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A Halogaf Community Thread: The Old Becomes New

I've just completed Halo Infinite and the campaign was absolutely brilliant, minus the open world elements. Did not care for that at the slightest and it felt tacked on in the same way Ubisoft games artificially add pointless shit for the sake of it. Final boss battle was really shit though. Felt unfair with waves of enemies and her tracking balls that follow you.

I take it the planned 'Endless' DLC is canned?

I'm also curious why they've switched from their current engine to Unreal Engine. Halo Infinite actually looks pretty sharp. The graphical effects are really good. The art style is also beautiful. I was so impressed at how pretty everything looked.

K6PUOoV.png
I don't believe it had to do with the capabilities of the engine. From everything that we have heard it sounds more like it was just a highly difficult engine to work with, to the point that every aspect of development was taking exponentially too long.

EDIT: Are they still planning to release DLC? I thought it was all scrapped lol.
 
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I've just completed Halo Infinite and the campaign was absolutely brilliant, minus the open world elements. Did not care for that at the slightest and it felt tacked on in the same way Ubisoft games artificially add pointless shit for the sake of it. Final boss battle was really shit though. Felt unfair with waves of enemies and her tracking balls that follow you.

I take it the planned 'Endless' DLC is canned?

I'm also curious why they've switched from their current engine to Unreal Engine. Halo Infinite actually looks pretty sharp. The graphical effects are really good. The art style is also beautiful. I was so impressed at how pretty everything looked.

K6PUOoV.png

The campaign was fun for the first third/half and then got repetitive and boring. The speeches, oh the speeches. I hated the story of Infinite, another reset and non-delivery. Please just forget the Banished already. Atriox is awesome, what's his face from Infinite was whatever.

The graphics at demo AND launch were nowhere near the current state. I went back end of last year with a buddy to play coop and the love plus detail that has been put into Infinite's campaign is striking between my launch solo playthrough and coop about 3 months ago. How 343 haven't put out marketing, ViDoc, social media, Waypoint articles etc or even a before and after type presentation is beyond me. It's night and day, seriously.

Another aspect of a huge enjoyment with our coop, me and one buddy, was the sheer fun of the outdoor open world stuff. We were loading up hogs and weird marine weapons while one of us went on foot and long ranged the big enemies and the motorised UNSC death hog cleaned house. By corridor 3 of the "story/missions" were just blasted through those, the setups in the big rooms, mini bosses and waves of enemies were awesome and really sing like Halo 2. Some of the fixed tunnels to get there fall well short of say CE experiences like the two bridges and tunnels etc.

I don't believe it had to do with the capabilities of the engine. From everything that we have heard it sounds more like it was just a highly difficult engine to work with, to the point that every aspect of development was taking exponentially too long.

EDIT: Are they still planning to release DLC? I thought it was all scrapped lol.

Armchair opinion inbound - there is no way SlipSpace was built from the ground up as a new engine, it's just engine modules being refactored mostly from what I can tell. I know engines/frameworks etc all have things to keep and retain that "Halo look and feel" but this SlipSpace was one of the worst things MS/Xbox allowed 343 to attempt, especially after MCC. Had Infinite started with Unreal 6+ years ago imagine where the show and game would be now. Mandalorian levels would not be out of the question for the show. Hogwarts IQ, world building and attention to detail would not be out of the question. Shame.

Campaign DLC has been cut, no go captain. The next Halo absolutely, categorically must have PvE. You want big numbers, GaaS, Azure backend....Cortana replies with 3 letters on repeat...PvE.
 
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Armchair opinion inbound - there is no way SlipSpace was built from the ground up as a new engine, it's just engine modules being refactored mostly from what I can tell. I know engines/frameworks etc all have things to keep and retain that "Halo look and feel" but this SlipSpace was one of the worst things MS/Xbox allowed 343 to attempt, especially after MCC. Had Infinite started with Unreal 6+ years ago imagine where the show and game would be now. Mandalorian levels would not be out of the question for the show. Hogwarts IQ, world building and attention to detail would not be out of the question. Shame.

