Forge World in Halo Reach was an amazing feat., however after playing Caspian border on Battlefield 3 I realised that Forge World can be so much more.I was thinking about this the other day, and I had some ideas about the new implementations and tweaks that would have taken place in Halo 4’s 3 year development scheme.
This is just my personal viewpoint and dream of how Forge World should be:
<mark>Style</mark>
The style of Halo Reach’s Forge World is literally just grey, blue and green. It was cool and everything for the first month, but after a while it kinda got old seeing every single building have either the same structure or colour (metallic bunkers etc.). I have to say that it’s great that we have a massive map to forge on, but how incredible would it be if we had forge world…and then some.
If you think about it, Battlefield 3’s Caspian Border is round about the same size as Forge World (probably bigger) and the games graphics are mind blowing. I’m going to be honest with you, Halo is definitely not a graphical game. I would love to see each forge object have different styles where you can go into a menu and choose whether or not you want a forerunner like object (the ones currently used), a UNSC object (think of any human building equivalent to the forerunner structures) and a covenant/whatever enemy is in Halo 4 structure equivalent to those above.
Basically you’re now stuck with 3 faction all with the same structures, just styled differently. This is present in Halo:Reach (human bunker and covenant bunker), however it feels so limited. To make maps really feel authentic the other half of the map (assuming you have a symmetrical map) should be stylised towards the other factions structures (in invasion there is no differentiation of the map factions as all the structures are neutral or are all one sided (think Boneyard, where everything is human, and Spire, where everything is covenant)).
<mark>Objects</mark>
No one can deny that there are many objects available in the current Forge, but I do feel we are missing out in variety. Everything is the same, everything looks the same, everything plays the same. I reckon there should be options to turn gravity on and off in certain parts of the map or structure. There should be more aesthetic objects and there should be conservative AND wild objects. Everything in the current forge seems to be perfect (as in its boring). I know when things are perfect building is easier as structures fit into place, but I do feel that there has to be some structures that can be really fun to play with if you can master how they work (rock spiral staircase).
Now another huge thing for me is the man cannons. I would be in awe of Halo 4 if it gave you the option to set how strong you want your man cannon to be as opposed to spending a countless amount of time trying to find perfect angles and such. It’s a small complaint, but one I needed to address.
<mark>Atmosphere</mark>
If you had different environments ( volcano as opposed to the north pole) you have an immediate change in gameplay assuming that different environments react differently (in the north pole your spartan will slide on ice and in a volcano he can’t sprint as much due to fatigue). I know that this is a MAJOR ask, but if there are environments that do achieve this (doesn’t have to be Forge made maps) my life would be complete (not really).
<mark>Social Integration</mark>
I reckon it would be really epic if after you finish your forge work of art you are able to post it to twitter and facebook and it can just be downloaded there because from my perspective, good maps are hard to find through bungie.net (but forgehub has some quality work). All I want is a simplistic medium in where the most quality maps are paid attention to (bungies fileshare system doesn’t work too well because the amount of time I’ve gone into ‘most recommended’ and have received garbage is incredible.
I would like to ask you, the community, to share and express your own ideas and I will add them to this topic (I will obviously give credit where it is due). Please let your voice be heard! Every idea counts!
Some Community Ideas
> I just hope that forge is scrapped and there’s a real map creator.
Like the one in starcraft 2? Thing is, the pc is really needed for map creation. I’ve seen some truly amazing productions in the Halo Reach and 3 forge, and that was just by controller. Imagine the possibilities if you use a mouse …
> Hell go one up and release a dev kit similar to SC2 Map Editor, or Skyrims Creation Kit.
> Nope. Making bigger forge worlds only mean a bigger percentage of stock maps will be forge made and that is bad. I’d much rather have a number (could be 2 for a ll I care) of smaller forge worlds, so we don’t have to play in the same damn environment all the time.
My idea is not not have ‘Forge World Maps’ playable in multiplayer (yes I know they are dull and boring). In Halo 4 : First Look 343 announced that there will be no maps pulled from campaign and all the maps were made ‘with competitive in mind’.
I just want Forge for the sake of building something awesome you can call your own. I want the file share system to work there so that there is alot more reason to play custom games. Halo is as big as it is because it can cater to many different player styles.