: I speculated that it must be very, very frustrating for folks at 343 to hear
: this feedback; they must be pulling their hair out screaming "What
: more do they want?!" After all: -Competitive gamers wanted a 1-50
: ranking system, and 343 gave it to them.

Hardly. The ranking system is a complete and total joke, nowhere near as difficult to rise through as in H3, and unlike in H2 or H3, just because you lose the CSR 50 and it doesn't show anymore doesn't mean you didn't get it. The world could see what ranks you had and how high you got. 343 added these alleged ranks outside of gameplay and the game itself, only making it more of a joke. They also took about 50 years to release the CSR thing, so you can file that under too little, too late.

: -They wanted a "classic" playlist with no custom loadouts, power
: weapon ordnance drops, or random weapon spawns, and they got it.

File that under too little, too late, since it took them 50 years to do that, too.

: -They not only wanted a title update to tweak weapons, but wanted competitive
: gamers to have a direct hand in making the changes. They got it.

The weapons needed to be tweaked, yes. Then they turned the weapon tweaking into this terribly written and presented spectacle by Bravo on their updates, "tweaked" to the point of swapping which weapons are overpowered and which ones aren't, and that overall "balance" is still lacking. Some of this is my opinion, a lot of this is fact. But the main fact from the two above points still stands: it took them 50 years to do it, so too little, too late.

: -They wanted MLG players to be hired by 343, and they got it.

I'm pretty sure they didn't. The MLG people, going back to the lead-up and aftermath of Reach, have only influenced gameplay for "competitive" and "casual" players in a negative way.

: -They wanted a huge competitive Halo 4 tournament with a giant cash prize,
: and they got it.

Pretty sure they didn't want that, either. Pretty sure 343 was just doing everything they could to keep people playing their game.

: As an outsider to the MLG-type communities, it seems that 343 has bent over
: backwards and done everything they can to please competitive gamers, but
: it's still not enough for them.

: So what can they do for Halo 5 to please them? Answers like "make a
: better game" or "have better maps" aren't really helpful.
: What specifically can they do to recapture the hearts of MLG fans?

As a non-outsider to the MLG-type communities, and one who really isn't a big fan of said communities from about the middle of H3 and on, I disagree that 343 bent over backwards. Their game had (and still has) issues, and as a company who I would like to assume cares about making money, they were obligated to make changes to fix things. And they did. Over 9000 TUs and patches to fix all the things ever. I'm a competitive gamer. I rocked at H4 when it had a billion issues, and I still rock at it now that it only has a few million issues.

Unfortunately, "make a better game" and "have better maps" does still apply, because competitive gameplay doesn't do much if the maps you're playing on are god awful and don't help support competitive/casual gameplay in general. It took them months just to better color coordinate some of the maps. Yes, one can say they bent over backwards and made all these changes and fixes, but again, by the time they got around to fixing all of these named issues, how many months had passed? How many people, including myself, said forget this game and left? How many came back, like myself, put time into playing, and found that there were still many, many issues left unresolved? H4 failed. Oh well. So now, let's get to the meat of your post: Halo 5.

: Or is this simply a perception thing? Are MLG gamers looking for an attitude
: adjustment and more overt signals from 343 instead of any particular
: gameplay changes?

MLGers are part of the problem, not the solution. I think that's pretty evident based on all the hyping up MLG input and everything else leading up to H4, during H4, and 343's continuing to hire and emphasize it going forward. Watch for a repeat with H5. All the MLGs ever, give or take 2-3 prominent people, will come out talking about how it's the best game in the universe, it's so awesome, omg, Halo is back (just like Reach, and just like H4), and then drop it and bag on it like H5.

: What do you think?

Halo 5 can succeed if they maintain the strong core mechanics that H4 had. For any kind of gameplay, the core mechanics are just extremely well done. People who complain about loadouts and things, MLG people specifically, need to get their game up and stop crying. I'm sure you've heard of Schooly D. He's what one might call a competitive player. He's pretty good. You should see how with a jetpack in Reach. Maybe you've heard of NartFOpc? Give him any armor ability, he'll still kick your ass, and probably a lot of MLG peoples' asses, too. Skill is skill.

Classic gametypes are nice, yes. It's awesome being able to have those gametypes pop up. You don't go the 343 route and split playlists and make a clusterfuck or gameplay like they did in Reach (Team Slayer vs Super Slayer, etc), or have 248907262394 playlists in H4. You make a Slayer playlist. Some gametypes, like in Reach, pop up with Team Slayer Pro. Others come up with traditional gametypes. You give people the ability to, holy shit, vote none of the above instead of being forced to choose from potentially three terrible choices. Maybe people want to get their Infinity Slayer on. It'll get voted for. Maybe people want to get their Pro on. It'll get voted for. Maybe you create an MLG playlist for all those MLG people to go hide in, like in H3 and Reach. Many, many options aside from stripping all the gametypes back down to bare basics Halo because some people who are apparently good can't handle it.

You have to improve the maps. And test the maps better. You just have to. When H4 came out (and actually I played a week ago and some weapons STILL do this on some of the maps), weapons spawned inside of the ground. You couldn't pick them up. That's inexcusable. It's still happening. Quit trying to fill your maps with pointless geometry and make them pretty with epic backgrounds and whatever. Make a map that plays well and fun. Take that back to basics, not the gametypes.

Have a ranking system you can see in-game. I had to click on someone in H3 to see their actual rank, but I could also see based on the symbol beside them if they were higher up. That guy's a General? Well you know he's a 50 (unless he bought it lol). Person's a Commander? Somewhere in 35-39 range. And while H3's ranking system did have issues (primarily with "capping out" and just stalling at a certain point), for the most part it was a hugely reliable indication of skill. Not always, obviously. Over 9000 times more reliable than H4's CSR.

Fix the UI. Seriously. It's terrible. It also breaks the overall experience. When a game ends and we want to return to the pre-game lobby, if I hit B, I don't want my screen to spazz out literally for up to four minutes (that's the highest I've ever timed it going) without me being able to start a game or select a playlist or look at anything or go anywhere. Let me get back in the game as quickly as possible after backing out to pick up someone new or go to a new playlist. The UI also just looks bad and is nowhere near as easy to navigate as H2, H3, or Reach.

Fix the search parameters. It shouldn't be harder to find a game in H4 than it does in Reach or than it did in H3, and I'm talking back when H4 actually had a population for people around here to try and defend it with.

Open up the player cap in playlists. Some of these playlists make it impossible to go into anything with a large party that doesn't quite hit Big Team or exceeds 8 but may be over 10. Reach has options. This will improve ability to play with friends and people for not just competitive players, but for anyone in a group or wanting to have a good time.

Drop all of the unnecessary weapons. 343 created a billion weapons that are practically all identical. Human, Covenant, Forerunner. Half unnecessary, plenty suck, and a ton never get used (largely because 343 also doesn't like to put weapons on the map). Random weapon drop ins and whatnot also change the flow of gameplay. Much more fun when you can try and get the rockets or something else, and you know they'll be somewhere consistently. That's been largely improved in H4, but it could use a bit more improving.

That's all I got for now. I'm sure there's more, but whatever. This post was made a lot easier since you didn't ask about how else to improve H5 (like from a campaign standpoint). I think H4's campaign is its biggest screw-up. :P