Campaign DLC has been cut, no go captain. The next Halo absolutely, categorically must have PvE. You want big numbers, GaaS, Azure backend....Cortana replies with 3 letters on repeat...PvE.
I agree with you 100%. I can't even imagine where Halo would be right now if 343 had just gone with Unreal from the start of Infinite's development. It's depressing to even think about what could have been.
 
But wait, there's more! lol. So one of the leaked maps, while it isn't covenant, at least it has purple in it. I like the look.

Uhhh... they removed the video. So, I'll post another one!
 
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Dang I keep waiting for Ozzy to come back from his ban. I'd be surprised if it was a permaban but I don't think there is any way to know.
Sad Arrested Development GIF


Mint Blitz occasionally puts out a vid focusing on the negatives of Halo Infinite. Theater. That it hasn't been fixed yet is just sad.
 

Naked Lunch

Member
New update is pretty cool. Lots of polish. From the menus to the post game screens - loading screens - just all around. Should have been there from the beginning but what you gonna do.

Im not sure why or how - but the whole gameplay feels slightly different. Maybe they adjusted hit detection a bit. Things definately have a different feel. I havent read into the patch notes at all yet.

The cliffside snow map is great.
Kinda hate the forerunner narrow hallway map. Plays so weird not very Halo-like but variety is good and I bet there are fans of it out there.
November's 2 forge maps are still the best in the game.
Didnt play the new BTB map yet.
DMR is gonna take some getting used to - has potential.
Not sure what kinda loadout one slayer variant was, but you started with an AR and the BR was secondary - that was strange.

They changed 2 of the armor colors I paid real money for which is shady as hell. (Red Scarlet for Mark V and VII).

It seems the performance of adjusting your armor sets has dropped - seems choppy and laggy. Im guessing this is Ray tracing activated. If this is what ray tracing is I dont like it - looks cheap and crap too - like everyone has 3 point lighting facing perfectly at them. Another gaming buzz word that amounts to pointless nothing.

Next step is to put way way more forge maps in playlists and I want to see a CTF only playlist.

Dang I keep waiting for Ozzy to come back from his ban. I'd be surprised if it was a permaban but I don't think there is any way to know.
Sad Arrested Development GIF
Theres a 'bans' tab at the bottom of this forum - which give you the details on people's bans.
 
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New update is pretty cool. Lots of polish. From the menus to the post game screens - loading screens - just all around. Should have been there from the beginning but what you gonna do.

Im not sure why or how - but the whole gameplay feels slightly different. Maybe they adjusted hit detection a bit. Things definately have a different feel. I havent read into the patch notes at all yet.

The cliffside snow map is great.
Kinda hate the forerunner narrow hallway map. Plays so weird not very Halo-like but variety is good and I bet there are fans of it out there.
November's 2 forge maps are still the best in the game.
Didnt play the new BTB map yet.
DMR is gonna take some getting used to - has potential.
Not sure what kinda loadout one slayer variant was, but you started with an AR and the BR was secondary - that was strange.

They changed 2 of the armor colors I paid real money for which is shady as hell. (Red Scarlet for Mark V and VII).

It seems the performance of adjusting your armor sets has dropped - seems choppy and laggy. Im guessing this is Ray tracing activated. If this is what ray tracing is I dont like it - looks cheap and crap too - like everyone has 3 point lighting facing perfectly at them. Another gaming buzz word that amounts to pointless nothing.

Next step is to put way way more forge maps in playlists and I want to see a CTF only playlist.


Theres a 'bans' tab at the bottom of this forum - which give you the details on people's bans.
It's great hearing your thoughts on the update! 343 needs to keep pumping more maps (forge/dev-made/either one) into the game. I think it could make a bit of revival if they are regularly implemented.

Also, how did I not know about the ban's tab!? Thanks for letting me know lol. March 14th!

Come on back Ozzy! He was fighting against the anti-Xbox crowd pretty hard there for a little while. Probably had something to do with that.
No doubt.
 
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Naked Lunch

Member
Im wondering if the new update put in some kind of memory leak - maybe with displaying different armor sets?
I was playing for a while yesterday then the game kinda froze up in BTB for a few seconds. Ever since that happened - everytime I got near other players - they were glitching all over the place in every match. I did a reboot of my game and console and it went away. I was reading similar stuff on reddit.
 

