Don’t get me wrong, I love the customs browser, but with forge and community being such a big part of Halo it could definitely use some work. Here are some of my ideas (in no particular order) that I feel would make custom games and the customs browser more engaging, popular, and easier to use.
Allow the ability to “title” custom games. For example, if you were testing a map you could have it show up in the custom browsers as “Testers needed, <Gamemode Name> <Map Name> Or you could list it as causal, competitive, a warm up game, or a community game night.
Allow lobby typed chat. In large custom games you can’t all join the same party but the ability to, in between games, ask for input on what game to play next or ask for feedback would be a nice addition.
Allow the leader to lock and change teams his/herself. People don’t know if a map is meant for 2 or 3 or more teams or are stubborn and refuse to change teams themselves leaving the teams unbalanced.
Allow the Fireteam leader to “post” the game to the custom browser before he/she starts the game. For a certain amount of time/players joined the game would appear in the customs browser as waiting for users to join. This would avoid people playing infection or other game modes by themselves or with too few players and give them a way for other people to join before the game actually starts.
More filters for custom games. Just add filters for infection modes, mini games, forge, etc. to make it easier to find the type of game you want to play.
Allow an overflow feature. Some popular modes get 20+ people joining and if there was an option for those extra people to easily start their own game with the same map/mode it would avoid people waiting forever to get in or doing something else because it was full.
Allow official version history. Forgers make multiple saves of maps so if they make a mistake they can go back. It would be nice for if a map with bookmarks gets updated for a redirect feature to the newer version.
Add a community tournament system. A section of custom games can have community tournaments with bracket and official verification of winners (Third party tournaments have issues with disputes and other problems). An in game tournament system would insure matches are reported correctly as the players wouldn’t have to manually report in a win/loss. This would just help the community and allow casual tournaments for practice for arising teams as well as have built in official recording of matches for use in HCS online tournaments.
Thanks for reading all of my suggestions, I understand some are going to be difficult to implement and the core gameplay is important as well. Any ideas that aren’t able to be implemented into Halo 5 could also just wait and be implemented in Halo Infinite. I just think that these ideas would strengthen the community aspect of Halo and support the game itself in general! Feel feel to provide feedback/additions to this list!
EDIT: Bugs/glitches and performance also could use some fixes as well. (Lag when player leaves/game ends, stuck on black screen for minutes)
TL;DR The customs browser could receive updates to make it used more and better for the community.
While those can be good improvements, 343 should be fixing the various bugs related to custom games and the browser before they start adding new features. Fix the almost guaranteed freeze that comes immediately after a game or when someone quits, fix the match info in the browser so it doesn’t say that EVERY game has infinite rounds, fix every other glaring issue I can’t remember. THEN we can add new features.
> 2535453407941985;1:
> Don’t get me wrong, I love the customs browser, but with forge and community being such a big part of Halo it could definitely use some work. Here are some of my ideas (in no particular order) that I feel would make custom games and the customs browser more engaging, popular, and easier to use.
>
> 1. Allow the ability to “title” custom games. For example, if you were testing a map you could have it show up in the custom browsers as “Testers needed, <Gamemode Name> <Map Name> Or you could list it as causal, competitive, a warm up game, or a community game night.
>
> 2. Allow lobby typed chat. In large custom games you can’t all join the same party but the ability to, in between games, ask for input on what game to play next or ask for feedback would be a nice addition.
>
> 3. Allow the leader to lock and change teams his/herself. People don’t know if a map is meant for 2 or 3 or more teams or are stubborn and refuse to change teams themselves leaving the teams unbalanced.
>
> 4. Allow the Fireteam leader to “post” the game to the custom browser before he/she starts the game. For a certain amount of time/players joined the game would appear in the customs browser as waiting for users to join. This would avoid people playing infection or other game modes by themselves or with too few players and give them a way for other people to join before the game actually starts.
>
> 5. More filters for custom games. Just add filters for infection modes, mini games, forge, etc. to make it easier to find the type of game you want to play.
>
> 6. Allow an overflow feature. Some popular modes get 20+ people joining and if there was an option for those extra people to easily start their own game with the same map/mode it would avoid people waiting forever to get in or doing something else because it was full.
