I just posted this response on Halo Waypoint to another forum users argument that Spartan Ops wasn’t quality and wasn’t as good as Firefight.
Let’s pit Spartan Ops versus Firefight (mind you this comes from someone who LOVED Firefight as well). Ask any of my friends I gamed with in Reach and they’ll tell you I played Firefight to death.
Spartan Ops vs. Firefight
• CG vids of Spartan Ops / Firefight-No full quality CG, just in-game cutscenes
• Spartan Ops Maps 15 at launch/ Halo Reach FF maps 10 (over a more than 2 year span)
• Varied missions using different vehicles to achieve goals. Scorpion, Mantis, Warthog, Gausshog, Rockethog, Wraith, Banshee, Ghost / Rare uses of anything but chaingun/rocket warthog, ghost or wraith
• Varied missions with ability to pick better weapons from the map to achieve goals (ie Sniper Alley with Snipers/Beam Rifles)
• Furthering canon / Firefight had NOTHING to do with canon. Just the same battles on the same maps with no rhyme or reason. At least with SpOps you have a goal/objective in mind other than just killing AI.
• RvB easter eggs / FF-RvB who?
• 50 missions / FF-10 maps with a select few gametypes all pretty much the same, just different enemies. Other than Generator Defense, it was all slayer, and I didn’t know ANYONE who played GenDef regularly if at all.
• The BIG one: SpOps season 1 FREE / FF-DLC cost money and we only got a paltry 2-3 maps of the total 10. Again we got FIFTEEN maps (which some were more like campaign LEVELS) for FREE.
These are all facts. Not something made up. So they can’t be denied.
Even if SpOps was created to keep people playing for the first 3-months, I see NOTHING wrong with that. A gaming devs SHOULD look to keep people playing at least that long if not MUCH longer. It brings them more credibility too. Beyond that though, I really think SpOps was also made to give we fans a new experience within Halo. It really is like another whole campaign.
If you added up all the time spent playing each of the 10 videos and 50 missions even just ONE time through, you’d have clearly 6-7 hours of gameplay. A short campaign yes, but a campaign none the less. Spartan Ops is free. Well season one anyway, and I’d GLADLY pay for a Season two. Considering Requiem has been destroyed, 343 would HAVE to make all new maps for season 2. Firefight in Reach came with about 6-7 FF maps at launch? Easily less than half of what SpOps gave us. And then only did we get maybe 3 more FF maps in Reach over the course of the next two years. And you know there isn’t going to be anything else new added for Reach.
Even if SpOps is done at Season one (which I hope it’s NOT), it has FAR exceeded what Firefight was in Reach and ODST.
End copy/paste
I think the only thing I miss from Firefight is in ODST’s FF you could play on and on and on as long as you had lives left. But then again, it would get boring after a 3 hour sessions of just ONE game of firefight. So I really don’t mind the shorter missions. There are certainly some that give me that classic Firefight feel to them. I also enjoy having real objectives to complete though, versus just slaying waves upon waves of Covies.
-Sal
While I really enjoyed Spartan Ops, and Firefight, I don’t like how people compare the two modes. I understand it’s because SpOps basically replaced it, but they are massively different modes.
I played ODST’s Firefight mode a few weeks ago, and it’s amazing. Maybe I’m just annoyed that Firefight wasn’t in Halo 4. I know there is only a limited amount of dev time but still, it was obviously replaced. That said, I wouldn’t want Spartan Ops to go away in place of Firefight, I want both. I know that’s unrealistic, but I feel Firefight was cruelly taken from us.
I hear ya. AS I mentioned I LOVED Firefight. So when I heard it wasn’t going to be in Halo 4 I was a bit peeved to put it nicely. Thankfully, Spartan Ops has filled that void and then some, for me.