Naked Lunch

Member
The noobs have returned to Infinite in spades.
I posted a 29-7 game in 4v4 slayer. Felt good and was hilarious.

The thing is I could have played even better - not using all the equipment at my disposal at all times (reflecting rockets back for one) and effing up some shots - but thats the beauty of Halo in general - that skill ceiling is so high - theres always something to reach for - and even after 20 years of playing - still room to get even better.
 
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Dutchy

Member
- theres always something to reach for - and even after 20 years of playing - still room to get even better.
I would say this is true for Halo 2 and Halo 3 but Halo Infinite's sandbox and physics leave a lot to be desired. Definitely the most linear and play-by-the-rules Halo multiplayer we've had so far. Arguebly the lowest skill ceiling if you take into account the absurd auto-aim and hitboxes.

I hit my first 4v4 killionaire in week 2. Something that took me 5+ years on Halo 3.
 

Naked Lunch

Member
I would say this is true for Halo 2 and Halo 3 but Halo Infinite's sandbox and physics leave a lot to be desired. Definitely the most linear and play-by-the-rules Halo multiplayer we've had so far. Arguebly the lowest skill ceiling if you take into account the absurd auto-aim and hitboxes.

I hit my first 4v4 killionaire in week 2. Something that took me 5+ years on Halo 3.
Ill just say I disagree. For one, with Infinite having a very popular launch and it being free to play - there were the most clueless noobs in franchise history at launch - that probably explains the week 2 killionaire.

I put Infinite in the ball park of H2 and 3 - its certainly the closest the series has been since then. Halo 4 was the bad apple 'linear play by the rules' Halo as you say.
Not sure how much youve played in the past 6 months or so but the hitboxes on BR headshots have been adjusted slightly since launch - they arent quite gimmies anymore.

I dont really get the auto aim beef either - I cant snipe for crap in Infinite, the commando is hard to aim - keeping the pistol on target for all its required shots isnt that easy either.
All Halo games have varying degrees of aim assist - H2 had major sticky aim assist magnetism.

I still say Infinite takes skill to play - my more novice friends who watch recorded clips of mine says it looks like im playing a different game than them. And Im only decent at best - ive played some people where I literally can do nothing against. There are levels/skill gaps - the way the series has always been. Its why I still play Halo.
 
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Dutchy

Member
Ill just say I disagree. For one, with Infinite having a very popular launch and it being free to play - there were the most clueless noobs in franchise history at launch - that probably explains the week 2 killionaire.

I got one on a BTB map I had never played before a week ago. I'm telling you man shit's not coincidental. It's either the spawns or the map design in general. And of course the ever-extending multikill timer plays a role as well. Spartan abilities like the grapple are cheap ways to gain instant verticality too.

I put Infinite in the ball park of H2 and 3 - its certainly the closest the series has been since then. Halo 4 was the bad apple 'linear play by the rules' Halo as you say.

I agree Halo 4 was the worst offender if you exclude the rng elements.

Not sure how much youve played in the past 6 months or so but the hitboxes on BR headshots have been adjusted slightly since launch - they arent quite gimmies anymore.
Not a whole lot. Maybe 16-24 hours. Most of it being in the past week(s) though.
I dont really get the auto aim beef either - I cant snipe for crap in Infinite, the commando is hard to aim - keeping the pistol on target for all its required shots isnt that easy either.
All Halo games have varying degrees of aim assist - H2 had major sticky aim assist magnetism.

Could be your controller settings maybe? I'm literally glued to whatever target I'm shooting at with the exception of maybe the unsc sniper rifle. Personally I had to tweak my settings a lot.

Not sure how you can say that about Halo 2 though as it's still being heralded as the most competitively sound and fun game we've had. People are *still* raising the skill ceiling on that game by finding entirely new jumps, button combo's and auto-reload glitches that are incredibly difficult to pull off.

ive played some people where I literally can do nothing against. There are levels/skill gaps - the way the series has always been. Its why I still play Halo.

You're going to find those in every game. Not to mention Infinite has the worst MMR out of all of that so you're going to be on the receiving end if you're even a smidge above average.

