The issue? Story. Or rather, Halo 5’s lack of one. Following Halo 4’s transitional tale, this is the first act of a new trilogy, but it actually feels far more slight than its predecessor. The problem is one of padding and pacing. Simply, Halo 5 makes the mistake of delivering the first act of a bigger story with no regard for functioning as a story within itself, the meaningful plot it does have really only enough to fill a single game’s first few hours. As such, the majority of its events are ultimately meaningless filler and misdirection.
That lack of consequence is the route of all of the story’s problems. By the time of the game’s climactic, heavily telegraphed events, it’s painfully apparent that the wider story would have played out the same whether or not Locke and the Chief had even got out of bed.
Fortunately, things get much better when you venture online. While the new combat mechanics rarely get a look-in due to impracticality (the dash-punch takes too long to activate, and the ground pound leaves a Spartan far too exposed in mid-air for far too long), even traditional Halo multiplayer is still a very hard experience to beat. The versatility, malleability, and sheer scalability of the core shooting just translates into so many richly varied, cerebrally satisfying situations and game-modes that there’s nigh-endless fun to be had here, whatever your preferences.
That scalability is responsible for Halo 5’s most obvious new addition. Warzone, the new 18-player team mode, is effectively Halo’s answer to Battlefield. Playing out over vast maps taking in all manner of geographical and architectural variations – and riddled with intricate, alternative routes – this is a wider, yet more purposeful, evolution of the old Big Team Battle set up, with more options, more strategy, and far more scope.
The genius of Warzone is in the sheer number of ways in which it’s possible to score points. With Spartan Kills, base capture, and AI ‘boss’ threats all on the table (with differing rewards for each) things get much more thoughtful than you’d expect. Bosses, for instance, can absorb a huge amount of damage, and take down individual Spartans in no time, requiring a fairly large, well-organised chunk of either team’s resources to kill. Pull it off though, and the scoreboard rewards are huge.
As such, the wildly varied moment-to-moment action runs in tandem with a wider meta-strategy. Do you continue to try to liberate that contested base? Or can you make more of an impact if you pull away, possibly forfeiting the installation for a chance to make a difference against that Covenant general on the beach? How’s the scoreline looking? How formidable is your team’s hardware – made up of player-selected weaponry and vehicles, furnished by unlockable, single-use REQ Cards – looking? Just what is the right thing to do, right now? Every interaction in Warzone is enjoyable, but the constant decisions over how best to maximise your immediate effectiveness make for a hell of an engaging overall experience.
