Halo 4 Release Date: Get Ready to Step Back Into the Shoes of Master Chief

November 6 release date for Halo 4 confirmed

Ready to continue the Halo saga? Prepared to skip Election Day? Well, you’ll have to to play Halo 4

The announcement came yesterday, when Halo 4 was confirmed for a release on Tuesday, November 6, 2012. That’s the date we reported yesterday, though more news was confirmed on the day.

343 Industries released a podcast alongside the release date, which clarified many of the details in the May issue of GameInformer. A summary of those points is below.

On the podcast, along with Frank O’Connor, Franchise Development Director of Halo 4, and David Ellis, a multiplayer designer, were Brad Welsch – lead multiplayer designer – and Kevin Franklin, lead competitive multiplayer designer.

The first point tackled was random weapon drops. First, when games start weapons will be placed in predetermined spot likes in all previous Halo games. It’s after the weapons are picked up that weapons drops will begin, which were revealed to be timed and are communicated to the player to minimize the chance of killing someone if they stand under a weapon drop. They also said weapons will make sense so, for example, the Sniper Rifle will be available on bigger maps. Perhaps that means the Shotgun and Energy Sword will spawn on smaller maps.

Random weapon drops

Regarding the “random” side of the weapon drops, that’s for the weapons themselves and not where they spawn. All players can see where the weapons drop so, while removing the advantage from players that know map layouts, skill will be required to get the weapon if there are duels. Weapon indicators will also disappear when the weapons are picked up, so you know a player has them.

On instant respawning, player will be able to customize loadouts during play. Certain game modes will not have instant respawns, such as Team Objective, while the system was described as being in the “premium” slayer experience. Maps can also support every gametype, but certain maps are designed for certain game types.

On weapons, base weapons are balanced so there is no “god tier” weapons that dominates. An example was the DMR is effective at long range, the BR mid range and the Assault Rifle short range.