These are the messages I got in my last session playing with my own novice friends rofl

6fbfmxh.png
 

Naked Lunch

Member
Not sure how you can say that about Halo 2 though as it's still being heralded as the most competitively sound and fun game we've had. People are *still* raising the skill ceiling on that game by finding entirely new jumps, button combo's and auto-reload glitches that are incredibly difficult to pull off.

These are the messages I got in my last session playing with my own novice friends rofl
Appreciate the response. Ill just say I agree with your H2 statement - my point was all the Halo games have sticky aim assist, even the great H2 and 3 - to act like they do not is just false.

The fact that you are getting all those messages kinda proves my point too - youre obviously on that higher skill echelon that people are going out of their way to send you messages. Thats just not common. It proves that you can play Infinite with skill as you are doing it enough to piss people off.

Look, Infinite is not on the level of H2 or 3 - its quite a few steps down. It plays a bit too fast for my liking - I still hate sprint to death. I hate how people bob up and down, quick duck and shoot in firefights. BTB is a chaotic mess with zero flow. Something about combat is rigid and narrow - hard to describe - but after 10+ years of Reach, 4, and 5 - Infinite is still the closest the series has been to H2 and 3 in my opinion.
 

dem

Member
Tried out the new update after taking a long break from Halo.

Still super disappointed in this game. Why does it take so freaking long to load into an 8 player game? It's insane.

Why do I need to search for a new game after every match? Why is the stupid bug where you can't actually cancel a game search still happening?

Infuriating quality of life shit.
The amount of times I have to kill the game and reopen it because shit isn't working is fucking INSANE.
 
Had to reinstall MCC, even though I know it's USA centric. How I want a great Halo game with an Aussie population.

Anyhow on to a clip from my first or second game back on, social and another esports forge fest, I just went run and gun to get it over-kill with.

 
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Naked Lunch

Member
Ive generally been pretty positive about Infinite over its lifespan despite its many issues - but Big Team Battle in Halo Infinite is pure trash.
It just doesnt play as it should - too fast, too wacky, complete chaotic nonsense.
Zero flow. Zero strategy. I actually hate it.
Which is a shame because I pretty much solely played BTB in Halo 2 and 3. 4v4 back then was just for warm ups for us.

Infinite's only playable mode is 4v4 arena imo - its night and day.
 

Lasha

Member
Ive generally been pretty positive about Infinite over its lifespan despite its many issues - but Big Team Battle in Halo Infinite is pure trash.
It just doesnt play as it should - too fast, too wacky, complete chaotic nonsense.
Zero flow. Zero strategy. I actually hate it.
Which is a shame because I pretty much solely played BTB in Halo 2 and 3. 4v4 back then was just for warm ups for us.

Infinite's only playable mode is 4v4 arena imo - its night and day.

I'm dying on the current featured mode. Playing BTB without objectives is so annoying. The maps are way too big to make team slayer fun. Escalation flows pretty poorly. Team fiesta is too weird. Zones are the best mode but I really just want simple two flag ctf.
 

Naked Lunch

Member
I'm dying on the current featured mode. Playing BTB without objectives is so annoying. The maps are way too big to make team slayer fun. Escalation flows pretty poorly. Team fiesta is too weird. Zones are the best mode but I really just want simple two flag ctf.
I hear you there.
BTB CTF is the best thing about Halo mp series as a whole imo - but even back when Bungie made the Halo games it still rarely came up in matchmaking.
Our crew used to hope and pray BTB 2 Flag CTF would come up - sometimes playing days at a time never seeing it - dating back to the Halo 2 days.

Even in the MCC I think CTF is lumped in with other modes in the composer selector tool.
No sense there has really never been a BTB CTF playlist - outside of a handful of CTF only weekends on like Halo 3.

There nothing cooler and more fun than escaping the enemy base with the flag and getting picked up by a friendly warthog in pretty much all of multiplayer gaming.
 
Halo 2 ranked clan BTB playlist with just bomb and flag games was the best Halo ever was. Period.

