Hey everyone! I’ve been an avid forger ever since Halo 3. And have always loved the concept of being able to build your own maps. However, in Reach, forging has taken a downturn. The main reason for this, is not the lack of tools or objects, but the lack of simplicity. Take Sandbox for example: a simple flat map with a flat sky area and a flat enclosed area. IMO, the best forge map ever made. Why yes, the flat ground does get boring, but I think seeing the same hills in every canyon map makes all of the maps feel the same in a way. This takes away from each maps uniqueness. And uniqueness is something that is not easy to achieve in Forge World.
Almost every section of Forge World was made exclusively for the map that was built there. The Quarry was built specifically for Asylum, the Rock for Pinnacle, the Canyon for Hemorrhage, the Island for Paradiso. While all these maps are good, the forge areas that were built for these maps feel like they were built for those maps ONLY. Take the canyon, building a symmetrical map there is rather difficult because of the little ledge and the two caves. Whatever structures you build on that map, if you leave those spots on your finished map, it will always have that hemorrhage feeling to it. The quarry, also, has the two little “indents” where they were on asylum, AND IT’S NOT EVEN FLAT!! What we really need are forge spaces that are symmetrical, and that have no identity of their own. So here is my list of suggestions:
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Reintroduce a sandbox style map. Something with a flat area, but that still has dunes or hills for people who like to make use of that. Also make sure the “dune area” is big enough to build large maps, and it needs to seamlessly blend into the flat area for those who make maps utilizing both areas (so that huge dune on one side that you all remember, would have to go).
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Surround the map with mountains instead of the guardian towers and that ring that encircled the map. In those mountians could be a small pocket carved out like the quarry, except make it freaking symmetrical, and flat.
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At the edge of the map could be a buried covenant ship that has a small opening showing (like the entrance to the crypt). Inside here could be a perfectly circular map, maybe a bit larger than Zealot. There could be a UNSC themed ship on the opposite side of the map, that is a square shape. But most importantly, these two spots have to be just barely showing out of the ground (so NOT like any of the crashed ships on Highlands, Tempest, or Sandtrap), and should be able to be covered up with a rock (the size of a seastack or arch), and seamlessly blend in with the rest of the mountain for those who don’t want to use it.
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Make the “roof” of the map higher than what Forge World had. There were many maps that used gravity, and were hindered by the low height of the roof.
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Make the aesthetics more simple! Don’t put glass EVERYWHERE! Not only does it hinder framerate in some cases, it just looks plain ugly when merging items together. Keep the individual window and decorative glass objects, but items like walls and blocks should just have a simple texture. And keep glass out of the geometry of the map as well. Forging in the colliseum where you have to merge items through the wall is very ugly. You can see the merged item through the glass and it just looks really tacky.
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While this is more of a forge feature than a map feature, allow us to make hill zones and edit traits of people inside of it for all gametypes. Like allow us to make a zone that lowers gravity, but still applies in all game modes. (Which is how I thought it worked when I first saw Zealot)
So those are my suggestions. Please comment and leave some suggestions of your own, IT’S FREE!