Xbox360Fanboy has a petition started to try to get open chat in Halo 3. I found myself on the fence before reading their stance.
Game related communication is vital in my opinion. I think the team chat should be alive with allied movement and strategies and enemy call outs. Team work is a vital part of this game and communication is necessary to make that successful.
I do not like team chat on the d-pad. Even after playing the beta for about a month, utilizing team chat never felt comfortable. I typically had to briefly stop what I was doing to activate it and sometimes had to choose between engaging the enemy or relaying vital in game communication. The d-pad never felt natural to use, but it could just be that I am uncoordinated or have smaller hands than other people. Not sure, but bottom line is I don’t like team chat on the d-pad.
I am fortunate to belong to an adult clan that knows how to stay focused on the game. I don’t play games like this by myself because dealing with the random idiots that infest Live is not a pleasurable experience. Having clanmates to watch your back and dominate with though, now that is a good time. Thankfully my clan plays the same way I do, keeping the in game chatter focused on the task at hand and reserving the small talk and conversations for the pre and post game lobbies. An open chat line would work perfectly for me.
XBox360Fanboy’s article : Hey Bungie, include open chat in Halo 3!
The Halo 3 beta wrapped up earlier this morning and for the most part everything was grand. That is except for one major issue that has been taunting us with an evil grin since first playing the beta … lack of an open chat system. True, open chat has never been a part of the Halo franchise, which opts instead for a push to talk system, but with the trilogy coming to an end it’s a feature that needs to be included. Who really likes pressing a button to talk anyway? So, we’re asking you for your help. We want you to comment on this post stating that you support an open voice chat system in Halo 3 multiplayer and want Bungie to get rid of the push to talk mess. We’ll make sure the big guys over at Bungie see this post and all the fanboy support for opening up Halo 3’s chat. Let’s band together and fight this push to talk madness, comment away fanboys and let’s make a change! Hoorah!
But wait, you aren’t sold on the whole open chat idea? Well, after the break we’ve posted a few reasons why open chat just makes sense and why it will make Halo 3 a better game. Trust us, push to talk is so 1977.
Posted by TTL Demag0gue on June 11, 2007 at 12:36 pm
Thanks for the tip, angel. I went and added my ‘yay’ vote to the list. Dunno if it’ll make a difference, but here’s hoping.
Posted by TTL Lansdown on June 12, 2007 at 9:39 am
I HATE push to chat, In Gears of War, we just openly chat, sure sometimes there are far fewer people, but it just works better. Push to chat takes you out of the fight.
Posted by Quantifier on June 15, 2007 at 12:48 pm
couldn’t agree MORE – the D-pad for PTT does NOT work forme either. After reading this i’m all for open chat.
Posted by Ben on June 15, 2007 at 2:19 pm
I love Halo but my friends just like it. To be more precise, they just like gaming. They’ve got Xbox Live mainly to have something to do while group voice chatting. They don’t really care what game we’re playing while chatting, as long as it isn’t Halo 2 because of having to press the white button. If open voice chat isn’t among the options in Halo 3, then they won’t buy it.
To Microsoft, if you want to appeal to casual gamers at least give them the OPTION to play the game in their own casual way :)
Posted by Excardon on August 13, 2007 at 11:11 am
Call me old school, but I personally do not like Open chat as the only option.
An option on it being selectable for people that like it, yes. However forcing me to use it and giving up being able to listen to my enemies, no.
Posted by Waffle Deluxe on February 21, 2009 at 2:43 pm
Good thing there is muting… just thought I’d put it in there…