Pity it was only around for the early days of Halo 2 XBL. It was a thing of beauty and I still have life long friends from that game and playlist. Going in a 2 or 3 man stealth run to counter cap or win a 2 bomb game on waterworks was something else.
 
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Lasha

Member
I hear you there.
BTB CTF is the best thing about Halo mp series as a whole imo - but even back when Bungie made the Halo games it still rarely came up in matchmaking.
Our crew used to hope and pray BTB 2 Flag CTF would come up - sometimes playing days at a time never seeing it - dating back to the Halo 2 days.

Even in the MCC I think CTF is lumped in with other modes in the composer selector tool.
No sense there has really never been a BTB CTF playlist - outside of a handful of CTF only weekends on like Halo 3.

There nothing cooler and more fun than escaping the enemy base with the flag and getting picked up by a friendly warthog in pretty much all of multiplayer gaming.

I would be happy with 8v8 blood gulch 25x8
 

MadPanda

Banned
Why, why can't they fix reconnection in this game. Quick resume and halo infinite is an awful combination. I always have to manually quit the game, suffer through unskipable intros, skip new season cinematics (why can't this game remember I watched them numerous times and stop bothering me?) and then search for a game. Today I just gave up on that ordeal and went to battlefield 2042.
 
Why, why can't they fix reconnection in this game. Quick resume and halo infinite is an awful combination. I always have to manually quit the game, suffer through unskipable intros, skip new season cinematics (why can't this game remember I watched them numerous times and stop bothering me?) and then search for a game. Today I just gave up on that ordeal and went to battlefield 2042.

I have to agree, it's the same with MCC, to a lesser extent though. You have to quit the build and restart, even sometimes when you menu > quit quick resume the option isn't there and then boom load it up and icon in the top right so you quit anyways. I wish they'd let us choose quick resume toggles per game for on or off. I love the idea of quick resume for single player but it's a tragic mess for multiplayer games like Infinite, MCC or even Apex Legends all the same. They really need to detect quick resume and refresh the network/player state or whatever. It doesn't even seem to be a difficult fix really e.g. load the engine, refresh the local player and server side.

Also, I was away this weekend and came back online Sunday night for a little MCC action. Boot that baby up and boom right back at it.

Skip to 1.35 for a nice little opener on Epitaph.

 
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Bubble/shotty/melee at the end didn't work and I lost my perfection run. Bummer, I was in the zone, but the competition wasn't much chop. Also Blackout sucks compared to Lockout or Lockdown, why does it come up so often in the MM pools?

 
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stickkidsam

Member
This really put Halo Infinite's polish in perspective for me.
Infinite feels like playing in a plastic toy set with nice wallpaper. It looks neat, but there's no actual depth.

A grenade hits the sand as if it were concrete.
Footprints (and tracks) are the same sticker on every surface.
Vehicles feel weightless... I mean physics in general are weak. Though I've heard that's partly net code problem?

It's so many little things that make a huge difference. I mean god damn, look at this!
 
Hard to believe that this thread has been quiet since April. That's how defeated Halo fans have been regarding Halo Infinite. I've taken a break, perhaps indefinitely. That's mainly because I get too angry when I play. However, I think there's always hope and some recent things moving in the right direction at least. I just watched the latest video from Mint Blitz and I like a lot of the season 4 news. 343 is gonna need some massive hype to bring Halo Infinite back to center stage, but it's still possible with a battle royale mode (some day?) and continued improvements to the game. If 343 could release a free map pack that included at least 5 new maps (preferably more), that would be a great jump start to get the blood flowing again. Eh but at this point it's so hard to even try to get hopes up.

 

stickkidsam

Member
Hard to believe that this thread has been quiet since April. That's how defeated Halo fans have been regarding Halo Infinite. I've taken a break, perhaps indefinitely. That's mainly because I get too angry when I play. However, I think there's always hope and some recent things moving in the right direction at least. I just watched the latest video from Mint Blitz and I like a lot of the season 4 news. 343 is gonna need some massive hype to bring Halo Infinite back to center stage, but it's still possible with a battle royale mode (some day?) and continued improvements to the game. If 343 could release a free map pack that included at least 5 new maps (preferably more), that would be a great jump start to get the blood flowing again. Eh but at this point it's so hard to even try to get hopes up.


