Eternal Marauders ideally, he even looks like them too aesthetically. Hyperius (whose necklace is apparently made of Spartan FINGERS - yikes) has his gravity hammer and a jump pack, could be like a buffed up version of the brute jumpers in Halo 3. Escharum has his gravity axe, which we hopefully get to use at least in the campaign. I'm not sure who else is part of the hand.

I'm hypothesizing that Atriox will return later in the game and not be pleased with Escharum. Atriox is more purposeful in his killing, and doesn't see the point in genocide. He certainly doesn't hate humans with the same passion as Escharum seems to, even having human members of the Banished. With Atriox away from the galaxy at the Arc, Escharum has seemingly started killing any and all humans he can. I'm thinking Atriox will come back from the Arc to the Milky Way, kill Escharum for going against his principles, but now be stuck fighting Master Chief and the humans for Zeta Halo, and take over as the villain, and now see fighting the UNSC as necessary due to the damage Chief will have done to the Banished during the campaign. I think that Escharum presumes Atriox to be dead, as he in some of the trailers speaks of Atriox in the past tense, and uses Atriox's supposed death to hype up the Banished that are in the Milky Way to go after the UNSC and Zeta Halo full force, as Escharum is more violent for the sake of it, and loves battle.
 
Tartarus was such a good villain, I think they killed him too early, I would have liked to see him escape and have Arbiter finish him in 3. 3 was really lacking a physical threat equal to Chief or Arbiter. Which is another reason I'm excited for Infinite and the Hand of Atriox, and hopefully Atriox himself. Looks like 343 is leaning back into boss fights. Jega 'Rdomnai, the elite with the red energy sword and shield from the campaign overview that is famous for being a Spartan killer is probably going to be very fast and mobile, with good defense, and presumably doing a one hit kill up close, meaning you will need to capitalize on openings with quick reflexes. Not at all unlike the Doom Eternal Marauders ideally, he even looks like them too aesthetically. Hyperius (whose necklace is apparently made of Spartan FINGERS - yikes) has his gravity hammer and a jump pack, could be like a buffed up version of the brute jumpers in Halo 3. Escharum has his gravity axe, which we hopefully get to use at least in the campaign. I'm not sure who else is part of the hand.

I'm hypothesizing that Atriox will return later in the game and not be pleased with Escharum. Atriox is more purposeful in his killing, and doesn't see the point in genocide. He certainly doesn't hate humans with the same passion as Escharum seems to, even having human members of the Banished. With Atriox away from the galaxy at the Arc, Escharum has seemingly started killing any and all humans he can. I'm thinking Atriox will come back from the Arc to the Milky Way, kill Escharum for going against his principles, but now be stuck fighting Master Chief and the humans for Zeta Halo, and take over as the villain, and now see fighting the UNSC as necessary due to the damage Chief will have done to the Banished during the campaign. I think that Escharum presumes Atriox to be dead, as he in some of the trailers speaks of Atriox in the past tense, and uses Atriox's supposed death to hype up the Banished that are in the Milky Way to go after the UNSC and Zeta Halo full force, as Escharum is more violent for the sake of it, and loves battle.
I'm indeed expecting boss battles in the game, and as a whole, I've felt the Reclaimer trilogy of the series has lacked a good, central villain. Didact himself would have fit the role had they not nixed him.

Curious, what humans are allied with the Banished? In the EU, Atriox did seem to have a thing against humans, though the reasoning for it was never properly explained. During the events of Halo Wars 2, there were also no Jackals in the Banished, which I found odd.

They seem to be present in Halo Infinite though.
 

Dankster Morgan

It is better this way
I'm indeed expecting boss battles in the game, and as a whole, I've felt the Reclaimer trilogy of the series has lacked a good, central villain. Didact himself would have fit the role had they not nixed him.

Curious, what humans are allied with the Banished? In the EU, Atriox did seem to have a thing against humans, though the reasoning for it was never properly explained. During the events of Halo Wars 2, there were also no Jackals in the Banished, which I found odd.

They seem to be present in Halo Infinite though.
I swear I read about human Banished somewhere, I’ll have to find it. Atriox definitely doesn’t like humans, but during his time in the Covenant he saw the attacks on humans for no greater purpose as a waste of Brute lives. I would imagine he’d feel the same about using Banished resources to aim for genocide. Not sure why there were no Jackals in HW2, he must have thought he didn’t need them at the arc. Would like to see Jerome back with Mark VII armor to really give him a fair shot.
 
I swear I read about human Banished somewhere, I’ll have to find it. Atriox definitely doesn’t like humans, but during his time in the Covenant he saw the attacks on humans for no greater purpose as a waste of Brute lives. I would imagine he’d feel the same about using Banished resources to aim for genocide. Not sure why there were no Jackals in HW2, he must have thought he didn’t need them at the arc. Would like to see Jerome back with Mark VII armor to really give him a fair shot.
Yeah, as I recall, he read into "The Great Journey" being BS pretty quick, and thus though everything the Covenant was doing was a waste.

For Halo Wars 2, my guess is more gameplay oriented. Instead of Jackal Marksman (with Carbines, could be upgraded to Beam Rifles), which were in Halo Wars, the Banished had Elite Rangers (with Carbines) instead. There were less Elites overall, so I think they wanted to focus on them more since the Ship Masters merc force was a big part of Atriox's fleet.
 
Another live ad, this one focusing on the the creation of the grappling hook:


These ads remind me of the live advertisements that were done for Halo 3, Halo 3: ODST, and Halo: Reach. I think Halo 4 had one or two as well.
 

Dankster Morgan

It is better this way
Did you see the IGN gameplay that people have been making fun of? I usually won’t criticize someone for being bad at a game, but I will for being bad at their job. When you’re a company who is showcasing arguably the most anticipated game release of the year, and don’t get someone who can operate a controller, that’s unprofessional as fuck. And also pretty funny. If I was 343, I wouldn’t be happy that this:
is how my game was being promoted. Hopefully whenever played this game isn’t the one to review it, this is absurd. We don’t need Olympic level halo players, but someone that can at least come out on top vs the fucking bots more often than not?
 

Dankster Morgan

It is better this way
@Dankster Morgan IGN has been a poor publication for years now though, and it's well known. They did the same thing with DOOM: Eternal, and are still made fun of for it.
It’s fucking embarrassing, like some of these game journalists are horrendous. 343 should just hire the act man and give him an early copy of Infinite because he actually understands and loves the games, and is good at them.
Also, you should check out his halo CE no deaths legendary run. Iv been using some of the strategies to do a no death run on halo CE myself before infinite comes out (but on heroic haha I can’t handle the legendary stress). Aside from rocket launcher flood, and the part in Truth and Reconciliation where Captain Keyes can be killed and cause you to fail the mission, it is such a fair game on any difficulty. It’s simple to play but so deep and engaging to try and figure out how to tackle the combat puzzle. I love CE more every time I play it, I hope Infinite can capture that.