The main official tournaments will definitely stay controller focused.
As I’ve said before, without some major balancing changes Halo wouldn’t really work competitively with a mouse.
The obvious example is the sniper, however, beyond that I’d expect the best mouse players to simply hit a skill ceiling. All competitive FPS titles on PC have some means by which the accuracy of a mouse is accounted - CS has spray patterns, Quake has super fast movement and slow projectile weaponry etc.
Halo is based around perfectly accurate weapons and relatively slow movement. At the top levels I just don’t think you’d see players really miss with a mouse, it would break the game and wouldn’t be much fun to watch.
This has been a wonder of mine since I learned the next halo game is coming to PC at launch.
What I’ve always liked about Halo’s competitive scene is that it uses a controller. That gives all these people playing at homes on their consoles a chance to make it somewhere without having a beefy PC with a 144hz monitor. I do hope Infinite continues to use controllers only for their main tournaments.
Another factor in why I doubt they’ll switch to mouse is that they’d effectively alienate the entirety of the current pro scene. Halo esports has a pretty storied history, they’d be shooting themselves in the foot if they were to abandon that.
Ya I see them sticking to controller for the esports scene, partially because of this. If some big streamers are willing to learn controller for Halo 3, I’m sure some people who want to join the esports scene for Infinite will learn… which I do think going F2P will increase the esports scene big time for Halo (if it’s built well).
If they ever offer a BR mode I think it should feature ODSTs and players enter the map in drop pods with a pistol to scavenge for weapons and supplies like armor pick-ups. That way they can offer a unique take on the mode that doesn’t completely break lore.
Yeah, I prefer a deeper level of customization in my BR games, like being able to add attachments but I imagine if Halo adds a BR mode, loot would fall more in line with what we see in Fortnite where players find different variations of weapons. With an ODST focus, they can have extra guns that feature silencers and different scopes for example. Like you mentioned, health packs would also make more sense for ODSTs who can’t rely on shields for protection.
I still prefer they offer new modes that hopefully start new trends and help the game standout but if they are going to follow the BR trend there are some potential ways to handle it.
If Halo were to have a BR you’d have to spawn with a competent weapon like the Halo 5 pistol.
They should also have it such that there’s no random weapon spawning - they should spawn in predetermined locations so you can actually learn the map. If you want that rocket launcher you have to climb that specific hill and grab it right out in the open.
I wonder how well that would work in a BR mode, especially when there will likely be some sort of wall that pushes all the players closer to a central location. If the Rocket Launcher is available in a few key areas and those areas are no longer accessible, maybe they could have backup spawn locations.
Regarding the wall, it would be cool to have a cloud of flood spores closing in on the map and if you die in the outside area, you transform into a flood soldier, becoming another threat on the battlefield. The more I think about it, the more BR can actually work in the Halo universe if handled correctly.
I just hope this game will be massively successful, everything I see and hear looks very promising. Never played 120fps before so I am super looking forward to it. Also now I am 100% upgrading my TV this year! The free to play aspect is really surprising since I thought they were going to push gamepass hard with this, but I guess all those f2p battle royals are tough competition and made a good case for this model
My hype levels are through the roof. The community around this game is going to be massive considering F2P and cross platform.
I love that Halo is taking more of a platform approach with this rather than fragmenting the community with every sequel. I expect lots of updates, events, etc.
I upgraded my TV a few months ago - bring on the 120 FPS goodness.
I’ve been wanting them to make Halo mp as a platform since 3. Glad it’s finally happening. Very curious to see what update cadence they run and how the cadence’s will differ between mp and sp.