>
> 7. Allow official version history. Forgers make multiple saves of maps so if they make a mistake they can go back. It would be nice for if a map with bookmarks gets updated for a redirect feature to the newer version.
>
> 8. Add a community tournament system. A section of custom games can have community tournaments with bracket and official verification of winners (Third party tournaments have issues with disputes and other problems). An in game tournament system would insure matches are reported correctly as the players wouldn’t have to manually report in a win/loss. This would just help the community and allow casual tournaments for practice for arising teams as well as have built in official recording of matches for use in HCS online tournaments.
>
> Thanks for reading all of my suggestions, I understand some are going to be difficult to implement and the core gameplay is important as well. Any ideas that aren’t able to be implemented into Halo 5 could also just wait and be implemented in Halo Infinite. I just think that these ideas would strengthen the community aspect of Halo and support the game itself in general! Feel feel to provide feedback/additions to this list!
>
> TL;DR The customs browser could receive updates to make it used more and better for the community.
All things we asked for BEFORE the browser even came out. I doubt most of these things would even make it into the next game, but one can always hope. It would be nice to see these features in the future.
Point 2. Do people even use mics anymore? This game feels extremely anti social from what i have noticed. I remember everyone in H3 had them, it was a sin if you didnt have one lol.
I think the customs browser as a whole is pretry cool, even though i rarely use it. I think the idea of it is great. & for infinite im sure they will build upon it.
> 2535449076192416;2:
> While those can be good improvements, 343 should be fixing the various bugs related to custom games and the browser before they start adding new features. Fix the almost guaranteed freeze that comes immediately after a game or when someone quits, fix the match info in the browser so it doesn’t say that EVERY game has infinite rounds, fix every other glaring issue I can’t remember. THEN we can add new features.
Yeah, the game freezing and the black loading screen for 3 minutes need to be addressed first. But I got my fingers crossed for Halo Infinite!
> 2533274826044245;4:
> Point 2. Do people even use mics anymore? This game feels extremely anti social from what i have noticed. I remember everyone in H3 had them, it was a sin if you didnt have one lol.
>
> I think the customs browser as a whole is pretry cool, even though i rarely use it. I think the idea of it is great. & for infinite im sure they will build upon it.
I think a lot of people have mics they just don’t wanna use them, heck many times iv talked in game chat and a few other people started talking (sometimes I regret talking in that match but anyway) people just don’t wanna talk basically…
also I remember when I was playing a map a lot of people who talking and a guy who joined expressed shock because it was such a lively lobby (I’m not sure if that’s a good thing)
> 2535430512793241;6:
> > 2533274826044245;4:
> > Point 2. Do people even use mics anymore? This game feels extremely anti social from what i have noticed. I remember everyone in H3 had them, it was a sin if you didnt have one lol.
> >
> > I think the customs browser as a whole is pretry cool, even though i rarely use it. I think the idea of it is great. & for infinite im sure they will build upon it.
>
> I think a lot of people have mics they just don’t wanna use them, heck many times iv talked in game chat and a few other people started talking (sometimes I regret talking in that match but anyway) people just don’t wanna talk basically…
>
> also I remember when I was playing a map a lot of people who talking and a guy who joined expressed shock because it was such a lively lobby (I’m not sure if that’s a good thing)
Hmm maybe there is a different vibe in customs when it comes to using mics then. Glad to hear!
> 2533274825960614;8:
> Id like them to update it so it doesn’t freeze after every game so i have to restart Halo 5 each time.
This has been going on for a while now, i dont think its a priority to fix atm. I do agree though, it does get frustrating, especially when you are with a big party.
> 2533274826044245;9:
> > 2533274825960614;8:
> > Id like them to update it so it doesn’t freeze after every game so i have to restart Halo 5 each time.
>
> This has been going on for a while now, i dont think its a priority to fix atm. I do agree though, it does get frustrating, especially when you are with a big party.
It’s an even bigger problem for me since some of the maps I made are a continuing story so that means I have to BEG for the game not to freeze so I can get on with the next part without having to reinvite the players from previous game with only one or two showing up!
> 2535430512793241;10:
> > 2533274826044245;9:
> > > 2533274825960614;8:
> > > Id like them to update it so it doesn’t freeze after every game so i have to restart Halo 5 each time.
> >
> > This has been going on for a while now, i dont think its a priority to fix atm. I do agree though, it does get frustrating, especially when you are with a big party.
