Halo 4 Maps: Not My Fav

Games Other Halo
1

Let me just say Halo 4’s multiplayer has quickly become boring for me.
Reason: Maps

I like one, MAYBE 2, and even those have multiple flaws.

Starting back in Halo 1, Halo maps were fun, engaging, kept the flow up, and just simply had “it”, that “it” that just made it Halo.

In Halo: Reach, map quality began dropping off, in my opinion. But they still had that Halo quality to them. Even the Forge maps that were rotated in weren’t bad!

Here are some brief points about some of the maps in Halo 4, mostly from a Slayer perspective, but objectives taken into account when needed.

Complex: huge lines of site render some parts of map useless, buildings not interesting to fight in

Haven: too ROUND! Therefore no strategy for using cover, bottom level never utilized due to few ways up to top (even taking into account newly-added lifts)

Adrift: map that I kind of like, however it’s basically only hallways and therefore nade-fest and corner dancing

Abandon: yuck, ugh, bleh; just not even fun to look at; huge lines of sight on one side, terrible central structure to defend/attack, side passages cluttered and ugly

Exile: not a TERRIBLE map, but bases are boring and “power points” (power weapon locations) are uninteresting to fight in; combat contained to central base and vehicles

Longbow: not bad, narrow vehicle lanes almost neutralize vehicles, banshee easily dominates due to ease in getting around these narrow cliff faces

Meltdown: good concept (multi-level figure 8) but random caves and rocks ruin vehicle usefulness and create too many choke points

Solace: fairly decent map, good sight lines and architecture, good weapon placement, but cluttered, too many random box-like things to run into or get stuck on; needs simplification

Vortex: okay map, interesting terrain and is open enough for vehicles with strategic choke points; some buildings are just never used unless you spawn in them

So, obviously I just focused on the maps that shipped with original game. This is because, while the map packs included many good maps (mainly the remakes, but some new originals are very well-designed) but I just never get to play them! I know the need to make money is there, but throw the community a bone here. I payed for the Map Packs Pass thing and bought the Champions Bundle, and about 100 other people did too.
Therefore when I play Slayer, the same 3 maps are rotated. I play Dominion and CTF and the same two maps are rotated. Here I must point out that I also didn’t mention the Forge maps in the hoppers.
That’s because they aren’t maps in my opinion.
I like Forge as much as the next guy. I love seeing what creative stuff people come up with and having fun puzzles and races and statues is awesome.
But I don’t want to play on them in competitive matchmaking.
They’re laggy (with split screen), they’re very ugly with the same color scheme and palettes used over and over and most of them just simply don’t keep the flow of the game going.
Maybe have a Forge playlist where people who want to see the community maps can go and do that, but if 343 wanted to put a Lockout remake in Team Slayer, they should recreate it with professional tools. Not trying to get abrasive, but that’s how I feel.

I’m not sure why these maps don’t really have that Halo “feel”, but I have my theories:

I say that, logically, the maps were made and tweaked with the gameplay in mind: including active camo, sprint, ordinance drops, instant respawn (yuck), etc. Therefore, when you have a gap on a level that would’ve been impossible to jump in Halo 3 now more than possible with sprint, you have to rethink how your maps play. Therein lies the problem, in my opinion.
The gameplay has been dissected and picked apart more than I can imagine and I won’t do that here, but I feel like the lack-luster gamePLAY has yielded equally-lack-luster game-STAGES.
Not to mention that most maps have a TERRIBLE spawn-location issue (ESPECIALLY Abandon) mixed with instant-respawn.

Idk, maybe I’m rambling now, and maybe this has all be discussed and maybe I’m the only one who feels this way, but I just wanted to get my thoughts out there.
I already spilled it about the Campaign and no one seemed to really care, but I’m having a hard time thinking of H4 in positive terms and I feel like the maps are part of an interlocking system of bad choice on the design aspect. I would go and play other games but I love Halo and this is the only one that’s really populated (and barely, at that).

2

Referring to maps that ship with the game: (I think the quality of DLC maps for the most part for both games was great)

I agree that map quality has been declining, but at least Halo 4 didn’t rip multiplayer maps straight from the Campaign. That was appalling. (Though I didn’t mind Powerhouse)

From Halo 4, I think Haven, Solace and Longbow are pretty decent maps. The rest however are garbage. I think Halo 4 did a great job with its art design, but I just don’t enjoy playing on the rest of the maps, particularly adrift. I think that map is the worst.

3

At the least, Halo 4’s are better than Reach’s. Reach’s maps were the worst overall IMO. Only like, two actually stood out for me (Zealot and Countdown).

I definitely believe Halo 4’s (or any other Halo out now for that matter) will never beat Halo 2’s. I loved every single map in Halo 2. The interactivity (switchs, for example) alone made them much better.

But as for Halo 4’s being compared to Halo 3’s? I don’t know.
Most of the maps that I thoroughly enjoyed were from Halo 2, so those don’t count.
The Pit and Valhalla, while I did enjoy a lot, they were remade in Halo 4, so those don’t count either.
Guardian is my favorite map of all time.
I’d have to say the only maps (that I can actually count) that I really enjoyed in Halo 3 were Assembly (I’ll count this, even though I’ve always consider it to be Warlock 2.0), Avalanche, Cold Storage, Construct, Narrows, and Sandtrap (mostly because of the Elephants). Now, don’t get me wrong, I really liked the other maps too, but majority of Halo 4’s are on the same level as them.

Comparing that with Halo 4’s (not including remakes)…
My favorite map in Halo 4 is probably Vertigo.
I really enjoy Haven, Monolith, Skyline, Exile, Vortex, Perdition, Wreckage, and Daybreak.
And again, while I do really like majority of the other maps, I find them to be on the same level as majority of Halo 3’s maps.

All in all, I’d have to say Halo 3’s and Halo 4’s maps are tied, IMO.

So, for my favorite list of Halo maps:

  1. Halo 2
  2. Halo 3/4
  3. Reach
4

Meehhhh, they’re decent enough. And I am referring to Adrift, Solace, Complex and Exile. Ragnarok is of course a good one. All others I despise.

I miss countdown :frowning:

5

I agree. I think that, including DLC maps, there’s maybe five or six that I actually enjoy playing on. The rest I just put up with.

6

I do like most of the BTB maps in this game, even if they aren’t particularly vehicle friendly. 8v8 Longbow and 8v8 Perdition play quite well, I’d look forward to both returning in Halo 5.

It’s just the 4v4 maps that I think are complete garbage, with the exception of DLC.

7

You guys think Halo will ever “get back to good” with regards to maps?

In my opinion, unless the gameplay goes back to more basics (which probably won’t happen) it won’t. Like I said in OP, the problems with Halo MP are now all interconnected. The maps are bad because of bad game mechanics and now the game mechanics are probably solidified.
I mean, if they take out sprint and jetpack now, newbs won’t buy the game.
We can only pray for decent, OFFICIAL remakes and that those remakes aren’t watered down by Promethean Vision using, Jetpack wearing, Active Camo spamming Sprinter-newbs.

Is the hope of good originals gone?

8

I can’t stand most of the on disc maps in Halo 4. Solace, Haven and Exile are the only maps I can actually tolerate. I don’t mind Ragnarok but it really doesn’t play well with Halo 4’s mechanics (Camo, Ammo and sniper…).

The DLC maps are great but never come up. Halo 4 has quite a few forge maps but they also rarley come up and those that do, when they do, are terrible maps e.g Blacksite. The best maps are on Forge Island but a lot of people don’t own the DLC.