Halo is in a worse spot now than ever, but at least we still have the MCC. Now if only INVASION wasn’t in the freakin’ ranked playlist lol

I think the only thing that can bring the hype back is a new project announcement. I think Infinite just has too many thing fundamentally built into it to get it to the right place. At least for me. Everything from the customization to gameplay to social features is just going to take too long for them to fix at this rate, and that’s assuming they even will prioritize those changes. Not to be downer or anything.

That said, any of you guys still hop on the MCC or 5 these days?

Edit:

Wait Ozzy got banned?? When did that happen?
 
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Halo is in a worse spot now than ever, but at least we still have the MCC. Now if only INVASION wasn’t in the freakin’ ranked playlist lol

I think the only thing that can bring the hype back is a new project announcement. I think Infinite just has too many thing fundamentally built into it to get it to the right place. At least for me. Everything from the customization to gameplay to social features is just going to take too long for them to fix at this rate, and that’s assuming they even will prioritize those changes. Not to be downer or anything.

That said, any of you guys still hop on the MCC or 5 these days?

Edit:

Wait Ozzy got banned?? When did that happen?
Yeah I saw the ban too but haven't frequented this thread enough to have any idea of when that happened. I think at some point Infinite could still be really good. It feels great to play if they could get all the other issues fixed. I still stand by my previous opinion that the lack of new and varied maps is the biggest offender. They are releasing new maps at a snail pace. It's no wonder people got bored of the game. And the new ones are all more industrial complex style maps or made in forge. Yay...
 

Havoc2049

Member
Halo is in a worse spot now than ever, but at least we still have the MCC. Now if only INVASION wasn’t in the freakin’ ranked playlist lol

I think the only thing that can bring the hype back is a new project announcement. I think Infinite just has too many thing fundamentally built into it to get it to the right place. At least for me. Everything from the customization to gameplay to social features is just going to take too long for them to fix at this rate, and that’s assuming they even will prioritize those changes. Not to be downer or anything.

That said, any of you guys still hop on the MCC or 5 these days?

Edit:

Wait Ozzy got banned?? When did that happen?
I've been playing MCC regularly over the last few months and I'm closing in on 40k kills and completing all 7 seasons.
 
Stuff like this just boggles my mind. Should have been done right from the start. If your game is struggling for content and you're still wasting resources into doing cutscenes there is something seriously wrong with whoever is in charge. Should have scrapped cutscenes and instead have been pumping out multiplayer maps. This franchise lol.

 

stickkidsam

Member
Stuff like this just boggles my mind. Should have been done right from the start. If your game is struggling for content and you're still wasting resources into doing cutscenes there is something seriously wrong with whoever is in charge. Should have scrapped cutscenes and instead have been pumping out multiplayer maps. This franchise lol.

Honestly I've hated the whole "Multiplayer Story" since the beginning, so I'm all for this. I'd rather they focus on making maps if anything. It'll be better for the people who enjoy Infinite at the very least.

I've been playing MCC regularly over the last few months and I'm closing in on 40k kills and completing all 7 seasons.
YOOOOOO very nice man :D

Which games on there do you usually play? I'm more of a Reach man, but 2 and 3 are still a blast.
 

Havoc2049

Member
Honestly I've hated the whole "Multiplayer Story" since the beginning, so I'm all for this. I'd rather they focus on making maps if anything. It'll be better for the people who enjoy Infinite at the very least.


YOOOOOO very nice man :D

Which games on there do you usually play? I'm more of a Reach man, but 2 and 3 are still a blast.
I mainly play CE, with a little of Halo 2, Halo 2 Anniversary and Halo 4. Mainly just 4v4, all game modes.
 

stickkidsam

Member
Anyone have something they’re hoping will come to the next Halo?

Personally, if I could have 1 new vehicle added, it would be the suit from the Halo Legends episode: Prototype. The catch would have to be it has limited ammunition and/or a timer similar to overshield. When the timer runs out, it blows up.

It could work as a buffed up Juggernaut, a tide turner in objective, and an absolutely insane piece to fight over in slayer.
 
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