>
> It’s an even bigger problem for me since some of the maps I made are a continuing story so that means I have to BEG for the game not to freeze so I can get on with the next part without having to reinvite the players from previous game with only one or two showing up!
Yeah that sounds like a pain. Sometimes my game will freeze & i wait 10-15sec or so & sometimes it just resumes. But that happens rarely.
> 2533274826044245;11:
> > 2535430512793241;10:
> > > 2533274826044245;9:
> > > > 2533274825960614;8:
> > > > Id like them to update it so it doesn’t freeze after every game so i have to restart Halo 5 each time.
> > >
> > > This has been going on for a while now, i dont think its a priority to fix atm. I do agree though, it does get frustrating, especially when you are with a big party.
> >
> > It’s an even bigger problem for me since some of the maps I made are a continuing story so that means I have to BEG for the game not to freeze so I can get on with the next part without having to reinvite the players from previous game with only one or two showing up!
>
> Yeah that sounds like a pain. Sometimes my game will freeze & i wait 10-15sec or so & sometimes it just resumes. But that happens rarely.
Generally if music and/or sounds are playing then it MIGHT unfreeze but by then you only got one or two guys left.
> 2535430512793241;12:
> > 2533274826044245;11:
> > > 2535430512793241;10:
> > > > 2533274826044245;9:
> > > > > 2533274825960614;8:
> > > > > Id like them to update it so it doesn’t freeze after every game so i have to restart Halo 5 each time.
> > > >
> > > > This has been going on for a while now, i dont think its a priority to fix atm. I do agree though, it does get frustrating, especially when you are with a big party.
> > >
> > > It’s an even bigger problem for me since some of the maps I made are a continuing story so that means I have to BEG for the game not to freeze so I can get on with the next part without having to reinvite the players from previous game with only one or two showing up!
> >
> > Yeah that sounds like a pain. Sometimes my game will freeze & i wait 10-15sec or so & sometimes it just resumes. But that happens rarely.
>
> Generally if music and/or sounds are playing then it MIGHT unfreeze but by then you only got one or two guys left.
Hmm ive never noticed the background music when it freezes. Ill have to pay attention to that next time.
> 2535430512793241;12:
> > 2533274826044245;11:
> > > 2535430512793241;10:
> > > > 2533274826044245;9:
> > > > > 2533274825960614;8:
> > > > > Id like them to update it so it doesn’t freeze after every game so i have to restart Halo 5 each time.
> > > >
> > > > This has been going on for a while now, i dont think its a priority to fix atm. I do agree though, it does get frustrating, especially when you are with a big party.
> > >
> > > It’s an even bigger problem for me since some of the maps I made are a continuing story so that means I have to BEG for the game not to freeze so I can get on with the next part without having to reinvite the players from previous game with only one or two showing up!
> >
> > Yeah that sounds like a pain. Sometimes my game will freeze & i wait 10-15sec or so & sometimes it just resumes. But that happens rarely.
>
> Generally if music and/or sounds are playing then it MIGHT unfreeze but by then you only got one or two guys left.
I wonder if there’s any pattern to it freezing. It would be nice to figure out how to avoid it.
One thing I think they should do is allow RP and XP be gained in customs. To prevent “farming” for the points and XP have it capped at say 20,000rp and 50,000xp or whatever per day. Come up with some sort of algorithm or whatever that measures, time in games, kills, and completed games to award the points and XP by. I think a lot more players would give the custom game browser a try if they could earn some points and XP.
> 2533274816788253;15:
> One thing I think they should do is allow RP and XP be gained in customs. To prevent “farming” for the points and XP have it capped at say 20,000rp and 50,000xp or whatever. Come up with some sort of algorithm or whatever that measures, time in games, kills, and completed games to award the points and XP by. I think a lot more players would give the custom game browser a try if they could earn some points and XP.
Yeah the Timmy helmet is a good start but xp and rp would definitely help a lot more.
> 2533275001522797;17:
> Along with a “Trending” section and a Forge Browser.
Yeah that would help new maps get discovered. It seems to me that the customs browser nowadays is full of the same dozen maps. No one is able to find any new good maps.
Adding a feature to like and bookmark a map or game type should be added to the carnage report for custom games.