Halo 4's multiplayer mode will be put through its paces a week before the game launches in Dallas, Texas, as professional players compete. Developers 343 Industries allowed the professionals to play Halo 4 in private sessions at E3 2012 to gain feedback. The tournament takes place Nov. 2-4 and is part of Major League Gaming's (MLG's) Fall championship. Games including Starcraft 2 will also be streamed live.

The tournament may be the final glimpse of Halo 4 players get before the game's release and, with the development complete, 343 Industries' response to fan issues. For example, the new armor ability Promethean Vision received criticism for the excessively long range of its environment-scanning wave. In gameplay videos from E3 (below), the wave appears to cover the player's line of sight.

Issues arose over Halo: Reach from MLG. The CEO called the game a "disservice" to the series, and the franchise's place in MLG was questioned. To replicate a Halo experience MLG players are comfortable with, the community reconfigured settings significantly. Armor abilities became picks-up, bloom disappeared, and movement speed increased. Whether similar changes take place in Halo 4 is unknown; however, the core mechanics -- movement speed, no bloom, and jump height -- seem to resemble Halo 2 and Halo 3.

It may also be a chance to see new maps in addition to those Haven, Adrift, and Longbow which have been released so far. 343 Industries claims that maps are built for specific gametypes, rather than forcing generic maps into multiple gametypes as seen in Halo: Reach.

343 Industries recently announced a new multiplayer feature: Specializations. It provides end-game content for players that reach level 50. The preceding 10 levels provide armor, emblems, weapon skins, and more, while the final level grants the "Specialization," a game-altering ability such as granting increased experience over time or increasing the stability of a scoped weapon.

Halo 4 will be released on November 6 for Xbox 360. Standard and Limited edition versions of the game are available along with a Limited Edition console.