: This isn't really true. ADS is sort of a mitigation tool for thumbsticks. You
: either have a lot of auto aim like Halo traditionally, or you allow the
: player to aim down sights which decreases sensitivity and increases
: precision as a result, allowing for decreased auto aim. Not needed with a
: mouse, but helpful with sticks. This is a positive I think, because now
: instead of lots of magnetism, you can replace that with ADS and still
: require aiming precision. It's better than the alternative I feel. Unless
: you are running around with a 1 sensitivity, there is an effective
: accuracy penalty when you don't aim down sights because of the higher
: sensitivity and minimal auto aim, at least in a properly designed console
: FPS game with ADS.

Well, I don't necessarily have a problem with ADS myself, and it wasn't my intent to argue the relative merits of the mechanic. In fact, I've played a lot of games that use the system, enjoyed a couple of them even. However, it's a mechanic I feel doesn't belong in Halo. 343i is simply using the aesthetics of ADS without actually implementing the mechanical aspects of it, which usually comes in the form of slowed movement when aiming, a massive hip fire penalty, and no "de-scoping." Halo 5's pseudo-ADS simply looks unusual and out of place, even if from a gameplay perspective it's still business-as-usual.

: You're very smart and perceptive. The problem is 100% the focus on
: multiplayer. I feel like in the long run competitive (but NOT
: co-operative) Multiplayer is a dead end, and I get the sense you recognize
: that too.

I certainly hope it does become a less common occurrence in gaming. COD is the big boy on the block, but it may have passed its peak. Activision used to brag about how much they made day one or week one, but they were rather quiet this year. Perhaps their unwillingness to divulge actual numbers for Advanced Warfare indicates a series in decline. Of course, there's still Battlefield, but only the last two main series games were really huge. There's also Destiny, but I sometimes feel it would have been better if Bungie had taken the resources and manpower devoted to Crucible and applied it to making at least one more PvE area, say, Mercury, or another area on Earth. Titanfall was all MP, all the time, and the lack of story mode killed any interest I had in it; I think it did okay in sales, but the lack of a single-player offline mode may have hurt it considering that there's still a significant chunk of console owners that either never go online, or do go online but don't pay for XBL Gold/PS+. Overall, I think most games would be better served by focusing more on their campaigns.

That's not to say I think MP should go away entirely, as I've had plenty of fun playing various games with MP (Mario Kart, some fighting games, and shooters like GoldenEye, Perfect Dark, and of course Halo), but I do think the industry has put too much emphasis on it over the past generation thanks to the advent of online for consoles. Fewer games should have it (unless of course it's a genre that's inherently based on multiplayer, like vs. fighting games), and those that do have it should try to be more unique. The increasingly homogenous multiplayer scene in FPSs is something I both rue and lament, as more and more devs think going "me too" with the same movement mechanics and/or Skinner box investment systems isn't making things better for gaming. The market for fighting games became over-saturated with too many same-y games trying to copy Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter, and the genre declined in the latter half of the 90s and never recovered, remaining a niche genre today. If too many FPSs insist on having competitive MP combined with all of them being too similar mechanically, it could cause lasting damage to the genre's commercial viability. We do still get more unique, single-player-only games like Alien: Isolation, but those are few and far between, and the stereotypical "dudebro" shooters rule the day sales-wise.

: This is where I'd not worry on principle. Halo was a product of its time, and
: of what the technology was capable of at that time. Both have changed, so
: 343 should be moving on and shedding the old, not trying to recapture it.
: I have had way more fun in the Crucible than I ever could with MCC, even
: if Matchmaking were fixed.

I actually still really enjoy Halo 1's MP. It's not perfect by any means, but it's still a blast. I love its simplicity, I think it flows well and, I like how the levels look with their clean lines and lack of visual clutter, and of course it's totally unhampered by the influences of Skinner boxes and e-sports. Like The BS Police said, the original Star Wars trilogy is a product of its time. It used green-screened models, animatronics, and other effects from the late 70s & early 80s, yet while from a technical standpoint it's primitive rough around the edges it's better for it, as the prequels, despite the vastly superior technology and more complex effects, couldn't capture the same magic as the original films even ignoring the script. Likewise, though Halo has become more complex mechanically and sophisticated technically, newer games still don't quite capture the same essence that made us fall in love with Halo in the first place. As I've said in various other posts in the past, to move forward, Halo needs to take a few steps back and try a different direction. Gimmicks like dual wielding or borrowing mechanics and investment systems from other games that clash with what makes Halo Halo isn't moving the series forward. I think the best way for the franchise to progress is not through it's competitive multiplayer or core mechanics, but with level design, encounter design, and AI design in Campaign, as well as through expanding what Forge is capable of, including having Firefight Forge, if Firefight ever comes back. Imagine being able to create entire levels from scratch, including making Firefight levels and determining where enemy squads spawn, where supply drops spawn, etc.